“Name means character”, this was the answer of one among the children I was teaching at school when I asked him: “What does it mean to change ones name?”
In the Middle East as in many other countries, people are not called only by their family name, rather by their Father’s as a middle name and this is to identify the person we are calling, especially when he or she carries a most popular name used by many others and maybe in the same family, carrying both first name and surname the same as others do, though they have different characters.
For example in a Christian community you would find many called: John, peter, Mike, George or Mary, Lilly, Rose etc.
At the time of the Lord Jesus Christ’s, we had many Simons, Johns, James, Judas and Levis as many other popular names. To identify which one, usually his father’s name is added or the city where he lives, so we hear some names mentioned as Joseph from Arimathea, which is a city in Judea, even Jesus who’s name was common in his times as Joshua or Yeshua, was called Jesus from Nazareth. We also read in John1: 48 Jesus calling Simon: “Simon son of John” and he did the same in John21: 15-17. While in Matthew 16: 17 Jesus said to him: “blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah”, meaning Simon son of Jonah.
Simon in Hebrew and in Arabic language means listener, and he was chosen among the first disciples of the Lord Jesus, and every time the twelve disciples were mentioned, his name was the first.
Though his name is a “listener”, but several times he seems distracted not paying attention to what was said, or maybe forgetting what he heard. When the Lord called him several times to be distinctive among the other disciples, still he did not keep this in mind, maybe neglecting it, because of his humbleness or his stubbornness. In John 21 we read that he wanted to go back fishing, and he withdrew six other disciples with him. After that we read the Lord asked him: “Simon son of Jonah do you love me more than these?” then three times he tells him “feed my sheep”, maybe three times to be sure he listens and never forget his call. Many times our names do not coincide with our attitudes, therefore they better let us be aware of how we should behave.
The Lord changed the name of other disciples too, he called James and his brother John the sons of Zebedee he surnamed them Boanerges, which means in Aramaic “The sons of thunder”, describing by that their fulminous character.
When Jesus first met him, he changed his name, telling him: “You are Simon Son of Jonah, you will be called Cefa” in Aramaic meaning Rock. Because the Gospel was written in the Greek language, Rock in Greek is “Pedros”, translated Peter.
Finally Simon son of Jonah became a famous Peter and many times he was called: ”Simon Peter”(Matthew16: 16; Luke5: 8;John6: 68 & 13:6) as well as in his second Epistle, He calls himself: “Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ” (2Pet.1: 1).
