Elohim

Five pictures in the name of the creator

Teaching and Understanding the Paleo-Hebrew

Document 4 of 11

 

The first sentence of the Torah names the one who creates. Bereshit bara Elohim, in beginning created Elohim. The English tradition translates Elohim as God. One word. Simple. Settled. Nothing to examine.

But Elohim is five letters. In the Paleo-Hebrew script, five pictures. And the five pictures declare something that the single English word God does not carry and was never designed to carry.

We read the five pictures. In the order they appear. What the pictures show is what they show. Nothing added. Nothing imposed. The drawing speaking directly.

 

The Five Pictures

א  Aleph  —  Ox Head — Strength, The First, The Strong One

The first picture in the name Elohim is the ox head, strength, the one who is first, the strong one who leads. The same Aleph that begins the alphabet. The same Aleph Yeshua declared himself to be in Revelation 1:8. The creator named first by the picture of the one who is strongest, who is first, who leads.

 

ל  Lamed  —  Staff or Goad — To Teach, Authority, Toward

The second picture is the staff, the shepherd’s crook, the teacher’s rod, the instrument of guidance and authority. Lamed carries the meaning of to teach, of authority, of movement toward a destination. The strong one who teaches. The authority that guides toward. The second picture in the name of the creator.

 

ה  Heh  —  Man with Arms Raised — Behold, Look, Reveal

The third picture is the man with arms raised, behold, look, pay attention, something is being revealed. The same Heh YHWH placed in Avraham’s name and in Sarah’s name from his own divine name. The command to look. The strong teacher, behold. Something is being shown.

 

י  Yod  —  Hand or Arm — Work, Make, Act

The fourth picture is the hand, the acting, creating, reaching, making presence. The same Yod that is the first letter of the divine name YHWH. The smallest letter Yeshua declared would not pass from the Torah. The hand of the strong teacher who reveals, present in the name of the creator in the act of creation.

 

מ  Mem  —  Water — Chaos, The Many, What is Below, The Mighty

The fifth picture is water, the chaos, the mighty, the many, what exists below. The waters over which the Ruach hovered in the second verse of the Torah. The condition into which the creator speaks and creates. The strong teaching authority who reveals his hand, over the waters. Over the chaos. Over the many.

 

What the Pictures Together Show

Five pictures. Read in sequence as Moshe drew them.

The strong one. Who teaches. Behold. The hand. Over the waters.

Not a philosophical concept of deity requiring centuries of theological definition. Not a plurality requiring grammatical explanation. Five pictures declaring the identity of the one who creates in the act of creation. The strong one whose authority teaches and guides. Who says behold, look at this. Whose hand is present and active. Over the chaos, over the many, over the waters that will be spoken into order by the word that follows.

The hand of Elohim, the Yod in the fourth position of the name, is the same Yod that is the first letter of the divine name YHWH. The hand declared in the name used for the creator in the act of creation is the same hand declared in the identity of YHWH. The same picture. The same identity. In two different names for the same one.

And the Heh in the third position of Elohim, behold, look, reveal, is the same Heh that appears twice in the name YHWH. The same behold. The command to look that YHWH placed in his own name is present in the name Elohim. The strong teaching authority says behold, and the behold is the behold of the divine name. The same one.

The hand in Elohim is the Yod of YHWH. The behold in Elohim is the Heh of YHWH. The same pictures. In both names. The creator and the covenant name are declaring the same identity through the same pictures. One YHWH. In the act of creation.

 

What the Tradition Did with Elohim

The institutional tradition looked at Elohim and saw a grammatical puzzle. The word ends in im, the masculine plural suffix in Hebrew. El is singular. Elohim is plural. A singular God referred to by a plural name. The tradition developed several explanations. The plural of majesty, the royal we, used by sovereigns of themselves. The hint of the Trinity, one God in three persons, the plurality of the name pointing toward the three-person nature of the deity. The council of divine beings, Elohim as the heavenly court.

Each of these explanations is built on the grammatical observation that Elohim is plural in form. The grammar is real. The plurality is real. But the institutional explanations read the grammar and stop there, they do not read the pictures that the letters contain.

The pictures do not show a grammatical plurality requiring theological explanation. The pictures show the strong teaching authority who reveals his hand over the waters. One sequence. One declaration. Five pictures of the same acting presence, the strength, the authority, the behold, the hand, the chaos being ordered. The plurality of the form contains a singular unified declaration of the one who creates.

The tradition walked around the pictures and explained the grammar. We walk through to the pictures. The pictures are not a grammatical puzzle. They are a declaration. The strong one who teaches, behold the hand, over the waters.

The tradition explained the grammar of Elohim for two thousand years. The pictures in the letters of Elohim have been showing the identity of the creator for three thousand years. The grammar requires explanation. The pictures speak directly.

 

Elohim and YHWH

One Identity

The first sentence of the Torah uses Elohim for the creator. The divine name YHWH does not appear until Genesis 2:4, these are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that YHWH Elohim made the earth and the heavens. YHWH Elohim. The covenant name and the creator name together. The same one.

But the pictures in Elohim already carry the Yod and the Heh of YHWH. The hand and the behold. The identity declarations of the divine name are present in the creator name before the divine name is named. Moshe drew the pictures of YHWH’s identity into the name Elohim before he introduced the name YHWH. The strong one who teaches, behold the hand, over the waters. The hand and the behold of the name that would be formally introduced in the next chapter already present in the name used in the first sentence.

One identity. Declared in both names. Through the same pictures. The strong teaching authority who reveals his hand over the chaos, creating, ordering, speaking into existence the heavens and the earth, is the same one whose name is behold the hand, behold the nail. YHWH Elohim. The covenant name and the creator name as the same declaration in two forms.

 

Elohim, the strong one, who teaches, behold, the hand, over the waters. The hand of Elohim is the Yod of YHWH. The behold of Elohim is the Heh of YHWH. One identity. In the act of creation. In five pictures.

 

 

א  ל  ה  י  מ

 

Aleph — The strong one.

Lamed — Who teaches.

Heh — Behold.

Yod — The hand.

Mem — Over the waters.

 

The hand of Elohim is the Yod of YHWH.

The behold of Elohim is the Heh of YHWH.

 

One identity.

In beginning.

 

The Gospel Revolution  •  Mike Williams Ministries

William Ethan Massengill  •  Michael Lilborn Williams  •  Daniel Thomas Rouse

Published by Audrey Williams