Lexicon

H1961 - hayah

Strong's: H1961 · BLB lookup Pronunciation: haw-yaw' Part of speech: verb (primitive root)

Semantic range (Brown-Driver-Briggs)

The lexicon notes hayah is "always emphatic, and not a mere copula or auxiliary", a critical point. Where many languages use "to be" as a thin grammatical link between subject and predicate, biblical Hebrew uses hayah with stronger force.

To exist, to be in existence, actual being, existence.
To come to pass, happen, occur, eventfulness; "and it came to pass" (wayyehi).
To become, transition into a new state.
To be (copula), joining subject to predicate, but with implicit weight.
To be done, accomplished, finished, completion sense.

Theological force, the divine name

The decisive theological use: in Exodus 3.14 God identifies Himself to Moses as

אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה, ehyeh asher ehyeh "I AM WHO I AM" / "I will be what I will be" / "I shall be that I shall be"

Ehyeh is the qal first-person imperfect of hayah. God then commands Moses: "thus shall you say to the sons of Israel, ehyeh has sent me to you" (Exodus 3:14b). One verse later, the divine name is given in third-person form:

YHWH (יהוה), H3068 - YHWH

This is the standard etymology: YHWH is the (presumed) third-person imperfect form of hayah, "He is / He will be / He causes to be", derived from the same root as the ehyeh of God's self-disclosure. The divine name itself encodes God's self-existence, eternal being, and covenant fidelity.

The translation choice matters:

"I AM" (KJV, NASB95, ESV), emphasizes timeless self-existence, eternality (the patristic / classical metaphysical reading).
"I WILL BE" (some Jewish translations, NRSV margin), emphasizes covenantal presence, "I will be there as I will be there" (Buber, Rosenzweig). The Hebrew imperfect can carry both senses.
"I AM CAUSING TO BE" (a minority Hiphil reading, seldom defended), would make YHWH "the One who causes to be," the Creator. Linguistically strained.

The classical Christian reading marries both: God's name means He is self-existent (aseity) and covenantally present.

Notable verses

Existence / being

Exodus 3.14, ehyeh asher ehyeh, the supreme self-identification
Genesis 1:3, yehi or wayehi or, "Let there be light, and there was light"
Genesis 1:6, 14, 15, repeated yehi / hayah across the creation account
Deuteronomy 32:39, "I am He" (paralleled by Christ's egō eimi sayings in John)
Isaiah 41:4, "I, the LORD, am the first, and with the last I am He"
Isaiah 43:10-13, repeated divine self-identification using ani hu

Coming to pass / eventfulness

Genesis 1:5, wayehi erev wayehi voqer, "there was evening and there was morning"
Genesis 4:8, wayehi bihyotam, "and it came to pass when they were"
Hundreds of narrative occurrences of wayehi introducing scenes

Becoming

Genesis 2:7, "man became (wayehi) a living being" (nefesh chayyah)
Genesis 19:26, Lot's wife "became (wattehi) a pillar of salt"

Patristic / scholarly note

Philo of Alexandria (Life of Moses 1.74-76, c. AD 30) reads Exodus 3:14 as the foundational metaphysical claim that God alone truly is; created things merely participate in being. This Jewish-Hellenistic reading shaped Christian theology directly. Augustine (Confessions 7.10; Tractates on John 38-43) develops the doctrine of divine aseity (self-existence) from this verse. Aquinas (ST I, q.13, a.11) calls God's name "He Who Is" the "supremely proper name" of God: every creature has being only through participation, but God is His own being (ipsum esse).

The LXX renders ehyeh asher ehyeh as ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ὤν, "I AM the one who IS" / "I AM the existing one", making the metaphysical reading explicit. Jesus's egō eimi sayings in John (8:24, 8:28, 8:58, 13:19, 18:5-6) deliberately invoke this LXX phrasing; the unmistakable claim is divine self-identification.

Verses in this codex

See Obsidian's backlinks pane for every verse page linking here.