Then Moses said to God, "If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." And he said, "Say this to the people of Israel, I AM has sent me to you."—Exodus 3:13, 14 (RSV)
This passage is a beautiful way of expressing the name and nature of the God who brought the children of Israel out of Egypt. Ancient name theology held that the name of a deity also expressed its nature or essential activity. So to think of I AM as God's own name gives a good insight into the essential activity of the divine.
When Moses asked God who has the power to send him on his impossible mission, the reply is 'ehyeh (I am) asher (who, that which) 'ehyeh (I am). This sentence does justice to the infinitely active Hebrew concept of being, because the essential activity, described by the words I AM is actually describing who I AM is. As the Medieval Jewish scholar Maimonides explained in his Guide to the Perplexed, (1.54–58), God is what God does. I AM WHO I AM is a simple and clear statement of the theological teaching that the name and the essential activity of Deity are one.
