[B-Greek] QEOS and KURIOS : a strange choice of words?

furuli at online.no furuli at online.no
Sat Sep 13 11:39:13 EDT 2003


Dear Ted,


I looked at the quote from Youtie to which Alex H. refers. It is 
correct that the meaning of the word QEOS had a different meaning for 
Jews and Christians than for the nations, as Youtie writes. However, 
his words about KURIOS contain an important error. There is no 
evidence that  LXX translators substituted YHWH with  KURIOS, as 
Yourie suggests. In all fragments of the LXX (or, LXX-like texts) 
from the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C.E.and from the 1st century C.E. we 
find either  YHWH in Paleo-Hebrew or square Hebrew script, or as the 
Greek phonetic transcription IAW.  Not before the 2nd century C.E.do 
we find something else in the LXX-manuscripts, namely, the nomina 
sacra TS (for QEOS)  and KS (for KURIOS). These abbreviations can 
hardly be original, so at some in time the LXX renderings of the 
tetragrammaton were removed from the manuscripts and substituted with 
KURIOS  or KS. There is evidence that something similar occurred with 
old Syriac translation of the Hebrew text.  As to the NT, we find 
exactly the same nomina sacra, KS and QS, in the oldest NT 
manuscripts from the second century C.E. as in the LXX manuscripts. 
These abbreviations in the NT can neither be original, so a change of 
this part of the NT text must have occurred in the late 1st century 
or early 2nd century C.E. Thus we cannot with certainty know what was 
written in the original NT manuscripts where later manuscripts has KS.

Three lines of argument have been presented in favor of the view that 
KURIOS  occurred as a substitute for YHWH in the NT autographs: 1) No 
NT manuscript has YHWH, 2) The LXX has KURIOS  as a substitute for 
YHWH, and 3) the Jews had long before Christ abandoned the use of 
YHWH and used 'ADOMAY instead.

Line 1) is strong but not compelling, in view of the fact  that there 
are some time between the oldest NT manuscripts and their writing, 
and because we know that some change in connection with the divine 
epithets occurred between the oldest NT manuscripts we have and their 
writing.

Line 2) is wrong,The original LXX did not substitute YHWH with another word.

Line 3) is very problematic for those who are using it. Whereas we 
find the view in lexicons and text-books that the Jews had ceased to 
use and pronounce YHWH in pre-Christian times and substituted it with 
'ADONAY, the evidence for this is meager indeed. The Qumran people 
evidently did not use or pronounce YHWH, but many of their 
manuscripts were imported from other places, and YHWH is found in 
many such manuscripts.  There is evidence that some groups used  the 
name in pre-Christian times and others did not use it. It seems that 
the name was no longer used by the Jews after 70 C.E. when Jerusalem 
was destroyed. But we cannot say with certainty that YHWH was not 
used by some individuals or groups as late as the days of Jesus. The 
substitution of YHWH with KURIOS  in the NT presumes a Hebrew 
antecedent for KURIOS, and this can hardly be anything but 'ADONY. 
The problem is, however, that the Qumran people did not substitute 
YHWH with 'ADONAY, but they substituted it with 'EL (god). There is 
even evidence in the DSS that the writers did *not* pronounce 'ADONAY 
when YHWH was found in the text. As a matter of fact, it is extremely 
difficult to demonstrate that any group of Jews  in pre-Christian 
times had substituted YHWH with 'ADONAY. The substitute we have is 
'EL, and if the writers  of the NT wanted to use a substitute for 
YHWH we would  expect that they uses QEOS (which is the normal 
translation of 'EL) and not KURIOS.

In view of all the evidence which goes contrary to popular opinion, 
it can be profitable to review the hypothesis of George Howard that 
the tetragrammton originally was found in the NT and that KURIOS is a 
later substitution. (See "The Tetragrammaton in the New Testament" in 
"The Anchor Bible Dictionary".


Best regards

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo





>Hello,
>
>This is a post which could easily veer
>off-topic.  I will try to be careful.
>
>If I am correct, the most common names in the
>Greek NT for the OT Deity are QEOS and KURIOS.
>For the most part, the NT neither translates
>nor transliterates the Hebrew names of Deity.
>That is, instead of calling the Deity
>Yahweh, Elohim, Adonai, El Shaddai, etc., or
>"I am that I am", "Almighty God", etc., the
>words QEOS and KURIOS are used.  (Certainly,
>some of the reasons for this go back to the
>LXX, with which I am unfamiliar.)
>
>I find this strange.  The word QEOS seems
>generic -- and this for a God who demands
>exclusivity.  The Greeks had used QEOS for
>centuries without referring to Yahweh.  And
>KURIOS doesn't even require the concept of
>Deity: it's also used where our own English
>would use "boss" or "mister".
>
>Would anyone care to speculate about the
>reasons for these choices of terms?
>
>This topic could easily slide away from a
>linguistic discussion.  If anyone wants to
>comment in a theological or devotional vein, I
>will be happy to read your thoughts.  But
>please send them to me by direct email, and
>keep this list on-topic.
>
>Thank you very much,
>
>Ted Shoemaker
>shoemakerted at yahoo.com
>



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