Parashah of the week: Pekudei

The name literally means "support my brother" and that is one of my personal goals (In a figurative sense rather than literal one - I only have one older brother and, thank God, he is quite capable of supporting himself.)

I guess the name is also meaningful to me on a personal level, for my father set up an organisation called Achisomoch over 40 years ago, which essentially enables people to give charity effectively and easily.

But, the reason I'm sharing this with you today is because thinking about our name can inspire us in a number of ways. The name we were given doesn't say so much about who we are but the "name" we achieve is more important. When King Solomon wrote in Proverbs 22:1 "a good name is better than riches" he was referring to what people think of us rather than our birth name.

Thinking about how we'd like to be remembered can help us decide what we want to dedicate our time and energy to. What kind of "name" do we want for ourselves? Do we want to be known as the most successful entrepreneur or the most generous person? The one who always had time to listen or the one who had the most beautiful home?

We all need to make a living to survive, we need to look after our bodies and cherish our homes. Developing our character may be overlooked due to the pressing physical needs that we are involved in on a daily basis. And yet, who we are, rather than what we own, creates the fabric of our very being.

Ultimately, even if others can't always remember our name, we hope they will remember how we made them feel.