Hashem
A Hebrew name meaning "The Name" as a reverent substitution for God.
Name Census estimates that about 569 living Americans carry the first name Hashem. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Hashem today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Hashem births was 2024 (41 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Hashem. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
569
~ 1 in 602,380 Americans
Peak year
2024
41 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#3,006
Tracked since 1979
Popularity
Hashem: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Hashem from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 220 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Hashem remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Hashem by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Hashem during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Hashems live
The SSA's state-level files cover 6 states and territories. California, Michigan, Texas recorded the most babies named Hashem, while New Jersey, Florida, New York recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 12 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Hashem
The name Hashem is a Hebrew word that literally translates to "the Name" and is used as a substitute for the proper name of the Judaic God, which is considered too sacred to be spoken aloud. The origins of this practice can be traced back to ancient times when Jews sought to avoid inadvertently violating the commandment against taking the Lord's name in vain.
While the name Hashem itself is not a personal name per se, it has been adopted as a given name by some individuals, particularly within the Jewish community. One of the earliest known references to Hashem as a personal name can be found in the Talmud, a central text of Rabbinic Judaism dating back to the 3rd to 6th centuries CE.
Among the notable historical figures who bore the name Hashem is Hashem ben Yosef, a Jewish scholar and physician who lived in Spain during the 12th century. Another noteworthy individual was Hashem ben Jacob, a prominent Talmudic scholar who lived in the 16th century in the Ottoman Empire.
In the realm of literature, the name Hashem appears in several works of Jewish mysticism and Kabbalah, where it is often used to refer to the divine essence or the ineffable name of God. For instance, the Sefer Yetzirah (Book of Formation), an ancient Kabbalistic text, frequently employs the term Hashem to discuss the mystical properties of the Hebrew alphabet and its relation to the creative power of the divine.
Another historical figure worth mentioning is Hashem ben Elijah, a 17th-century rabbi and kabbalist who lived in Safed, a city in present-day Israel that was a major center of Jewish mysticism during the 16th and 17th centuries. His writings on Kabbalah and Jewish law have been widely studied and influential within certain Jewish communities.
It is important to note that while the name Hashem has been used as a personal name throughout history, its primary significance lies in its role as a reverential substitute for the explicit name of God in the Jewish tradition, a practice that continues to this day.
People
Hashem + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Hashem as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with H
Other first names starting with H with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Hashem: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Hashem?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 569 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Hashem going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 602,380 US residents.
Is Hashem a common name?
We classify Hashem as "Very Rare". It ranks above 85.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 576 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Hashem most popular?
The single biggest year for Hashem was 2024, when 41 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Hashem is about 15 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Hashem a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Hashem in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.