Elijah - Pronunciation please

[parkerpink]

How is the name Elijah pronounced?

I thought it's Eh-lie-jah but I recently heard it pronounced as Ee-lie.

What is the right one?

A bit of both I’d say.

I think I would probably say Ee ligh ja but poss more of an I sound at the beginning.

Eli is a completely separate name from Elijah or a nickname for it, definitely not a difference pronunciation!
I'd pronounce it eh-lie-juh

I've always pronounced it Ee-lie-jar with E-lie as a nickname

As in the phonetic i sound.

As pp said - it’s two different names. Eli is short for Elijah. It’s not a pronunciation of Elijah.

They are two different names. I have both in my class currently. Eli and Elijah (I do know that Elijah is often shortened to Eli, but 'my' Eli is just Eli and 'my' Elijah never shortens his name).

The first syllable is a ‘schwa’ sound. Which is the default sound for unstressed vowels in English like:

the first and last a in banana
the first o in potato
the second e in television
the i in family
the u in support

That’s for the E in Elijah obviously. E in Eli is stressed so I think it’s usually ee sound.

I wouldn't pronounce the sound in Elijah or television the same as the others - I'd pronounce them "ih" rather than "uh".

I thought the OP was questioning the pronunciation of the beginning part of the name. As in Eh lie ja or Ee lie ja?

That's right. I pronounce it ih-LIE-juh.

EE-lie-jah as in Elijah Wood. Eli is a name in its own right.

Ee-LYE-shugh

I thought the OP was questioning the pronunciation of the beginning part of the name. As in Eh lie ja or Ee lie ja?

Eh lie ja

There's no EE sound in the first syllable. It's short like Eliott

Eli is often short for Elinor or Elin.

I know, I copied what the OP had written.

I meant that I thought she was questioning how to pronounce the first syllable not that she didn’t realise it was a different name.

but I don’t think it’s an E sound but an i sound, so not like Elliot at all.

El-eye-juh