God's Name in the Old Testament

God's name in the Old Testament is indicated by four letters YHWH which are often called "tetragrammaton" (this word in Greek means "four letters"). Ancient Jews as well as other Semitic nations did not indicate vowels. They did not pronounce God's name because of their fear to violate God's commandment:

You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. (Exodus 20:7, New International Version)

Instead of God's name, Jews pronounced "Adonai" which means "Lord" (literally, "my lords"). Because of this practice, the original pronunciation of tetragrammaton was lost. Later, when Jewish scholars called Masorets added special symbols for vowels, they used the vowels for Adonai (with some necessary changes). Then, some Western theologians read this word literally and got the pronunciation "Jehovah". Actually, Jews did not read this word in this way. They used the vowels of Adonai in order to indicate that this word should be pronounced as Adonai.

Another variant of pronunciation of this word is Yahweh. This pronunciation is an attempt to reconstruct the original pronunciation. In Exodus 3:13-15, Moses asks God about His name:

13 Moses said to God, "Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them?"

14 God said to Moses, "I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: 'I AM has sent me to you.' "

15 God also said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. (New International Version)

In Hebrew, "I am who I am" is "'ehyeh 'asher 'ehyeh". "'ehyeh" means "I am" and this word is related to YHWH. According to a hypothesis, YHWH is the form of 3rd person, singular number of the same Hebrew verb that means "to be". That is, YHWH means "He is". Yahweh is singular 3rd person form from the Hebrew verb "hawah". This reconstruction follows the hypothesis that YHWH is singular 3rd person form from this verb.

In Septuagint (ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament), "I am who I am" is "Ego eimi ho on". Here, "ego eimi" means "I am", "ho" is the definite article, "on" is the present participle of the verb "to be". So, this phrase means "I am the existing one".

The meaning of YHWH is that God is ever-existing and self-existing. He exists always. This is why He says, "I am who I am". He also exists by Himself. Some theologians believe that YHWH also means that God becomes known to people by revealing Himself. In Hebrew, there is the same verb for "to be" and "to become". However, most often, this word means "to be". So, I agree with the view that the meaning of God's name is that "He is", not that "He becomes".

Now, it is interesting to compare the meaning of YHWH with surah (chapter) 112 of Qur'an:

1 Say: He is Allah, the One and Only;
2 Allah, the Eternal, Absolute;
3 He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;
4 And there is none like unto Him.
(Surah (chapter) 112, translation of Abdullah Yusufali)

The word translated as "the Eternal, Absolute" in Arabic is "as-Samad". This is one of 99 names of Allah. This name means that Allah exists by Himself, eternally, and does not need anything or anybody for His existence. This is about the same concept as expressed by YHWH in the Old Testament.

In Sunni theology, four of Allah's sifats (God's attributes) are:
1. Al-Wujud - Existence. This attribute means that Allah exists and His non-existence is impossible.
2. Al-Kidam - Eternity without beginning. This attribute means that Allah exists eternally without beginning, He did not have beginning of His existence.
3. Al-Baka - Eternity without end. This attribute means that Allah exists eternally without end, His existence will never end.
4. Al-Kiyamu bi-nafsi-hi - Self-existence. This means that Allah exists by Himself and does not need anything or anybody for His existence.

In Christian theology, God's attributes include these four attributes. The only difference is that in Christian theology there is one attribute - God's eternal existence without beginning and end.