Allison writes:<\/p>\n
I am hoping you can help me with a name for our daughter. Her due date is July 21st. Our process for our first two children was this: an unusual, or little used, Biblical first name and a middle name that honors a family member. Our last name is Petersen.<\/p>\n
We have a 3 1\/2 year old, Selah Mae. Mae is my maternal grandmother’s middle name.<\/p>\n
We have a 21 month old, Titus Glen. Glen is my father-in-law’s name and my husband’s middle name.<\/p>\n
I love the name Ava or Eva, but I feel that it is way to common right now so I am looking for something different. Adah is at the top of my list, but my husband doesn’t like it. I have also considered Kyra, Michal, Calah, Eve, Mara, Micah and Eden.<\/p>\n
Possible middle names include Violet (paternal grandmother) and Louise (husband’s grandmother). I was concerned that it doesn’t follow our 3 syllable names with the previous two.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I think it’s fine not to match the number of syllables in the sibling names. And trying to match it eliminates so many possibilities, for no benefit.<\/p>\n
From your list my favorite is Eve. Uncommon (#582 in 2009, though the popularity of Ava\/Eva makes it feel more common) and biblical, and very close to the Ava\/Eva you love. Eve Louise would be pretty, and then you’d still have three syllables total, even if they weren’t divided the same way.<\/p>\n
Some of the names on your list are names I would use—but not if the Bible were my motivation for using them. The name Mara, for example, is a beautiful name, if I’m not thinking of it as a biblical name. But as soon as I think of the Bible, I think of Naomi, after her husband and both her grown sons had died (leaving her, in those times, completely impoverished and unprotected and unable to support herself), saying, “Don’t call me Naomi anymore—instead, call me Mara, because God has dealt very bitterly with me.” (Mara meant “bitter,” from another unpleasant biblical connection where the water of a river was too awful to drink, so they named the place Marah.) Do you see the sort of thing I mean? Mara alone is a very nice name; but using it FOR its biblical connection and BECAUSE OF its biblical connection brings to mind the sadness and bitterness and death it was used to represent in that book.<\/p>\n
It’s the same with the name Cain (not on your list—I’m just on a roll now). If someone uses it with no intention to link it to the Bible, it’s just a name, not much different than Dane or Cade. But if they use it as a biblical name, then they’re using the name of the guy known for murdering his brother, and that’s an odd thing to do: the deliberate biblical connection brings in the negative biblical significance.<\/p>\n
Okay, sermon over. I’m going to ignore what I just said, and suggest names that appear in the Bible whether the associations are positive or negative, because what _I_ would want for a biblical baby name is not relevant, just fun to discuss while we’re on the topic.<\/p>\n