The modern English lord is a simplification of the Middle English lovered, laverd, which is in turn from the Old English hlāford, made up of hlāf, “bread,” and ward, “keeper.” Our English word lord therefore derives ultimately from “bread-keeper” and refers to a feudal superior or titled nobleman. In a broad sense, it came to mean “master,” “ruler,” “owner,” or “dominant person.” 

When my parents named me, they gave no thought to the meaning of my name. At least I hope they didn’t, for cam béalis Gaelic for “twisted mouth” or metaphorically, “cheating mouth.” For them the name had a pleasing ring, and its significance was irrelevant.

Bible names are almost never like that. In the Bible a person’s name reflects something important about that person: the circumstances of their birth, their character, or their God-given purpose and destiny.

The many dozens of names that are attributed to God are all for this reason highly important: they each reveal something of God’s nature, his attributes, or his work.

The preeminent name for God is “the LORD.”

“The LORD” is God’s personal name, and we must understand it if we are to understand God’s nature. Yet, it is also one of the most confusing and difficult of the divine names to comprehend. For although God has, as we will see, given us considerable explanation of its meaning, the explanation itself is more or less enigmatic! In this short article I tackle the difficult meaning of the LORD, in the hope that we might better know and understand God’s glorious personal name, that we might know and love Him more.

The confusion around God’s personal name is caused by its seven or so iterations of which those who read the Bible in English need to be aware. Let me briefly introduce and explain them.

What does God’s personal name actually mean?

The modern English lord is a simplification of the Middle English lovered, laverd, which is in turn from the Old English hlāford, made up of hlāf, “bread,” and ward, “keeper.” Our English word lord therefore derives ultimately from “bread-keeper” and refers to a feudal superior or titled nobleman. In a broad sense, it came to mean “master,” “ruler,” “owner,” or “dominant person.”

The LORD, in capital letters in the English Old Testament, represents יהוה(in Hebrew); YHWH (English letters substituted for the Hebrew)[1]; Yahweh (a scholarly “best guess” as to how YHWH should be pronounced); and Jehovah (an early English attempt to represent YHWH).  [2]

What does YHWH actually mean? After many past attempts and failures, it is now commonly agreed that the Hebrew word יהוה, represented by YHWH, does not in itself represent any other noun, adjective, or verb in the Hebrew language. It seems to have been coined to be God’s name, and only to be God’s name.

Having said that, in Exodus 3:12-17 God closely associates YHWH with the Hebrew word אהיה, which we may represent as AHYH. It is the “first person singular imperfect” of the Hebrew verb היה (HYH) and means “I am,” “I will be.”

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