Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, felt that practically there was much in a name, when he heathenized the names of the young Hebrew captives.  By this he thought to detach them from their Hebrew associations.  God was in each of their original names, and in this way they were reminded of their religion.  But the names this Chaldee king gave them were either social or alluded to the idolatry of Babylon.  Their Hebrew names were to them witnesses for God, mementoes of the faith of their fathers; hence the king, to destroy their influence, called Daniel, Belteshazzar, i.e. “the treasurer of the god Bel;” Hannaniah he called Shadrach, i.e. “the messenger of the king;” Mishael he called Meshach, i.e. “the devotee of the goddess Shesach.”  He showed his cunning in this, and a historical testimony to the potent influence of a name.

By this same rule of correspondence, Adam doubtless named, by order of his Creator, the things of nature as they struck his senses.

  “He specified the partridge by her cry, and the forest prowler by
    his roving,
  The tree by its use, and the flower by its beauty, and everything
    according to its truth.”

The Hebrews obeyed the same law in naming their children.  With them there was a sacred importance attached to the giving of a name.  For every chosen name they had a reason which involved the person’s life, character or destiny.  Adam named the companion of his bosom, “woman because she was taken out of man.”  He called “his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.”  Eve called her first-born Cain (possession) “because I have gotten a man from the Lord.”  She called another son Seth (appointed,) “for God hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.”  Samuel was so named because he was “asked of and sent to God.”  God Himself often gave names to His people; and each name thus given, conveyed a promise, or taught some rule of life, or bore some divine memorial, or indicated some calling of the person named.  Says Dr. Krummacher on this point:  “Names were to the people like memoranda, and like the bells on the garments of the priests, reminding them of the Lord and His government, and furnishing matter for a variety of salutary reflections.  To the receivers of them they ministered consolation and strength, warning and encouragement; and to others they served to attract the attention and heart of God.”  This was right, and fully accorded with the economy of the Hebrew home, and with the conception of language itself.

Would that the Christian home followed her pious example!  But Christians now are too much under the influence of irreligious fashion.  Instead of giving their children those good old religious names which their fathers bore, and which are endeared to us by many hallowed associations, they now repudiate them with a sneer as too vulgar and tasteless.  They are out of fashion, too common, don’t lead us into a labyrinth of love-scrapes and scenes of refined iniquity, and are now only fit for a servant.