We are taught (Talmud Bavli Berakhot 40b) that every time we say a בְּרָכָה (berakhah, blessing), it has to include God’s most special name. This name is so special that we almost never write it out, and we definitely never say it out loud! Here it is, spelled out with dashes between the letters to create breaks:

י - ה - ו - ה

What could this name mean? Look at the word - it has the letters yud, heh, and vav. These can be combined into: הָיָה (hayah, was), הוֹוֶה (hoveh, is), or יִהְיֶה (yihyeh, will be). Maybe it is a name that means: God always was, is, and will be.

But there is another possible meaning, found in this week’s parashah. God says to Yitzhak:

See the bolded words? God later says this exact same phrase to Yaakov (Bereishit 31:3), to Moshe (Shemot 3:12), and to Yehoshua (Yehoshua 1:5). In fact, in Tanakh, the word ehyeh (I will be) is only ever said by God, and it is almost always followed by imkha or imakh (with you).

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