Names are important. They identify particular places, specific persons. They save us from the swamps of undifferentiated generality. They protect us from the arid wastelands of abstraction. A name is a lifejacket that keeps us afloat in the ocean of anonymity.
Names locate and identify.
Abstract words such as glory, honour, courage , or hallow were obscene beside the concrete names of villages, the numbers of roads, the names of rivers, the numbers of regiments and dates. The story begins in disaster. David and his company of six hundred men, off on a military mission with King Achish of Gath, had left their wives and children at Ziklag unprotected. A raiding ban of Amalekites, persistent and long-time enemies of Israel, came down on the village, captured the women and children for slaves, looted the place, and carried off a huge booty, leaving behind them nothing but smoking rubble. When David's men returned, they were greeted by the rubble and smoke.