How Do You Know If A Last Name Is Jewish?

How do you find out if somebody's last name is Jewish, or if they're name is Jewish in general? Is there a site with listings of Jewish names? Or is there a common prefix or suffix?


Thank You

How Do You Know If A Last Name Is Jewish?
In some cases there are distinctly Jewish names that belong to people that are not Jewish. There are also people that are Jewish that do not have Hebrew names. The answer is no, there is not a direct database that has the names of just Jews in it. Not directly that is, but many medical records and civic organizations keep records of what members religions are, frequently people do not provide this information because it is not legally required information at this time.





Your question is a little spooky!
Reply:There is no such thing. "Jewish names" are really in Ashkenazi culture European names. They come from the person profession like Schneider was a last name from those who worked with clothing or were Tailors and Bauer were peasants and servants. In Sephardi culture, "Jewish Names" are really spanish names. But there is no such thing. They are just common in Judaism. Like Cohen is a perfect example. A person with the name Cohen has a 80% chance that they are Jewish and 60% chance that they are a Cohen(Kohanim) in history were priest in the Temple years and years back in history. But here is a list:


http://www.jewfaq.org/jnames.htm
Reply:Well, if their name is like, Jewy McJewJew, that's a pretty good sign. Seriously though? Sometimes you simply can't tell. Since a Jew is someone who either converts to Judaism, or is born to a Jewish mother, you could have someone who's technically Jewish but with a name like "Christiansen," either because they had a non-Jewish father, or they converted but who didn't change their last name. Plus, a lot of Jews have changed their last names, or had their last names changed for them (gotten the "Ellis Island treatment"), either in the hopes of assimilating them, or to improve their socioeconomic upward mobility.





As far as first names go, if the name is in Hebrew or Yiddish, there's a pretty decent chance that they're Jewish. But, in the western world at least, there's no law saying a Christian can't name their son "Moishe" or "Yankel". Moreover, Christians and Muslims have taken a lot of Jewish names for themselves, since they draw some of their traditions from the Hebrew scriptures. Avraham can become Abraham or Ibrahim, for example. Yaakov can be Jake or Yaqub, and so on.





Some last names are of Jewish origin, but if a Jewish guy with that name marries a non-Jewish woman and passes the name on to their kids, you can have non-Jews with Jewish names.





If you ever meet someone with a last name like Levy or Levi or Levinsky or Levinowitz or what have you, odds are that they're descended from the tribe of Levi. And names like Cohen and Cohn signify members of the priestly line (the kohanim, singular = kohein) within the tribe of Levi (descendants of Moses' brother Aaron). "Katz" is another kohein name, an acronym for "kohein tzedek" or "righteous priest".





Suffixes vary from country to country, and may not reliably identify someone as Jewish. They may have become stereotypically associated with Jews in places like the United States. But a lot of the cultural idiosyncrasies or physical features that are thought of as "Jewish" are in fact just Eastern European, like, Russian or Polish. People don't realize that not all Jews are "-steins" or "-bergs" or "-skys" (and that not all steins bergs and skys are Jewish). There are Hispanic Jews, Black Jews, Middle Eastern Jews (and I'm not even talking about converts who of course are 100% Jewish as well).





So there's your Jewish culture lesson for the day. Not all Jews have Jewish names, and not all people with Jewish names are Jewish. Sorry to disappoint. That being said, folks with names like "Moishie Goldberg" and "Chaim Lefkowitz" are probably members of the tribe.





I hope this helps.
Reply:Well, first of all you have the common ones of Levy, Levi, Levey, Cohen, Cohn, Cowan which are all variations of the names of two Tribes. Common names also end in Stein, Berg, Baum, Klein and Roth. For instance, there are many Jewish people called Goldberg etc.
Reply:There are some names that you can be pretty sure are Jewish!





Such as:


Cohen


Abrahams


Greenberg





These and various other names are almost always Jewish - and also names that end with 'berg' and 'stein' tend to be Jewish as well. Lots of European Jews had their names changed when they arrived in, for example, the UK.





But this aside, you can't be sure. If you want to know if a person is Jewish, best just to ask them!
Reply:I find your question offensive and worthy of being a anti-semetic
Reply:i guess jewish and muslim names are very peculiar ,,,


you could google up a few sites u will surely find sth ..
Reply:Call me overly-sensitive, but why do you ask?
Reply:My last could either be German or Jewish. But it's bad to make assumptions... Those are some strange questions. :\
Reply:Is it any of your business?
Reply:is there a reason you care? people are just people after all.





call me curious