These four letters of the Tetragrammaton are usually transliterated from Hebrew as YHWH.

EARLY in the second century, after the last of the apostles had died, the falling away from the Christian faith foretold by Jesus and his followers began in earnest. Pagan philosophies and doctrines infiltrated the congregation; sects and divisions arose, and the original purity of faith was corrupted. And God’s name ceased to be used.

As this apostate Christianity spread, the need arose to translate the Bible from its original Hebrew and Greek into other languages. How did the translators render God’s name in their translations? Usually, they used the equivalent of “Lord.” A very influential version of that time was the Latin Vulgate, a translation of the Bible by Jerome into everyday Latin. Jerome rendered the Tetragrammaton (YHWH) by substituting Dominus, “Lord.” http://www.watchtower.org/