What's in a name?
Holy is the Name
What’s in a name? Well, as it turns out, quite a lot. Holy is the name.
In the Semitic languages, the root word shem, translated as “name,” also can mean light, sound, or atmosphere. Actually, it can connote all of these meanings at once. In the thought-world of Hebrew or Aramaic, people are perceived as vibrating with a particular sound, which was associated with their name. The predominate metaphor here is sound; one’s shem doesn’t designate an object per se so much as its resonance. It is what radiates from within us rather than our outward appearance that matters. It is like listening to the sound that a string makes to determine whether or not it is in tune: that is its shem.
As Neil Douglas-Klotz describes ancient semitic cultures, “It was as though human beings were condensed sound rather than mere outward appearance. The easiest way to connect with the shem of a prophet was to breathe as they were breathing, to get into rhythm with them, to walk in their footsteps, or to intone sound as they were intoning it.”[1] The felt sense of whether a person is in tune with the divine breath that resonates through all things; the atmosphere that a person gives off; that is their shem.
When the Psalmist sings, “O Lord our Governor, how exalted is your shem in all the world,” he is evoking the wonder of the atmosphere or sound of God’s breath that creates and resonates through all things. It is an exclamation of awe at the One breath that permeates and unites all things in the divine rhythm.[2]
When the Aaronic blessing is pronounced in the Torah it places God’s shem on the people of Israel.[3] It bathes them in the sound or atmosphere of the divine breath. Blessing communicates shem, alignment with the divine rhythm. This is the significance of name changes in scripture. Sarai becomes Sarah and Abram becomes Abraham because their shem is now in tune with the divine breath. And so Jacob becomes Israel, Simon becomes Peter, and Saul becomes Paul.
When Paul writes in his letter to the Galatians that God has sent the breath of his Son, Jesus, into our hearts, so that we are no longer slaves, but rather children of God, he is indicating a similar change in our shem: we are now in tune with the divine breath.[4] We are bathed in the breath of God, sharing the same shem as Jesus. Recall that Jesus’ name, given by the angel, means “God redeems.” Jesus’s shem is the Ever-Living Life that makes it possible for people to fulfill their natural human purpose: to be released from whatever constricts our breathing so that we can breathe in rhythm with God.
When we share in Jesus’ shem, our breath or spirit is aligned with the breath or spirit of God. We might say that our self is attuned with our soul. It is the heart that connects the self and soul in one unified field. This is why Mary ponders the shem of her son, Jesus in her heart, and Paul says that the breath of Jesus is poured into our hearts. The heart is the center of the person that connects the breath of self with the breath of God, and radiates the shem that is our true name. We are most truly ourselves, when we are fulfilling our purpose in alignment with the divine breath breathing in us.
What is your name? The answer is not found on your passport or driver’s license. It is written on your heart, communicated by the spiritual presence that radiates from the center of your being. What kind of atmosphere do you emit? Is it clear and calm? Wet and stormy? Cold and constricting? Warm and expansive? Is your heartbeat entrained to the rhythm of the divine breath, in time with the heartbeat of God? Or is your heart beating to someone else’s drum? Our shem can be in or out of tune with God, just like a string on a musical instrument.
Today, we celebrate the Holy Name of Jesus, the one who taught us to pray to God, saying, “holy is your name.” To say that Jesus’ name is holy is to say that his shem is radiant with the divine shem. It is to say that his heart is a still point through and around which radiates the breath, or light or sound of the divine. This still point defines the space around it, creating an atmosphere; like a point expanding into a circle, or a lamp illuminating a room, or a sound capturing the attention of an audience. It creates a heart-to-heart connection, a space where something live-giving can happen.[5]
Our shem is intrinsically holy, an expression of the divine breath. It is our true identity. But that identity can become obscured by the layers of family and culture and self-image that we internalize from our birth. Just as Jesus was given a name and culture, marked by the ritual of circumcision, we too are marked by the name and culture we are given. But it is not our shem.
Our experience can help us to stay tuned into the divine breath, or it can bring us out of tune. But, fundamentally, we are not our experience. It is what happened to us, but it is not us. Holy is your name. This is your birthright, and you can always wake-up from the illusion of the identity you have been given – however wonderful or horrible you may think that identity is – and claim your true name, your shem.
Breathe on me, Breath of God,
Fill me with life anew,
That I may love what Thou dost love,
And do what Thou wouldst do.
Breathe on me, Breath of God,
Until my heart is pure,
Until with Thee I will one will,
To do and to endure.
Breathe on me, Breath of God,
Till I am wholly Thine,
Until this earthly part of me
Glows with Thy fire divine.
Breathe on me, Breath of God,
So shall I never die,
But live with Thee the perfect life
Of Thine eternity.[6]
When our breath and God’s breath is one breath, then we will realize our name, and that name is holy. Amen.
[1] Neil Douglas-Klotz, Revelations of the Aramaic Jesus: The Hidden Teachings of Life & Death (Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads Publishing, 2022), p. 17.
[2] Psalm 8:1.
[3] Numbers 6:22-27.
[4] Galatians 4:4-7.
[5] Douglas-Klotz, p. 33-34.
[6] “Breathe on me, breath of God,” words by Edwin Hatch (1835-1889), number 508 in The Hymnal 1982.