<Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> Yahweh (/ ˈjɑːhweɪ /, or often / ˈjɑːweɪ / in English; Hebrew: יַהְוֶה ‬ (jahˈweh)) was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel (Samaria) and Judah . His exact origins are disputed, although they reach back to the early Iron Age and even the Late Bronze: his name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon, but the earliest plausible mentions are in Egyptian texts that place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan . </P> <P> In the oldest biblical literature, Yahweh is a typical ancient Near Eastern "divine warrior", who leads the heavenly army against Israel's enemies; he later became the main god of the Kingdom of Israel (Samaria) and of Judah, and over time the royal court and temple promoted Yahweh as the god of the entire cosmos, possessing all the positive qualities previously attributed to the other gods and goddesses . By the end of the Babylonian exile (6th century BCE), the very existence of foreign gods was denied, and Yahweh was proclaimed as the creator of the cosmos and the true god of all the world . </P> <P> There is almost no agreement on the origins and meaning of Yahweh's name; it is not attested other than among the Israelites, and seems not to have any reasonable etymology . (Ehyeh ašer ehyeh, or "I Am that I Am", the explanation presented in Exodus 3: 14, appears to be a late theological gloss invented to explain Yahweh's name at a time when the meaning had been lost .) </P>

Where did the ancient israelite god yhwh live