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AHebrew name is aname ofHebrew origin. In a more narrow meaning, it is a name used by Jews only in a religious context and different from an individual'ssecular name for everyday use.
Names with Hebrew origins, especially those from theHebrew Bible, are commonly used byJews andChristians. Many are also used byMuslims, particularly those names mentioned in theQur'an (for example,Ibrahim is a common Arabic name from the HebrewAvraham). A typical Hebrew name can have many different forms, having been adapted to thephonologies andorthographies of many differentlanguages.
A common practice among theJewish diaspora is to give a Hebrew name to a child that is used in religious contexts throughout that person's lifetime.
Not all Hebrew names are strictly Hebrew in origin; some names may have been borrowed from other ancient languages, including fromEgyptian,Aramaic,Phoenician, orCanaanite.
Hebrew names used byJews (along with many Hebrew names used inChristendom) often come from theTanakh, also known as theHebrew Bible (the Christian version of which is called theOld Testament).
Many of these names are thought to have been adapted from Hebrew phrases and expressions, bestowing special meaning or the unique circumstances of birth to the one who receives that name.
Theophoric names are those which include a form of a divine name, such by adding the suffix־אל-el, meaning "God", forming names such asמיכאלMichael ("who is like God?") andגבריאלGabriel ("man of God"). Another common form of theophory is the use of theTetragrammaton YHWH as the basis for a suffix; the most common abbreviations used by Jews are־יה-yāh/-iyyāh and־יהו-yāhû/-iyyāhû/-ayhû, forming names such asישׁעיהוYəšaʻªyāhû (Isaiah),צדקיהוṢiḏqiyyāhû (Zedekiah) andשׂריהŚərāyāh (Seraiah). Most Christian usage is of the shorter suffix preferred intranslations of theBible to European languages: Greek -ιας-ias and English-iah, producing names such as ΤωβίαςTōbias (Tobias, Toby) instead ofTobiyyahu and ἸερεμίαςIeremias (Jeremiah, Jeremy) instead ofYirmeyahu.
In addition to devotion toElohim andYahweh, names could also be sentences of praise in their own right. The nameטוביהוṬôḇiyyāhû means "Good of/is the LORD".
Aramaic was a major vernacular language of Israel at the time ofJesus, though it was not the only language spoken in the region.[1] Aramaic was also the language used to write parts of theBook of Daniel, theBook of Ezra, and the entire Jewish BabylonianTalmud. Aramaic remained thelingua franca of the Middle East until the time of Islam.[1]
Judæo-Aramaic names includeעבד־נגוʻĂḇēḏ-nəḡô,בר־תלמיBar-Talmay andתוםTôm, as well asBar Kochba.
Due to theHellenisation of the Eastern Mediterranean and the movement of Jews around the area, many Hebrew names were adapted to Greek, reinforced by the translation of the Tanakh in theSeptuagint with many Hellenized names.
Many of the names in theNew Testament are of Hebrew and Aramaic origin, but were adapted to the Greek by Hellenistic Christian writers such asPaul of Tarsus.
Such Hebræo-Greek names include ἸησοῦςIēsous (originally fromישׁועYēšûªʻ), ΝῶεNōē (originally fromנחNōªḥ), ἸσαΐαςIsaias (originally fromישׁעיהוYəšaʻªyāhû), ἸσραήλIsraēl (originally fromישראלYiśrā’ēl).
Furthermore, some Jews of the time had GreekGentile names themselves, such as the ChristianLuke (Greek ΛουκᾶςLoukas). Though used by some Jews at the time, these names are generally not associated with Jews today, and are considered characteristically Greek and largely confined to use by Christians. Hebrew forms of the names exist, but they are extremely rare.
Many Hebrew names were adapted into Latin, some via Greek. Such names include Jesus (from Greek ἹησοῦςIēsous) andMaria (from Greek ΜαρίαMaria, itself from ΜαριάμMariam, originally from HebrewמריםMiryām).
Also, some Jews duringRoman times also had Latin names for themselves, such as the Christian evangelistMark (LatinMarcus). As was the case with contemporary Jewish names of Greek origin, most of those Latin names are generally not associated with Jews today and have retained a Roman and Christian character.
With the rise of Islam and the establishment of an ArabCaliphate, theArabic language became the lingua franca of the Middle East and some parts ofBerberNorth Africa. Islamic scripture such as the Qurʼan, however, contains many names of Hebrew origin (often via Aramaic), and there were Jewish and Christianminorities living under Arab Islamic rule. As such, many Hebrew names had been adapted to Arabic and could be found in the Arab world. Jews and Christians generally used the Arabic adaptations of those names, just as English-speaking Jews and sometimes Muslims often use anglicized versions like Joshua, rather than Yəhôšúªʼ,
While most such names are common to traditional Arabic translations of the Bible, a few differ; for instance, Arabic-speaking Christians useYasūʻ instead ofʻĪsā for "Jesus".
Such Hebræo-Arabic names include:
The influence of Aramaic is observable in several names, notably ʼIsḥāq (Isaac), where theSyriac form is simplyÎsḥāq, contrasting with more Hebraic forms such as Yaʻqūb (Jacob).
Some of these Arabic names preserve original Hebrew pronunciations that were later changed by regular sound shifts;migdal, recorded in the New Testament asMagdalene and in Palestinian Arabic asMajdala, which turneda in unstressed closed syllables intoi.
Typically, Hebrewאל-ʼēl was adapted as ـايل-īl, and Hebrewיה-yāh as ـيا-yāʼ.
James I of England commissioned atranslation of the Christian Bible from the original languages, including a translation of the Tanakh, or Old Testament, from Hebrew into English, which became known as theKing James Version of the Bible and is often referred to today by the abbreviation "KJV".
Even so, many KJV Old Testament names were not entirely without New Testament Greek influence. The influence mostly reflected the vowels of names and left most of the consonants largely intact and only modestly filtered to consonants of contemporary English phonology. However, all KJV names followed the Greek convention of not distinguishing between soft anddāḡeš forms of בbêṯ. The habits resulted in multilingually-fused Hebrew-Helleno-English names, such asJudah,Isaiah andJeremiah. Additionally, a handful of names were adapted directly from Greek without even partial translations from Hebrew, including names such asIsaac,Moses andJesse.
Along with names from the KJV edition of the New Testament, these names constitute the large part of Hebrew names as they exist in the English-speaking world.
A Hebrew name is used in a religious context during prayer. When deceased relatives are remembered during theYizkor memorial service or during the El-Malei Blessing, the Hebrew name of the deceased is used along with the Hebrew name of the father.[2] When theMisheberach (prayer for the sick) is recited, the ill person's Hebrew name is said along with the Hebrew name of the mother.[2] When an adult Jew is called to receive analiyah to theTorah, they are identified with their Hebrew personal name along with their father's Hebrew name; for example,Ya'akov ben Chaim. (In some communities, especially those who allow women the honour of receiving an aliyah, the practice is to include both parents' names in the context of an aliyah;[3][4][5] for example,Elisheva bat Moshe v'Sarah.)
While, strictly speaking, a "Hebrew name" for ritual use is in the Hebrew language, it is not uncommon in some Ashkenazi communities for people to havenames of Yiddish origin, or a mixed Hebrew-Yiddish name;[5] for example, the nameSimhah Bunim, wheresimhah means "happiness" in Hebrew, andBunim is a Yiddish-language name possibly derived from the Frenchbon nom ("good name").
Converts to Judaism may choose whatever Hebrew name they like as a personal name. However, the parental names in their case are not the names of their actual parents, but ratherAvraham v'Sarah, who are (as the first patriarch and matriarch of Jewish tradition) the prototypical "parents" in Judaism.[6]
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