Benjamin
Meaning of Benjamin
Benjamin drifts through time like the slow ripple of a koi beneath a moonlit pond: born of the Hebrew ben yamin—“son of the right hand,” or, in an older compass, “son of the south”—he was the cherished youngest of Jacob, a figure whose quiet loyalty still echoes like a temple bell in the Book of Genesis. The name’s syllables—BEN-juh-min—fall with the clean precision of a haiku, yet carry the weight of statesmen and storytellers alike, from Franklin’s lightning-chasing wit to Button’s backwards clock. In the United States, Benjamin has glided upward for half a century, settling comfortably among the nation’s top ten like a well-placed stone in a zen garden; spreadsheets confirm what lullabies already knew: parents, en masse, favor a name that feels both seasoned and fresh. Cool, dependable, and faintly mischievous, Benjamin wears a suit by day and folds origami cranes by night, suggesting a child who might bargain shrewdly for an extra bedtime story while pondering the impermanence of cherry blossoms. Not bad for a name that began as a simple blessing whispered in a desert tent.
Pronunciation
English
- Pronunced as BEN-juh-min (/ˈbɛndʒəmɪn/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
States Popularity Chart
Notable People Named Benjamin
| Benjamin Franklin was an American polymath and Founding Father who helped draft and sign the Declaration of Independence and served as the first Postmaster General. |
| Benjamin Britten was an English composer, conductor, and pianist, a central figure in 20th century British music known for Peter Grimes, War Requiem, and The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra. |
| Benjamin Ricketson Tucker was an American individualist anarchist and self-identified socialist who edited and published the periodical Liberty from 1881 to 1908. |
| Benjamin Elijah Mays was an American Baptist minister and longtime Morehouse College president whose mentoring of leaders like Martin Luther King Jr and advocacy of Black self determination, nonviolence, and civil resistance helped lay the intellectual foundation of the civil rights movement. |
| Benjamin McLane Spock, known as Dr. Spock, was an American pediatrician, Olympian, and left wing activist whose 1946 Baby and Child Care became one of the best selling books of the 20th century and made him a trusted parenting authority. |
| Benjamin Chew was a Quaker-born American lawyer and judge, chief justice of Pennsylvania, renowned for concise arguments, keen judgment, mastery of statutory law, and devotion to the rule of law and the constitution. |
| Benjamin Franklin Chavis Jr is an African American activist author and journalist who is president and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association and a national cochair of No Labels. |
| Benjamin Zephaniah - Benjamin Obadiah Iqbal Zephaniah was a British writer, dub poet and performer whose work, shaped by racism, incarceration and Jamaican heritage, earned 20 honorary doctorates and a place on The Times 2008 list of Britains top postwar writers. |
| British painter Benjamin Robert Haydon specialized in grand historical canvases, but his tactless dealings with patrons and colossal scale left him in chronic debt and even in prison for it. |
| Benjamin Franklin Wade was an Ohio senator and Radical Republican leader who nearly became president during the 1868 impeachment of Andrew Johnson. |
| Benjamin Franklin Bache was an early American journalist and publisher who founded the Philadelphia Aurora, championed Jeffersonian ideals, and whose fierce attacks on Federalists helped prompt the Alien and Sedition Acts. |
| Benjamin of Petrograd, a Russian Orthodox metropolitan who led nonviolent resistance to Soviet anti-religious laws, was executed after a show trial and later canonized in 1992. |
| French defender Benjamin Pavard plays for Marseille on loan from Inter Milan and for France, mainly at center back but also at right back. |
| Benjamin Ingrosso is a Swedish singer songwriter and producer who rose from child theater to win Lilla Melodifestivalen 2006 and Lets Dance 2014, claimed Melodifestivalen 2018 to represent Sweden at Eurovision, released five albums, and hosted the TV show Benjamins. |
