I Have Called You By Name (Part IV)
The name of the Lord is a fortified tower; the righteous run to it and are safe. (Proverbs 18:10)
Silence is powerful. Even though the rings and beeps of our modern technology seem to tell us otherwise. Silence can even be deafening, especially when trying to listen to the Almighty`s voice. If you've read the previous two installments, you are acutely aware of two simple yet powerful things; God's name is important and the distinction between a name, epithet and title.
It might even be clear to some what God's name is as demonstrated through the passages and exercises that have been used to explain previous points. But in my humble opinion, it is important to know how we got to the point that believers do not utter the name of the Father? Not only that, the Bible asks us to denounce false doctrines, as per Titus 1:9. He must hold firmly to the message which can be trusted and which agrees with the doctrine. In this way he will be able to encourage others with the true teaching and also to show the error of those who are opposed to it.” And understanding where these false doctrines have come from will help us find the Lord’s voice, amplify his word and open our eyes. More importantly, it will bring us out of the silence and into the Word of God.
As a historian, I can see three points that are inextricably linked that have participated for this situation to happen; the second commandment, the structure of Ancient Hebrew itself and the cult of Baal in Neo- Babylonian culture.
For those that forgot their Sabbath school or Sunday school teachings and need a refresher, the second commandment says; “ Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” This means two things; that in principle the Ancient Israelites didn’t use God’s name passively and that it meant that God’s name shouldn’t be used in vain, not never. Hence, the name of God was only and should only be used when teaching or reading the Bible, which is not in vain but meant to be done for God’s glory.
Ancient Hebrew is a hard language to learn, because it doesn’t have any written vowels, making sounding out words in order to learn them difficult. Someone else has to speak in Ancient Hebrew in order to hear the vowels. Even God’s name (YHWH) called the tetragrammaton, is only written in consonants, the entire Old Testament was written in this fashion. By the time that Jesus started to teach, the preferred language of the Jews was Aramaic not Ancient Hebrew, hence why nobles, rabbis, levites and the priests of the Temple were the prominent people who spoke and could read in Ancient Hebrew, hence making the use of God’s name even more restrictive.
It is important to note that by Jesus’ time, most of the Jews of the region spoke Aramaic, because they had been in exile in Babylon, where the Neo Babylonians spoke to Aramaic. Hence, the people of Judah adopted their language and some aspects of their culture. By the time the Kingdom of Judah had been exiled to Babylon, the Neo Babylonians had adopted the ideology of not saying their deity’s names out loud, instead using the title of Ba’al, meaning lord or owner. The Neo-Babylonians at that point believed that the names of their deities were too powerful to be said by their worshippers .This confused historians and archeologists for a very long time, because by using one title for all of these regional and city centric deities, they essentially morphed all these deities into one, making it seem there was a great widespread worship of one deity named Ba’al. This ideology of silence or replacement is one that the people of Judah seem to have adopted as well since the use of the word Adonai, meaning Lord in Ancient Hebrew seems to have increased during and after exile. Since the people of Judah believed that their God was the God above all gods, they adopted this doctrine, which they transcribed in the Bible.
This ideology also seems to have afflicted later Biblical and Christian transcribers, who also used Adonnai or Lord instead of God’s name (even though some had texts with the original tetragrammaton), which led us to believe the false doctrine of not saying God’s name up to today.
These factors led us down a very dangerous path, of praising someone we don't know. To further prove this point and show the practical ramifications of this, the Bible often condemns the praising of false idols, yet it is easier to praise idols if you don’t know to whom you are addressing your prayers towards. You might be thinking that you are praising the God of Israel yet you are really praising the idols in your heart.
The next part of the series, which might be the last of the series, will focus on what God and Jesus’s names really are, the meaning and its practical applications.