The Scripture lists both ‘God’ and ‘LORD’ as two very important deities that rule over humankind. The main difference between ‘God’ and ‘LORD’ is that God represents what is called the Supreme Being, the Creator, or Father of the world. While the word ‘LORD’ is a specific power, force, and or a person on earth having an honorary title that has influence and authority over others on earth and in hell.
The Supreme God in Heaven (universe) being a separate deity would perform his works (power/force) through the LORD of the earth who also worked through humans via knowledge (gnosis), philosophy, good works, and or sins. The LORD is the Almighty One, governing all creatures, guiding all events, commanding all powers both heavenly and earthly, and ruling the whole history of humanity. The LORD was also a supernatural force that worked through matter, animals, and even human bodies to become instruments or tools for God issuing punishments and rewards to people for their good or bad behaviors often called sins.
This power is also called the “LORD of Hosts” who we win favor by maintaining love and justice as it is said in Hosea; “Yes, he struggled with the angel and prevailed; he wept and sought His favor; he found Him at Bethel and spoke with Him there— 5the LORD is the God of Hosts— the LORD is His name of renown. But you must return to your God, maintaining love and justice, and always waiting on your God.”
The “LORD of Hosts” can also make the earth melt, control people’s minds, make war, and bring devastation as we read in Psalm 46:7 – “Nations rage, kingdoms crumble; the earth melts when He lifts His voice. The LORD of Hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress. Selah Come, see the works of the LORD, who brings devastation upon the earth.” The LORD of Hosts has countless angels at his command (2 Kings 6:16, 17; Psalm 68:17; Matthew 26:53). And he is “with us” – on our side, ready to help. The word ‘Hosts’ is variously translated as a mass of persons organized for, war, a campaign.
Throughout the Old Testament, we find the name LORD God also referred to as YAHWEH and JEHOVA working as an instrument of God’s mercy and his vengeance upon the earth. Yahweh, name for the God of the Israelites, represents the biblical pronunciation of “YHWH,” the Hebrew name revealed to Moses in the book of Exodus. The name YHWH, consisting of the sequence of consonants Yod, Heh, Waw, and Heh, is known as the Tetragrammaton.
The word “LORD” is written in all upper case and had the inherent ability to make or mold man into being- “And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.” (KJV, Genesis 2:15) Our LORD could be jealous, vengeful, and also loving and giving – just like we humans of today. YAH or the LORD worked in the prima material i.e., the dust and in the heavens via the winds and human anatomy, with his Prophets/Servants as the executor of God’s judgments. These wise people would become Prophets or speakers for God and saviors to the masses who believed in their knowledge and teachings.
YAWEH aka the LORD, was the ruler of the world and people as Moses emphasized to the Israelites, “The Lord [yhwh] your God [‘eloheykem] is God of gods [‘elohey ha’elohim], and Lord of lords [‘adoney ha’adonim], a great God [ha’el haggadol]” (Deuteronomy 10:17). He was, and still is, the Lord or ruler of his people, who covenant to be loyal to and obey him.
For example, in Nahum, we read the Oracle of Nineveh;
“The LORD is a jealous and avenging God; the LORD is avenging and full of wrath. The LORD takes vengeance on His foes and reserves wrath for His enemies. The LORD is slow to anger and great in power; the LORD will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. His path is in the whirlwind and storm, and clouds are the dust beneath His feet.” (Nahum 1:2) In Samuel 25:26, Abigail swore an oath to David, saying, “Now, therefore, my lord [‘adoni], as the Lord [yhwh] liveth,” and Job declared, “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord [ Jehovah]” ( Job 1:21). And the Psalmist proclaimed, “Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore” (Psalm 113:2; see also Enos 1:1; Alma 7:4; 3 Nephi 11:17).
In the New Testament and with the advent of our LORD Jesus Christ, this concept was personified as the Son of God or his Captain being an earthly representative of these eternal truths. Jesus was not God but his Father who worked through him proving to the Apostles and early Church authorities that he was a de facto Son of God by his words and works. Hence, God created and was in Jesus so he became a God amongst the people and earned the title LORD and his place amongst the Saints.
These humans who are metaphysically connected and honor God’s will would be called his servants, witnesses, and angels in the world like Jesus Christ and John. For example, as we read in Revelation – “The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near.
John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood.”
“Jesus is Lord” (Greek: κύριος Ἰησοῦς, kyrios Iesous) is a statement of faith for Christians who regard Jesus as both fully man and God. As the early Church Father, Polycarp had explained in The Letter of Polycarp to the Philippians – “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” and “our Lord and God Jesus Christ.” Justin called Jesus, a “created angel” who is “other than the God who made all things.” He said Jesus was inferior to God and “never did anything except what the Creator willed him to do and say.” Irenaeus clarifies that “God, the Creator, who formed the world, is the only God, and that there is no other God besides Him.” But that Jesus even though he is a man is also God in the Flesh indicated by the name, Emmanuel (Immanuel) – meaning “God is within man”. Clement of Alexandria said that the Son ‘is next to the only omnipotent Father’ but not equal to him.”
In the prophecies of First Isaiah, an important 8th-century BCE prophet of Judah, we learn that the Apostles through the Tribe of Judah have made a covenant with death, and with hell. Issah had prophecied against the sins of Judah, which strongly resemble the problems of our Modern world – “the rich oppress the poor, the nation squanders its economic resources on military spending, idolatry runs rampant in the land, everyone tries to cheat his fellowman, women flaunt their sexual charms in the streets, and there are many who cannot wait for a strong drink in the morning to get them through the day. One of Isaiah’s castigations warns: “Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right!”
In humans, he worked as an instrument through the mind of the skin or body called the Sarka, and based on a person’s good deeds or evil deeds, could reward or punish us accordingly. This would make sense since YAH represents primordial matter, including the human body, which the modern science of today has already informed us is intelligent and works similarly via our genetics, lives, and our natural immune systems.
This is important for you to understand as it relates to the story of human civilization and the science of earth’s ecology and human biology. The LORD or Yahweh would represent the God of this world who in Christianity is the Devil and is referred to as the “Prince of the World.” The Hebrews (Phoenicians) had called this force Behemoth of the land and Leviathon of the water and the Ancient Greeks Kronus and in Rome, Saturn.
This is why the Biblical prophets had prayed and honored the LORD of their flesh, the Word of God, the world, and hell. They are all metaphysically and permanently connected.
To the Ancient Phoenicians (Hebrews, Canaanites) writing in 12-10 B.C., we find the name of God on the Mesha Stele, which is the oldest known inscription dating to approximately 840 B.C. Since our modern writing systems and computers do not compute the actual Pheoncian letters initially used, I will post an image below showing how they had traditionally written God’s name, which is as such;
The Mesha Stele (840 BCE) is an old Phoenician inscription dated to around 590 B.C. called the Lachish letters (Lachish Ostraca or Hoshaiah Letters) also shows the anciently used letters discovered at the excavations at the Biblical city called Lachish, which is also variously spelled as Laish, Lavish, Lasha, and Leshem. These letters are in reality, the Phoenician script.
In the Scripture, the city is located in the southwest part of Idumea, now called Judah (Joshua 10:3,5,31), which was near Mount Ida on the island of Crete. Lachish was part of the Kingdom of Judah, also known as the Tribe of Judah had originated. An island that was once a Phoenician and Israelite stronghold that today can be found in Greece.
The letters representing God are also commonly known today as the Tetragrammaton. The original Phoenician letters dating from 1100 BC to AD 300), and modern Hebrew scripts.
The Ancient Greeks were the inheritors of the Phoenician empires so they had naturally adopted the Phoenician writing system, further developing the first true alphabet, the various names of Phoenician deities, and their philosophies. The Greek concept of God was represented as matter and form (materia prima) by the words EIAO, IAO, or ΙΑΩ (Iώτα, ιαω, Αλφα, Io or Ia), which was a further interpretation of the Tetragrammaton, or name of God. These were scientific concepts of great importance in Grecian Philosophy that were allegorized and mythicized to occult these teachings from the profane. (1)
The English translation is the first letter of the Hebrew and Greek alphabet being Alpha or Aleph (Α) symbolizes the origin of the primordial substance that created all things in the material universe and the end represented by the Greek omega (Ω). The first and last letters of the traditional (Io-nic) Greek alphabet. From the Greek EIAO, IAO, or ΙΑΩ (Iώτα, ιαω, Αλφα, Io or Ia), different translations are Ya, Yah, Yahweh, Vah, Jah, Jehova, and the LORD (Κύριος, Kyrios) with various similar appellations depending on the language, religion, time in history, and the country. These ideas further developed much later into the modern four-letter Hebrew word יהוה (YHWH), the name of the national God of Israel. The four letters, read from right to left, are yodh, he, waw, and he.
In the Scripture, this philosophy is conveyed via various passages such as we find in Revelation, “I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end;” “saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.” (Revelation 1:8, 21:6, 22:13) And in Isaiah, “Thus says the LORD, the King, and Redeemer of Israel, the LORD of Hosts: “I am the first, and I am the last, and there is no God but Me.” (Isaiah 44:6)
To the Greek stoics, through the power of EIAO – Iώτα Αλφα, Io or Ia or Yah was the bestower of darkness and light, health and sickness, intelligence and ignorance, wealth and poverty, honor and dishonor. Plato had called it the Demiurge that worked through the mind of humans, constantly creating, fabricating, molding, and even destroying our world via the inherent power of matter that they believed possessed a peculiar form of intelligence.
The Supreme Intelligence of the universe has passed through all things, including humans; thus people are given their natural capacity for knowledge could be receptacles and instruments for the LORD. People who can be called “Sons or Prophets of God” can gain intelligence as a force of the universe to act upon the world to form matter to create and destroy – even ourselves. This is where we get the word ‘materialize’ to form matter into being and materialism, which is the doctrine of materialists and Freemasons.
As we read in Exodus 31:1-5; “Then the Lord said to Moses, “See, I have chosen Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, with understanding, with knowledge and with all kinds of skills— to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver, and bronze, to cut and set stones, to work in wood, and to engage in all kinds of crafts.”
From EIAO, YAH, the LORD, or primordial matter, various forms of I.O., IOS, or ION are important or Holy nouns of person, places and or things were named who helped create our world such as ἱερός (hierós, “holy”) + -εια (-EIA) → ἱέρειᾰ (hiéreia, “priestess”) Καῖσᾰρ (Kaîsar, “Caesar”) + -εια (-EIA) → Καισᾰ́ρειᾰ (Kaisáreia, “Caesarea”). And from YAH or JAH, we have many of the Biblical Prophets such as Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the name John ( Ιωάννης, Ioannes, Joannes) as several very important Israelites such as the Apostle John the Baptist – a member of the Sanhedrin to whom God is gracious (1 Chronicles 3:24; Ἰωνᾶ, 2 Kings 25:23; Ἰωάνης, 2 Chronicles 28:12)
Our world is materialized, including humans through this peculiar substance i.e., EIAO, YAH, the LORD that is constantly creating, molding, and even destroying our world via the inherent power of matter that they believed possessed a peculiar form of intelligence. Whether corporeal or incorporeal, it had the ability to create nature, humans and through our minds was constantly creating, molding, and even destroying our world via the inherent power of matter to be molded into something else.
Including our thoughts and words, which not only create our realities, they shape the world around us. In the Scripture, this is emphasized with the passage, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was at the beginning with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.” (John 1-3)
In Greek Mythology, Yahweh aka the LORD or prima material force was personified in the Goddess, IO who the God Zeus loved, but due to the jealousy of Hera, Zeus transformed the maiden into a white heifer. Herodotus (i. l, &c., ii. 41) tells us that Isis was represented like the Greek Io, in the form of a woman, with cows’ horns.
Philostratus had written, “He [the C1st AD philosopher Apollonios of Tyana] reached the ancient city of Ninon [Nineveh in Babylonia], where he found an idol set up of barbarous aspect, and it is, they say, Io, the daughter of Inakhos (Inachus), and horns short and, as it were, budding project from her temple.” (Life of Apollonius of Tyana 1. 19 (trans. Conybeare Greek biography C1st to 2nd A.D.)
In the 10th century A.D., this philosophy was further developed in the Suidas, making IO (Isis) representing the moon;
“Io : A name. Inakhos (Inachus), a king of Argos, founded a city which he named for the moon, Io, for that is what Argives call the moon. He also had a daughter Io; Pekos (Pecus), who is also Zeus abducted her and fathered a daughter, Libya, by her. And Io, lamenting her ruin, fled to the Silicon Mountain and there died. Her father and her brothers, when they learned this, built a shrine to her and called the place Iopolis and remained there until the end. And they performed a ritual in her memory, banging on each other’s doors every year and saying ‘io, io!'” (Suidas s.v. Io (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek lexicon C10th A.D.) :
According to the prophet Haggai who prophecizes; “On that day, says the Lord of Hosts, I will take you Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, my servant, and wear you like a signet ring; for it is you whom I have chosen. This is the word of the Lord of Hosts’” (Hag. 2:23).
“And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive.” (Revelation 2:8)
“When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. But He placed His right hand on me and said, “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last, the Living One. I was dead, and behold, now I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of Death and of Hades. Therefore write down the things you have seen, and the things that are, and the things that will happen after this.” (Revelation 1:8)
SOURCES:
1. Hermes: Or, A Philosophical Inquiry Concerning Universal Grammer by James Harris · 1825 pg 308
2. All other sources can easily be found online or in the Scripture
Moe is the founder of GnosticWarrior.com. He is a father, husband, author, martial arts black belt, and an expert in Gnosticism, the occult, and esotericism.