Jewish Girl Names with Meanings

The oldest layer of Jewish girls' names comes straight from the Torah's matriarchs and women — Leah (weary, delicate), Hannah (grace, favour), Naomi (pleasantness), Abigail (my father's joy) — names that have stayed in continuous use for three thousand years without ever feeling dated, which is part of why Leah and Hannah are both back near the top of secular baby-name charts worldwide. A second, much newer layer arrived with the rebirth of spoken Hebrew in Israel: short, nature-rooted names like Eden (place of delight), Gal (wave), Maya and Shai (gift) were coined or revived in the twentieth century and travelled back out to Jewish communities everywhere because they read easily in any language.

Ashkenazi families keep a custom that shapes many of these names in practice: a girl is traditionally named after a deceased relative, often producing a Hebrew name used at the synagogue and Torah reading alongside a separate English name used everywhere else — a child might be Elka at services and Ella at school. Sephardi and Mizrahi families more often name a daughter after a living grandparent instead, and favour names like Sara, Ariel and Adina that move comfortably between Hebrew, Arabic and Ladino-speaking communities.

The names below are the girls across our Jewish-tradition catalogue, most common first, then modern and classic picks. Many, like Hannah, Elizabeth and Sara, are also mainstream Christian names — a reminder of how much of this naming pool the two traditions share.