Rabbi Yishmael asks Metatron a question that sounds simple. Why are you called by so many names?
Otzar Midrashim's Seventy Names of Metatron answers with a flood. Metatron is called Na'ar, "youth," because he serves before the King with the speed and readiness of a young attendant. He is called by names tied to height, light, command, memory, and service. The names do not make him a second power in heaven. They mark the many jobs of an angel who stands close to the throne and still remains a servant.
The frame is Hekhalot literature at full intensity. Rabbi Yishmael has ascended on high. Metatron teaches him the hidden names and explains how heaven speaks about authority. A name is not decoration there. A name is a function. It tells you where an angel stands, what he carries, what fear surrounds him, and what permission he has been given.
The most important detail is restraint. Metatron may carry seventy names, but every one of them points back to God. He records, escorts, teaches, and serves. He does not rule on his own. The midrash turns the angel into a palace of titles, then keeps him inside the palace of the King.
That is why Rabbi Yishmael's question matters. In heaven, names are power. The righteous mystic has to learn which names reveal glory and which names still bow.
Seventy Names of Metatron: The book "Seventy Names of Metatron", which Rabbi Yishmael revealed, 23 of which he received when he ascended on high. The book was brought to print by Rabbi Moshe son of Rabbi Menachem Graf in the year 1678, with the place of printing missing, and it appears to be the Amsterdam printing as written by the author of Rav Pe'alim (p. 93), who further wrote there. The Sages said: Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachmani said in the name of Rabbi Yonatan: This verse the minister of the world said: "I have been young, and now am old" (Psalms 37:25). And see Tosafot s.v. "This verse etc." And concludes: And in the Pesikta of the Seventy Names of Metatron it also enumerates "Na'ar" (youth). And in Chullin (60a) Tosafot s.v. "This verse etc." said: Alternatively, that which the liturgist called Metatron "Na'ar" was not because of the verse "I have been young", but because it is written in the Book of Josephus that Metatron has seventy names, and it enumerates "Na'ar". And it is not found in our Book of Josephus, and is certainly a scribal error. In the Book of Seventy Names of Metatron it says: Rabbi Yishmael said: I said to Metatron: Why are you called by the name of your Master with seventy names, and you are greater than all the ministers and loftier than all the angels, and more beloved than all the servants, and more honored than all the hosts in majesty and honor? And why do they call you in the supernal names "Na'ar" (Youth)? And he said to me: Because I am Enoch son of Jared. And when the generation of the Flood sinned and said to God "Depart from us" etc., then the Holy One Blessed Be He brought me up from among them to be over them in the supernal names forever, so that they should not say - heaven forefend - that the Merciful One is cruel etc. And even if they sinned, their sons and daughters, their possessions and acquisitions, animals and beasts and birds - what did they sin, that they were gathered with them and destroyed by Hashem from the world? Therefore the Holy One Blessed Be He brought me up before their eyes to the supernal realms, to be a witness over them forever in the world to come etc. At that time, when the Holy One Blessed Be He brought me up to the supernal realms, three angels from the angels of Uzza and Azael came and complained about me and them (the people) in the supernal realms. And they said before Him: Master of the Universe! The early ones did not speak well when they said the man should not be created before You. And the Holy One Blessed be He answered them: I made and I will bear and I alone will endure it. And when they saw me, they said before Him: Master of the Universe! What is the nature of this one who ascended on high - of the sons of the sons of those who were destroyed in the days of the Flood he is! (It appears it should say "that the sons of his sons will be destroyed by the Flood waters"). And what is his purpose in the firmament? And the Holy One Blessed Be He answered them and said: What is your purpose, that you involve yourselves in a matter that I desired more than all of you - that he should be minister and ruler over you in the supernal realms? Immediately they all arose and said: Fortunate are you, and fortunate are your creators, that your Maker desired you! And because I am small and a youth among them - "and I am still young" (Psalms 37:25) - therefore they call me "Na'ar". And that which is written in the book Tziyuni, Parshat Bereishit: "Know that from Enosh onwards, weakness and frailty came to the world. What was their sin? The man of secrets (he refers to the author of the secret mystical work Sefer HaRokeach) revealed that they would walk from end of the world to the other end, and bring silver, gold, precious stones and gems, and make idols from them in the four directions, a thousand parsas in size. And they would bring down the sun, moon, stars and constellations to serve them in the manner they serve the Holy One Blessed Be He. And how did they have this ability? But that Makhaziel and Azazel taught them all the workings of sorcery. And then the angels prosecuted and said 'What is man that you should remember him' - it does not say 'What is Adam', but 'What is man', who was the head of idolatry. And then the Divine Presence ascended, as it says 'God went up with a shout'" - all this is taken from the Seventy Names of Metatron, see there at greater length. And that which the author of Yalkut Reuveni brings in Parshat Bereishit: "Rabbi Yishmael said etc. in the name of Sodi Raza and in the name of the Sage of Mysteries" - you can find all of it in Seventy Names of Metatron. And Tosafot (Yevamot 16b s.v. "Posak") called it the Pesikta, and said "And in the Pesikta of the Seventy Names of Metatron it also enumerates 'Na'ar'" - and it is known that there are seventy names of the Holy One Blessed Be He, and these are the appellations, and they expounded about this "seventy shekels corresponding to the seventy names the Holy One Blessed Be He has" (Bamidbar Rabbah 14). And in the commentary Ba'al HaTurim on the verse "Gather for Me seventy men" (Numbers 11:16) he says it corresponds to the seventy nations and the seventy names the Holy One Blessed Be He has, and enumerates them there. And because they said the name Metatron is like the name of his Master (Sanhedrin 38b), therefore they also enumerated seventy names for him. See also Enoch; Metatron.
