Why it is necessary for us to know the names of the meraglim, the spies. They sinned, okay. What do we gain from knowing their names? (Usually we wish the names of wicked people should rot; not be mentioned at all!)
One suggestion I heard is that their names hint at the character traits which caused their downfall. I don’t know much about discerning character from names, so I cannot comment on that one.
I suggest that the saga of the meraglim is our story too, our history. Even though we shy away from talking about resha’im we do so when the story pertains to us and our history. We need to know our history even when it is unpretty and bad, for this is our makeup, our essence is built of our experience. When we know our history, we learn ourselves.
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