Biblical names

The annual list of popular baby names from the Social Security Administration is chock full of biblical names on the boy's side -- 13 out of the top 20. Less so on the girl's side -- only six of the top 20.

Inspired by that imbalance, I present the following.

7 biblical women's names that deserve wider usage:

1. Tirzah. This name has never cracked the SSA's Top 1,000 list -- not even after it was used in the movie Ben Hur. That's a shame, because Tirzah was an impressive woman (see "Hoglah" below).

2. Jael. You meet plenty of people named after Mary, the other biblical character praised as "most blessed of women," but I've never met or even heard of anyone named after Jael. Maybe it's because the name translates, literally, as "mountain goat." Or maybe it's because "bad-ass" isn't what most parents are looking for in a name for their baby girl. Jael was bad-ass. She took out Sisera, the general in charge of the invading army:

Barak came by in pursuit of Sisera, and Jael went out to meet him. "Come," she said, "I will show you the man you're looking for." So he went in with her, and there lay Sisera with the tent peg through his temple -- dead.

Don't mess with Jael.

3. Deborah. If we're going to mention Jael, we also need to mention Deborah -- the other heroine of this story from the book of Judges, which is all about the men dithering and the women bailing them out with real courage and leadership (and tent pegs).

4. Sophia. This actually cracked the Top 10 last year for girl's names. It's a Greek name, but I've linked it there to Proverbs 8, which certainly wasn't written in Greek. That passage is a hymn in praise of Wisdom, which is what Sophia means, making it, arguably, a divine name, a name for an aspect of God.

5. Susanna. Steven Foster may have knocked this name out of favor by forcing a connotation of banjos on knees, but it's still a lovely name. Susanna was one of Jesus' earliest disciples and -- unlike those freeloaders Peter, James and John -- she paid her own way: "helping to support them out of their own means."

6. Phoebe. The NIV calls Phoebe a "servant" of the Roman church. Everywhere else that term is used it is translated "deacon," but the translators didn't like the idea of a woman as a deacon so, in this one case, they changed it to "servant," with a guilty footnote suggesting "or deaconess." That's a made-up word, too, "deacon-ess." The problem with the name nowadays is it's probably associated more with Friends than with the first-century church leader. (I liked Lisa Kudrow's wifty character, but that's not quite the set of connotations I'm looking for here.)

7. Priscilla. The translation games used to demote most of the female leaders (like Phoebe, above) in the early church didn't work with Priscilla since she's almost always mentioned as part of a tag-team with her husband, Aquila. They couldn't very well twist the translation to refer to both of them as "deaconesses" or some such. Paul regarded them, both of them, as his peers. Priscilla is also thought by some to be the author of the epistle to the Hebrews, which is as good a guess as any. The downside: Ever been to Graceland?

7 biblical women's names to avoid:

1. Leah. "Leah was not loved," the book of Genesis tells us. And she was horribly misused, treated as a pawn by her father and her husband. Even the translators of the New International Version pile on. "Leah had weak eyes," Gen. 29:17 says, although the footnote suggests that "weak" there might also be translated "delicate." But they just had to go with "weak," didn't they? That's how everybody treated Leah, poor woman. Leah is a beautiful name, but this is a pretty rough set of connotations to saddle your daughter with.

2. Jezebel. If they were casting a movie of the books of Kings, this is the part that every actress would want, but it's not a popular girls name for the same reason that Lady Macbeth is not a popular girls name.

3. Sapphira. She and her husband figured out a scheme that would let them keep much of their wealth while still reaping praise and credit for giving all of it away. The scheme didn't quite work out the way they planned. So not a great role model. Plus, you'd pretty much be dooming your daughter to work as an exotic dancer.

4. Gomer. I love the book of Hosea. I love the portrait it paints of God waiting patiently, singing Bonnie Raitt's "I Can't Make You Love Me," more saddened than wrathful. But poor Hosea and his wife, Gomer, wind up with miserable roles to play to illustrate this divine romance. Nobody is likely to name their daughter "Gomer," of course, because of Gomer Pyle, but you'd actually be better off naming your little girl after Jim Nabors than after the biblical Gomer.

5. Lo-Ruhammah. Hosea and Gomer's daughter's name means "not loved." Again, I love the book of Hosea, but wasn't there some way to make this point without dooming this poor girl to a lifetime of therapy?

6. Noah. (see below)

7. Hoglah. Noah and Hoglah were actually very cool, admirable women -- two of Zelophehad's three daughters who fought for -- and won -- women's right to inherit and own property a few millennia before Jane Austen. Unfortunately, Noah's a bit more famous as a boy's name, and Hoglah isn't terribly euphonious (suggesting unfortunate nicknames). We can honor their spirit through the name of their sister, Tirzah, who joined them in persuading Moses that denying them their rights just because they were women was indefensible.

Comments

[Mark C. Chu-Carroll]

Actually, Jael translated in the modern hebrew fashion is Yael, which is a fairly common name for Jewish girls.

[Abelardus]

This is a list, of course, and I can't affect it one way or t'other (not right now, at least); but two names sprang to mind whilst reading this: Chloe and Judith.

Chloe I think is a pretty good name when you consider that this New Testament follower of Paul's (as Fred has mentioned) was the head of her household and probably owned property -- which is pretty amazing considering it's also the name of a soon-to-be-lobotomized woman from LB by gynophobic L&J.

The name Judith is a two-edged sword: she was a brave woman, regardless of the status of her book, and historical accuracy aside it's pretty bad-ass for the day to depict a woman bringing back the head of an Assyrian general and thus gain a victory for the Hebrews. The only downside is that you might be called a "widow-maker," hint, hint.

Pith observations, Fred, as always.

[Abelardus]

Pithy; that's what I meant.

[burgundy]

In addition to the Yaels I've known, there was a Jael on America's Next Top Model a year or so ago. This may serve as a disincentive for future use, I realize.

I know someone with a daughter named Noah, but I can't remember now who it is. One of my old rabbis?

It breaks both my heart and my brain that Nevaeh is ranked 42.

[burgundy]

Ranked 43, I meant to type. I'm too tired to come up with a decent Douglas Adams joke, although I'm sure there's on in there somewhere.

I have a Biblical name myself; it's not super common, but it's common enough that when people want to make inane comments about celebrities with the same name, there are a couple for them to choose between (although the supermodel is far more frequently cited than the country singer or the feminist writer.) When I was younger I hated it and wanted to use my middle name (also Biblical, but much more common), but I'm ok with it now. I can't say I've ever given any thought to the characteristics of my namesake or felt in any way that they had anything to do with me.

[Ryan]

The problem with the name nowadays is it's probably associated more with Friends than with the first-century church leader.

I always think of the redhead from The Magic School Bus who can't stop talking about her old school.

[Bugmaster]

Lilith 4tw !

[Jen]

Isn't Dorcas a Bible name? When I first heard it I laughed -- I thought it was a joke. I still laugh, because I have the sense of humor of an 11 year old boy.

[Tonio]

My family is not religious, and one of our children has a name that happens to be a Biblical name. One of our acquaintances praised us for choosing a Biblical name. I found this odd, as if such names were inherently preferable to names from secular sources.

Does it seem to anyone that in our culture, girls' names seem to be more affected by trends than boys' names?

[Tonio]

Why do all the names listed here seem to come from the Old Testament? From my memory, the only women's name in the New Testament seems to be Mary, used twice.

[Genesis]

I know of a Tirzah - the daughter of an old friend. My name, Genesis, has acutally been gaining in popularity over the years (according to the SSA) although I've still only met a handful in my life (I'm 36). Interestingly, the SSA only lists Genesis as a female name, but I've met as many men as women with the name, and several of my teachers over the years told me "I saw your name on the roll sheet but I thought you would be a boy."

[Lea]

Leah is a beautiful name, but this is a pretty rough set of connotations to saddle your daughter with.

Heh. Can't argue with that one.

Jen -- Dorcas is indeed a biblical name. She turns up in...gah, which book is it? I want to say Acts, but I'm not sure I'm right about that. Though I tend to associate it with pastoral poetry (this is because I'm an early modernist).

[Abelardus]

I think there's a Martha in there somewhere -- whose has a sister named MARY! Dun, dun, dun!

[Lea]

From my memory, the only women's name in the New Testament seems to be Mary, used twice.

Also Martha. And Elizabeth.

[Abelardus]

Er, that was to answer Tonio's question if I could.

[cminus]

(I liked Lisa Kudrow's wifty character, but that's not quite the set of connotations I'm looking for here.)

"Wifty?"

For some reason I didn't think that was a typo, and a search on urbandictionary.com came up with: "Adjective, origin unknown. Flaky, space-cadet, but in a *nice* way. Not generally used outside the Philadelphia PA region."

Huh. I'm used to learning new things on this blog, but Philadelphia slang would have not been my first guess for today's lesson.

[Tonio]

Also Martha. And Elizabeth.

Are those in the Gospels?

[Lea]

Elizabeth
Martha (she also appears in the Gospel of John when Mary's and her brother Lazarus is raised from the dead)

[Chris Ashley]

My favorite Biblical-name factoid: There's an interactive tool on (I think) iVillage that lets you watch names rise and fall in popularity. Starting in the '70s and accelerating into the present, Josiah and Caleb spike up from nowhere-- the theocentric reformer and the countercultural remnant, heroes of the religious right. If you look today, there's an emerging spike in Elijah and Isaiah as the prophetic backlash starts to rumble.

[Salamanda]

Sophia's my (newborn!) daughter's name, although at this point I think she's going to grow up thinking her name is Monkey, because that's all hubby and I can bring ourselves to call her. :)

Re: Dorcas. We had a Dorcas at my high school. I remember commenting to a friend what a bummer of a name that'd be to have, and then realizing she was the girl sitting at the next table. (She was in a different grade, so I didn't know who she was...until then, of course. Naturally, I felt like a colossal ass, and promptly began sputtering and backpedaling...)

FWIW, Tirzah is rather pretty.

[Anna]

Are those in the Gospels?

Yes. I know one version of the story is Luke 10:38-42, but I think there's also a version in John, wherein the two are also sisters of Lazarus. Magdalena is also a girl's name, and is arguably in the Gospels (Magdalene is the original, but Magdalena is a close derivative).

Sort of along the trend of Judith, Thecla is my favorite name for a woman whose book got omitted from the Bible (it's considered apocryphal by the Catholic church, but if memory serves, a few sects of the Eastern Orthodox Church consider it canon). She was a disciple of Paul who basically vowed asceticism and dressed as a man so she could travel with Paul. Apparently she also preached and baptized as part of Paul's ministry. The most popular version of the reason that Thecla's text isn't Catholic canon is that early patriarchs were concerned about women getting uppity, and didn't want the Thecla text putting ideas in their heads about actually having the ability to work as equal partners in the Church.

[hapax]

Tonio, #5, 6, & 7 of the "deserving" list and #3 of the "avoid" are New Testament. There are severable admirable Salome's in the NT as well, but any use of it in the modern day would just conjure up images of salacious exotic dancing, alas.

I've always liked Talitha.

[Reverend Ref]

Judges 4:21 is probably my most favorite verse in the bible:

But Jael, Heber's wife, picked up a tent peg and a hammer and went quietly to him while he lay fast asleep, exhausted. She drove the peg through his temple into the ground, and he died.

Like . . . No shit, what do you expect?!?!

I had a seminary prof who thought "Jael's Peg" would be a great name for a rock band.

[burgundy]

I had a seminary prof who thought "Jael's Peg" would be a great name for a rock band.

Or a sex toy. But I wouldn't expect a seminary prof to see it that way (or at least to say so.)

[Victoria]

Re: Judith

I'm guessing Fred's sticking to the Protestant canon, in which case the book of Judith is not included (a shame, it's a great book).

[Kayte]

Wasn't Candace the name of the Ethiopian noble whom the eunuch served in Acts? Surprised heck out of me when I finally read the Bible (spiritual slow learner).

But I still see her with massively teased hair, white lipstick, and a wad of gum. [I can't help it. My high school age mates graduated in 1965]

[Kayte]

Wasn't Candace the name of the Ethiopian noble whom the eunuch served in Acts? Surprised heck out of me when I finally read the Bible (spiritual slow learner).

But I still see her with massively teased hair, white lipstick, and a wad of gum. [I can't help it. My high school age mates graduated in 1965]

[John]

These are actually the 2006 most popular names. 2007's list probably won't come out for a few more months.

[Nenya]

Oooh. I'm on the recommended-by-Fred list! With a variant spelling, but still. Shiny.

I know a number of Deborahs (and Debras--though I prefer the original spelling). Another name you could have is Abigail (for which again I prefer that spelling to Abigayle, Abighaile, etc). Means "father's joy", which seemed appropriate for the one in our family (my dad's youngest daughter).

Sapphira, however, will now always remind me of the dragon in Eragon. Don't name your girls this. (Even though, for a dragon, I liked it.)

[Nenya]

Ahh, I see Abigail already made it to the top ten. Well done.

[jeh]

Then there's that messy Tamar, Er, Onan situation. Tamar is occasionally used as a name, but Er and Onan--not so much.

[ctate]

I know women named Tamar and Leah.

Who in their right mind, in an English-speaking country, would name their daughter "Jael?" It's just begging for "Jaelbait" snark.

[jamoche]

I had a seminary prof who thought "Jael's Peg" would be a great name for a rock band.

Or a sex toy.

There was a Yael in the Showtime series "Weeds". The above comment is very much more funny if you know that show (or if you know what Anne McCaffrey once said about tent pegs).

"If they were casting a movie of the books of Kings, this is the part that every actress would want, but it's not a popular girls name for the same reason that Lady Macbeth is not a popular girls name."

Brilliant.

[Praline]

To my ear, 'Jael', though pretty, seems too easy to confuse with 'jail', which invites endless jokes about getting into Jael and going to Jael and don't send me to Jael... But maybe I'm pronouncing it wrong.

[Jesurgislac]

Actually, Gruach is not a popular girl's name any more not because it is the given name of the woman popularly known as "Lady Macbeth" (most people who know the character only by the Holinshed history/Shakespeare's play have no notion what her name was) but because of the pronounciation/spelling problems.

[OneFatEnglishman]

Wasn't Candace the name of the Ethiopian noble whom the eunuch served in Acts? Surprised heck out of me when I finally read the Bible (spiritual slow learner).

It's given as her name in Acts, but I believe it was actually her title, approximately "Queen Mother" in the Meroitic language.

Dorcas (Greek) was also known as Tabitha (Aramaic?), which I think is a prettier name, but generally associated with old ladies, at least in Britain.

[OneFatEnglishman]

OK, Jes, how do you pronounce Gruach? Isn't it phonetic?

[Mark]

Did you count Grace and Faith? That's always been the way with girls names, naming them after characteristics, you know, grace, patience, faith, hope, perseverance, prudence. Etc...

[Jesurgislac]

Grev-ach.

The "e" is long: the "v" is hardly sounded: the "a" is short: the "ch" is a fricative spoken in the throat, like "loch".

It is phonetic. But it's phonetic in Gaelic.

[magistra]

From the New Testament, two more possibilities are Lois and Eunice (Timothy's grandmother and mother) (2 Timothy 1: 5). On the other hand, even though Shiphrah and Puah are heroines (see Exodus 1: 15-20), they're tough names for a child to get landed with. And I can't help wondering about the theological complications of being called 'Trinity' (63 in girls' names).

There are also UK lists for girls (2 out of 20 biblical plus Sophie) and boys (9 out of 20 biblical). So we are (not surprisingly) less devout, but with the same kind of male/female ratios.

[alfgifu]

My parents went for an all Biblical naming scheme for their children, but (being British) chose fairly safe names from the existing name gene pool. We were still fairly young when we got interested in meanings and etymology - something which I don't think occurred to Mum and Dad. Turns out the name scheme looks like this:

Ruth - friend of God.
Michael - who is like God.
Anna - grace, or gift of God.
Rachel - ewe, or female sheep.

Needless to say, Rachel wasn't exactly over the moon.

[Kate Nepveu]

I'd love to see an equivalent list for men's biblical names. Friends and relatives keep using ones that puzzle me (my default association with Isaac, for instance, is "father was willing to sacrifice him"), but I'm working off a very shallow knowledge of the Bible.

[McMartin]

As another Michael, I've always been fond of the name once I learned its meaning. I'm particularly entertained by the way its meaning is apparently reversed if you put the question mark in (as maybe half the name books I've checked do). And I wound up being a humanist who nevertheless does not believe in the perfectability of mankind, so it -- question mark and all -- worked out pretty well.

[Lurker]

I have a biblical first name, but my second name is Tapio, the name of the god of forests and hunters in the Finnish mythology. Actually, such name is not so weird in Finland, but think about an English-speaking family naming their child e.g. Peter Mercury or John Baal. I'd like to see the face of the priest administering the baptism. :-)

[Karen]

I think Tabitha is the Aramaic form of Dorcas, both names translating to "gazelle." Tabitha/ Dorcase was the name of an elderly woman in the Christian community of Antioch whom Peter raised from the dead or healed. I'm too lazy and sick to walk ten steps and look it up, though. Here in the states, Tabitha is probably less popular than it would be because it was the name of Samantha and Darren's daughter on the TV show "Bewitched." Parents would be docked 25 class points for naming the girl after a TV character.

Related to that, my cynical opinion is that most little Trinities over here are either Anglicized "Trinidads" (please, I really, really hope this is the majority) or named after the character in the Matrix movies.

[Karen]

Praline, I bought your book this morning, too. Only a used copy from Amazon, since in the last 24 hours I've had both a light fixture fail in a shower of sparks and something go wrong with the water heater, but if I can avoid any major house disasters next month, I'll send a new one as a birthday gift.

[Keith]

My coworker is named Suzanna (with a Z, no H at the end) and my niece is named Sophia. I've always liked Jezebel, though. Tom Robbins has a great bit of Jezebel revisionism that puts a positive spin on the name in Skinny Legs And All. Or was it Salome? Another great name for an empowered woman. Everyone named John better watch their ass around her.

[MikhailBorg]

I know some Deborahs and and Susannas, but Priscilla always brings to mind Priscilla Asagiri of the Knight Sabers. Or her Replicant namesake.

[Tonio]

There are some names that have Biblical origins but have long since passed into general usage in English and American cultures, such as John or Michael. But there are also names that are not common, like Micah, that many conservative Christian parents use specifically because of their Biblical origins. Is there a similar prevailing custom among Orthodox and Conservative Jewish parents? I suspect that names that non-Jews might assume to be Jewish may have origins not in scripture but in Ashkenazi culture.