How popular is the baby name Soraya in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Find out using the graph below! Plus, check out all the blog posts that mention the name Soraya.
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The name Rajai first appeared in the U.S. baby name data in 1980, and its usage increased in 1981:
1982: unlisted
1981: 13 baby boys named Rajai [peak usage]
1980: 9 baby boys named Rajai [debut]
1979: unlisted
1978: unlisted
After that, though, it dropped out of the data again (and didn’t return until the early 2000s).
What was influencing the name in the early ’80s?
Iranian politician Mohammad Ali Rajai, who served briefly as Iran’s second president in 1981.
Rajai was born into poverty the early 1930s, and became politically active as a young man. He was involved in the Iranian Revolution (1978-79), which overthrew the monarchy (under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi*) and established an Islamic republic (under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini).
After Rajai was selected as Iran’s prime minister in August of 1980, his name started to pop up in the U.S. newspapers.
Those newspaper mentions became a lot more frequent the following summer. Rajai was elected president in late July, and he began his term in early August. But on August 30 — after less than a month in office — Rajai and many other government officials (including the new prime minister) were killed by a bomb blast in Tehran.
I haven’t been able to figure out the etymology of Rajai, but it could be related to the Arabic names Raja (meaning “hope”) and Rajiya (“hopeful”).
Interestingly, one of the 1980 babies named Rajai is former professional baseball player Rajai Davis (who played against Anthony Rizzo in 2016 World Series).
What are your thoughts on the baby name Rajai?
*Two of the Shah’s wives, Soraya and Farah, also had an influence on U.S. baby names…
Below are hundreds of baby names with a numerological value of 7.
What do I mean by that?
Well, in numerology, you substitute each letter in a word with that letter’s ordinal value in the alphabet. (The letter B has a value of 2, for instance, because it’s the second letter.) Then you add those ordinal values together to come up with a total. Lastly, you add the digits of that total together to obtain a numerological value.
Here’s an example: The letters in the name Jack have the values 10, 1, 3, and 11. Added together, these values equal 25. And the digits of 25 added together equal 7.
All of the “7” names below are sub-categorized by totals — just in case any of those larger numbers are significant to anyone. Within each group you’ll find some of the most popular “7” names per gender (according to the most recent set of U.S. baby name rankings).
7 via 16
The letters in the following baby names add up to 16, which reduces to seven (1+6=7).
Girl names (7 via 16)
Boy names (7 via 16)
Ana, Jada, Alba, Adaia, Fia
Cal, Chad, Jae, Dak, Efe
7 via 25
The letters in the following baby names add up to 25, which reduces to seven (2+5=7).
What does the number seven mean in numerology? Unfortunately, there’s no clear answer. Various numerological systems exist, and each one has its own interpretation of the number seven.
That said, if we look at a couple of modern numerology/astrology websites, we see 7 being described as “truth-seeking,” “introspective,” “intellectual,” “reserved,” and “unusual.”
Personally, I prefer to look at associations, which are a bit more concrete. Here are some things that are associated with the number 7:
The Arabic word Ayatollah (ayatu-llah), which is a title for a Shiite religious leader in Iran, literally means “sign of god.”
Americans started hearing this word more often in the late ’70s, when Iran’s Ruhollah Khomeini, typically called “Ayatollah Khomeini” by the U.S. press, led the Iranian Revolution that overthrew the last Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (whose wives included Farah and Soraya).
From that point onward, Khomeini became the leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The year the revolution ended and Ayatollah Khomeini took control of the country, we see the baby name Ayatollah appear in the U.S. baby name data for the first and only time:
1981: unlisted
1980: unlisted
1979: 6 baby boys named Ayatollah [debut]
1978: unlisted
1977: unlisted
What are your thoughts on “Ayatollah” as a baby name?
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