Just for kicks, I'll post this excerpt from de Purucker's
Encyclopedic Theosophcial Glossary:Jehovah yehowah (Hebrew) In the Bible, the god of the Hebrews; a modern mispronunciation of the Hebrew alphabetic characters, resulting from the combining by the Jews themselves of the Hebrew consonants of this word (YHVH) with the vowels of the word Adonai (my lords) because the Jews, while always writing or copying the alphabetic characters of the name correctly in their manuscripts, when reading it never pronounced the word YHVH, but read "Adonai" in its stead -- writing the Massoretic points of Adonai to vocalize YHVH to produce Yahovah. Consequently when the Bible came to be studied by those unfamiliar with the real pronunciation of YHVH, it was read in various ways, commonly as Jehovah. It is now held by some scholars that YHVH should be pronounced yahweh or yave. It is also given as Yihweh (he will be, or it will be) (SD 2:129). However, Josephus, a priest who undoubtedly knew the correct pronunciation, wrote that it would be highly unlawful for him to divulge it as the Jews regarded it as too holy to pronounce aloud.
Blavatsky writes that the rendering Ja-ho-vah is "a perversion of the Holy Name": that the majority of the Jews themselves were ignorant of the true pronunciation. "Alone, out of all their nation the high priests had it in their possession, and respectively passed it to their successors," before their death. "Once a year only, on the day of atonement, the high priest was allowed to pronounce it in a whisper" (IU 2:398-9).
The Hebrews were not the only ones who knew of and revered a divinity whose name when written was conveyed by vowels mainly, as for instance the Gnostic Iao, Ieuo, or Iaou. All these ancient peoples by these vowel-words desired to express the fluid life-giving energy of the globe, of the moon, and of the planetary source -- in this case, Saturn.
The early Christian Fathers connected the moon and its functions with Jehovah -- as the proximate but not causal "giver of life and death." Moreover "With the Israelites, the chief function of Jehovah was child-giving, and the esotericism of the Bible, interpreted Kabalistically, shows undeniably the Holy of Holies in the temple to be only the symbol of the womb. . . . This idea must certainly have been borrowed by the Jews from the Egyptians and Indians . . ." (SD 1:264). Jehovah is likewise identified with the serpent or dragon that tempted Eve, the dragon often standing for the primordial principle.
In the Qabbalah, Jehovah is regarded as hermaphrodite and connected with the female Sephirah Binah. The Qabbalists show the word to be "composed of the two-fold name of the first androgyne -- Adam and Eve, Jod (or Yodh), Vau and He-Va -- the female serpent as a symbol of Divine Intelligence proceeding from the One-Generative or Creative Spirit" (IU 2:398).
From the standpoint of the Jews, Jehovah was their patron deity, the regent of the planet Saturn.
Notice that Saturn is mentioned twice, and in this last reference the phrase is
"regent of the the planet Saturn." We know that in fact,
every planet has its
regent ... and THESE are the Creative ELOHIM, most certainly and obviously PLURAL.
Regent [from Latin regens ruling] Ruler, rector; the divine-spiritual-intellectual ruler or cosmic spirit of any cosmic entity. Equivalent to the 'elohim, kabiri, rays of the Logos, the four Maharajas, the genii of the seven sacred planets, of the twelve zodiacal constellations, or of stars, worlds, etc. (Ibid)
And for clarity's sake, here are de Purucker's entries on
`Elohim' and on
`Adonai,' and a few other related terms:
Elohim 'elohim (Hebrew) [from 'eloah goddess + im masculine plural ending] The monotheistic proclivities, not only of the Jews but of Christian translators, have led to this word always being translated as God; yet the word itself is a plural form, nor is it in any sense necessarily a plural of majesty, as suggested by some monotheistic scholars. A correct rendering should denote both masculine and feminine characteristics, such as androgyne divinities.
In spite of the ideas imbodied in the word itself, the later development of Judaism caused 'elohim to be almost entirely translated in paraphrase as the "one true God"; but in earlier times 'elohim (or rather benei 'elohim or benei 'elim -- sons of gods, members of the classes of divine beings) meant spiritual beings or cosmic spirits of differing hierarchical grades: a collective class of cosmic spirits among whom is found the familiar Jewish Yahweh or Jehovah. Thus, strictly speaking and as viewed in the original Qabbalah, the 'elohim meant the angelic hierarchies of many varying grades of spirituality or ethereality; and in cosmogonic or astrological matters, the 'elohim were often mentally aggregated under the generalized term tseba'oth [fem pl from the verbal root tsaba' a host, an army] as in the expression "host of heaven."
In the Jewish Qabbalah the 'elohim, however, are the sixth hierarchical group in derivation from the first or Crown, Kether: [as Bruce already pointed out] cosmogonically they represent the manifested formers or weavers of the cosmos. In this Qabbalistic system, Jehovah was the third angelic potency (counting from the first, Kether).
The opening words of the Bible refer directly to the activities of the 'elohim, for this is the sole divine name mentioned in Genesis 1:1-2. De Purucker translates these verses from the original Hebrew as: "In a host (or multitude), the gods (Elohim) formed themselves into the heavens and the earth. And the earth became ethereal. And darkness upon the face of the ethers. And the ruah (the spirit-soul) of the gods (of Elohim) fluttered or hovered, brooding" (cf Fund 99-100). He goes on to say that "we see that the Elohim evolved man, humanity, out of themselves, and told them to become, then to enter into and inform these other creatures. Indeed, these sons of the Elohim are, in our teachings, the children of light, the sons of light, which are we ourselves, and yet different from ourselves, because higher, yet they are our own very selves inwardly. In fact, the Elohim, became, evolved into, their own offspring, remaining in a sense still always the inspiring light within, or rather above . . . the Elohim projected themselves into the nascent forms of the then 'humanity,' which thenceforward were 'men,' however imperfect their development still was" (Fund 101-2).
Eloaeos (Gnostic) The spiritual genius of the planet Jupiter; one of the seven stellar or planetary spirits of the Egyptian and other Gnostics, who together form the second or inferior hebdomad. See also ASTAPHAI
Hebdomad [from Greek hebdomas a group of seven] A group of seven, a septenary; a period of seven days, or seven years, etc., as in Sabbatical periods.
Astaphai, Astaphoi (Gnostic) [from Greek astaphaios] With the Egyptian Gnostics, the genius of the planet Mercury, corresponding to the Egyptian Thoth and the Greek Hermes.
Adonai 'adonai (Hebrew) [from 'adon lord] My Lords; through usage, Lord, a plural of excellence. Originally a sort of appeal or prayer to the hierarchical spiritual powers of the earth planetary chain, and more particularly of the planetary spirit of the earth itself; later it became a mere substitute for the unutterable name of God, usually for Tetragrammaton (YHVH).
"As the inner nature of YHVH is hidden; therefore He (YHVH) is only named with the Name of the Shekhinah, Adonai, i.e., Lord; therefore the Rabbins say (of the name YHVH); Not as I am written (i.e., YHVH) am I read. In this world My Name is written YHVH and read Adonai, but in the world to come, the same will be read as it is written, so that Mercy (represented by YHVH) shall be from all sides" (Zohar iii 320a). Adonai is rendered Lord in the Bible, although it means "my Lords"; whereas 'elohim is translated God in the English Authorized Version.
In the Sephirothal scheme, the Divine Name of the Sephirah of Malchuth was 'Adonai. The Gnostics taught that Iurbo and Adonai were names of Iao-Jehovah, who is an emanation of Ilda Baoth. According to Origen the Gnostics considered Adonai the genius of the sun. Blavatsky writes: "Both Aidoneus and Dionysius [Dionysus] are the bases of Adonai, or 'Jurbo Adonai,' as Jehovah is called in Codex Nazaraeus. . . . Baal-Adonis of the sods or Mysteries of the pre-Babylonian Jews became the Adonai by the Massorah, the later-vowelled Jehovah" (SD 1:463). See also 'ADON; IAO; JEHOVAH
Adon 'adon (Hebrew) plural 'adonim [from 'adan to fix, determine] Commander, lord, master, ruler; "The Adonim and Adonai . . . which the Jews applied to their Jehovah and angels . . . were simply the first spiritual and ethereal sons of the earth; and the god Adonis, who in his many variations stood for the 'First Lord' " (SD 2:452).
I mean, I know this is not all printed up in the form of a nice color pocket-sized leaflet, ready for handing out during door-to-doors ... but come on, I can play cut'n'paste just as well as our resident Jehovah's Witness,
et al - meanwhile witnessing
the other Six of Them, as well. 