The short answer
Because the new name carried the promise. In Genesis 17, at ninety-nine and still without a son by Sarai, Abram, “exalted father,” becomes Abraham, explained as “father of a multitude of nations.” Sarai becomes Sarah, “princess.” The new names seal a covenant, with circumcision as its sign, a year before Isaac is born.
Last reviewed
The scene in Genesis 17
Twenty-four years after leaving Haran, Abram is ninety-nine. He has one son, Ishmael, by Sarai’s slave Hagar, and Sarai is still childless. Then God appears: “I am God Almighty. Walk before me and be blameless.” He repeats the covenant, and this time it comes with a new name.
Your name will no more be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.
Notice the tense: “I have made you.” The promise is spoken as already done, to a man whose wife has never given birth. Sarai’s name changes in the same speech: “her name shall be Sarah,” and “kings of peoples will come from her” (Genesis 17:15–16). The covenant also gets a sign in the body, the circumcision of every boy on the eighth day. Abraham falls on his face and laughs, and the promised son is named Isaac, “he laughs.”
What the names mean
Abram is an ordinary-sounding name for its age: av-ram, “exalted father.” Abraham is only a little longer, and Genesis explains it by sound rather than by grammar: it echoes av hamon, “father of a multitude.” Many scholars think Abraham was simply a longer form of the same name. What matters is what it says aloud every time someone calls him: father of nations, said of a man with no heir by his wife. The Talmud even reads Abram as “father of Aram,” a local chief, and Abraham as father of the whole world (Berakhot 13a).
Sarai and Sarah both mean princess. The same Talmud passage reads the change as a widening: Sarai, “my princess,” was a princess to her own people; Sarah would be a princess to the world. In Hebrew each name gains the letter he. A midrash adds that the yod taken from Sarai complained before God’s throne until it got a new home at the front of Joshua’s name, when Moses turned Hoshea into Yehoshua (Genesis Rabbah 47:1; Numbers 13:16).
A name given, not made
The change answers a story told just before Abram’s. At Babel the builders say, “let’s make a name for ourselves” (Genesis 11:4), and their tower is left unfinished. In the very next chapter God tells Abram he will “make your name great” (Genesis 12:2). On one side, a name grabbed by building a tower to the sky; on the other, a name received as a gift. Genesis 17 is that promise kept. Centuries later, a prayer in Nehemiah praises the God who “gave him the name of Abraham” (Nehemiah 9:7).
A new name for a new role
In the Bible a new name usually marks a new role, and often a new master. Pharaoh renames Joseph Zaphenath-Paneah (Genesis 41:45). Babylon renames Daniel Belteshazzar (Daniel 1:7). Pharaoh Necoh turns Eliakim into King Jehoiakim (2 Kings 23:34). When God gives the name, it carries a calling: Jacob becomes Israel after wrestling at the ford of the Jabbok (Genesis 32:28), and Jesus calls Simon Cephas, the rock, Peter (John 1:42). Paul is a different case: Acts simply says Saul was “also called Paul” and never shows a renaming.
The rabbis took Abraham’s new name seriously. One taught that anyone who still calls him Abram breaks a commandment (Berakhot 13a). Jacob is different, the Talmud notes, because God himself goes on calling him Jacob (Genesis 46:2).
Sources
- Genesis 11:1–9; 12:1–4; 17:1–27
- Nehemiah 9:7; Numbers 13:16; Genesis 32:22–32; John 1:42; Acts 13:9
- Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 13a
- Genesis Rabbah 47:1
Bible quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain.