Over the centuries, there’s been a lot of debate about the names of the main characters who appear in the book of Ruth.
Naomi which means “pleasant” or “delightful” or Elimelech which means “my God is king” are no big deal.
They are common Hebrew names and simple to understand.
The difficulty arises when we examine the OTHER family members’ names…
I’m talking about the two sons’ and their Moabite wives.
First off, let’s start with “Ruth”.
Contrary to popular opinion, Ruth was probably NOT a Hebrew name even though it was adopted into Hebrew culture and is today one of the most popular names among Jewish females.
Rather, it’s more likely a Moabite name with the Hebrew spelling being REUT.
Now most folks will say “Ruth” means “friendship”.
Though some people would debate that, I wouldn’t necessarily disagree.
Because it fits in quite well with the overall theme of the book.
But what about Orpah, the other daughter?
What does her name mean?
The Rabbis say Orpah means “stiff-necked” or “stubborn” because she took a strong position, wasn’t comfortable with change and could NOT be persuaded to go with Naomi back to the land of Israel.
Let’s not forget that in the Bible and in ancient times in general, a name wasn’t a mere label of identification as it is today.
Names were assigned based on a person’s character traits.
In addition, sometimes the Biblical writers would flat out CHANGE the names of certain characters.
They would give them nicknames that more accurately identified their roles in the story.
And sometimes the re-assigned names were not flattering at all.
A perfect case in point were Elimelech’s two sons Machlon and Chilion.
Machlon means “sickness” and Chilion means “destruction”.
No parent in his or her right mind would give their children such insulting names.
So we can be confident, these were not the real names of the children…
This was just a common literary device used by the Biblical authors in ancient times for stories that were handed down by word of mouth.
In this case, the writer wanted to use names that symbolically expressed the untimely deaths of Elimelech’s two sons.
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