Peshitta Forum

Hello I was wondering if anyone could tell me what the peshitta icon means? It??s history is and where it comes from? Best regards styrmirh

Do you mean the peshitta.org logo or what exactly?

shlama,

Dean

yes I mean the peshitta.org icon, I think it looks very nice and I??m interested in finding out more about what it means, in what language it is written, what the history is behind it etc. the more information the better, thank you

Hi styrmirh,

The Aramaic letters in this website's logo are called the "Yudh-Heh", the Aramaic letters "Y" and "H", which form the historical shortened form of the Name of God (YHWH).

Words with which you may be familiar that also contain this shortened form of the Name of God include "Hallelujah" (Praise Yah), "Isaiah" (Yah saves), "Jeremiah" (Yah has appointed), "Elijah" (My God is Yah), etc.

The shortened form actually occurs in scripture (in Psalm 63:4, 68:4, 89:8, Isa. 12:2, Isa. 26:4, etc).

In Church of the East history, this symbol was placed on holy texts such as the scriptures and other material (i.e., liturgical texts, hymnals, etc) in order to warn the reader to treat the text with care and reverence. It is also typically found in the sanctuary of the churches, as in the below pictures.

The first picture is the Patriarch of the Church of the East (Mar Dinkha) consecrating the sanctuary of a parish in Los Angeles. Notice the symbol not only on top of the Peshitta copy in front of him, but also within the center of the Cross.



The picture below is one of our parishes in India. Notice the logo on top of the sanctuary area.

Ok I see, does the name have any relevance to the name of Jesus since you also use a cross with the letters "Y" and "H"? What is the Church of the East history? And in what denomination is this icon/letters used? Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions

Hello,

styrmirh Wrote:Ok I see, does the name have any relevance to the name of Jesus since you also use a cross with the letters "Y" and "H"?

The name Jesus is the same as the English Joshua (from Hebrew, "Yeshua") and means "Yah is Salvation", so in that sense Jesus' name has the shortened form of God's Name as well.

styrmirh Wrote:What is the Church of the East history?

The Church of the East is a nearly 2,000-year old denomination that is not in communion with any other branch of Christianity. The Church of the East began with Apostolic missions to Babylon (1Peter 5:13) outside of the Roman empire, in Persian territory. In Babylon, there was a very large population of Jews who never returned to the Holy Land when Cyrus released them from captivity....they chose to remain in Babylon, and from that community you have things like the Babylonian Talmud, etc.

It was to that very large Jewish community that Peter went to preach the Gospel (again, 1Peter 5:13) and it was from that starting point that the Church of the East grew to be, by the 11th century, the largest Christian denomination of its day. It stretched from Cyprus to Japan and covered the whole of Asia.

It retained a distinctive Semitic, Aramaic-based culture as opposed to the Church of the West (Roman empire) which took on a Hellenistic culture. We have retained and still speak Aramaic today....the language of Jesus and the apostles.

styrmirh Wrote:And in what denomination is this icon/letters used? Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions

Just in the Church of the East.

Take care.