Grace, Faith & Life

Pulpit Commentary

They shall put my name upon the children of Israel. The “name of God is uniformly treated in Scripture as something very different from a mere arrangement of letters or an arbitrary vocal sound. All nations have bad names for the Supreme Being, but there was nothing sacred about them, except from association. The name of God was not of man, nor from man, but of his own direct revelation (Exodus 6:3), and was therefore of an unspeakable sanctity (Exodus 20:7; Exodus 33:19). Like the “word” of God, it cannot be dissociated from God himself. It is in some sense an extension outwards, into the sphere of the created and sensible, of the ineffable virtues of the Godhead itself. It stands in a real, though un-assignable, relation to infinite goodness and power, and therefore it comes fraught with untold blessing (or perchance cursing) to those on whom it lights. Hence, to put the name of God – the covenant name – upon the people had a real meaning. No one could do it except by his express direction; and when it was so done there was an invisible reality answering to the audible form; with the name pronounced in blessing came the blessing itself, came the special providence and presence of God, to abide upon such at least as were worthy of it. It is a fact, the significance of which cannot be denied, that the name which was commanded to be put upon the people was lost, and irrecoverably lost, by the later Jews. Out of an exaggerated dread of possible profanation, they first disobeyed the command by substituting Adonai for that name outside the sanctuary; and finally, after the death of Simeon the Just, the priests ceased to pronounce that name at all, and therefore lost the tradition by which the pronunciation was fixed. Our method of spelling and pronouncing the name as Jehovah is merely conventional, and almost certainly incorrect. It would seem to be the more devout opinion that the name itself, as revealed by God and uttered by many generations of priests, was forfeited (like Paradise), was withdrawn, and ought not to be inquired after. And I will bless them. Here is the precise truth of all effectual benediction: they shall put my name;… I will bless. The outward form was ministered by the priests, the inward reality was of God and from God alone. It is observable that the form of blessing is expressed in the singular; either

(1) because all Israel was regarded as one, even as the first-born son of God (Exodus 4:22, 23; Hosea 11:1), or

(2) because all real blessing must in truth be individual – a nation can only be blessed in its several members.