Middle name help for Ezra... honoring issues

General Name Discussion
1

I think my husband might be coming around to my top choice of [name]Ezra[/name] for our coming boy! He even called him by that name a couple of times in the last few days. [name]Ezra[/name] has been the only name that really felt “right” since I started thinking of names for this boy. So I am very excited at the possibility of using it. Now on to think of a middle name.

This will be our fourth son, and we have named each of our other boys after someone important in our lives. My oldest is [name]Joshua[/name] [name]David[/name] ([name]David[/name] was the name of my father), then we have [name]Noah[/name] [name]Brian[/name] (my husband’s brother) and our third son is [name]Levi[/name] [name]Paul[/name] (one of our best friends since college days). At this point, I feel like we have covered all of our bases in honoring people. I don’t really want to use a name from one side and not the other since I don’t want to seem like we are favoring one side of our family. But I talked to my older sons (they are 10 and 12) and they both said that it was special to them to have a special connection through their names, and that I should try to find a similar connection for their little brother. The only family member that I would want to honor would be our angel baby, [name]Levi[/name]. But I feel weird about using the name “[name]Levi[/name]” because I don’t want him to feel the pressure of living up to the hopes and desires that we had/ have for both him and his brother. I just don’t think it’s fair to him. So I came up with the idea of using [name]Matthew[/name] or [name]Matthias[/name] since they are both Bible names, and it says that the apostle [name]Matthew[/name] was also called [name]Levi[/name]. [name]Do[/name] you think that this could work or would it be too obscure of a connection? Any other ideas? [name]Do[/name] you think that naming a child this way could be probematic?

The only other “honoring” ideas that I can think of are through popular culture routes. Here is a list of ones that we have thought of as potential middle names. [name]Do[/name] any of these just not sound well together, or sound better than the others?

[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Matthew[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Matthias[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Jack[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name] (is this weird since one of the most famous “Ezras” is [name]Ezra[/name] [name]Jack[/name] [name]Keats[/name], who he wouldn’t be named after?)
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Calvin[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Henry[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Rohan[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name] (this one might have too many “RRRR’s” but it’s so fun to say, and I feel very Scottish when I say it :wink: )

Husband’s suggestions…
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Douglas[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]
[name]Ezra[/name] [name]Phillip[/name] [name]Carlisle[/name]

2

I think [name]Levi[/name] in the middle is a wonderful choice. [name]Ezra[/name] [name]Levi[/name] is handsome and biblical, like your other sons.

3

I like the name [name]Matthew[/name] as a tie in to [name]Levi[/name]. I don’t think the connection is too obscure. I think it goes well with your other children’s names and isn’t the exact name of your angel baby. We have an angel who has a name (well, I named our other angels too, but they were very early m/c and I haven’t really shared the names with people outside my immediate family) and I have gone back and forth about re-using her name. It’s not that I want another child to live up to her memory or replace her - and it’s not even that it’s the only name I like or really want to use it again – I would use it in an honoring way. Having her in our lives taught us something important and I’d want to pass that part of her memory on to her sibling. However, like I said, DH and I go back and forth on this and I think like you’ve done here, I would probably only use a variation or more subltle connection to her name instead.