What’s in a name?

The Hebrew Meaning of the Name Israel

Biblical Hebrew is a wonderfully rich and mysterious language, but it is not one that is not so easily translated into English. It operated as an oral language long before it was written down and its vocabulary depended on creating images, or word pictures meaning it is not as precise as say Latin or Greek. 

One example of this is the way names are used.  They do not normally have significant meanings in English-speaking lands, but that is not true of the Bible.  In the Scriptures, names are more than just an identifying tag.  Names speak of the essential character of a person, their place in society, and their God-given vocation.  They truly were whoever their names said they were.   Knowing someone’s name was important because it meant you had an insight into their true nature, and their special identity as a man or woman.

For example, my name is Michael - Michael is derived from the Hebrew phrase מי כאל‎ mī kāʼēl, 'Who [is] like-El', in Aramaic: ܡܝܟܐܝܠ (Mīkhāʼēl [miχaˈʔel]). Just to round it out from the Biblical perspective, the Greek of the Old Testament, the Septuagint is rendered as Μιχαήλ (Mikhaḗl). 

The name is theophoric, that is, it bears the name of God.  Here it reads as a rhetorical question – "Who [is] like [the Hebrew God] El?",.  The only possible answer is "there is none like El", or "there is none as famous and powerful as God." Paradoxically, the name can also be interpreted as, "One who is like God."  None of that comes out from the popular use of the name, but when used in Hebrew, it opens up some rich spiritual insights.

God’s Name is of special importance.  In some parts of the Bible there is no name given for God.  His title is used instead – el and so we have Elohim.  It was the common word for the gods in Canaan, all gods are "el".

At the time of Moses and the Exodus, God did provide the Hebrew people with his name:  Yahweh – although the precise translation of the meaning of that Name is difficult to clarify.  It appears to have the past, present and future elements of the verb “to be”.    I generally translate it as – I am who I am now, who I was before (in the beginning of Creation) and who I will be into the future.  Thus, Yahweh is eternally unchanged, always God in the divine fullness in every aspect of our life, the world, of people.

Important biblical names

Moses, for example, means drawn out – just like he was drawn out of water by the Pharaoh’s daughter, and then his life was used to draw Israel out of Egypt.

 Elijah means The Lord is my God and we see this acted out in his ministry as a prophet of God. Because he lived his life under the guidance and protection of God, his life was marked by bold and uncompromising stands for the Lord. 

What was of great significance was when God changed someone’s name.  It was not done lightly, and it usually meant a change in their life’s direction or calling.

Abram (honoured father) became Abraham (father of nations),

and Sarai (leader) became Sarah (princess). Yet there is probably no more significant name change than that of Jacob.

In Genesis 17, God describes the sign of the covenant He will make with Abraham and his offspring.  He gives Abraham a new name to symbolise his destiny as the patriarch of God’s chosen people. 

The name “Abram” אַבְרָם (Avram) is composed of two words, av and ram, and means something like “exalted father.” 

Abraham אַבְרָהָם  (Avraham), on the other hand, derives from the words אַב  (av) and הֲמוֹן  (hamon), as explained by the phrase “because [I give you as] a father of a multitude of nations” (Gen. 17:5). Here a single letter change makes the significant difference.

Then God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name.  And I will bless her and also give you a son by her; then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of peoples shall be from her.” – Genesis 17:15-16

Notice the way Sarai parallels Abram’s renaming in meaning. Both are called by their new names, because of their future roles as father and mother of many nations. “Sarai” (שָׂרָי) and “Sarah” (שָׂרָה) are different forms of the same Hebrew word that basically means “princess/woman of strength”.

It is likely that Sarai is simply the possessive form of Sarah (i.e. “My Sarah”). Sarah, signifying that her strength does not belong exclusively to her immediate family, but to the future nation of Israel and even the world-at-large. As in the case of Abraham, the changing of a single letter made all the difference.

One of the strangest encounters in Genesis is the wrestling Jacob had with God at Peniel as he returned from Paddan-aram to the land of promise, the land of his fathers (Gen. 32:24–32). In the night before Jacob was to confront the enmity of his brother Esau, a Man came to Jacob and wrestled with him until dawn. Unable at last to prevail over Jacob, the Man disabled Jacob’s hip, the strength of a wrestler.

Jacob, however, would not let the Man go until he had won His blessing. The Man changed Jacob’s name, telling him he would thereafter be called Israel - "God struggles" or "he who struggles with God.  When Israel then asked the Man His name, the Man did not answer him. Jacob recognised that he had seen the face of God in the Man with whom he had wrestled, and he marvelled that his life had been spared. He therefore  memorialised the name of the place as “Peniel,” or “the face of God” (Gen. 32:30).

The name "Israel" is a combination of two Hebrew words: "Yisrael" which translates to "he who struggles with God". 

"Yisrael" (יִשְׂרָאֵל): 

The Hebrew word "Yisrael" is a masculine name that means "he who struggles with God" or "God contended". 

In the morning Jacob went forth limping, but he went forth as Israel (Gen. 32:31). Note how once Jacob became weak in the flesh, he became strong in the Spirit. It was through this wounding that he became Israel. Afterwards, the Jews refused to eat the flesh of the “sinew of the thigh that is on the hip socket,” Moses reported, for the thigh represented the weakness of Jacob (Gen. 32:32).

Before His Name Was Israel

When Rebekah was giving birth to twins, she named one of them “Jacob” because he grabbed the heel of his brother. The Hebrew meaning of Jacob – or Yaakov in Hebrew – is “supplanter”. It derives from the Hebrew word for “to seize the heel”, but figuratively it can mean “to trip up” or even “to deceive”.

Later, as Jacob and Esau were being blessed by their dying father Isaac, Jacob lived up to his name. This was what was said of Jacob by both Isaac and Esau when Jacob pretended to be Esau to gain his father’s blessing hence the name “supplanter”:

And he [Isaac] said, ” Your brother came deceitfully and has taken away your blessing.” Then he [Esau] said, ” Is he not rightly named Jacob, for he has replaced (usurped)  me these two times? He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing.” (Gen 27:35-36)

As a result, Esau wanted to kill him. But with the help of Rebekah, Jacob quickly left town and headed east to find shelter with his relatives. 

The Hebrew name Esau, meaning "hairy" or "rough," is a biblical name belonging to the twin brother of Jacob, the eldest son of Isaac and Rebekah.

“Angel Encounters” of Jacob

Much later, Jacob is returning to the land of his fathers with two large companies of his family and livestock. After sending everyone ahead of him at night, Jacob had an unexpected visitor that changed everything, including his name.  He was unsure what kind of response he would receive from Esau.

Then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he touched the socket of his thigh; so the socket of Jacob’s thigh was dislocated while he wrestled with him. 

Then he said, “Let me go, for the dawn is breaking.” But he said, ” I will not let you go unless you bless me.”….”  He said, “Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel; for you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed.” (Gen 32:24-29)

When Jacob’s Name Changed to Israel

Who was Jacob wrestling? In Genesis, it was a “man”.  Hosea 12:4 calls him an “angel”. However, the man/angel said Jacob wrestled with God when changing his name. 

Afterwards, Jacob names the place Peniel, because “I have seen God face to face, yet my life has been preserved.” (Genesis 32:30). Here again, the name of the location provides us with information on a person. 

So just to clarify- Jacob wrestled God but in the form of a man… yet, like an angel, brought a message from God to change Jacob’s name and character. This man/God sounds familiar…

We are not sure what exactly happened. The word used for “wrestled” is a bit of a mystery verb in biblical Hebrew. It only appears twice in the Bible, in v24 and 25. The root is connected to dust particles, which could mean rolling in the dust. 

Thus, when Hosea says Jacob wrestled an angel, he uses a different Hebrew word. In this case, it’s a word that means “to prevail” or “have power as a prince”. 

One could thus say of Genesis 32:24-25 : this Man/God came to Jacob to “get dirty”, and roll around the dust with him. Then, He gives him a new name and character, as one of prevailing power and influence with God. 

Hebrew Meaning of Israel

Because of the different verbs used in Genesis and Hosea to describe Jacob’s encounter, there are varying interpretations of the meaning of the name Israel. That is also probably because the English language doesn’t have comparable verbs.

Some scholars say Israel means “One who wrestles or struggles with God”. Others say it is “One who strives or prevails with God”. And still others say, “Prince of God”.  Is there a significant difference in meaning?  Certainly, there is a difference between someone “struggling” with God and someone who “prevails” with God.   If Israel was to remain faithful to their covenant promises made to God, they had to do more than simply rely on their own powers and abilities.  They could only prevail with God, if they remained collaborators with God in all the Almighty was doing to bring salvation to the world. 

All of those elements can be found in Jacob’s experience of “wrestling” the Man/God who gave him his new name, Israel. The English language is simply unable to describe this in the precise way biblical Hebrew manages.

Conclusion:

There was an old English legend that said if you give your name to a faerie, you give yourself up to its power. To have the name of someone is to have some element of power over them.  This is true in many traditional communities.  In PNG, for example, people used a variety of names depending on the situation in which it was used.  They had one name, called a “steal” name that was rarely used in public.  It was their true name; the one normally kept a secret in case someone wanting to do them harm and so stole it.

For the people of the Bible, names held great significance, beyond the mere association of a word with a person. Ancient cultures, including Israel, believed that to know someone’s name was “to know that person’s total character and nature”.  It is for this reason, the Jews, even today will not pronounce the Sacred Name of God.  That name was considered so holy that it was not spoken aloud.  It would be too arrogant, too presumptuous and probably heretical to presume we could ever know God’s true nature, his special identity and therefore have some kind of influence over him.

Today might be good time to go back to sacred tradition, one in which I grew up.  We were taught at school by the Christian Brothers to bow our heads, a nod really, whenever we used the Sacred Name of Jesus.  It is not superstitious, just an act of worship, an acknowledgement of the divinity standing behind that earthly Name. 

Endnote on God’s Name.

How Yahweh Got Changed To Jehovah

In Hebrew the name of God is represented by the Tetragrammaton (“four letters”) יהוה (Yod Heh Vav Heh), transliterated into Roman script Y H W H.

Since ancient Hebrew had no written vowels, it is uncertain how the name was pronounced originally, but there are records of the name in Greek, which did have written vowels. It is from these records that some believe the name should be pronounced “Yahweh”.

 Shortly before the first century A.D., it became common for Jews to avoid saying the divine NAME for fear of misusing it and breaking the second commandment.  This resulted in the original pronunciation being lost. The name may have originally been derived from the old Semitic root הוה (hawah) meaning “to be” or “to become”. Whenever they read Scripture aloud and encountered the divine name, they substituted another Hebrew word, “Adonai” (which means “Lord” or “my Lord”), in its place.

Eventually Hebrew developed written vowels, which appeared as small marks called vowel points and were placed above and below the consonants of a word. The Masoretes, from about the 6th to the 10th century worked to reproduce the original text of the Hebrew Bible and did this with the newly inserted vowels.

The vowels from Adonai (“Lord”) or Elohim (“God”) found their way into the consonants YHWH, thus forming “YaHWeH.”

This was done to remind the reader of Scripture to say “Adonai” whenever he read “Yahweh.”  and so avoid pronouncing the divine Name by mistake.

But this does not necessarily mean that was how God’s Name was originally pronounced. Any number of vowel combinations are possible, and the Jews are as uncertain of the real pronunciation as Christians.

Jehovah?

“Jehovah” is the new kid on the block, a much later variant in Latin (probably 12-13th century). It was a novel name that was created when Latin-speaking Christian scholars, with limited Hebrew skills substituted

the “Y” (which does not exist in Latin) with an “I” or a“J” (the latter of which exists in Latin as a variant form of I, also Hebrew does not have a “J” sound),

and the “W” with a “V,” plus another vowel combination, resulting in “JeHoVaH”.

From then onward, many Christian scholars and Bible translators incorrectly used the name JeHoVaH for Yahweh – YHWH.  This eventually made its way into some English translations.

Summary:  Jehovah comes about when the consonants of “Yahweh” YHWH are written with the vowels of Adonai (lord) and pronounced it with the vowels of “Adonai.” It is therefore not an accurate English translation.

The first recorded use of this spelling was made by a Spanish Dominican monk, Raymundus Martini, in 1270. Most Bibles today find a compromise by using the capital letters LORD whenever the name Yahweh is found in the Hebrew text.  It uses lowercase letters when the title lord is used in Hebrew.  This is a significant point on which to focus.

Using the name Yahweh means we are speaking of the God of our fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.   By using the title Lord, we are not speaking of God’s Name, simply using a title.

 Conclusion:

There was an old English legend that said if you give your name to a faerie, you give yourself up to its power. To have the name of someone is to have some element of power over them.  This is true in many traditional communities.  In PNG, for example, people used a variety of names depending on the situation in which it was used.  They had one name, called a “steal” name that was rarely used in public.  It was their true name; the one normally kept a secret in case someone wanting to do them harm and so stole it.

For the people of the Bible, names held great significance, beyond the mere association of a word with a person. Ancient cultures, including Israel, believed that to know someone’s name was “to know that person’s total character and nature”.  It is for this reason, the Jews, even today will not pronounce the Sacred Name of God.  That name was considered so holy that it was not spoken aloud.  It would be too arrogant, too presumptuous and probably heretical to presume we could ever know God’s true nature, his special identity and therefore have some kind of influence over him.

Today might be good time to go back to sacred tradition, one in which I grew up.  We were taught at school by the Christian Brothers to bow our heads, a nod really, whenever we used the Sacred Name of Jesus.  It is not superstitious, just an act of worship, an acknowledgement of the divinity standing behind that earthly Name, a reality before whom we should fall to our knees in an act of humble submission. 

Bishop Michael Hough March 2025