Yeshua
[6] The 2004 film The Passion of the Christ, which was made in Aramaic, used Yeshua as the name of Jesus and is the most well-known western Christian work to have done so.
The Late Biblical Hebrew spellings for earlier names often contracted the theophoric element Yeho- to Yo-.
This name is a feature of biblical books written in the post-Exilic period (Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles) and was found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, though Haggai and Zechariah prefer the spelling Joshua.
Strong's Concordance connects the name יֵשׁוּעַ, Yēšūaʿ, in the English form Jeshua (as used in multiple instances in Ezra, Nehemiah, and 1 and 2 Chronicles), with the verb "to deliver" (or, "to rescue").
The name Yehoshua has the form of a compound of "Yeho-" and "shua": Yeho- (יְהוֹ) is another form of יָהו, Yahu, a theophoric element standing for the name of God, יהוה (the Tetragrammaton YHWH, sometimes transcribed into English as Yahweh), and שׁוּעַ, shua' is a noun meaning "a cry for help", "a saving cry",[12][13][14] that is to say, a shout given when in need of rescue.
"Hosheaʿ" certainly comes from the root ישע, yasha, yod-shin-ʿayin (in the Hif'il form the yod becomes a waw), and not from the word שוע, šûaʿ.
The final letter, ayin (ע) is /ʕ/ (a voiced pharyngeal sound not found in Greek or English), sometimes transcribed "ʿ" (Yeshuaʿ).
[24] Qimron describes the general linguistic environment of Hebrew dialects by the time of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
[26] For example, the Dead Sea Scrolls spell the Hebrew word ראוי (/rɔˈʔui̯/, 'seen') variously, recording both pronunciations: reduced ראו ([ro]) and expanded ראואי ([rɔˈuwi]).
In the Septuagint and other Greek-language Jewish texts, such as the writings of Josephus and Philo of Alexandria, Ἰησοῦς (Iēsoûs) is the standard Koine Greek form used to translate both of the Hebrew names: Yehoshua and Yeshua.
The Greek Ἰησοῦς or Iēsoûs is also used to represent the name of Joshua son of Nun in the New Testament passages Acts 7:45 and Hebrews 4:8.
In the post-exilic books, Joshua the son of Nun is called both Yeshua bin-Nun (Nehemiah 8:17) and Yehoshua (1 Chronicles 7:27).
)[29] The earlier form Yehoshua saw revived usage from the Hasmonean period onwards, although the name Yeshua is still found in letters from the time of the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132–135 AD).
An argument in favor of the Hebrew reduced form ישוע, Yeshua, as opposed to Yehoshua, is the Western Syriac language, in which the pronunciation is Yeshuʿ /jeʃuʕ/.
(Scholars typically argue the word "Hebrew" in the New Testament refers to Aramaic;[32] however, others have attempted to refute this view.
Some of the Hebrew sources referencing Yeshu include the Toledot Yeshu, The Book of Nestor the Priest, Jacob ben Reuben's Milhamoth ha-Shem, Sefer Nizzahon Yashan, Sefer Joseph Hamekane, the works of ibn Shaprut, Moses ha-Kohen de Tordesillas, and Hasdai Crescas.
[35] Some of rabbinical sources comment on the reasons for the missing ʿayn from Yeshu, as opposed to the Hebrew Bible Yeshuaʿ and Yehoshuaʿ.
