Jesus Christ, Name and Titles of

In our culture names serve primarily to distinguish one person from another. In Bibletimes names had other significant functions. In the New Testament, names that were appliedto Jesus often had special meanings that went back into Old Testament and intertestamentaltimes.

"Name" in the Ancient Near East. Outside Israel knowledge of the nameof a god or goddess was important in the performance of magical rites, by which a personcould get control of the deity. Benevolent deities would reveal their names and protect oraid their human contacts; unwilling or malevolent deities would be reluctant to revealtheir names and thereby come under the control of the magician.

Though it is anachronistic to speak of "secular" Greek, non-Christian Greekliterature used "name" in a number of different ways. For example, if a strangerexpected hospitality, he first had to indicate to his host what his name was. Philosopherssuch as Plato attacked the widespread idea that the root meaning of the names of gods orhumans revealed their character. Though Stoicism argued that there was really only onegod, it also held that the deity was known by many different names. At the other extreme,the seventeen tractates of the Greco-Egyptian god Hermes Trismegistos argue that he is solofty that no name is appropriate for him and that, as in rabbinic Judaism, human beingsshould not attempt to utter his name at all.

The Old Testament uses the word, shem [ev], "name, " no less than 854 times, with"in the name of" occurring over 130 times. The idea of Name often revealed abasic characteristic of an individual. Similarly, names could be changed to reflectchanges in circumstances (e.g., Jacob becomes Israel — Gen 32:28 ).

Of special importance is shem Yahweh, "the name of the Lord" (orsimilar expressions such as "in the name of [our] God"). Though some scholarssuggest that the "name" is somehow a being separate from the Lord who is presentin the angel of the Lord ( Exod 23:20-21 )or in the temple ( 1Kings 8:14-30 ), such a conclusion was contradicted by the monotheistic history ofIsrael.

The name of God was significant to the ancient Hebrews because it comprehended initself all that God is. In fact, "the name" was a synonym for God; hencebelievers are not to take the name of the Lord in vain ( Exod 20:7 ). The nameof God is holy and awesome ( Psalm 99:3 ; 111:9 ) andsignifies his personal presence ( 2 Chron 7:16 ; Psalm 75:1 ). God'speople are to reverence ( Psalm 86:11 ), love( Psalm 5:11 ),praise ( Psalm 97:12 ),trust ( Isa 50:10 ),call upon ( Isa 12:4 ),and hope in the divine name ( Psalm 52:9 ). InGod's divine name is the ultimate salvation of his people.

In the pseudepigraphical and rabbinic writings of later Judaism, two significantdevelopments centering on the "name" of God occur, though in general thetendency is to repeat the practices of the Old Testament. The apocalyptic literature ofthe period tends to focus on the meaning of the names of saints and angels, not God. Sevendivine names are mentioned in 4 Esdras 7:132-39. The rabbinic writings mention the healingof a rabbi "in the name of" another person. The most important development wasthe substitution of "Adonai" (Lord) for "Yahweh" in synagogue usageand the use of hashem, "the name, " for both "Yahweh, ""Elohim" (God), and even "Adonai" in the rabbinic schools, at leastwhen quoting the Tanach, so the rabbis forgot how YHWH was orginally pronounced.

The "Name" of Jesus. The expression the "Name" of Jesus isfrequent and highly significant in New Testament usage in that it parallels the use of thename of God in the Old Testament. The early Christians had no difficulty substituting thename of Jesus for the name of God. Indeed, for them the divine name, YHWH, was given toJesus, that every knee should bow to him and every tongue confess that he is Lord ( Php 2:9-11 ; cf. Isa 45:20-23 ).New Testament believers are to live their lives in Jesus' name just as the Old Testamentbelievers were to live in the name of God the Lord.