A bumper crop of biblical names to come in 2014
By kenchitwood on January 7, 2014 at 8:51 AM
A newborn baby. Ah, cute. But what's it's name? Maybe Isaac, Irene or…Ichabod. Biblical names are on the rise (PhotoStock).
You are having a baby. There are decisions to be made. When will you tell your friends and family? How will you do it? What color will the nursery be? Oh, and yes, you have to choose a name for your newborn.
The popular blog-site Waitbutwhy.com recently offered that there are four options for you to go on: go timeless (John, James, Mary, Elizabeth), go super weird (Winter, Namaste, Apple), go a little weird (Brooklyn, Ashton, Alexia) or choose from amongst the most popular (Chloe, Mason). Wait, but what about going biblical?
According to social baby naming website Belly Ballot, 2014 will not only prove a popular year for strange names, showbiz inspired favorites and Hispanic hits, but names inspired by Old and New testament characters like Caleb, Judith or even Hadassah.
Belly Ballot collects real-time data on what names parents are selecting from around the globe. Based on naming data from over 3,500 parents, along with 25,000 votes from their friends and family, the site has released predictions for the 2014 New Year that include biblical favorites.
"We've been seeing strong naming trends for upcoming 2014 babies," said Belly Ballot Editor Lucie Strachonova. "Distinctiveness is paramount. It's an exciting time to see so much variety and we can't wait to see how things turn out."
She also said, "After a few years of innovations and experimenting, parents are restoring old customs to regain the essence of religious values."
The practice is not novel, but it is regaining popularity and new parents are overlooking perennial Scripture favorites like Jacob, Michael or Noah in favor of rarer epithets such as Shiloh, Judith or names like Pax – inspired by Latin Vulgate translations of the the Bible.
The trend is proving particularly popular among young evangelical Christians. Rev. Joel Beyer, a young pastor in San Diego, California recently had a child and named him Noah. He said, "We like the story of God loving and using an imperfect man." Another young evangelical pastor, Rev. Steven DeMik named his daughter Phoebe after one of the deaconesses in Romans 16:1.
Sometimes, there are more than pious reasons for selecting a biblical moniker for a child. DeMik said that Phoebe was selected because she was a deaconess, a female minister's assistant in the church, and some of his family currently serve as deaconesses. Others cited that names like Judah, Joseph and John were chosen not only because they are biblical, but because they are the names of important friends and family who impacted their life.
Dr. Andy Dearman, a professor of Old Testament at Fuller Seminary Texas, said that while the trend may be emerging here in the U.S., it's been popular for years for Christians in other parts of the world to use biblical names.
"Old Testament names predominate in sub-Saharan Africa among Christians, perhaps because of an appreciation of tribal identity and the narrative character of the OT," he said. Dearman added that Hispanic Protestants in the Americas also use Scripture as a name source, avoiding Jesus in distinction from their Catholic counterparts.
However, biblical names are not the only popular choices inspired by religious texts among young parents. Belly Ballot shared, "The trend of going back to Biblical names is complemented by parents going even further in history, choosing names from Ancient Mythology." Not only are these ancient, but they are exotic and unique, which seems a popular motivation for unorthodox names including Luna, Camilla, Gaia, Tristan, Damon, or Thor.
Even with the predictions, as it always is with babies themselves, there could always be surprises with popular names in the year to come. Indeed, even those who used the Bible as a name book for their first child do not necessarily utilize the same for their second.
Rachel Kirk, whose first child was named Judah said, "Everyone expected when we had our daughter last year we'd give her an Old Testament name (my husband is Noah). We chose not to give her a biblical name and named her after my mother instead and her name is Frances."
With pregnant expectation then, everyone will have to wait to see which names prove popular, and which stay relegated to the pages of holy writ.
*Follow @kchitwood for more on religion, culture and, every once and a while, babies.