Thinking to Believe

The English name “Jesus” is an English transliteration of the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew name of our savior, Yeshua.  Yeshua is an updated form of the old Hebrew name, Yehoshua, transliterated into English as “Joshua.”  That’s right, Jesus’ and Joshua had the same name, and thus Jesus’ name could rightly be pronounced “Joshua” in English!  This is made clear in the Greek New Testament in which the name of Joshua the son of Nun and the name of Jesus of Nazareth are both “Iesous.” 

Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness, as he had appointed, speaking unto Moses, that he should make it according to the fashion that he had seen. 45 Which also our fathers that came after brought in with Jesus into the possession of the Gentiles, whom God drave out before the face of our fathers, unto the days of David (Acts 7:44-45, KJV) 

For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day. (Heb 4:8, KJV)

Most translations other than the KJV translate Iesous as “Joshua” in these verses since they are clearly referring to Joshua the son of Nun who succeeded Moses and led the children of Israel into the Promised Land.  I used to use these verses as examples of poor translation on the part of the KJV translators since it was clearly Joshua and not Jesus who led the children of Israel into the Promised Land, but truth be told the KJV translators were not only accurately translating the Greek, they were doing so in a more consistent manner than most modern translators since they translated every occurrence of Iesous as “Jesus” even when it referred to someone other than our savior. 

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I am feeling prophetic today.  Let me make a prediction about the direction of the music industry and music downloading.  The price to download a single track will triple from $1 to $3 within two years, but the price to download an entire album will remain at ~$13.  Why?  Too many people are downloading singles rather than entire albums, and there is not enough revenue coming in for the record companies and recording artists.  Having a higher price for singles will not only create more revenue than today, but it will also provide a good incentive to spend a few more dollars and purchase the entire album.  Watch and see!