Rut 4:10

10. That the name of the dead be not cut off The name of the child borne unto Boaz by Ruth was not called Mahlon, the name of the deceased husband, but Obed. Ruth 4:17. To the question why this was so, Patrick answers that what Boaz did was in obedience to the law in Deuteronomy 25:6, for he was not the brother of Mahlon, but only a remote kinsman, and therefore not bound by the strict letter of the law in giving a name to the child. But the passage in Deuteronomy 25:6, need not be pressed to mean that, even if the redeemer be a brother, the child born of the levirate marriage must literally bear the name of the deceased brother; but rather, that all the facts of the case should be made known and preserved, as has been done in this history before us. Thus the name and memory of the dead Elimelech and of Mahlon were not cut off from among their brethren, nor from the gate of their native city, although the child of Ruth was not called after either of them.