THE NAMES OF GOD

NAMES OF GOD IN THE BIBLE: A DISPENSATIONAL APPROACH : PROF. M. M. NINAN
VI
"CHILLUL HA-SHEM"
PROFANATION OF THE NAME.
Leviticus 22:32:
"And you shall not profane My holy name;
but I will be hallowed among the children of Israel: I
am the Lord who hallows you".
Though God clearly refers to Himself as 'I am' in Exodus 3:14, and though He specifically stated in the
next verse that this was the name by which He wanted to be remembered, this was not the name that
the Jews subsequently used. They preferred the name Yahweh, which is the third person singular of
the present tense of the same archaic form of the verb 'to be'. So, instead of referring to Him as 'I am',
the ancient Jews and the compilers of the Old Testament always called him Yahweh, meaning 'He is'
or 'He who is'. 'I am' was too holy a name for the Jews to use. As time went on even the
euphemism 'He who is' was so sacred and holy to them, it was never spoken by ordinary people. Only
the high priest of the temple was permitted to say it out loud, and even he was only permitted to utter it
once a year on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year.
This was essentially due to the understanding that knowing a name means knowing one intimately
and thereby one can rule over that person. Thus the personal names of God, Angels and Demons
were always kept secret. Thus the name of YHVH was forbidden in common use lest by using the
name anything can be done. One of the explanation for the powers of healing and miracles of Jesus
was that he alone knew the correct pronunciation of the name YHVH and he could use the name to do
all impossible miracles.
So how did the Jews get round saying the name of Yahweh when they read the scriptures or spoke of
Him? They used two further euphemisms: 'Adonai', meaning 'Lord' ; Elohim or merely 'HaShem',
which means 'The Name'. In the ancient Hebrew script there were no vowels, only consonants, and so
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