THE FATHER'S NAME AND THE NIKKUD.
Our brothers that help to preserve the Thurah / Torah took the Word of Yah seriously and reverently. The second commandments states that we are not to take the name of the Father in vain. In an effort to protect His name from being taken in vain, (or as some think, to possibly remove the true pronunciation of His name) the Masoretes decided to "code" the four vowels that spelled His name so when it was read the code would indicate to them to NOT say YAHUEH but to say ADONAI or ELOHIM. The thought that should come to our mind is that we don't and didn't need nikkud to pronounce the Father's name because His name is already comprised of vowels; we simply need to exhale it out.
We will examine the Hebrew word for "my Lord," i.e. Adonai, אֲדֹנָי, without getting too technical. I want you to observe to nikkud or points that surround the letters. Then, compare them to the nikkud that surround the name of the Creator as the Masoretes placed them, יְהֹוָה . They are almost identical!
Let's take a closer look:
A
יְהֹוָה
B C
A. The small dot above the ו indicates an "O" sound. The dot is usually over the first ה
B. The small symbol, which looks like a miniature "T" has the "AH" sound.
C. The two dots, tells the reader to make a short "EH" sound.
If you read the characters with the accompanying nikkud, you CAN get:
YEH-HO-VAH / YEH-HO-WAH - If you pronounce the ו as a "V" or a "W"
but you can also get:
YAH-HO-VAH / YAH-HO-WAH - If we correctly recognized that the first two characters spell His
name YAH.
Let's examine the nikkud for the word Adonai.
A
אֲדֹנָי
B C
Do you notice that they are the almost identical to the nikkud that was placed around the tetragrammaton?!
A. The small dot is, again, the "O" sound,
B. We see the "AH" vowel again, and
C. We see a variation of the same short "EH" vowel sound.
Learned Hebrews / Jews would recognize that these vowel points that were surrounding the Creator's name was to be read as Adonai and NOT any of the variations that are above.
יְהֹוָה is sometimes spelled without the dot on top. When that happens, you can the pronunciations:
YEH-VAH or YEH-WAH - If you pronounce the ו as a "V" or "W"
YAH-VAH or YAH-WAH - If you recognize that the first two letters is the Creator's name.
יְהֹוָה (with the nikkud) also can give you another perverse pronunciation by using the ו uau / waw as a vowel AND a consonant:
YEH-O-VAH or YEH-O-WAH- this was morphed into JeHoVah
but you can also get....
YAH-O-VAH or YAH-O-WAH - If you recognize the first two letters as YAH.
Unfortunately, I am sure that some of these variant spellings / pronunciations are familiar to you. The truth is that when unlearned translators translated the Hebrew sScriptures into other languages; they read the vowels for face value. They were in error. The Masoretes never intended for the nikkud around the tetragrammaton to be vocalized. It was simply a code for the reader.
The pronunciation was a simple breath, EE-AH-OO-EH.