yhwh
Some years ago, my wife Wendy and I went to a weekend conference featuring Rabbi Kushner. During the weekend, he did a session on Exodus 3:14-15 where he discussed the history of this name.
“Then God said to Moses, “I Am Who I Am” [These Hebrew words are related to the name Yahweh, usually translated “Lord”, and suggest that God eternally lives and is always with his people]. When you go to the people of Israel, tell them, ‘I Am sent me to you.’ God ·also [or again] said to Moses, “This is what you should tell the people: ‘The Lord is the God of your ·ancestors [fathers]—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He sent me to you.’” (Expanded Bible)
The original spelling was yhwh, and as time passed, as religion is prone to do, the priests began to say the name was too “holy” to speak. However, the problem was not that it was too “holy,” but that it was unpronounceable! With no vowels, it is more a sound than a word. It is the sound of inhaling “yh” and exhaling “wh.” It is simply the sound of breathing. It was derived from hayah – “to be.” This would make it a causative verb with the meaning “he causes to be” or “he will cause to be.” How more intimate and involved could our God be to us giving us life in every breath? They breathed into Adam the breath of Life and The Spirit is known as the wind and breath of God.
Breathing
This meaning puts a new spin on, “It was not worth the breath!” and gives a new meaning to “Taking God’s name in vain,” vain as in empty, or taking His breath for nothing! Park there for a few minutes and consider the implications.
Living
In Jesus’ reference to the Exodus passage, he reveals to the Sadducees that His Father was the “God of the Living” and that all live in Him. What we do with His Breath is a whole other matter. Eventually, the vowels were added, and “Yahweh” was a name we could say. Something very significant was lost here in the transition from relating to the Divine as a verb and moving to a noun! We like nouns. We think there is power in naming something, thinking that we possess it or control it by naming it. Verbs, however, move and find their power in giving! The Divine nature is far more verb than noun.
Everyone wants to be a leader – the priest, pastor, elder, or deacon in our religious world. Notice these are all nouns. But the original idea was about verbs- shepherds, overseers, and servants; when you were found doing the work you were recognized as the noun!
The Shack
Paul Young, in chapter fourteen, “Verbs and Other Freedoms,” writes:
“Sarayu smiled, ‘Mackenzie, I will take a verb over a noun anytime. . .
‘I,’ she opened her hands to include Jesus and Papa, ‘I am a verb. I am that I am. I will be who I will be. I am a verb! I am alive, dynamic, ever active, and moving. I am a being verb.”
“And as my very essence is a verb,’ she continued, ‘I am more attuned to verbs than nouns. Verbs such as confessing, repenting, living, loving, responding, growing, reaping, changing, sowing, running, dancing, singing, and on and on. Humans, on the other hand, have a knack for taking a verb that is alive and full of grace and turning it into a dead noun or principle that reeks of rules: something growing and alive dies. Nouns exist because there is a created universe and physical reality, but if the universe is only a mass of nouns, it is dead. Unless, ‘I am,’ there are no verbs, and verbs are what makes the universe alive.”
“For something to move from death to life you must introduce something living and moving into the mix. To move something that is only a noun to something dynamic and unpredictable, to something living and present tense, is to move from law to grace. May I give you a couple of examples?”
“Then let’s use your two words: responsibility and expectation. Before your words became nouns, they were first my words, nouns with movement and experience buried inside of them; the ability to respond and expectancy. My words are alive and dynamic – full of life and possibility; yours are dead, full of law and fear and judgment. That is why you won’t find the word responsibility in the Scriptures.”
“Oh boy,’ Mack grimaced, beginning to see where this was going. ‘We sure seem to use it a lot.”
“Religion must use law to empower itself and control the people who they need in order to survive. I give you an ability to respond and your response is to be free to love and serve in every situation, and therefore each moment is different and unique and wonderful. Because I am your ability to respond, I have to be present in you. If I simply gave you a responsibility, I would not have to be with you at all. It would be a task to perform, an obligation to be met, something to fail.”
“Let’s use the example of friendship and how removing the element of life from a noun can drastically alter a relationship. Mack, if you and I are friends, there is an expectancy that exists within our relationship. When we see each other or are apart, there is an expectancy of being together, of laughing and talking. That expectancy has no concrete definition; it is alive and dynamic and everything that emerges from our being together is a unique gift shared by no one else. But what happens if I change that ‘expectancy’ to an ‘expectation’ – spoken or unspoken? Suddenly, law has entered into our relationship. You are now expected to perform in a way that meets my expectations. Our living friendship rapidly deteriorates into a dead thing with rules and requirements. It is no longer about you and me, but about what friends are supposed to do, or the responsibilities of a good friend.”
Trinity
The Trinity, Father, Son, and Spirit are a relationship in motion, as creators and sustainers of Life in every moment, place, and being! They are not sovereign clock makers setting things up and watching them run. Our Father loves us as we are, the Son, Jesus delivers us from ourselves, and the Spirit teaches and tutors us in Their ways. They, all working together, bring us into the relationship They share with one another, and finally into Their Life! Lord Jesus, give us this resurrection!
Yhwh is an introductory reflection on the Unspoken Sermon linked below: