10. Yod | Paleo Hebrew Alphabet | Night and Day, Writing on the Wall, Prophets’ Names, and more
Belshazzar’s last feast in Babylon, Daniel in the lion’s den, how the word “night” reminds us that GOD never sleeps, and YASHUA, the salvation of GOD.
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Timestamps:
0:00 Meanings of the letter Yod and word Yad
1:18 Famous Yad stories in the Bible
1:52 The Writing on The Wall
3:06 Paleo Hebrew and the Wise Men of Babylon
4:40 Daniel saved from lions
5:15 Salvation (“YASHA”) is in the prophets’ names
6:11 Jacob with a Y
7:01 YASHUA is JESUS
7:24 Day and Night (Yom & Layilah)
9:19 How Yod is used to mean “my” in Hebrew
11:04 Yad challenge
12:10 Song: “I Will Cast My Cares”
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Transcript:
Dawson: Today’s episode is about the letter yod and it’s a picture of a hand with an arm attached. In Hebrew, the letter yod is often used to add a sense of doing something, the same way that you use your hand and arm to do things.
Whether we’re talking about Hebrew or English, the hand is very versatile. In English we use words like “handiwork” and “handcrafted” to speak of things that people do or make. When something is put into your hands, it often means you’re in charge of it.
The phrase “long arm of the law” is an English phrase that speaks about authority and in the Bible when people doubt Father’s ability to get something done, HE often uses the phrase “His arm is not too short” or “His hand is not too short to accomplish the job”.
All of these things are the meanings of the letter yod and they’re also the meanings of the word “yad” which is the Hebrew word for hand. So yod is the letter and yad is the word. Both mean hand and the spelling is identical.
The word “hand” appears an astonishing 1600 times in the bible and there are two very famous stories with the yod that appear in the Book of Daniel, taking place in Babylon. The first is a story that you may be familiar with as the writing on the wall. It speaks about a Babylonian king who dishonored THE LORD by taking vessels that were designed for use in Father’s house and using them for a party where he honored the false gods and he was quickly shown whose hand was the ultimate authority in the land.
There is one interesting and purely speculative note about the writing on the wall and that is that it says no one could read the writing except for Daniel. Not even the king’s wise men could read it.
Now it’s very likely that the king’s wise men included educated people and skilled professionals from all throughout the empire. That was Babylon’s custom to bring such people into the capital city to serve the king. That’s how Daniel himself ended up in Babylon when Judah was conquered. So, it’s very likely that some or all of these wise men were familiar with the writing systems and the alphabets of the day and that would have included these modern Hebrew characters that many people know as Paleo-Hebrew.
The modern Hebrew of the time was nearly identical to the Phoenician alphabet and the Phoenician alphabet had already made its way around the world through trade. So, if the writing on the wall had looked anything like these characters, somebody in the room should have been able to attempt a reading, especially since there was such a huge prize involved, but nobody could. Only Daniel could. So, there is at least a slim possibility that Father used the original Hebrew letters to convey the message to Daniel and ultimately to Belshazzar and the Babylonian empire.
[Music]
Lisa: What’s that?
Dawson: [The name] Yashua.
Lisa: That’s Yashua?
Dawson: Yeah.
Lisa: Oh, wow,
Dawson: That’s Yashua. Yeah.
Lisa: Beautiful.
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Dawson: Over the centuries, the Hebrew letter yod turned into the English letters “I” and “J”. You may have noticed earlier (in the video) that the name of the prophet Isaiah actually started with a yod and it’s common in the Bible that names beginning with the letter yod are transliterated in English as beginning with an I or a J. In addition to Isaiah, there’s also Jacob whose name in Hebrew is Yaaqob and the prophet Jeremiah whose Hebrew name is Yirmeyah or Yirmeyahu.
Here’s a picture of the land of Israel and the city Jerusalem with their Hebrew names. The Hebrew yod turning into the English I and J should help explain some of the reason why most English speakers today refer to Yashua as Jesus. There’s a bit more to that story but it’s probably a better study for a series called Original Greek rather than Original Hebrew.
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We got paleo?
Carlos: We got Adam was here. Look. There’s ancient writing if you look for it. Yod, mem.
Dawson: At the very beginning of Father’s work in creating the heavens and the earth, it’s written that His spirit was hovering over the waters and HE separated the light from the darkness and called the light yom. That’s the Hebrew word for day.
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(Video showing the word layilah on the sand)
Carlos: Layilah.
Dawson: Layilah.
Carlos: Yeah.
Dawson: So you were talking about the word yom and how the yom has the yod in it which is the letter for work which makes perfect sense because you work in the day and I asked you why is there a yod in night (layilah).
Carlos: Well, it’s to help you at night. To guard you at night. HE takes care of you at night. HE shepherds you at night because you turn off all your senses and trusting yourself to just anything out there.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: This is layilah.
Dawson: So, the Shepherd works.
Carlos: The Shepherd works.
Dawson: The Shepherd watches.
Carlos: The Shepherd watches.
Dawson: Father never sleeps.
Carlos: Shamar, layilah. Open all night. Open all layilah.
[Music]
Dawson: Hebrew has a few letters that are added to the beginning of words and the end of words as prefixes and suffixes and keeping a list of these is very handy if you are studying Biblical Hebrew. So, we will put up a little chart on screen and as we go along, we will build it out so that you have the full list.
Let’s go through the ones that we’ve already learned. The beyt is added to the beginning of words as a prefix to mean “in”. The example for this would be bereshit, in the beginning.
The letter hey is added at the beginning of words also as a prefix to mean “the”. One example would be “haderek” is the way. And there’s also vav, another prefix which is added at the beginning of words to mean “and,” “thus,” “therefore” and other connecting words like that.
So that brings us to yod, which is actually a suffix and it’s added to the end of words to mean “me” or “mine.” This use of the letter yod is one of the reasons yod is the most common letter in the Scriptures.
As an example, the Hebrew word for father is “av”. My father in Hebrew is “avi”. It’s father with a yod at the end. GOD is “EL”. My GOD is “ELI”. The word for love or loved one is “ohav”. My loved one is “ohavi” and this is what Father called Abraham, ohavi. It gets translated to us as “my friend.”
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[Yad Challenge Game]
Dawson: OK. Sixty seconds.
Lisa: OK.
Dawson: Any word or phrase in English that uses the word hand or arm. Go.
Lisa: OK. So we’ve got hand-me-down, hands off, give me a hand.
Dawson: Right hand.
Lisa: Handy, handyman. Lend me a hand.
Dawson: Handiwork.
Lisa: Handful, hands up.
Dawson: Hands up [laughter]
Lisa: Handy wipe, handwritten.
Dawson: Handwritten. Handwriting.
Lisa: Handwriting, yeah.
Dawson: Hands-free.
Lisa: Oh, hands-free, good one.
Dawson: Any more? Well, let’s give ourselves… a hand.
Lisa: Yay!
Dawson: We did a good job.
Lisa: We did a good job.
[Applause]
Dawson: And with that, I think our work on this episode is done. Next time we will take a look at the other hand in Hebrew, the kaf, the one that covers. See you guys.
[Music]
[End of transcript]
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