Why Amichai Sasha?

Yesterday evening, our son was entered into the covenant of the Jewish people and officially given his name....Amichai Sasha De Lowe!

Here is an explanation of the meaning and intention of his name which we read at his Brit milah:


From Kohelet Rabba we learn:
“A person has three names:
one that we are called by our parents;
one that people know us by,
and one that we acquire for ourselves.”

Amichai Sasha De Lowe….today we give you your birth name, a responsibility that we did not take lightly and approached with much thought and reverence. We bestow it upon you with a sense of your family’s history as well as our hopes for you in the future. We look forward to witnessing your life as you continue to earn names of honor and deep meaning.

We will call you Amichai…
For as long as we can remember, long before you were a part of our lives, one name has always stood out in our minds. Amichai. My people live on. This beautiful name carries with it many levels of meaning—

The Israeli poet, Yehuda Amichai, from whom your name came into our minds so many years ago, wrote in the poem ‘What Kind of Person’:
'"What kind of a person are you," I heard them say to me. I'm a person with a complex plumbing of the soul, sophisticated instruments of feeling and a system Of controlled memory…But with an old body from ancient times And with a God even older than my body. I'm a person for the surface of the earth.'

Your soul is complex, Amichai, filled with memories of our collective past and with the bright future ahead of you. Your name reflects that.

To us your name is about connection, both to the Jewish people as a whole and to our family. Your name says that our people are strengthened by your birth. It connects you to the history of our family name and to the people who lived that history. The De Lowe name carries so much within it—a long, proud and rich history that was also marked by hardship and loss. Your name is Amichai De Lowe, in honor both of our family members whom we lost in Germany and of those who lived on. We see in your name the fierce juxtaposition of loss and new life, of destroyed futures and persevering ones. With your name Amichai, we honor and remember those who came before us, while we also celebrate the future of our people through you.

We will call you Sasha…
In Slavic language, the name Sasha means 'helper and guardian of mankind', and we hope that you will embody this meaning of your name.
We call you Sasha in memory of your Great Grandmother Sylvia Winston. It is still unbelievable to us that you will never meet her, as her presence remains so strong in our family and in our lives. Sylvia was the life force of her family for 94 years. She lived life to its fullest until her very last days. She loved her family with all of her heart and with all of her might. She made it her business to know everything about everyone she came across, and she remembered every detail and every story that each person told her. To be in her presence was to be amazed. While she could drive us all crazy like no one else could, she could also touch our hearts like no one else could. Sylvia was strong. She was small in stature, but giant in heart and chutzpah. She had seemingly endless room in her heart for love. She would have loved to have known you. Grandma Sylvia always had to be the center of attention, so we know she is glowing right now with pride that you were named for her! We wish to bestow upon you her devotion to family, her commitment to human connection, her sense of humor, her ability to really know people, and her lust for life.

Lastly, your family name, De Lowe, links us to one another and to those who came before us. As we bring you into the covenant of the Jewish people today, so too do we bring you into the proud heritage and trajectory of the De Lowe family name. May you be fierce like a lion, a leader of our people, the joy of our family.

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