At the Name of Jesus every knee shall bow,

every tongue confess him King of glory now;

'tis the Father’s pleasure we should call him Lord,

who from the beginning was the mighty Word. (Hymn #435)

Dear Saints,

As a child in the Church, I learned the custom of bowing my head at the mention of the name of Jesus. Later in life, reading assignments for my seminary liturgics class reinforced the habit:

Simple Bow: At the name of Jesus and on other occasions of reverence, a simple bow is made with the head, inclining the shoulders slightly. (Dennis Michno, “Ceremonial Acts,” A Manual for Priests)

The biblical warrant for the custom is said to be Philippians 2:9-11. If we followed it to the letter, we would bow not just our heads, but also our knees, at the mention of Jesus’ Name:

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

In the Church kalendar, January 1 is the Feast of the Holy Name of Our Lord Jesus Christ. This holiday commemorates Jesus’ circumcision on the 8th day after his birth, according to the law of Moses (Genesis 17:12; Leviticus 12:3), and his naming:

And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. (Luke 2:21)

The name “Jesus” is the English form of the Greek variant of the Aramaic and Hebrew name Yeshua(Joshua), meaning “God is salvation.” In the same way that certain girls’ and boys’ names go through cycles of popularity now, it is likely that, in the time of Jesus’ birth, Jewish parents living under Roman military government expressed their hope and patriotism by naming their sons Yeshua after Israel’s national hero who had once led the children of freed slaves across the Jordan into the Promised Land.

So Jesus received a heroic name, and also, for the time he walked the earth, a very ordinary Jewish man’s name. The good news of God Incarnate, God-in-the-flesh, begins by describing the cosmic impact of this exceptional, unique birth - angels appearing, signs in the sky, foreign sages visiting, prophetic dreams - but, at the same time, stresses the ordinary, unexceptional facts of Jesus’ early life: his “ordinary” name, his growing up in a small town, observing the law of Moses, and submitting to his parents’ authority.

From the Bible’s perspective, to know someone’s name is to know the person’s character. When the Lord says he has called someone by name, it is a way of saying he knows the person intimately, even from before birth, and has prepared a destiny for her or him:

...The LORD called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my name. (Isaiah 49:1)

Jesus’ “Name” is more than the one word “Jesus.” One of our hymns captures this:

Jesus, Name above all Names, beautiful Savior, glorious Lord,

Emmanuel, God is with us, blessed Redeemer, Living Word...

...and so forth, for a total of perhaps 25 names in all. Almost half of the names of Jesus we recite in this song are names we associate with God the Father. The same might be said of Isaiah 9:6, which at first glance seems to refer to a future human king of Israel, but it calls that king not just by traditional royal titles, but by some names that belong only to God:

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Ancient Near Eastern kings were usually polygamous, and therefore likely to have multiple first-born sons by different wives. Upon the king’s death, this could have set the stage for a civil war to determine who the next king should be. While he still lived, the reigning king would often begin transferring his names (titles) to a particular son, designating that son as co-regent and heir of his royal authority. The New Testament borrows this imagery to describe how the eternal Son of God, the Word, became fully human, offering the Father an obedient life even to death on the cross, so that he might enter into his ministry as the King of Kings and perfect High Priest interceding for us. (Hebrews 1:8 and 5:1-10)

Where your Bible uses capital letters for “LORD” as a name of God, the word in the Hebrew text is Yahweh, the name (I AM WHO I AM) by which God identified himself to Moses.

Then he said “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground” ...Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” (Exodus 3:5, 13-14)

In the time of the Babylonian exile, devout Jews considered the name Yahweh so holy it could not be said aloud. When they saw it on the page they substituted ’Adonai, “my Lord”: something a subordinate might say to a human superior (“sir,” “boss,” or “master”), but, when addressed to God, a term of reverence. The Greek Old and New Testaments use the word kurios for both: God’s covenant Name (“Lord”=Yahweh) and the respectful address to a human male superior (“sir”).

I am convinced that when he wrote, “...at the name of Jesus every knee should bow...,” the name Paul had in mind, more than all the others, is “Lord.” The shocking good news of the New Testament is that the homeless carpenter from Nazareth, whom the disciples addressed as “master,” who was unjustly executed on the cross, is LORD, the I AM (John 6:35, 8:12, 10:9-11, 11:25, 12:46, 15:1, 18:5-6), who now reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Among the changes now being proposed for Episcopal liturgies, I notice that the word “Lord” as a name of Jesus has been almost eliminated. The reason, I am told, is that for us modern, democratically-minded speakers of English, the word “Lord” connotes the abuse of power, especially male power. But when we Christians call Jesus “Lord,” it does not mean we imagine he is a man in a powdered wig chasing after foxes on horseback.

“’Tis the Father’s pleasure we should call him Lord…” When we balk at calling Jesus “Lord” in our worship, we forfeit an important element of our covenant relationship with God. We lose some of what it means to pray in Jesus’ name (with his authority). The same Jesus who declares us holy by his word (John 13:10) has the authority to judge, to forgive sins, and to command. (Luke 6:46, John 13:34) To serve him is perfect freedom. (Prayer Book, p. 99)

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:28-30)

Faithfully,