Bible characters who changed their name

Those are Sarai and Abram, who became Sarah and Abraham after God spoke to Abram. Sarai was 90 years old at the time and it says “it ceased to be with Sarai after manner of women”. Because of this, she laughed when her husband told her that God said she would have a son. Abraham means “FATHER OF NATIONS” and Sarah means “PRINCESS”. The son Sarah gave birth to after was 90, was named Isaac.

The next one to have a name change (also in the old testament) was a son of Isaac’s. His name was Jacob. But after cheating his brother and running away for many years he was on his way home, when he had a strange experience while trying to sleep. It says, that “there wrestled a man with him until the break of day”. When Jacob asked his name, he was not told the name, but the wrestler gave Jacob the new name of Israel, which means PRINCE, because the wrestler said that Jacob had wrestled with God and had prevailed. This Jacob/Israel person was the first Jew and his 12 sons became the 12 tribes of Israel, who, with their descendants are called the children of Israel or the Jews.

Another one to have his name changed was Simon. This fisherman was one of the first disciples called by Jesus to be fishers of men. He was very outspoken and enthusiastic. When people were confused and making contradictory speculations on who Jesus really was (a resurrected John the Baptist, one of the prophets come back to life, or Elijah returning from the past), Peter blurted out that Jesus was the Christ – the Messiah the Jews had long been waiting for. For this statement, Jesus changed his name to Peter, which means the ROCK.

The next name changer was Saul. He was a very righteous Jewish person, who was quite sure that the Christians were totally mistaken and dangerous. He was going around collecting them and taking them in chains to be gladiators or burned etc. So he was going on his way when he saw an overpowering bright light which had him flat on the ground. He heard a voice say, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” He asked who was speaking and was told it was Jesus. Saul asked what he was to do and was told by the voice to go to a certain house and he would find out. When he stood up he was blind. His people took him to a house and someone came and healed his sight. Right after that, Saul who had been named after the great King Saul of the Old Testament, took the new name of Paul, which means SMALL. This all happened after Jesus’ resurrection so that Paul never met him in the flesh, but he did hear his voice and follow what he said. He did more than anyone to spread Christianity.