The Name Above All Names – How Yehoshua the Messiah Became Jesus Christ.

To Whom it may concern…

The question of names in Scripture is not a trivial matter; it is the foundation of identity, authority, and power. A name is never just a label in the Word of God—it is a prophetic declaration. It is a banner that carries the essence, mission, and authority of the one who bears it. To change a name is to change the identity and to strip it of the covenantal weight it carries. When Gabriel appeared to Miriam, known to the western world as Mary, he did not simply assign a random label to the child she would carry. He announced a name with purpose, a name divinely given from the throne of the Father: Yehoshua (historically attested as Yeshua during the Second Temple period), which means “YHWH saves – the Anointed One.” The name itself is a declaration of who He is and what He came to do. But what happens when this name, the Name above all names, is removed from its original context and replaced with something else? What happens when a hollow, Greco-Roman construct is substituted in its place? That is exactly what happened when Yehoshua the Messiah was transformed into the name Jesus Christ, and the consequences are nothing short of catastrophic.

The Original Hebrew Name: Yehoshua (Yeshua)

The name Yehoshua is rich with meaning. It is formed from two components: Yah, the shortened form of YHWH, the eternal covenant name of God, and yasha, which means “to save” or “deliver.” Together they form a declaration of divine action: “YHWH saves.” Embedded within the very syllables of the name is the prophetic reality of who Yehoshua is and what He came to accomplish. It is not merely a title or a way to address Him; it is His identity. In Hebrew, names carry weight because they are more than sounds—they are assignments. When we speak Yehoshua (or Yeshua), we are not only identifying the Messiah; we are declaring the eternal truth that YHWH saves through Him. This is the Name by which every knee will bow and every tongue confess. This is the Name that carries the full covenantal authority of the Father. When the disciples healed the sick, cast out demons, and performed signs and wonders, they did so in this Name, knowing it embodied the power and presence of YHWH Himself.

The Septuagint Translators and the Seeds of Identity Loss

To fully understand how the Name of Yehoshua was altered, we must examine the role of the Septuagint—the first Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. This translation, completed between approximately 250–150 BCE, was commissioned by Ptolemy II Philadelphus in Alexandria, Egypt, as part of his desire to add the sacred texts of the Jews to his famed Library of Alexandria. The translators were Jewish scholars, not Greeks, who according to tradition were selected from each of the twelve tribes of Israel. These men were fluent in both Hebrew and Greek and lived in a world dominated by Greek language and culture. The Septuagint was produced for the Jewish diaspora, most of whom no longer read Hebrew fluently, and it quickly became the most widely used version of the Scriptures for Greek-speaking Jews across the ancient world.

The cultural and spiritual context of these translators is critical to understand. They were Hellenized Jews—Jews who were deeply influenced by Greek culture. Greek was considered the language of sophistication, learning, and civilization, while Hebrew was increasingly viewed as archaic and foreign. Many Jews in the diaspora were far more comfortable speaking and writing in Greek than in their ancestral language, and that cultural reality shaped how these translators approached their work. There was tremendous pressure to make the Scriptures readable and acceptable in Greek, and that meant adapting the language in ways that aligned with Greek norms.

One of the most consequential aspects of the Septuagint translation was the treatment of names, particularly sacred names. Hebrew names were adapted to Greek phonetics because the Greek alphabet lacked key sounds that exist in Hebrew. For example, the Hebrew letter yod (“Y”) became an “I” in Greek because there was no equivalent “Y” sound, the “sh” sound disappeared because Greek did not have it, and endings like “ua” were dropped entirely. This is how the Hebrew name Yehoshua was gradually transformed into the Greek Iēsous (Ἰησοῦς). Similarly, the divine covenant Name YHWH, which the Hebrew people had already stopped pronouncing aloud, was replaced in the Greek text with “Kyrios” (Lord). This practice of substitution, while rooted in reverence, further distanced the text from the original covenantal identity.

Why did the translators make these choices? On one level, it was a matter of linguistic necessity. Greek simply lacked the sounds and letters to fully preserve Hebrew names. But there were deeper issues at play as well. The translators were products of a culture that had normalized compromise and assimilation. They wanted their translation to be readable, acceptable, and even respected by the Greek-speaking world. This desire for cultural acceptance led them to smooth out the very things that made the Hebrew Scriptures distinct. Moreover, their avoidance of the divine Name YHWH reflects how far the people had drifted from their covenantal intimacy with God. By the time the Septuagint was produced, the Name was treated more like a sacred symbol than the living identity of the God who saves.

Perhaps the most striking reality is how impersonal these changes would have felt to the translators themselves. The Messiah had not yet come, so the Name Yehoshua was not tied in their minds to a living person. Changing it felt like adapting a word in a text, not dishonoring a person. They could not yet fathom the prophetic weight embedded in that Name, and so they treated it as something that could be molded to fit the Greek alphabet. In their ignorance, they could not see that by altering the Name they were severing the connection between the Messiah’s identity and His covenantal declaration.

The consequences of these decisions were enormous. The Septuagint became the standard Scriptures for Greek-speaking Jews and later for early Christians. Its Hellenized names and terminology set the precedent for future translations. Once the pattern of adapting Hebrew names into Greek forms was established, later translations into Latin and English followed the same trajectory. What began as an attempt to make the Scriptures accessible to a Hellenized Jewish population laid the groundwork for the Roman Catholic Church to fully rebrand the Messiah’s Name and identity.

The Septuagint translators were not consciously rejecting the Messiah—He had not yet come—but their compromise and cultural assimilation created a spiritual vacuum. Their choices unintentionally stripped the Names of their Hebrew identity and meaning, setting the stage for the greatest identity theft in history. What began as ignorance and practicality became the enemy’s foothold, one that allowed the covenantal power embedded in the Name of Yehoshua to be disconnected from generations of believers who would one day inherit the altered name “Jesus.”

Yehoshua Becomes Iēsous: The Greek Transliterations

The first major alteration of the Name was solidified in the Septuagint’s transliteration: Yehoshua (or its contracted form Yeshua) into the Greek name Iēsous (Ἰησοῦς). Greek lacked several sounds that exist in Hebrew, so the “Y” became “I,” the “sh” sound disappeared, and the “ua” ending was dropped. This name, pronounced “Ee-ay-soos,” carried none of the original meaning of “YHWH saves.” It was a hollowed-out shell, a sound-alike constructed to fit the limitations of Greek phonetics and the cultural goal of assimilation.

Some have noted that Iēsous bore a phonetic resemblance to the name of the supreme god of the Greek pantheon, Zeus, pronounced “Zay-oos” or “Zee-oos.” While mainstream scholarship generally dismisses the idea that the name was deliberately altered to sound like Zeus, the resemblance would have made it sound familiar to the Greek ear and likely less offensive to pagan converts. Whether by intention or by coincidence, the result was the same: the Hebrew identity of the Messiah was lost, and His Name now carried a culturally comfortable sound that stripped away its covenantal meaning.

The Zeus Connection

Because the suffixes “-sus,” “-seus,” and “-sous” were often linked to Zeus in Greco-Roman names, some believe that rendering Yehoshua as Iēsous was a subtle way to merge the Messiah’s identity with the deities of the nations. While this hypothesis cannot be fully proven, it is undeniable that Hellenization often syncretized pagan and Hebrew concepts to make them more acceptable to a wider audience. The alteration of the Name fits this broader pattern of cultural assimilation, even if we cannot definitively state that it was crafted with Zeus in mind. What we can say with certainty is that the Name no longer carried the prophetic declaration “YHWH saves,” and that alone represents a devastating loss.

Latinization: Iēsous Becomes Iesus

As the Roman Empire consolidated its power, Latin became the dominant language of governance and religion. The Greek name Iēsous was carried into Latin as Iesus. The Hebrew “Y” sound was gone entirely. The “sh” sound remained absent, as Latin lacked the sound, and the “ua” ending was never restored. With each linguistic transition, the Name was further separated from its Hebrew roots. By the time the Roman Catholic Church established Latin as the official language of its liturgy, the Name had been entirely transformed into something unrecognizable from the original Yehoshua.

The English Transformation: Jesus

The final transformation of the Name occurred with the development of the English language. The letter “J” did not exist in the English alphabet until the 16th century. Prior to that, the Latin Iesus was still pronounced as “Yay-soos” or “Ee-soos.” Once the letter J was introduced, the Name became Jesus, pronounced with the hard “J” sound familiar to modern English speakers. At this point, the Name no longer bore any resemblance to Yehoshua. It carried no covenantal meaning, no prophetic declaration, and no direct connection to YHWH. It was a Greco-Roman construct, solidified by the institutional dominance of the Roman Catholic Church and spread to every corner of the world through colonization and religious indoctrination.

What Was Lost in Translation

The loss of the true Name is not a minor detail; it is a spiritual crisis. The Hebrew Name Yehoshua carried not only meaning but also power. In Hebrew thought, to act “in someone’s name” is not a casual invocation; it is to declare and demonstrate that person’s presence, authority, and identity through your being. It means to step into the fullness of who they are, to let them move through you as if they were physically present, and to manifest their will in the earth. When the early disciples healed the sick and cast out demons “in the Name,” they were not reciting a formula. They were embodying the presence of Yehoshua Himself.

To declare in His Name is to speak as if He is speaking. To demonstrate in His Name is to manifest His power and authority as if He is acting through you. To function in His Name is to occupy time and space as Him, while simultaneously being seated with Him in the heavenly places. The most vivid way to understand this is through the analogy of a mech suit. Imagine the Name of Yehoshua as a supernaturally advanced suit of armor. When you step into it, you and the suit become one. It functions through you as you function through it. You move as Him, and He moves as you. This is what it means to act in the Name of Yehoshua.

But when the Name was stripped of its covenantal identity and prophetic declaration, the mech suit was taken away. Institutional Christianity, birthed from the Roman Catholic Church, left people holding a powerless shell. They speak a name disconnected from the true Person and authority of YHWH. This is why modern Christianity is largely powerless. Without the true Name, there is no true embodiment, no real declaration, and no genuine manifestation of the Kingdom. The religious system may appear godly, but it denies the power thereof because it functions outside the true authority of Yehoshua the Messiah.

Why This Matters: The Power of the Name

Scripture declares that at the Name every knee will bow and every tongue confess. This is not poetic language; it is the spiritual reality that the Name of Yehoshua carries. Names in Hebrew are not arbitrary. They carry function, authority, and prophetic fulfillment. The Name Yehoshua is not simply how we address Him; it is His mission. It is who He is. When Rome rebranded the Messiah and replaced His Name, they did more than change a word. They severed the connection between the Messiah and His covenantal identity, creating a religion that could look godly but was devoid of the true power of the Kingdom. This is why the Name matters. It is not about legalism or phonetics; it is about identity and authority. If the Name is hollow, the faith becomes hollow.

Returning to the Name Above All Names

The time has come for the people of YHWH to return to the true Name of the Messiah. This is not about abandoning language or obsessing over syllables; it is about reconnecting to the identity, authority, and prophetic declaration embedded in Yehoshua. When we call on Him by the Name the Father gave Him, we are reestablishing the covenant connection that was severed by institutional corruption. We are stepping back into the mech suit of His authority. We are declaring and demonstrating His presence in the earth. We are undoctrinating ourselves from the powerless religion that Rome built and returning to the Kingdom reality that Yehoshua inaugurated.

The consequences of this are eternal. When the true Name is restored, so is the power. The sick are healed, the oppressed are set free, and the Kingdom of YHWH advances through the lives of those who embody the Messiah. But as long as we cling to a hollow name that was engineered to be palatable to the pagan world, we will remain powerless, deceived, and complicit in the very system that stripped the Name of its power in the first place. The call is clear: return to Yehoshua the Messiah, the Name above all names. Step into the mech suit. Allow Him to function through you as you function through Him. Reconnect to the identity and the mission embedded in the Name the Father Himself gave. Anything less is religion without power, and time is far too short for empty religion.