Pronouncing “Jesus”

Some folks get all bent out of shape about the name Jesus being wrong. Some have gone so far as to fabricate a connection between the names Jesus and Zeus! I have heard that anything starting with a “J ”is wrong; his name must start with a “Y.” Even the “Y” advocates cannot agree among themselves.

• Complete Jewish Bible, Yeshua the Messiah
• Names of God Bible, Yeshua Christ
• Orthodox Jewish Bible, HaMoshiach Yehoshua
• Tree of Life Version, Yeshua ha-Mashiach

The transliteration from the Greek is Iesous. The Greek is pronounced as something like “eeaysoos” or “eeesoos.” This Greek spelling has developed in English as Jesus, influenced by the Latin. Interestingly, even in English, there was a distinction (now mostly lost) between using Jesus (nominative) and Jesu (usually when addressed, vocative). (You can find it is older writings.)

Words that are the same/mean the same thing are said differently in different languages. While the pronunciation changes, the person or thing does not. English speakers call our Messiah Jesus, with a “J” that sounds like “gee.” Spanish speakers call the Messiah Jesus, with a “J” that sounds like “hey.” Both of these are correct. In English the pronunciation gee-sus is correct. In Spanish the pronunciation hey-sues is correct. Same goes for whatever language in which someone is speaking. Bulgarian speakers call him Исус; French speakers call him Jésus; German speakers call him Jesu; Italian speakers call him Gesù; and so forth. All are correct in their own languages. There is one God and one mediator between God and man.

My opinion is that the pronunciation of the Hebrew a transliteration of the Hebrew name יֵשׁוּעַ has no exact equivalent in Greek or English (or most any other language), and in general the debate over “pronouncing Jesus” is a very unnecessary distraction.