Joke Hebrew names

Sorry for poor rendering. It’s just that Hebrew is written right to left, and the WordPress admin interface is just too complicated and confusing.

Does the Jo- in Jonah, Joseph, and Josiah reference the tetragrammaton? No…

Jonah is transliterated from Yonah (יונה) and means “dove.” Joseph is transliterated from Yosef (יוסף) and means “add” or “increase.” Josiah is transliterated from Yoshiyahu (יושיהו) and means “Yahweh supports.” Note that Hebrew is written from right-to-left, and the Heh (ה) at the end of a word is usually silent. The “Jo” in each of these does not reference the tetragrammaton. The only name of the three that references the tetragrammaton is “Josiah”, but with the suffix -iah, not the prefix Jo-. The “Jo” means nothing on its own. And it’s the “Jos-“ that means “supports”, not the “-siah.” There’s no such suffix as -siah!

Yehosef (יהוסף) – Would mean “YHWH adds.” Would be transliterated Jehoseph.

Yehonah (‎יהונה) – would mean “YHWH’s dove.” Would be transliterated Jehonah.

‎Yehoshiyahu (יהושיהו) – would mean “YHWH supports YHWH.” Would be pronounced Jehosiah. Wait, that meaning doesn’t make sense. it would make more sense to say “YHWH supports himself.”

In Hebrew, Joshel or Josel (יושאל) would be pronounced as Yosh’el and would mean “God supports” (God as in Elohim, not JHVH). The Jos- prefix would mean “supports,” and the -el suffix would mean “Elohim.” Or should it be Josiel, יושיאל (Yoshi’el)? Note that the apostrophe (‘) marks a glottal stop. I don’t think that name exists in the Bible though.

What about Jehojah? That would mean “JHVH is JHVH.” It could also be spelled Jehoiah. It would be spelled יהויהו (Yehoyahu).

What if יהו was a root, rather than a prefix or suffix? Then it would be -yaho- and be transliterated -jaho-. As in ”My father is Yahweh’s son”… or something.

Enough of the tetragrammaton.

Does Abel mean ”God’s father”? Does the “Ab” mean “father” while “el” means “God”? If that was the case, it would be spelled אבאל (av’el), but it’s actually spelled הבל (hevel) which comes from the Hebrew word for “breath and means “ephemeral” or “short and sweet.” It’s the same Hebrew word used for “vanity” in the book of Ecclesiastes. There is no glottal stop in that name.

Other Hebrew name ideas are Adoniel (God is Lord).