A biblical Hebrew name meaning 'Yahweh is glory,' borne by the mother of Moses.
Jocabed is a variant spelling of Jochebed, one of the most significant yet undersung figures in the Hebrew Bible. The name is composed of two elements: "Yo" — a shortened form of Yahweh, the divine name — and "kaved," meaning honor, weight, or glory. Jochebed thus means "God is glory" or "Yahweh is honor," making her one of the first named individuals in scripture whose name explicitly incorporates the divine.
She appears in Exodus as the Levite woman who gives birth to Moses, Aaron, and Miriam — three figures who together define the Exodus narrative. Her story is one of radical maternal courage. When Pharaoh decreed that all newborn Hebrew boys be drowned in the Nile, Jochebed hid her infant son for three months, then waterproofed a papyrus basket and placed him among the reeds of the riverbank.
The infant was discovered and adopted by Pharaoh's own daughter — and Jochebed, brought in as a wet nurse, was paid by the Egyptian court to raise her own child. It is a story of cunning, faith, and extraordinary nerve that has inspired commentary from the Talmud to liberation theology. Though rare as a given name in the modern West, Jocabed persists in Sephardic Jewish communities, Latin American Protestant communities where biblical names run deep, and among families seeking names with profound scriptural weight. Its unusual consonant cluster and rhythmic three syllables make it memorable — a name that carries the full gravity of ancient narrative.