Praising Jesus’ name

September 16, 2023 - Saturday

Memorial of Saints Cornelius, Pope, and Cyprian, Bishop, Martyrs

Psalm 113:1b-2, 3-4, 5 and 6-7

Psalm 113 invites us to praise the name of the Lord. The name of the Lord was revealed to Moses in the context of the promise of liberation from Egypt (see Exodus 6:6), but then, at a certain stage in the Jewish tradition, it was considered improper to pronounce this name. Today, as the Jewish scholars indicate, we simply do not know how to pronounce it - although most scholars think that it was pronounced as Yahweh. And so, we are left with four Hebrew letters known as the Tetragrammaton - YHWH. 

Our Catechism gives three possible meanings of that name: “I AM HE WHO IS", "I AM WHO AM" or "I AM WHO I AM" (CCC, 206). Robert Alter in his commentary on Exodus 3:14 states that the most plausible meaning of that name is: “I Will Be Who I Will Be”. But he also says that it could be rendered as “I Am He Who Endures”. But what do all these possible explanations tell us? Perhaps, the best explanation is given by our Catechism, namely that God’s name, like God himself, remains a mystery. “It is at once a name revealed and something like the refusal of a name, and hence it better expresses God as what he is - infinitely above everything that we can understand or say” (CCC, 206). Then the Catechism quotes the famous passage from the book of Isaiah in which the prophet says: “Truly, you are a God who hides himself, O God of Israel, the Savior” (Is 45:15).

If we do not know how to properly pronounce God’s name and are incapable of grasping its mysterious meaning, how can we praise the name of the Lord? Again, our Catechism helps us to solve this difficulty. Although God’s name is beyond our comprehension, he “reveals himself as the God who is always there, present to his people to save them” (CCC, 207). The psalmist mentions three groups of people that God helps: the lowly, the poor, and the barren woman (see Ps 113:7-9).

A classic biblical example of the poor and needy lifted from the dung heap and placed among princes is Joseph from the Old Testament. A contemporary example could be Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years in prison for his anti-apartheid activities and then became the president of South Africa. Regarding the barren woman, we have the examples of Sarah, Rebecca, and Rachel - the great matriarchs of the Jewish people, Hannah, the mother of the prophet Samuel, and Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist. And I know personally few mothers who after years of worrying, waiting, and praying could finally conceive and give birth.

The psalmist wants to witness God’s name being praised in time - “both now and forever” - and in space - “from the rising to the setting of the sun” (Ps 113:2-3). We find a similar prayer expressed by the first followers of Jesus Christ and preserved for us by Saint Paul in his letter to the Philippians. In that Christian hymn that speaks of Christ emptying himself until the point of death on the cross and then being exalted at the right hand of the Father, we find this statement:

“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” (Phil 2:9-11).

Let me close this reflection on God’s name with one more quote from our Catechism that explains to us the meaning and power of Jesus’ name:

“The name "Jesus" signifies that the very name of God is present in the person of his Son, made man for the universal and definitive redemption from sins. It is the divine name that alone brings salvation, and henceforth all can invoke his name, for Jesus united himself to all men through his Incarnation, so that "there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved" (CCC, 432).