Does Lord = Yahweh and God = Elohim?

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exile

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I'm trying to find a literal translation of the Old and New Testament that uses Yahweh and Elohim instead of Lord and God. Would I be correct in stating that Lord is a standin for Yahweh and God is a stand in for God throughout translation of the bible?
 
The only version that I know of which conscientiously attempted to do that was the English RV of 1881 (not to be confused with the RSV). Its no longer in print, but you can get the RV version of Ruth for free on google books. Rather than using transliteration or sacred spellings, the RV distinguishes between the various sacred names by attempting to assign words to them like 'Almighty' and 'LORD'. A copy of the full out of print RV Bible is pricey, so you may have trouble getting one. Try the library.

You don't need the RV, however. Several major modern versions have exhaustive concordances with lexicons (purchased separately) which allow you to look up a translation for any word in any passage, so I would just use that method. Some people use Bible software. Some people like to use colored pencils to mark up their Bibles with notes as they look things up in a concordance. You'll find the general idea in this article by Ruth Lynchburg. (Probably she, being Mennonite, was named after the book, Ruth.)
 
My understanding is that we had two groups of people....the Yahwists and Elohists.... one from the Bethlehem area and one from the Jerusalem area...

When the Jews were working on their cannon and putting their books together....both sides wouldn't agree to a final version of Genesis without their stories...and this is why we got Gen 1 and Gen 2, two versions of creation....different order of 7 days and different creations of man and woman...they also had variants on Noah...so we got both stories, one with a pair of animals, and one with 7 animals....

the other differences in their books were ironed out, but evidently these were deal breakers...
 
Wil,

That is a fascinating idea, that there were two stories that got mixed together, except for a few discrepancies that they couldn't overcome. My interpretation does not have these discrepancies, but it is fascinating to hear your story which also gives reasons for these discrepancies.
 
Nick the Pilot said:
Wil,

That is a fascinating idea, that there were two stories that got mixed together, except for a few discrepancies that they couldn't overcome. My interpretation does not have these discrepancies, but it is fascinating to hear your story which also gives reasons for these discrepancies.
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You mean your bible does not contain Genesis 1 and Genesis 2?

Go thru day by day and make a chart of what was created each day...

And then how man and woman were created, one from a rib, and one, they were created together, (without Adam trying out all the animals to find a helpmeet)
 
Jehovah...Yeah, I can't recall when the J was 'invented" He used to be Yeshua, or Yesus also before the "J"

(No "J" street in DC)
 
interesting....

therefore, English J, acquired from the French J, has a sound value quite different from /j/ (which represents the initial sound in the English word "yet")..... Occasionally J represents other sounds, as in Hallelujah which is pronounced the same as "Halleluyah" (See the Hebrew yud for more details).
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Now me wonders how the YHWH became the JHVH where the double v, became a V....

And it is is interesting how the changing of a letter often becomes a changed word and a changed word develops a new meaning....
 
"You mean your bible does not contain Genesis 1 and Genesis 2?

Go thru day by day and make a chart of what was created each day...

And then how man and woman were created, one from a rib, and one, they were created together, (without Adam trying out all the animals to find a helpmeet)"

--> In my interpretation, the seven days refer to the creation of the universe, our galaxy, our sun, our solar system, our planet, and our human race, and the creation of us humans on the astral plane, not the physical plane. (This explains the "anger" that God had, and the idea that our newfound knowledge and loss of innocence was "bad", which it was.)

The story of Adam and Eve then describes our first entry into physical bodies (with its sexual story of snakes chasing fruit, an obvious reference to what we started doing, just as soon as we found ourselves living in physical bodies). The traditional interpretation of Genesis, that we sinned upon eating from the tree of knowledge makes no sense at all, but fortunately we have this interpretation which finally explains the "bad" knowledge we actually came into contact with as a result of partaking of the "fruit." The old Puritan readers began with, "In Adam's fall, we sinned all," and the snakes-chasing-fruit meaning is a lot more literal than most people think.

This also explains the discrepancy that Genesis ("mistakenly") says humanity was created twice, first on Day Six and then again in the story of Adam and Eve. Humanity WAS created twice, or rather, two different aspects of humanity were created, first our astral aspect and then our physical aspect, as Genesis correctly reports.

The story of Genesis makes sense once we understand the symbology that is being used (and not allowing ourselves to be distracted by confusing 24-hour-day-symbology with what is actually being referred to: periods of time of billions of years). Prehistoric humanity could not comprehend periods of time of billions of years, but they could comprehend periods of time of 24-hours, and so this misleading symbology was used (and is certainly not necessary any more).
 
Cool....now how does your interpretation interpret separate versions of the stories?

(in mine we see the first version as happening in Divine mind, thought, the second version as thought manifested)
 
Wil,

I do not see this as different versions, I see this as merely being two parts of one story that happen in linear ‘time’ (although it is not ‘time as we know it,’ because ‘time as we know it’ does not begin until, as you say, manifestation begins).
　
It is a fascinating question: what is the difference between unmanifested Divine Thought and manifested Divine Thought? (All of the events of Genesis and our universe, manifested as well as unmanifested, are part of Divine Thought, they are just different aspects of it. To answer your question, my interpretation clearly designates the first moment of manifested Divine Thought as the first appearance of Light in Gen 1:3. The appearance of Spirit and Water in Gen 1:2 are unmanifested activity, and can be said (as you say) to be ‘activity’ that is only happening ‘within the Divine Mind.’
　
This ‘jives’ with the Christian concept of the Three Persons of the Trinity, with Spirit being the First Person, Water being the Second Person, and Light being the Third Person. It is only with the coming forth of the Light that true manifested activity begins. (This also explains why I call the Light — the Son — our universe — the Third Person and not the Second Person. According to Christianity, Jesus came from Mary, who came from God, which also agrees with my idea of labeling the Son as the Third Person.)
 
In your interpretation, both of these happen after light/manifestation, yet you don't see these as different stories?

,in the first book, the animals are created first....and then something was missing and man was created, male and female he created them together....

in the second book man was created first.... then the birds and animals to find a suitable helpmeet for him... but when none was found he created woman out of man's rib...
 
Lord is a term used in the early middle ages for a leader who had land, power, and control of a group of serfs as well as village artisans. Lord was subordinate to the King and even the Duke. Those who translated the gospels were exposed to Roman uses for Lord in both Rome and Greece. The Lord was never as powerful as the king was. and eventually also less than a Duke.

My greatgrandfather 30 or more generations back, was the Lord of the Isles off the west coast of Scotland. He was lower in rank than the Earl of Sutherland and the Earl of Moray. They were subordinate to the Duke of Argyle, and a few other Dukes. They were in turn subordinate to the King of Scotland.

King James Stuart was familiar with the medieval prestige and authority ladder.

St. Paul in his epistles refers to Jesus as the Lord who sits at the right hand of God (Probably JHWY. or El.) after the attempt of Moses toward Monotheism. The word Elohim is a left over term for the past polytheism of the Amorites and Arabs who were ancestors of the Jews. Paul's designation of Jesus as a Lord meant he had authority but as the gospels show, Jesus was subordinate to God. JHWY or El were probable terms used in the Gospels. They may have used Theos or Dios as Greco-Romans absorbed the Jesus Cults.

They did not use the word GOD. GOD is a German name for the Father God of the Teutons. It could be Gott as in Hitler's belt buckle, and God in the Germanic Anglo-Saxons who invaded Christian Britain and brought the Teutonic name Gott or God instead of the Hebrew YHWY. The Teutonic Gott the Father had a son who was a Lord, named Baldur. All Indo-European Religions have this structure. Christianity by the 4th Century had become Indo-European with only tenuous ties to Judaism. They included carefully censored Jewish scriptures in the new Christian Bible.

Various versions in the Gospel and Paul's epistles distinguish between Jesus and the Father God (JHWY). I doubt that Jesus knew the word God. Writers inserted God in the gospels and Paul's letters to reach out to the yet unconverted Goths who were either Pagan or Arian Christian. Arianism is the form of Christianity most consistent with the four gospels and the letters of Paul. It was Romans like Constantine and Greco-Roman Indo-European Pagans to begin a structural Indo-European Religion. They began the slow evolution of Jesus from Lord to God or Dios or Theos. That led Constantine who first leaned to Arianism then Mommy Helena persuaded him to accept the most distal form of Jesus cult, the Trinity (a common Indo-European concept.)

I find this transition interesting for its political effects, the transition to a European Paganism while pretending to be linked to Judaism. Judaism remains monotheistic as its offspring, Islam. Christianity is Indo-European as its cousins, Roman, Greek, Zoroastrian, Hindu, Tocharian, Alans, German, Hittite, Scythians, Celts, Picts, Balts, Slavs, and Gauls.

Amergin
 
Amergin said:
St. Paul in his epistles refers to Jesus as the Lord who sits at the right hand of God (Probably JHWY. or El.) after the attempt of Moses toward Monotheism. The word Elohim is a left over term for the past polytheism of the Amorites and Arabs who were ancestors of the Jews.
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This idea of Moses trying to create Monotheism is a variation on the Welhausen theme. He would have said that monotheism evolved from polytheism, but there are endless variations by scholars that have built upon his work. In his lifetime Evolution was a recently popularized idea due to the writings of Darwin and colleagues. Welhausen applied evolutionary theories to the Bible. In doing so he created many scholarly schools (Twitter hadn't been invented yet) which loved his theories. These followers had endless modifications of his theory, discussing how things might have happened and believing that through evolving their theories they could come upon a single best theory which would explain everything. Their search continues today, 150 years later. The reason is that Welhausen (following Darwin) wrongly assumed that evolution always results in improvements or that it tends toward a specific end. The theories surrounding the Bible's evolutionary development will probably always fork and go different ways.

Bringing that home, the theories about the tetragrammaton and other sacred names continue to disappoint, because there is no one particular answer, idea experiment or thought process that can through scholarship satisfy all of the requirements. For example, you cannot just say that Moses made an attempt to introduce Monotheism. Its only one answer of many that have equal possibility. Similarly, sacred names may have originated in many ways, and who knows whether the Jews are descended from Amorites and Arabs or vice versa. Without someone who was there, answer A is equally as good as B, C, D, E...
 
Hi Exile —
exile said:
I'm trying to find a literal translation of the Old and New Testament that uses Yahweh and Elohim instead of Lord and God..
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How about here

You can go to any text, and click on the 'c' icon to see the original Hebrew or Greek, with concordance, and with a list of occurrences.

God bless,

Thomas
 
Hi Nick —
Nick the Pilot said:
The story of Adam and Eve then describes our first entry into physical bodies ...
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This is a not-so-common theme in Christianity as well. Origen and especially St Gregory of Nyssa wrote of a state which was substantially different to humanity's lapsarian condition.

Nick the Pilot said:
(with its sexual story of snakes chasing fruit, an obvious reference to what we started doing, just as soon as we found ourselves living in physical bodies).
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That's somewhat problematic, as the snake is not usually associated with sex in traditional symbology, nor was the snake 'chasing' fruit ... nor was sex, or sexual distinction, a condition in the pre-lapsarian state, so I'm not sure that thesis is viable?

Nor is sex a bad thing, so again I think there's a certain anachronism in the argument — it reflects contemporary cultural thinking — concupiscence is a result of the fall, but not a cause.

The snake has to be seen in relation to paradise, the tree, and the fruit. So what you then have is the horizontal plane (paradise) and the vertical axis (the tree in the midst) which leads and draws man upward (the fruit).

The snake signifies the contrary tendency which must exist, even in paradise, if 'freedom' is to have any ontological reality.

Nick the Pilot said:
The traditional interpretation of Genesis, that we sinned upon eating from the tree of knowledge makes no sense at all...
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Actually it does, if you understand the symbology:
"And the serpent said to the woman: No, you shall not die the death. For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:5]
Here the serpent patently 'lies' — we do 'die', after all.
Secondly, it's not, as many assume, the case that man is without knowledge, or ignorant, prior to this. He converses with God, he has an intellect which he exercises and in which God watches and delights, and he has a task, so he is by no means stupid.
What he does not do is discriminate between the will of God and his own will, and decide that he would rather pursue the latter than the former — this is precisely what the serpent's temptation is all about.
Thus man actualises evil where before it existed only potentially, a necessary component of true 'freedom'.
"And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold ... "
Here we see the process actually happening ... the fruit, according to the Word of God, is dangerous, indeed 'mortal', this is the knowledge of the essence of the fruit, but the woman already closes her mind to that information, and sees only the outward form, the sensible form, looks 'good' and 'fair' and 'delightful to behold'.

"And the eyes of them both were opened: and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons" (3:7)
They saw each other and were ashamed (cf v10) nor did they need God to tell them so, so what occurred when eating the fruit was not so much a punishment, as simply the real nature of things, indeed 'karma'.
Now there is no beauty and, by extension, no truth. They have, by their own volition, succumbed to the world of maya, the world of illusion.

Nick the Pilot said:
This also explains the discrepancy that Genesis ("mistakenly") says humanity was created twice ...
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I agree that this is an erroneous interpretation.

Nick the Pilot said:
Humanity WAS created twice, or rather, two different aspects of humanity were created, first our astral aspect and then our physical aspect, as Genesis correctly reports.
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I would say the two aspects comprise the vertical (Genesis 1) and the horizontal (Genesis 2).

God bless

Thomas
 
To add a little fuel, much of the problem in Christian interpretation is that we are primarily a Greek derived culture. The basic Cosmology (philosophical, not physical) of the Greek was soooooooooo different from the Jewish culture. A pretty easy explanation can be found in the first part of Danielson's "the book of the cosmos".

The Greek Gods, like the dao, are "just there" in an agricultural sense (seeds sowns and then they go away) or in an archtectural sense in that they lay out a Platonic Form (which underlies much of Greek mythology). The mind-set (if you will) is very much different than the Divine Father and caretaker of Genesis.

exile--try Mechon-Mamre... a 1920 or so translation with the Hebrew interlinear. Should be able to pick up froim library. I think both Stern's and Klein's works (can see at a bookstore or libray) translate just that way.
 
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