Yahya

Yahya from the Arabic verb Yahya meaning "to live" or "alive". The name is mentioned in the holy Quran (Koran) in Chapter 19 (Surat Mariam "The Chapter of Mariam"). Yahya is the son of Zakariyya (Zacharias). John thus is not a variant of Yahya nor Yahya is a variant of John although they both refer historically to the same person. However it is known that many Biblical characters were popularly known by nicknames or titles given to them by their people which is evident in many names that indicate events that happened in the lives of those people, thus it cannot be logically be their birth names, for example, Job from the Hebrew Iyov "persecuted or hated" this is only later in his life that he was "persecuted" and "hated".