Did Jesus and his disciples tell others about Jehovah?

[Eloi]

The Jews to whom they were first preached the good news of the Kingdom already knew who God is. Jesus and his apostles were Jews, so they knew it too. The OT is full of references to the person of God and his personal name, so Jews were considered His witnesses (Is. 43:10-12). Jesus even told the Jews that the One they believed to be their God was his own Father.

John 8:54 Jesus answered: “If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my Father who glorifies me, the one who you say is your God. 55 Yet you have not known him, but I know him. And if I said I do not know him, I would be like you, a liar. But I do know him and am observing his word.

Although Jesus mentioned his Father to them many times, he had to make them understand that he was the Messiah that Jehovah had promised before, but they did not believe him. In time it began to be preached to non-Jews who believed in many gods, and who had no idea of the importance of God's Messiah.

What God did Judeo-Christians speak to non-Jews when Christian congregations began to form in the first century? Did they talk about Jehovah, or did they forget about him? Can a worshiper of Jehovah forget his God?

[onewithhim]

Is it that hard to understand that Jesus would have spoken Jehovah's name when quoting from the Hebrew Scriptures?

Not only is that unrelated to my claim, but you're now once again claiming that the Bible isn't inerrant. There is no manuscript in which Jesus ever uttered the name of Yahweh.

Just how can you say that when we know that Jesus quoted from the Hebrew Scriptures where the name of God (represented in the Tetragram, YHWH) appeared? It is in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, and, in spite of the silly superstition of the Jews that involved not pronouncing God's name, Jesus would have pronounced it when quoting the Scriptures that he did. It is interesting to note that God wanted people to pronounce His name, as seen at Exodus 3:15 where He said, "Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, Jehovah, the God of your fathers...hath sent me unto you: this is my name forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." (American Standard Version) Does that sound like He thought that His name was too holy to be pronounced? Jesus wouldn't have gone along with that superstition.

[Difflugia]

There is no manuscript in which Jesus ever uttered the name of Yahweh.

Just how can you say that when we know that Jesus quoted from the Hebrew Scriptures where the name of God (represented in the Tetragram, YHWH) appeared?

We don't know that. You've claimed that, but there's no scriptural support for it.

It is in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, and, in spite of the silly superstition of the Jews that involved not pronouncing God's name, Jesus would have pronounced it when quoting the Scriptures that he did.

You're once again making claims about how the Bible should be changed to match your theology. According to the Greek text itself, Jesus never pronounces either God's name or any variant of "Jehovah."

It is interesting to note that God wanted people to pronounce His name, as seen at Exodus 3:15 where He said, "Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, Jehovah, the God of your fathers...hath sent me unto you: this is my name forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." (American Standard Version) Does that sound like He thought that His name was too holy to be pronounced?

No.

Jesus wouldn't have gone along with that superstition.

I've always thought that what the Bible should say is a much better book than what it actually says.

[onewithhim]

There is no manuscript in which Jesus ever uttered the name of Yahweh.

Just how can you say that when we know that Jesus quoted from the Hebrew Scriptures where the name of God (represented in the Tetragram, YHWH) appeared?

We don't know that. You've claimed that, but there's no scriptural support for it.

It is in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, and, in spite of the silly superstition of the Jews that involved not pronouncing God's name, Jesus would have pronounced it when quoting the Scriptures that he did.

You're once again making claims about how the Bible should be changed to match your theology. According to the Greek text itself, Jesus never pronounces either God's name or any variant of "Jehovah."

No, the Bible hasn't been changed to match my theology. It was changed to match the Jews' theology (which was decidedly against the one true God, as we can see because they killed the Son of God) and later the theology of the Catholic Church (the trinity, as well as submerging God's name, as the pope has recently shown when saying that the Name is to be taken from all songs and writings). JWs go back as far as we can to see what the earliest manuscripts say, before men tampered with the Scriptures. Jesus said "I have made your name known...and will continue to make it known!" (John 17:6,26) Wouldn't he have pronounced God's name? YOU are changing what the Scriptures are telling us.

[Difflugia]

No, the Bible hasn't been changed to match my theology. It was changed to match the Jews' theology (which was decidedly against the one true God, as we can see because they killed the Son of God) and later the theology of the Catholic Church (the trinity, as well as submerging God's name, as the pope has recently shown when saying that the Name is to be taken from all songs and writings).

You're claiming this, but there's no evidence that it's true. In all the manuscripts we have, Jesus uses an epithet in place of God's name. By claiming that the manuscripts were nevertheless changed from what you want them to be, you've just given yourself license to change any scripture you want and claim that you're restoring the text to its true form. Hubris much?

JWs go back as far as we can to see what the earliest manuscripts say, before men tampered with the Scriptures.

That's fine in itself, but that's not what we're talking about. Witnesses have changed the text so that instead of matching any manuscripts, let alone the earliest, they are creating new variants of their own. You're claiming that there is some text somewhere that matches your imagination. You are declaring your imagination to be authoritative over every single manuscript that actually exists.

Jesus said "I have made your name known...and will continue to make it known!" (John 17:6,26) Wouldn't he have pronounced God's name?

According to the Bible, he didn't. Since he had many opportunities to do so, the non-imaginary answer is apparently no.

YOU are changing what the Scriptures are telling us.

Because I refuse to accept that your imagination is more authoritative than the actual texts?

[onewithhim]

No, the Bible hasn't been changed to match my theology. It was changed to match the Jews' theology (which was decidedly against the one true God, as we can see because they killed the Son of God) and later the theology of the Catholic Church (the trinity, as well as submerging God's name, as the pope has recently shown when saying that the Name is to be taken from all songs and writings).

You're claiming this, but there's no evidence that it's true. In all the manuscripts we have, Jesus uses an epithet in place of God's name. By claiming that the manuscripts were nevertheless changed from what you want them to be, you've just given yourself license to change any scripture you want and claim that you're restoring the text to its true form. Hubris much?

You don't understand. The name of God was in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, including the verses that Jesus quoted in the Greek Scriptures. JWs didn't change anything. It is later men who changed the Scriptures to eradicate God's name.

[Difflugia]

In all the manuscripts we have, Jesus uses an epithet in place of God's name. By claiming that the manuscripts were nevertheless changed from what you want them to be, you've just given yourself license to change any scripture you want and claim that you're restoring the text to its true form. Hubris much?

You don't understand.

I surely do.

The name of God was in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, including the verses that Jesus quoted in the Greek Scriptures.

But it's not in the Greek Scriptures, including in the quotations of Jesus.

JWs didn't change anything. It is later men who changed the Scriptures to eradicate God's name.

If that's true, there's no evidence of it. And not the hyperbolic claim of no evidence that means one doesn't like it, but literally no evidence. We have exactly zero New Testament manuscripts with the Tetragrammaton or any other Name of God anywhere in them, including the quotations of Jesus.

Witnesses have added "Jehovah" to the New Testament 237 times where it isn't now and as far as anyone can tell, never has been. By even the strictest and narrowest definition, that's a change.

[onewithhim]

In all the manuscripts we have, Jesus uses an epithet in place of God's name. By claiming that the manuscripts were nevertheless changed from what you want them to be, you've just given yourself license to change any scripture you want and claim that you're restoring the text to its true form. Hubris much?

You don't understand.

I surely do.

The name of God was in the Hebrew Scriptures over 7,000 times, including the verses that Jesus quoted in the Greek Scriptures.

But it's not in the Greek Scriptures, including in the quotations of Jesus.

JWs didn't change anything. It is later men who changed the Scriptures to eradicate God's name.

If that's true, there's no evidence of it. And not the hyperbolic claim of no evidence that means one doesn't like it, but literally no evidence. We have exactly zero New Testament manuscripts with the Tetragrammaton or any other Name of God anywhere in them, including the quotations of Jesus.

Witnesses have added "Jehovah" to the New Testament 237 times where it isn't now and as far as anyone can tell, never has been. By even the strictest and narrowest definition, that's a change.

So you think that Jesus would refuse to speak his Father's name when he quoted a Scripture that has the name in Hebrew? Why do you think that he would bow to a silly superstition of the Jews?

Why wouldn't you believe that he actually said God's name in the Christian Greek Scriptures when he was determined to make Jehovah's name known as can be seen from his prayer to the Father (John 17: 6,26)?

Matthew and all of the New Testament writers quoted verses from the Hebrew text or from the Septuagint where the divine name appears. In Peter's speech at Acts 3:22 a quotation is made from Deuteronomy 18:15 where the Tetragrammaton appears in a papyrus fragment of the Septuagint dated to the first century B.C. It is safe to assume that Peter would've used God's name. When his speech was put on the record, the Tetragrammaton was here used according to the practice during the first century A.D.. Sometime during the second or third century A.D. the scribes removed the Tetragrammaton from both the Septuagint and the Christian Greek Scriptures and replaced it with Kyrios, "Lord," or Theos,, "God."

George Howard of the University of Georgia wrote in the Journal of Biblical Literature: "In the following pages we will set forth a theory that the divine Name and possibly abbreviations of it, was originally written in the NT quotations of and the allusions to the O.T. and that in the course of time it was replaced mainly with the surrogate kg [abbreviation forKyrios, "Lord."] This removal of the of the Tetragrammaton, in our view, created a confusion in the minds of early Gentile Christians about the relationship between the Lord God and the Lord Christ which is reflected in the manuscript tradition of the NT text itself." (Vol.96, 1977, p.63)

So there is some evidence that the divine name was written in the Christian Greek Scriptures until the 2nd or 3rd centuries.

[Difflugia]

So you think that Jesus would refuse to speak his Father's name when he quoted a Scripture that has the name in Hebrew?

Yes.

Why do you think that he would bow to a silly superstition of the Jews?

If he was real and the Gospels accurately reflect what he said historically, because he was a first-century Jewish man. If he wasn't real or the Gospels aren't historically accurate, then the authors reflected first- or second-century Jewish tradition.

Why wouldn't you believe that he actually said God's name in the Christian Greek Scriptures when he was determined to make Jehovah's name known as can be seen from his prayer to the Father (John 17: 6,26)?

To "make Your Name known" is used in many contexts as a euphemism for making people aware of Yahweh's divine attributes and deeds. Isaiah 64:1-2 uses the phrase this way and it's likely how John's Jesus uses the phrase, because he's focusing on Yahweh's love rather than the idea that people are getting His Name wrong or something. In fact, Jewish tradition uses the literal epithet Hashem, which literally means "The Name," to refer to Yahweh.

An interesting irony is that this tradition is used as a common apologetic excuse for why Exodus 6:3 doesn't contradict Genesis 14:22, for example, even though it is specifically talking about His Names. From the NKJV Study Bible (emphasis in original):

The patriarchs had known God Almighty. It is not that they had never heard the name Yahweh, but they had not known God in an intimate way. The patriarchs knew a great deal about God and had experienced His goodness in many ways. But they had not had the revelation that was granted to Moses and the people of his day.

Matthew and all of the New Testament writers quoted verses from the Hebrew text or from the Septuagint where the divine name appears. In Peter's speech at Acts 3:22 a quotation is made from Deuteronomy 18:15 where the Tetragrammaton appears in a papyrus fragment of the Septuagint dated to the first century B.C. It is safe to assume that Peter would've used God's name.

To the contrary, both Peter and the author of Acts were Jewish men of the first or second century. It is likely that they would have used an epithet for God rather than Yahweh's Holy Name.

When his speech was put on the record, the Tetragrammaton was here used according to the practice during the first century A.D..

This is speculation and zero New Testament manuscripts back it up. You and the Witness translators have changed the text to match what you want the text to have said, but there's no manuscript evidence that it ever actually said that.

George Howard of the University of Georgia wrote in the Journal of Biblical Literature: "In the following pages we will set forth a theory that the divine Name and possibly abbreviations of it, was originally written in the NT quotations of and the allusions to the O.T. and that in the course of time it was replaced mainly with the surrogate kg [abbreviation forKyrios, "Lord."] This removal of the of the Tetragrammaton, in our view, created a confusion in the minds of early Gentile Christians about the relationship between the Lord God and the Lord Christ which is reflected in the manuscript tradition of the NT text itself." (Vol.96, 1977, p.63)

So there is some evidence that the divine name was written in the Christian Greek Scriptures until the 2nd or 3rd centuries.

This is from page 82 of the same paper:

Concluding Observations. The above examples are, of course, only exploratory in nature and are set forth here programatically. Nevertheless, the evidence is sufficiently strong to suggest that the thesis of this paper is quite possible. We have refrained from drawing too many conclusions due to the revolutionary nature of the thesis. Rather than state conclusions now in a positive manner, it seems better only to raise some questions that suggest a need for further explanation.

You're right. In Dr. Howard's opintion, there is enough evidence for it to be declared possible. Therefore, I'll henceforth clarify that there is no New Testament manuscript evidence to support the speculation.

Second, while Dr. Howard acknowledged that there wasn't enough evidence in 1977 to draw a conclusion, he suggested that this possibility was enough to raise questions that justify more study. Has any such study been conducted? Has the Academy moved beyond "quite possible," or are we still at the starting line with no more than Dr. Howard's conjectural thesis?

It should also be noted that to the extent that your argument is based on what you think Jesus would have said. Dr. Howard addresses this in a footnote on page 63:

In order to avoid any confusion, it should be stated at the beginning that we are dealing primarily with the divine name as it was actually written in ancient documents, not with what word or words a reader pronounced when he came across the divine name in a document. What was pronounced is a different matter and, though of consequence in another context, it will be mentioned only briefly in the following discussion.

[Difflugia]

For future reference, if you want to quote this with the Hebrew and Greek characters, here's the quotation from the Watchtower Library:

Concerning the use of the Tetragrammaton in the Christian Greek Scriptures, George Howard of the University of Georgia wrote in Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 96, 1977, p. 63: “Recent discoveries in Egypt and the Judean Desert allow us to see first hand the use of God’s name in pre-Christian times. These discoveries are significant for N[ew] T[estament] studies in that they form a literary analogy with the earliest Christian documents and may explain how NT authors used the divine name. In the following pages we will set forth a theory that the divine name, יהוה (and possibly abbreviations of it), was originally written in the NT quotations of and allusions to the O[ld] T[estament] and that in the course of time it was replaced mainly with the surrogate κς [abbreviation for Kyʹri·os, “Lord”]. This removal of the Tetragram[maton], in our view, created a confusion in the minds of early Gentile Christians about the relationship between the ‘Lord God’ and the ‘Lord Christ’ which is reflected in the MS tradition of the NT text itself.”

[Bible_Student]

When studying the teachings of the Bible, distinguishing between the original writings and the translated manuscript copies we have today is crucial.

For instance, does the LXX include God's personal name? It was long thought not to.

Ancient manuscripts of the Greek version of Hebrew Jewish texts lacked the name of God. Due to this absence, it was concluded that when the Jews translated the LXX from Hebrew to Greek about 200 years before Christ, they replaced the Tetragrammaton with titles like "Lord." However, later Greek versions of the Old Testament were discovered containing God's name in ancient Hebrew characters. This discovery proved the earlier notion wrong; God's name was indeed present in Greek versions of the Old Testament during the time of Jesus Christ. Evidently, something occurred after the first century AD that led to only certain manuscripts surviving, which replaced God's personal name.

Upon discovering the oldest Greek manuscripts of the Old Testament, we ask again: was God's name included in the Greek versions? The response was always the same: YES, God's name was indeed present in the LXX that Christians cited during the first century. It was carefully erased from subsequent copies, while with absolutely certainty attempts were made to erase all references in the earlier versions, likely by destroying those copies that included it.

Now, considering Christian writings, is there reason to believe the same occurred with early Christian Greek Scriptures, like those of the Hebrew Scriptures, which might have included God's name? Indeed, there are compelling reasons to believe early Christians both pronounced and documented God's personal name in their Greek texts. Why then do the Christian Greek writings available to us, similar to the initial LXX versions, lack God's name despite indications it was there? The explanation is straightforward: God's name was removed from both the LXX and Christian writings around the same time, by the same individuals, and for identical reasons. Who were these individuals, and what were their motives?