All Scripture is inspired of God and beneficial for teaching, for reproving, for setting things straight, for disciplining in righteousness, (2 Tim 3:16).
What does this mean? This comment is part of Paul’s final writings, his valedictory letter to a friend and brother in Christ. He was in prison awaiting the inevitable. By this time most of what we accept as the Bible Canon had been completed. But what did Paul mean by ‘all Scripture’? This can be translated in two ways (Ellicott et al). All Scripture is inspired… or All Scripture that is inspired… (i.e. there being some that is not inspired – perhaps those passages in Erasmus' Textus Receptus that are deemed spurious such Mark’s conclusions, or the early verses of John chapter eight). The majority of English translations accept the former as does the New World Translation (NWT), and this is what counts as far as this dissertation is concerned. The eponymous book, published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society (WTS) states:
‘The Sacred Scriptures, as a collection from Genesis to Revelation, form one complete book, one complete library, all inspired by the one Supreme Author… The 66 Bible books, all together, form the one library of the Holy Scriptures.’ (si-E 1990 p11)
Hence they accept that Paul was including his own writing and, prophetically, the subsequent writings of John. According to the WTS therefore, the Canon, everything that had been God-breathed, was finally and universally agreed upon in AD397 at the Third Council of Carthage. However, it had been largely accepted as it is, with minor differences, from AD170; an early catalogue known as the Muratorian Fragment, published in 1740, is stated as evidence of this. (si-E 1990 p303) On the following page (304) it is noted that ‘Origen, about the year 230 C.E., accepted among the inspired Scriptures the books of Hebrews and James, both missing from the Muratorian Fragment.’ So if we accept the WTS chronology whereby John wrote his letters and gospel in AD98, the Bible as we know it today, had been assembled, and largely agreed upon, in less than one hundred years after its completion. There are writings from these years and thereafter that are not included in the Canon. Only two of Paul’s letters to the Corinthians are included. His letter to the Laodiceans is excluded. His friend Clement (Php 4:3) also wrote a letter to the Corinthians. Polycarp of Smyrna and Ignatius of Antioch were both disciples of John who wrote letters that are not deemed to be inspired. There is a Gospel of Barnabas (late middle ages), Epistles of Barnabas (AD70 – AD135) and an Acts of Barnabas. None of these are canonical. So accepting what we have, what do we mean by ‘all Scripture’? Are we saying that every single word or thought written in the original documents was inspired of, authorised and approved by God? Or that everything written was free from error? I think we have to, otherwise we end up in a morass of controversy in trying to separate those that are inspired from those that would be otherwise viewed as human interpretation and tradition. And anyway, we are told that God cannot lie (Heb 6:18). This is precisely why it is so egregious when interpretation creeps into translation, for words to be added or meanings to be manipulated. Those involved in translation have a heavy responsibility towards their readers, most of whom, it has to be assumed, are not students of the original Bible languages.
When it comes to the Divine Name in the New Testament we have a problem. The above quoted book (si) states that the Greek critical texts available today are largely error-free. With over 5,000 manuscripts available for inspection, and with several master texts having been produced from these, such as the Westcott and Hort, Nestle-Aland and by the United Bible Society (UBS), we can have absolute confidence that God has ensured that his Word has been preserved fully and accurately. Page 319 quotes F.J.A. Hort:
‘The great bulk of the words of the New Testament stand out above all discriminative processes of criticism, because they are free from variation, and need only to be transcribed…. If comparative trivialities… are set aside, the words, in our opinion still subject to doubt can hardly amount to more than a thousandth part of the whole New Testament’ (ellipses in original quote).
However, WTS also claim that the Divine Name was deliberately and systematically removed from the early copies of the Greek writings and thus they have been forced into ‘restoring’ the name in their own New World Translation (NWT). Appendix 1D of the Reference Bible (1984) states that:
‘Sometime during the second or third century C.E. the scribes removed the Tetragrammaton from both the Septuagint and the Christian Greek Scriptures and replaced it with Kyrios, “Lord” or Theos “God”.’
They quote a theory posited by George Howard that appears to support this stance, which they then follow up by writing
’We concur with the above, with this exception: We do not consider this view a “theory”, rather a presentation of the facts of history…’.
Mr Howard was not happy about this. In a letter, dated 3rd July 1997 he wrote, in part,
‘there is no evidence for doing what they (Jehovah’s Witnesses) do. Although they quote me in support of their theory, my research does not support them. Finally, my articles report only on a theory of mine that is not yet proven’ (jwfacts.com).
For clarification on what has been presented so far: on the one hand WTS state that all Scripture is inspired of God and, based on over 5,000 manuscripts, we can have absolute confidence that the Greek text we have today is largely error-free, barring trivialities; and on the other hand that the divine name has been deliberately and systematically deleted from the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament. Are they stating that God’s name is but a triviality? That seems to be very brave position to take!
These two propositions cannot both be true. יהוה
It leads to a paradox. If we ask the question ‘Can we trust the Bible?’ We have to say ‘Yes’. It is complete and accurate. But if we ask ‘Why is Jehovah or יהוה missing from the Greek manuscripts that are the bases for all translations?’ we are told that it was mysteriously deleted. Therefore the Bible we have is not complete and accurate. So we return to that initial question; Can we trust the Bible? There is no logical answer to this dilemma created by the WTS. To move on, we must determine whether the Bible is complete – in which case Jehovah does not belong in the NT, or whether we can have confidence in any of it, if the name of its author has indeed been systematically removed without trace. This is important. What else has been deleted, or inserted, without authorisation?
Let us assume that the WTS position is true; that during the second and third centuries AD, that there was a systematic campaign to remove the name Jehovah, Yahweh, the Tetragrammaton, and in any and all other forms. Would this even be possible? Although there would be only one original of each of the 27 books, each one would have been copied straight away and many times over. This was the job of the Scribes and copyists. They were professional men whose careers were built upon the task of copying documents, completely and accurately. Peter’s first letter, for example, is addressed to the ‘temporary residents scattered about…’ across a wide area that we today know as Turkey. How many copies were required to achieve this? I cannot say, but it would have been more than a few. With the persecution in Rome, the destruction of Jerusalem and many other tribulations, Christ’s followers, by the second century, were widely spread across Europe, Asia and North Africa. Their copies of the Gospels, the Acts and the epistles would have been treasured possessions. In total, it seems reasonable to conclude that these documents numbered into many thousands. For the WTS position to be tenable, we must accept that every one of these copies has either been destroyed, replaced, or amended invisibly, leaving no trace of what has been done. We also have to accept that this was done without opposition, without debate. The writings of the above mentioned men, along with others such as Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus of Portus, Origen and many others, make no mention of such an event. If the followers of Christ were so devoted to him and his teachings such that they were willing to die for him, would they have meekly acceded to a corruption of their faith without a murmur? Such an event would have provoked fierce debate, argument, hostility, persecution. But none is recorded. I wonder why? So we have to return to the WTS and determine by whose authority they have unilaterally chosen to ‘make an addition to these things’ (Rev 22:18). This is found in the J references. There are twenty seven of these and they are listed in both the 1984 Reference Bible and the 1969/85 editions of WTS’s own Kingdom Interlinear translations. Being naïve, trusting, thinking that I was ‘in the truth’, or possibly just lazy, I have always assumed that these Hebrew versions were all ancient documents whose provenance and authority was above question. I recently decided to take a closer look, and, to be honest, I was disturbed by what I discovered. One of these 27 is a concordance (J20), and another the Emphatic Diaglott by Benjamin Wilson (J21). The other 25 are translations into Hebrew from the same Greek texts that form the bases of most Bible translations that are widely available – including the NWT. If the Greek master texts that we have today are complete and accurate, that they do not contain the divine name in any form, and there is no evidence that they ever did, on what authority do these translators into Hebrew insert the Tetragrammaton into their versions? Inspecting the publication dates, we see that the oldest of these is J2, the Shem-Tob, his book which includes the Gospel of Matthew, dated 1385. The latest is 1979 (J22), and with most of the rest being works from the 19th and 20th centuries. Yet when we understand that the manuscripts that form the basis of that Greek text are truly ancient, we have to ask the question. One document is dated AD125, just 25 years after the death of John. The Codex Sinaiticus and ms Vatican are dated fourth century (AD300 – 399). The codices Alexandrinus and Ephraemi are dated fifth century (AD400 – 499). There are papyruses that date to the third century (AD200 – 299). Why is this antiquity important? Simply because of the copying process. If each document was copied manually, as they were, then the older they are, the fewer chances there are for human error. With the probability of scribes independently making identical errors being very low, and with such a large body of manuscripts to work from, it is possible to recreate the original text. This was the point that Mr Hort was making, quoted above. He was working in the 19th century. Today there are many more documents available for inspection and the Greek master texts are being continuously updated accordingly. The Nestle-Aland is up to v29 and the latest UBS text is at v6. And there is still no evidence that the Divine Name, as the Tetragrammaton, or in any other form, was ever in the Greek text.
Regarding the Shem-Tob, it is possible that this might be a recension of Matthew’s Gospel as written in Hebrew, rather than a translation. Even this does not contain the Tetragrammaton but a circumlocution of the words ‘the Name’ as written in Hebrew characters, although with 1,300 years from when the original was written, we have to treat this document with caution. So why is the Tetragrammaton inserted into these various Hebrew New Testaments? Bizarrely the answer is published in the Watchtower, the primary organ of dissemination of doctrine of the WTS. It is a piece about a man called Elias Hutter, who produced a quite extraordinary twelve-language polyglot in 1599, which included his own translation into Hebrew, and whose work receives the reference J7. Found in the public edition of The Watchtower 2017/4 p11, it says that he inserted the Tetragrammaton
‘where the text is a quotation from the Hebrew Scriptures or where he felt it referred to Jehovah… thus adds evidence in favour of restoring God’s name in the Christian Greek Scriptures’ (italics mine).
So what can we conclude? That 1,500 years after the Canon of Scripture was completed and 1,100 or more years after the composition of that Canon was finally settled, a man, talented and sincere without doubt, was inspired by God to reopen it and make additions to the Word of God, even considering that dire warning from Jesus at the conclusion of the Revelation not to do so? Yet that is exactly what the WTS appear to be suggesting. The 25 have been elevated to divine status!
Another matter for consideration are the agendas behind some of these publications. For example, J17 (Delitzsch) and J18 (Salkinson-Ginsburg) are both published by the Trinitarian Bible Society.
Regarding the former, Franz Delitzsch was born in Leipzig in 1813 to a very poor family. But a Jewish friend, Levy Hirsch, paid for him to have a decent education. Consequently he developed an extraordinary love for the Jewish people, such that he wanted them to appreciate the New Testament in their own language. Hence he set about translating it into Hebrew. At this time Hebrew was a dead language, long before its official revival through the work of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda (late 19th century onwards) and the establishment of the political state of Israel in 1948, so he had to adapt it to become a language fit for the 19th century reader. His first complete translation was completed in 1874 and published in 1877 by the British and Foreign Bible Society. This first edition was translated from a critical text. The publishers asked him to use Erasmus’s longer received text (upon which the KJV is built) for the second edition. Delitzsch’s NT was not the only Hebrew translation available at that time. The Salkinson-Ginsburg NT (J18) was being produced by the Trinitarian Bible Society but it too was translated from a critical text. When the TBS discovered the Delitzsch version, based upon the received text, they chose to publish his NT instead. And they are still editing and publishing it ‘to this day’ to keep it relevant to a modern audience. I have a PDF copy of the ‘Streams of the Negev’ edition from 2002. The Tetragrammaton appears 143 times, if my word counting is correct.
That is a very brief précis of the history of Franz Delitzsch and his New Testament found on the Trinitarian Bible Society website (tbsbibles.org).
Question: why would WTS, a fiercely Unitarian society, want to utilise the works of an organisation that promotes a belief that they so adamantly reject? A doctrine that dishonours both God and Jesus (ti 30-31)? I cannot answer that!
An extremely important point that cannot be overstated. The role of a translator is to create, in the target language, a text that faithfully reproduces the exact meaning of the original. That is his one and only task and heavy responsibility. If he starts amending meanings and replacing or adding words according to his own beliefs and doctrine, he is moving into interpretation. There is nothing wrong with interpretation; that is what commentaries are for. But the two disciplines should never be amalgamated. The Bible reader should have absolute confidence that his text faithfully reproduces what God originally inspired his penmen to write.
Despite all that has gone before, the NT of the NWT contains the divine name 237 times. If there is no historical basis for this, no manuscript support, no logical reason, has the WTS gone too far and corrupted, for their own theological bias, the pure word of God? The answer is Yes and No. Really! And it is not easy for us to decide as we have some rather illogical reasoning to untangle. For example:
It is stated that when Jesus stood to read Isaiah in the synagogue at Nazareth, he would have read out loud the divine name. ‘Jehovah’s spirit is upon me…’ etc. (Luke 4:18). In v22 ‘they all began to give favourable witness about him and to marvel at his winsome words…’. If, as we believe, by this time pronouncing the divine name was taboo, the Tetragrammaton having been struck through and superscribed with ‘Adonai’, as shown in the Dead Sea scrolls, would they have been marvelling at his winsome words, or would there have been uproar in the synagogue? You decide, based on what you know about the attitudes of the Jews and Pharisees of the day.
It is further stated that when Matthew wrote his gospel in Hebrew that he would have been obligated to use the divine name when quoting the 100 or so OT passages in his text. If we ask the same question as above, in doing so, would he have alienated his readers from the off and thus prevented the important gospel message to reach his readers? Again, I do not know. But these are two statements, assumptions made, that are presented without evidence. That is not good practice.
The word kyrios has a wide range of meanings. According to the BibleHub Lexicon it means Lord, lord, master, sir, owner, husband, God, ruler, sovereign. The translation of this word depends heavily on context, speaker, and theological perspective. If kyrios is to be translated ‘Jehovah’, in order to avoid ambiguity for example, then any and all such instances must be accompanied by a meaningful footnote explaining that this is an emendation, with a clear explanation for why it has been done. But even this would be unnecessarily forcing a theological bias on a reader who perhaps wants nothing more than a clear and accurate translation.
The WTS use of the divine name falls into two broad categories:
1. where it was used in the Hebrew of the OT when that text is being quoted by a New Testament speaker or writer.
2. where the context clearly shows that Jehovah is the object of the sentence.
There are problems with both of these that we have to acknowledge, even if we cannot definitively resolve them.
We readily acknowledge that the Tetragrammaton is found in the OT nearly 7,000 times. There is no question whatsoever as to its validity and no doubt where it is found. To use the divine name here is a relatively simple process of find-and-replace, and that is exactly what most translations do. Alas they replace the name with LORD. They know what is right but refuse to do what is right. How can the name of the LORD be a strong tower, how can we call on the name of the LORD if the reader is not told what that name is? However, when the OT is being quoted in the NT it is not so simple as replacing kyrios or theos with Jehovah.
Take for example Isaiah 45:23. Regarding Jehovah, that verse says ‘that to me every knee will bend down’. Paul quotes this verse twice – to the Philippians and to the Romans. To the Philippians he explicitly states ‘that in the name of Jesus every knee should bend…’ (2:10). To the Romans he writes ‘As I live, says [Kyrios], to me every knee will bend down…’ (14:11). The NWT inserts Jehovah here on the basis that it is a quote from a Hebrew text that was most certainly referring to Jehovah. To the Philippians Paul applied Isaiah to Jesus (Iesous) in a way that cannot be challenged. To the Romans, was he applying it to Jesus too? Is the NWT justified in making the insertion, corrupting the Word of God as it is agreed upon by scholars far and wide?
In Luke chapter one the name Jehovah appears 16 times with a wide range of interpretations. Some seem quite justifiable, others are fairly neutral and some quite dubious. In verses 6 and 9 we have reference to the ‘legal requirements of Jehovah’ and ‘the sanctuary of Jehovah’. It was certainly his sanctuary and it was him who gave the Law to Moses, so to who else could this refer?
We have Jehovah’s angel in verse 11. An angel is an angel, those who have defected are demons, so angel ‘of the Lord’ (aggelos Kyriou) seems superfluous, but Luke put it there and it must be translated: so Jehovah’s angel, God’s angel, the Lord’s angel. There is no doctrinal issue at stake.
Both Elizabeth and Mary converse with angels and offer doxologies to the Lord. I think that at this point in history, the identity of the Christ was not yet known. He was still a prophetic seed of Abraham, so once again, offering praise to their God, the God of their forefathers, known as Jehovah, seems a reasonable assumption.
However in verse 17, regarding John, we are told that he will ‘get ready for Jehovah (Kyriou) a prepared people’. John was to perform a preparatory work for Jesus, whose followers have come to be known, colloquially, as Christians. They are followers of, believers in, disciples of Christ. So who is the Lord here? Jehovah or Jesus? Suddenly we are in the realms of interpretation.
Similarly with verse 76, and again with reference to John: ‘you will go in advance before Jehovah (Kyriou) to make his ways ready’. This is a quote from Isaiah 40:3 which contains the Tetragrammaton. Was John going before Jehovah or before Jesus? He personally believed it to be the latter ‘but the one stronger than I am is coming, the lace of whose sandals I am not fit to untie’ (Luke 3:16). What is the justification for replacing Lord with Jehovah here? Is it blind dogma, or do the translators have an insight that they are not sharing with us?
Actually the WTS does acknowledge that OT quotes can be reapplied. For instance, at Hebrews 1:3 we are told that ‘he (a son, Jesus) sustains all things by the power of his word’. Later, at Hebrews 1:10, the NWT translation says ‘At the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations…’ whereas the original at Psalm 102:25 says ‘Long ago you laid the foundations…’ knowing that the Psalm is a prayer, a cry for help, to Jehovah. Sadly they cross-reference both verses to the passage at Colossians 1:15-20 where they have spuriously inserted '[other]' five times. It is an interpretative mess. If Jehovah is the creator of heaven and earth, as taught by Jehovah’s Witnesses, why translate kyrios with Lord here?
Hopefully, it has been demonstrated in this section that use of Jehovah in the NT can be excused by contextual logic, or where the change makes no doctrinal difference. It has also been demonstrated that an OT quote that refers to Jehovah, can, quite legitimately be reassigned to his son Jesus, as Paul has done, quite explicitly to the Philippians. In other words, neither of those two broad categories are clearly defined or adhered to.
Returning to the J references, as we have discovered, they are rather modern works that are translations into Hebrew from the same Greek texts as our English versions. What authority do they carry? Does the Hebrew language in and of itself, mean that everything written therein is divinely inspired? Do scholars of Hebrew receive divine insights that are withheld from all other language scholars? It seems unlikely. And this is where the WTS is wrong. Some use of ‘Jehovah’ in the NT may be quite legitimately justified. If this is the desire of the translators, they need to be able to explain clearly and unambiguously, in every instance, their reasoning behind the decision made. The 1984 Reference Bible does have an asterisk next to every instance of Jehovah, that sometimes lists the relevant Greek and Hebrew references, but invariably takes us back to Appendix 1D, which, as we have discussed, is rather disingenuous, flawed in its logic and takes George Howard’s name in vain.
We must also discuss inconsistency. Appendix 1H of the Reference Bible states that
‘The use of ha before the title Adhohn limits the application of the title exclusively to Jehovah.’
As an example of this inconsistency, the word haAdhohn appears 19 times in the first letter to the Corinthians, in J17 (Delitzsch). And yet, only three of these instances are translated ‘Jehovah’ in the NWT. The other 16 remain as Lord.
There are three accounts of Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. Using the above rule we would get the following translations from J17:
Acts 9:1 …against the disciples of Jehovah (haAdohn)…
Acts 9:10, 11, 15 Jehovah (haAdohn) said to him (Ananias)…
Acts 9:17 Saul, brother, Jehovah (haAdohn), the Jesus that appeared to you…
Acts 22:10 Jehovah (haAdohn) said to me…
Acts 26:15 and Jehovah (haAdohn) said ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting…
These translations, and they are human, non-inspired, translations despite being in Hebrew, quite obviously try to conflate the identities of Jehovah and Jesus. Franz Delitzsch was a Trinitarian. His publishers, The Trinitarian Bible Society, are proudly Trinitarian. So are we surprised when Trinitarian theology infects their work and publications? In every one of these examples NWT translates kyrios, or haAdohn in the Hebrew versions, as the ‘Lord’. So why create and publish a rule that they are clearly unwilling to abide by? I do not understand the thought process!
Yet another. At 1 Peter 3:15 we are told to ‘sanctify the Christ as…?’ Who? NWT translates this as ‘Lord in your hearts’. Nine of the Hebrew versions insert the Tetragrammaton here and that is acknowledged in a footnote to this verse in the Reference Bible. Can we, as non-Trinitarians sanctify the Christ as Jehovah? You can see the problem.
Jesus came to earth to provide salvation to mankind (Jo 3:16). Despite Rutherfordian doctrine to the contrary (Vindication of Jehovah’s name, 1932), this was his primary mission. One of the many other benefits that resulted from this was to make known his Father’s name (Jo 17:6 et al). Surely, of the 237, many will be attributed to Jesus referring to his Father as Jehovah? No. Jesus only ever referred to him as ‘my Father’, ‘our Father’, ‘your Father’, ‘Father’, ‘heavenly Father’, ‘righteous Father’, ‘holy Father’, ‘my God’, ‘the only true God’, ‘Eli’, ‘Abba’, ‘Lord of heaven and earth’. The only occasions when Jesus used the name ‘Jehovah’, according to the NWT that is, was when quoting the Old Testament. There are seven verses where he says to Satan, ‘it is Jehovah your God…’. Mark 5:17, 13:20 and Luke 20:37 all appear to be allusions (Ex 18:8, Isa 1:9, Ex 3:6 respectively); all the others are direct quotes. It has to be noted that the name Jesus means ‘Jehovah is salvation’, something well hidden by transliteration through various languages. Jesus comes from the Latin Iesus and the Greek Iesous, Ιεσους, which itself comes from the Hebrew Yehoshua and the Aramaic Yeshua. By comparing the Hebrew characters יהוה (yhvh) with יהושע (yhvs’) we see that Yahweh is indeed in Yehoshua, something that could not fail to be noted by Jesus’s Jewish audiences.
A comment on the footnotes. At 1 Peter 3:15 the footnote references five Greek texts in favour of ‘the Lord God’ and nine J texts that favour ‘Jehovah God’. At 1:25 (random selection) there are ten J texts noted, ‘of Jehovah’, plus three Greek texts (Kyriou) and one Syriac which all go with ‘of our God’. The inference is that there is a far greater weight of evidence in preference for the Hebrew versions than for the Greek. This is disingenuous. Anyone who has given this subject due consideration knows that there are thousands of Greek manuscripts available, but only 25 Hebrew versions for the revisionists of the Reference and Interlinear Bibles to consult, and four of which are dated post 1947 when the NWT project was initiated. Is it an attempt to plant a subliminal seed in the minds of the unwary? I note that the list of J reference has expanded enormously of recent. In the Study Notes to the NWT (nwtsty), there are now 365 references, described as ‘a partial listing’. Does this change anything? Not one iota. It is interesting information. That I do not deny. But is it evidential? Does it prove anything? No. Whilst each entry gives the publication name, the publisher and the year, it generally states that ‘This translation uses ‘[a form of the divine name]’ in the main text/footnotes/etc of various verses’. We really need to know the agenda and beliefs of the translator and the publisher, which verses are affected and on what basis this was deemed appropriate. Alas we are supplied with none of this information. Every one of us is capable of researching the background to each translation, but how many will? None of these new Js influenced that original decision back in 1947, and now, 75 years after the publication of the NT part of the NWT, the list can be as long as you like, but it still adds nothing to theological reasoning process that has influenced the NWT for all these years. The only thing that would be game-changer would be if an ancient Greek manuscript was found, with sound provenance, that unambiguously contains a form of the divine name, such as the Tetragrammaton. But until that day arrives we have to be intellectually honest. Translators must not mislead their unwitting readers into believing unsound doctrine through secret interpretation, knowing that the majority will never even consider verifying the facts. Of course, now that we are in the information age, verification is but a click away, wherever we happen to be. There was a time when such information was to be found only in reference libraries, universities and other academic establishments. That is no longer the case, so that now, anyone with an enquiring mind and a desire to ‘make sure of all things’ can prove to himself ‘the good and perfect and acceptable will of God’ (Rom 12:2).
Conclusion
It is a simple one. Jehovah has gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure that his word the Bible has been preserved, intact and complete. Over thousands of years, it has been burned, banned, forcibly kept in dead languages, discredited, ridiculed, corrupted, subtly changed... yet we still have a book that is widely accepted as being as written, or as close to as makes no difference. If Jehovah wanted his name in the New Testament, we would know about it. It would be there, and without question, just as it is in the Old Testament. That most translators choose to replace the Tetragrammaton with Lord is a crime for which they will need to account for to the Most High. So why has the WTS taken upon itself, a task that, apparently, Jehovah himself was unable or unwilling to do? I cannot answer that; it feels like the obverse of the same crime! But neither do I wish to be dogmatic. It is always possible that an autograph will one day be discovered that contains the divine name (or not). Or that a first-century copy will come to light similarly endowed; either possibility would equally be a game-changer. In such an event, thousands of years of scholarly work and belief will be turned on its head. But until, or unless, that day arrives we have to accept that what we have is what God wants us to have and that we change it, or append it, at our peril. If we start questioning its completeness and accuracy, where will it end? Jesus said something about being faithful in least and much (Luke 16:10). If we start to doubt the exactness of God’s Word, perhaps just here and there to start with, then we have to question the whole thing. It really is that serious!
Some personal reflections
Am I antagonistic to the name Jehovah appearing in the NT if it belongs there? Not at all. Jehovah is the name of the God I love and worship and I am therefore happy to see that name. This God sent his only-begotten son, Jesus Christ, to earth to forgive my sins, and to offer me eternal salvation based on this ineffable act of grace; not for mine only, but for those of the whole world. For doing it so well, upon his resurrection, Jesus was granted ‘all authority in heaven and on earth’ (Matt 28:18). It is easy to read these familiar words without comprehending the enormity of that authority conferred upon him. Ultimately Jesus hands over the kingdom to his God and Father, having subjected all things to himself, including the last enemy, death (1 Cor 15:24). Between these two bookends, I cannot help but accept that Jehovah has stepped back to allow his son to do his work without distraction or detraction. By having God in the background as ‘God’ or ‘Father’ allows us to focus on all that Jesus has done, is doing, and will yet do, on our behalf. Granted, that is not a provable theory, on which I cannot be dogmatic, but it is good to ponder these things. Having opinions is not bad. Having opinions in the face of evidence to the contrary is.
Another possibility that I have considered is that Jehovah deliberately excluded his name to allow us to insert it ourselves, as a kind of test to determine the seriousness of our study and devotion to his word. I think that I have discounted this idea, based on that dire warning in Revelation 22 regarding such matters. If we start emending God’s Word here and there, what is to stop us carrying on ad infinitum? It sets a dangerous precedence.
We must accept, however, that every translation is interpretative to some degree. All punctuation is interpretation. The originals were written in Greek uncials without punctuation of any kind. To native speakers of Koine Greek, that might not have been too much of a challenge. But we need help. A word-for-word translation without commas and full stops would be difficult to understand, especially as so few of us are academics, and that language is an expression of culture. We are not Greek; we are not of the first century. What hope would we have? So we are grateful for these translations that bring the Word of God alive in our own language. This does place a heavy responsibility on the translators to be accurate, honest and transparent in their work. A small example; the WTS places great emphasis on the position of the comma at Luke 23:43 ‘Truly I tell you today you will be with me in Paradise’. They are dogmatic that it must go after ‘today’, in that the telling was ‘today’ whereas the being in Paradise would be later. That argument has merit. Others insist that it must go before ‘today’, suggesting that the criminal would be in Paradise immediately upon his death. That too has merit. It all depends on your theological bias. The fact remains that Luke did not put any commas in his writing at all, so inserting one, before or after, is an act of interpretation and so arguing about it is senseless, a moot point. To insist that one is right and one wrong is disingenuous. Every translation is biased according to the beliefs of the translators or publishers. Why go to enormous effort and expense to create your own version of the Bible when there are many excellent translations already available? So that your Bible is seen to support your doctrines and theologies – as simple as that. This is why there is no openness and transparency regarding the placing of the divine name where it is, and this is what I object to. Power and secrecy go hand-in-hand. Ignorance among the masses creates control mechanisms for the few. We could, quite feasibly, take the NWT as it is and, in our meetings, have lively discussion and debate on whether any, all, or none of the 237 has validity. Many of us would come to a different conclusion to that propounded by the governing body. They cannot allow that and it makes me very sad. Without truth we are enslaved to human tradition, to modern-day Scribes and Pharisees. If we are ‘in the truth’, then truth should be paramount. ‘You will know the truth and the truth will set you free’ (John 8:32).
The above essay raises many important questions of doctrine. As for answers, well, that is for you to decide. It is not for me, or any one else, to tell you what you should believe. This is a fundamental truth, even promoted by the WTS, for example in both the 2025 Special Talk, and at the Pure Worship convention. Ironic, or what? We all have access to God’s Word and a brain capable of digesting its contents. Above all, we have access to God’s spirit as a guide and advocate. Theologians and enthusiastic amateurs alike have grappled with Bible teachings for centuries, ever since it was written, many of whom were extremely intelligent, some with a profound understanding of those original languages. Some have produced quite extraordinary works of faith, from which we could all now benefit, if only they were not deemed out-of-bounds to all Witnesses due to being ‘worldly’. If nothing else, they highlight my own inadequacies and ignorance of Scriptural truth. Therefore it really is not for the WTS to tell anyone what to believe. Having been raised as one of Jehovah’s’ Witnesses, and now in my sixties, and having gone through life believing that I was ‘in the truth’ so to speak, all of this has come as quite a shock; that JWs have no more truth than any other religion; but at the same time making a thrilling journey that I wish to continue: exciting, jaw-droppingly revealing, disturbing.
These are the questions that I have thought of. You may have others of your own. So, in no particular order:
* What is the relationship between Jehovah and Jesus?
* Is the WTS attempting to diminish the current role of Jesus in favour of a completely Jehovah-centric belief system?
* Who or what is the holy spirit, or Holy Spirit?
* To whom, then, should I pray?
* Does this affect my salvation?
* How did Jesus ‘make your name known’ if he did not use that name, other than in quoting OT sources?
* How do I make God’s name known?
* If Jesus was handed ‘all authority in heaven and on earth’, and subsequently ‘hands over the kingdom to his God and Father’, would having the divine name in the NT detract from his work during this time?
* Perhaps Jehovah does not want his name in the NT!
* Or is it something for us to discover? A kind of test of intelligence, belief and sincerity?
* Who is the Creator? The Alpha and the Omega? Who is worthy ‘because you created all things’?
* Why has the WTS gone down this path, given the lack of evidence in the over five thousand Greek manuscripts that the Tetragrammaton was ever used?
* Therefore, why have they been so selective and secretive?
* Why have they have concluded that modern translations into Hebrew are more authoritative than the much older parchments, papyri, vellum on which the Greek is recorded?
* Do I remain as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses? If not, how do I fulfil my obligation to share the message of salvation? To meet in community worship?
* Will there come a day when I can be a source of comfort and support to my brothers when things crash and burn?