Wednesday, April 23, 2008
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Hello, My Name is Saul. I mean Paul!
Saul turned into Paul. That's how the bible story goes.
Big-Bad-Saul was being a jerk to Christians then decided to change his ways…and his name.
Why is it that he had to change his name? It makes for a confusing story to new Bible-readers when the Bible character changes his name.
My thoughts are that Saul was known as a bad guy, similar to the way we hear the name "Osama Bin Laden" and think of terrorists. By changing his name, people associated him less with his old-bad-ways. Some people, perhaps, didn't even know that he was the same person…because of his different name.
One of my friends posed this question. He has tons of questions about the Bible, Christianity, and religion and I intend to find good, sound answers to all of them.
Yes, I realize that some things cannot be explained; it takes faith. But for those questions for which an answer can be found, I intend to find those answers.
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Comments (4)
In some Jewish schools of thought, they believed that when you had a strong spiritual encounter with God, you must change your name, since your life will never be the same again. Several biblical characters do this. Maybe Saul did this as well
That's a good thought. I never really thought about it. I hope you can find some more answers for him!
All the unanswerable questions you have will be good to save. I've got a few of those myself, and when I get to heaven, I hope Jesus will sit in a big chair, with us around at His feet. Then He can tell us stories and answer questions, just like a loving grandfather talking about "the good ole' days" with all his grandchildren sitting around him.
Naming conventions vary between cultures. Hispanics, for example, have two last names: one from their father and one from their mother. Many Asian cultures place the name of one's father as a surname for the children first and end with their given name. Therefore, a Japanese man named Masaharu whose father is Marubiashi is Marubiashi Masaharu. Arabs often use the fathers name last and the given name first with a word like "bin", "ibn" or "bint" in front that means "son of". for example, Osama bin Laden's father's name is Laden. This was true in Jesus' time. Peter's name was Simon Barjona. The word "bar" means "son of". Simon's name was Simon, son of John. It's also not uncommon outside of western culture to change one's name when one becomes a Christian. Simon was given the name "Peter". Saul was given the name "Paul". The practice goes back at least as far as Abram/Abraham, Sarai/Sarah, Jacob/Israel. Even today, I know many Asian Indians do this. I know a minister named Mari Daniel. (Mari is his father's name.) So changing his name is not extraordinary to anyone but us strange westerners.