In the beginning was the Word:
The Word was with God
And the Word was God.
He was with God in the beginning.
Through him all things came into being,
Not one thing came into being except through him.

(John 1:1-3, The New Jerusalem Bible) 

It has always struck me as odd that Christians who claim to take the Bible literally are those who are most inclined to call it "the word of God." Obviously, the Bible is not a word, but a collection of thousands of words. Amongst these thousands, a very small percentage are represented as coming directly from God. When pressed, most Biblical literalists become highly symbolic and allegorical about the word "word."

"That means it is inspired by God," goes the usual argument. This claim could be made equally for a Bach cantata, or any other esteemed work of man. Christians who take this route generally end with an appeal to faith in the book -- as opposed to faith in God.

If the phrase "the word of God" is taken literally, that is, as a single word, then in the Judaeo-Christian tradition the only serious candidate for this word is the Tetragrammaton. For a closer look at the basis for this claim, see the associations of magical power with this word.

In the ancient world, a word was primarily a thing spoken, not written. Correctly spoken - "invoked," if you will - the consonants of the Tetragrammaton emerge as what you might call bright spots, where phase shift causes a second voice to appear. This second voice can be quite distinct, even moving up and down the scale in arpeggios while the singers' normal voice sustains one single note. One can imagine the awe such a phenomenon might inspire in the ancient world. The remarkable thing is that it is no less awe inspiring today, and under scientific scrutiny only draws the searcher deeper into discovery of the essential nature of the universe.

It is clear that "the Word" in John 1 does not refer to the Bible. Inspired or not, the writers of the Bible were not there in the Beginning with God. However, if we assume that John uses "the Word" to refers to the sound of the Tetragrammaton, a fascinating and coherent pattern begins to emerge.

 John's choice of words to open his Gospel, "In the beginning," are intended to remind his readers of the opening words of Genesis:

 In the beginning, God created heaven and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, with a divine wind sweeping over the waters.

 Here is a juxtaposition of the text which follows in John, and in Genesis:

 John goes on to explicitly equate the Word with Light:

 "The Word was the real light that gives light to everyone…"

 To take this statement as some kind of metaphysical analogy is to deny the clear, literal meaning of the text. Taken literally, after all, modern physicists suggest that light, like sound, is a kind of vibration.

 Genesis and John both offer support for this literal interpretation. The Hebrew verb translated in the NJB as "sweeping" used with "divine wind" in Genesis 1:2 has a secondary meaning of "fluttering;" either could be a pre-scientific description of periodic motion, i.e. vibration. Moreover, consider what happens when breath or wind (both meanings encompassed by the Hebrew ruach) blows across water: anyone who has ever cooled a hot cup of soup or lived near the sea knows what it gets you. What better way, in a world more acquainted with soup and sea than with science, to describe waves?

 The radically literal understanding of John 1 through 10 is then that Jesus was conceived by the vibration of a word which was light. If this much is granted, then to further assert that this word was the full pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton is pure orthodoxy. The remarkable thing about this radical literalism is how completely it fits into traditional Christian ideas about the virgin birth – and into modern ideas about physics.

 The full pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton is the crux of the matter. This is not just a matter of sounding all of the harmonics between a long E and a long O, and back. The Judaeo-Christian understanding of God pushes us to understand the audible spectrum as simply one small fragment of God’s Name. By analyzing that fragment, it is clear that the physical dynamics of phase shift apply equally to any wave-type phenomenon: that the optical physics of rainbows are an extension of the Name of God.

 In physics, the quest for a general theory of relativity is something of a holy grail. In broad terms, it is an article of faith and study for many physicists that physical matter, light, magnetism and everything else in the universe are somehow different forms or expressions of the same thing. There is a convergence here between monotheism and physics. The particular genius of Christianity here is to assert that there is a personal relationship between the universe as a whole and its every particular. This relationship can be understood in scientific languageas the transmission of energy between quantum levels, or in religious language as the free gift of God’s self to us, as Jesus Christ.

 By this logic, the full pronunciation of the Name extends far beyond the normal sensory apparatus of humanity. Audibly, this is represented by the sound "H," which though silent in the English "Yahweh" is clearly audible in Hebrew. It is the sound of breath, of the wind – of spirit. "H" is what leaves you when you are dead. While living, the way you breath is determined largely by what you are doing. It follows then that to pronounce the name fully – to participate in the transmission of energy from on high to below and back again – you must incorporate your whole lifestyle into the pronunciation. This is what the early church meant by a "vocation," a calling. To truly "call upon the Name of the Lord" is to be called.

 Today, as ever, what Christians are called to do is to prepare the way of the Lord. Traditionally, this has meant changing the way that we live, seeking to be vessels for God’s will. The literal interpretation of John 1 - 10 suggests that we may take this a step further. Those bold enough to believe in the second coming of Christ may seek to prepare a vessel for God’s very Self. Who, after all, provided God with vocal chords to call Jesus into being? Did a circle of Essenes invoke the name that night in Jerusalem, or perhaps John the Baptist himself? We cannot know. But it is clear that the priestly tradition of invoking the name of the Lord was active at least from the time of Enoch down to Solomon, and the Jewish mystical traditions hint that it has never ceased. What does this mean for the faithful of our sceptical, scientific age? A new kind if Messiah, as radically different from traditional expectations as Jesus was from those of his day.