<Xian poster> Jesus Christ, Jehovah, Yahweh, etc. anyway you say it, it means the
same.
<Raven’s response>
Actually, no they don’t.
"Jehovah" is using the German phonetics where J=Y
("jahwohl"="yavoll"), and if pronounced like an English word spelled
that way bears little resemblance to the sound it’s meant to represent:
"YahVeh".
In turn, of course, "YahWeh" somehow permutes a V into a W.
Both are intended to be spoken forms of the Tetragrammaton, the four letters
representing God’s name: YHVH. But these are not meant to be spoken as the complete
spelling of a name. In Jewish tradition, the name of God is too holy to speak or even
write -- which is why many even spell the English word without the middle letter:
"G-d".
By that tradition, I should not even go on and tell you what name YHVH is used as a
place-marker to represent. But it isn’t "Yahweh".
On the other hand, "Jesus Christ" is not a name.
The chap you refer to was named "Yeshuah," the same name we now spell and
pronounce in English as "Joshua". Depending on whether or not you grant Joseph
his nominal fatherhood, it’s "Yeshuah ben Yussif," or else "Yeshuah
ben Miriam." The Greeks rendered "Yeshuah" as "Iesos," the Romans
made it "Iesus," and the J replaces the I only later -- because originally J and
I were the same letter.
What is not a name, more specifically, is the word "Christ."
This I the Greek word for "anointed one." It was used to translate the Hebrew
word "Messiah" (same meaning), so it is not a name but a title. You might
equally say "Yeshuah the Messiah."
But there’s a problem with using "Christ" as your chap’s title,
namely that it was already a religious title in Greece long before Yeshuah was born.
Initiates of the Eleusinian Mysteries were called "digenes," twice-born, and
"christos," anointed one. The mysteroi of Eleusinia are the ORIGINAL
"born-again Christs."
So it happens that a Jewish rabbi has for nearly two thousand years been called by the
title of an initiate of a religion to which he never (on record) belonged. In effect, you
are calling him a pagan.
And, yes, you may believe that he shares Godhead with God the Father, YHVH, but
Trinitarian theology is also very clear that these are separate PERSONS -- so they are not the "same." You should know that!
