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The triple Benediction of the O.T.
"The Lord bless thee, and keep thee;
The Lord make His face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace" (Numb. 6: 24-26).
The triple Benediction of the N.T.
"The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and
The love of God, and
The communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all, Amen" (II Cor. 13: 14).
To which may be added the triple baptismal formula:
"In the name of the Father,
And of the Son,
And of the Holy Ghost" (Matt. 18: 19).
And the triple ascription of praise given by the Seraphim as they cover their faces and
feet:
"Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of Hosts" (Isa. 6: 3).
If the `Jesus' of the N.T. be the `Jehovah' of the O.T., then of necessity the other
attributes and offices which particularly inhere in the Person of the Son of God cannot be
removed, and should not be divorced from the Lord of the O.T., the God of Israel. While
it is most certainly true that in the fullness of time He was born of a woman, and it is
most certainly true that the Jehovah of the O.T. is the Creator as well as the Redeemer of
Israel, these apparently contradictory attributes are reconciled in the "Mystery of
Godliness" where God was manifest in the flesh.
"Out of extreme (but mistaken) reverence for the ineffable Name `Jehovah' the
ancient custodians of the Sacred Text substituted in many places `Adonai'. These in the
A.V. and R.V are all printed `Lord'. In all these places we have printed it `LORD'
marking the word with an asterisk in addition to the note in the margin, to inform the
reader of the fact" (The Companion Bible, Appendix 32).
The Massorah contains 134 references where the name `Jehovah' is altered to
`Adonai'. In some of these places the reason for this alteration is not obvious, but in the
majority one can perceive a sensitiveness for the name of God, a desire to protect Him
from anything that would approach familiarity or use terms that are far too human to be
safely allowed in the sacred Scriptures of the Hebrews. "Extreme but mistaken
reverence" may put out its hand `to stay the ark of God' with disastrous consequences.
The first of the emendations occurs in Gen. 18: 3 where Abraham actually said
`My Lord', using the name `Jehovah'. In ten or eleven passages, the Sopherim have
altered `My Jehovah' to `My Adonai' evidently fearing to allow this approach to the
Most High God to become current. In Gen. 18: 32 we have another illustration of
their sensitiveness for the honour of His name, which led them not to scruple at altering
the inspired words of Holy Writ. The A.V. reads `but Abraham stood yet before the