Remarks on the naming of Jacob Samuel Sufrin Simon at his Brit Milah
By Claire Sufrin and Michael Simon
Home of Barry and Irene Sufrin
Glencoe, Illinois
March 30, 2011 ~ 24 Adar II 5761
I. JACOB/YA’AKOV
Claire:
Our son’s first name is Jacob, in Hebrew Ya’akov. He is named after my maternal grandfather Albert Jacob Katz, Avraham Ya’akov.
On my grandfather’s 80th birthday, we videotaped him talking about his life. He was already showing signs of the dementia that would come to take his life, but he still had his charm and his sense of humor. “I had four sisters,” he told us. “They were very good, but I was very bad.” He repeated this line several times, making it the refrain of the interview. But each time he said it with a twinkle in his eye. He and his sisters were the children of immigrants; their childhood was difficult with the death of their father at a young age, and one of the sisters died young as well. But my grandfather and his sisters were dedicated to one another and in different ways provided for one another in times of need. They were all very good. Family was the bedrock of my grandfather’s life.
When we got in trouble growing up, there were two things my mom could say to us that showed just how serious things had gotten: the first, “wait til your father gets home” is self-explanatory. The second was: “well, as Grandpa would say, I don’t care what other people are doing. I care about what you’re doing.” When you heard that, you knew that whatever silly thing it was you wanted, wherever it was you wanted to go, whatever excuse you had made, you had hit a dead end. An appeal to Grandpa was an appeal to your deepest values, your deepest core, to the part of you that already knew that indeed, it didn’t matter what other people were doing or saying or achieving. You were responsible for your own self, being true to that self, and being true to what was right and good. This was part of my grandfather’s approach to Judaism, why he his father’s orthodoxy for the Conservative Judaism that shaped my mother’s life and mine as well.
My grandfather was a man of commitment; his marriage to my grandmother was loving and true. He worked hard. He was a man of moderation: if you were going to drink a milkshake, you could only have one sip for every bite you took of the healthy part of your meal. But given that deal, by all means order the milkshake and drink up!
My grandfather was a man of great creativity, which he expressed in many ways in the years in which I knew him. Half of my grandparents’ garage was filled with his woodshop where he was willing to undertake any woodworking project he or we could dream up. As a retiree, he took up sculpting, learned how to make stained glass, and studied Spanish.
Our little Jacob: we wish you a life in which you are true to who you are, in which you find pleasure in life’s milkshakes and sustenance in its oatmeals. We wish you inspiration as you create. We welcome you to the Jewish people. You are the inheritor of the Judaism that my grandfather gave to your grandmother and she gave to me, and I hope that you find in it a source of value and strength. We welcome you to our family, both the small one that your father and I are creating with you and the larger one in which we belong. Baruch ha-ba, Ya’akov.
Michael:
“Ma nora ha-makom ha-zeh” – these are the words that Jacob cries out after his dream encounter with the ladder of angels and God. “How awesome is this place.” And ma nora ha-makom ha-ZEH – How awesome is this place, and this moment, for all of us.
Little baby Jacob: we had selected Jacob as your first name even before you arrived, but we hadn’t fully settled on it, wanting to meet you first and then decide how it felt, whether you really were Jacob. The moment you were born, the cord was cut and you were brought to the warming table to be cleaned and checked, and that’s where I first really met you, and saw you reaching for, grabbing for, the blanket in which you were wrapped. Grabbing, striving – I told your mom then, “He’s Ya’akov”.
Students with whom I have worked in recent years can attest, little Jacob, that I often talk of the biblical Jacob as “my guy”. We meet Jacob in the womb – just like we met you in the womb – struggling, striving with his twin (OK – no twin for you, but you were plenty active). Jacob is complex even from his youth – devoted to his mother, connected to his father, a brilliant student of Torah (according to the Midrash) even before Torah was formally given. Jacob wrests the birthright and the blessing, but this is not the end of his story – it’s the beginning. His entire life is a search for shleimut – for peace, for wholeness. Jacob’s dream of the ladder has some angels heading toward heaven and others toward earth – Jacob himself lives in the tension between the present and the timeless, between finite and infinite, between kodesh (holiness) and chol (mundanity).
Jacob develops his mind, his body, and his spirit – he is book-smart and street-smart. He becomes wealthy, with a large and powerful family – he is truly the builder of a nation, of our people – he becomes Yisrael, and we are Am Yisrael.
But, little Jacob, the biblical Jacob is not “my guy” because of his triumphs and successes – he is “my guy” because he faces real struggles and has real shortcomings. He tries and fails, and tries again. He wants to be treated fairly but shades the truth. Ultimately, Jacob faces his adversaries – he wrestles with beings human and divine, he wrestles with the ish, he wrestles with himself…and he is able to survive and even thrive.
Little Jacob, everyone in this home and everyone in your life hope that you will only know peace, joy, and happiness. But we also know better. The day you were born, we received many messages thanking us for the good news, because this is a world that does not always bring good news, let alone extraordinarily wonderful and beautiful news such as your arrival into our midst. Our blessing to you, little Ya’akov, little Jacob, is that like the biblical Jacob you will strive toward shleimut (wholeness and peace), that you will work to be a blessing and to bestow blessings upon your family, your community, and the world.
II. Samuel/Shmuel
Michael:
Our son’s middle name is Samuel; in Hebrew “Shmuel”. We give him this name to honor the memory of my father, Sam Simon.
My father Sam died in January 2009, just over two years ago, at the age of 83. Often, when I mention the loss of my dad, I note that he died exactly three months after Claire and I got married. I take comfort and gratitude from this, that he was able to be there and to experience that moment of utter joy in our lives. So, little Jacob, it is with an exquisite mix of bitter and sweet that we give you the middle name “Samuel”. We are so grateful to be able to honor my dad’s memory in this way, but we are so sad that you did not get to spend time in this world together, that you will only know him in memories and photos and stories.
What you will hear and learn and discover about Grandpa Sam is that he was a good man. He lived most of his life in California, but, like you, he was born in the Midwest, and he carried with him his whole life a down-to-earth quality, a plainspoken nature, an honesty and kindness toward others. You’ll learn that my dad loved to eat, he loved to watch TV, loved to go to movies and out to dinner with my mom, and loved their excursions to Las Vegas. And, most of all, you’ll learn that your Grandpa Sam loved his family – his two sons and their wives, his three wonderful grandchildren, and, of course, his wife and partner, my mom.
Baby Jacob Samuel, we wish so much that you could have met your Grandpa Sam - he would have been smiling his twinkly smile at your arrival. But we are so proud and honored that you will carry with you his name, and our blessing for you is that you will carry too his love of family, his appreciation for simple pleasures, and his kindness.
Claire:
Samuel, Shmuel, is also the name of one of the most significant prophets of the Tanakh, and from him too, we hope that you will take lessons.
Like Jacob, we first meet Samuel before he is born, when his mother Hanna prays for a child. In the same way too, your father and I feel like we knew you before we knew you; we knew you when you were only an idea.
As a young man, Samuel is called by God to serve as a prophet.
Prophecy is a biblical phenomenon that we as moderns often struggle to understand. Abraham Joshua Heschel describes the prophet as the one who is able to see the world from God’s perspective and to share in the divine pathos, God’s emotional participation in and reaction to human beings and the consequences of their actions. In Samuel’s time, the central question facing the Israelites is: who will lead them and how? Who is a worthy ruler and guide?
Samuel is the prophet who explains to the people that if they will have a king, they must never forget that God is truly king; he appoints Saul and then must later tell Saul that he has fallen short and his sons will not inherit his title; Samuel appoints David as Saul’s replacement. Samuel sees both failures and triumphs of leadership in his life, in the kingship and among the priests as well. He himself both fails and succeeds as he makes his way.
All of this Samuel understands from God’s perspective, as God’s will and God’s actions. Samuel is God’s messenger but he also his witness.
Jacob Samuel, we are not going to dedicate your life to temple service for you, as Samuel’s mother Hanna did for him. There’s a good chance we’ll send you to day school, maybe even Schechter. But you can still live at home.
But, like Samuel, there are countless ways in which you, like all of us, have been born into a situation that is bigger than you are and that is beyond your control. In light of your middle name Samuel, we wish you the courage to stand up to those circumstances and to be a leader when leadership is needed. Prophecy may be over, but the need for pathos and empathy among human beings will never end. We wish for you the courage and strength to struggle with this need, just as your biblical namesake did.
Jacob Samuel, Ya’akov Shmuel, already we love you more than we ever knew was possible. Your name is a gift we give you from this love; now it is yours. It comes to you from your past and you will take it into your future. Use it in the life you will lead.
