The Book of Ruth

A story in four acts

The book reads like a play in four scenes, modeled on its four chapters. The first leads from Bethlehem to Moab then from Moab to Bethlehem: it is the drama of mourning and the oath of Ruth. The second takes place in the fields at the barley harvest: Ruth gleans at Boaz. The third takes place at night, on the threshing floor: Ruth asks Boaz to exercise the right of redemption. The fourth takes place during the day, at the city gate: Boaz legally seals the redemption and the marriage, and the child Obed is born. The story thus progresses from empty to full: from Naomi's bitterness, returning “empty-handed” (Rt 1, 21), to her restored fullness with the birth of Obed (Rt 4, 14-17)^[4].

There is nothing improvised about this careful construction. The very names of the characters, transparent in Hebrew, function as clues: the family fleeing famine bears names of death and illness, while the figures of salvation bear names of grace and strength^[5]. The table below gives the key, as noted in the liturgical translation itself.

The place of the book in the canon

The position of the book of Ruth varies between Bibles, and this variation is significant. In the Hebrew Bible, Ruth does not appear among the historical books: it belongs to the third section, the Ketuvim ("Writings"), and more precisely to the group of five scrolls (Meguilloth) read on the major Jewish holidays. Ruth is read on the feast of Shavuot (Jewish Pentecost), which celebrates both the giving of the Law and the harvest — the very setting of the story^[6].

In the Greek Septuagint, then in the Latin Vulgate of Saint Jerome and in all Christian Bibles, the book is on the contrary inserted between Judges and the books of Samuel. This movement follows a chronological and narrative logic: the story opens with the Judges and ends with the genealogy of David, whose story begins precisely in the books of Samuel. The book thus becomes the bridge between the tormented era of the Judges — where “everyone did what pleased him” (Jg 21, 25) — and the dawn of Davidic royalty. Saint Jerome, in his famous preface to the books of Samuel and Kings (the Prologus Galeatus), counts Ruth with the book of Judges in the Hebrew reckoning of twenty-two books — while noting that others place it separately among the Hagiographa (reckoning of twenty-four books); its full canonicity is called into question in neither reckoning^[7].

A jewel of biblical narrative art

Ruth is held by literary criticism to be one of the pinnacles of Hebrew prose. Everything is sobriety and delicacy: no battle, no spectacular prodigy, no thunderous prophetic speech, but a plot woven from everyday gestures - a grain of corn picked up, a coat spread out, a sandal removed. The art of the storyteller is displayed in the dialogues, which carry the essential part of the narrative^[8], and in a benevolent irony: the reader, who knows where the story leads, savors the apparent coincidences that God alone leads. It is “by good fortune”, says the text with false innocence, that Ruth falls on the field of Boaz (Rt 2, 3) - a formula which, in the mouth of the sacred author, actually designates the hand of Providence^[9].

Naomi’s mourning and Ruth’s oath

A famine chases a certain Elimelek, his wife Naomi and their two sons from Bethlehem; they emigrate to the country of Moab, east of the Dead Sea^[10]. There, misfortune strikes them: Elimelek dies, then his two sons, who had married two Moabites, Orpah and Ruth. In about ten years, Naomi found herself “deprived of her two sons and her husband” (Rt 1, 5) — widowed and without descendants, that is to say without future or protection in the ancient world.

Learning that "the Lord had visited his people and gave them bread" (Rt 1, 6), Naomi decides to return and urges her daughters-in-law to leave her to start a new life in Moab. Orpa, after tears, obeys. Ruth, for her part, attaches herself to her mother-in-law by an oath which is one of the most beautiful texts of the Old Testament:

• “Do not force me to abandon you and move away from you, for where you go, I will go; where you stop, I will stop; your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. Where you die, I will die; and there I will be buried. »* — Ruth to Naomi, Rt 1, 16-17^[11]

This oath is not only a promise of affection: Ruth renounces her homeland, her family and her gods to adhere to the God of Israel. It is a conversion as much as a loyalty. Back in Bethlehem, Naomi, broken, refuses even her name: * “Don’t call me Naomi (My-gracious) anymore, call me Mara (Bitterness). For the Mighty One has filled me with bitterness. I left fulfilled, but the Lord brings me back empty-handed”* (Rt 1, 20-21)^[12]. The book thus opens with an almost Jobian cry - but they arrive, notes the text, "at the beginning of the barley harvest" (Rt 1, 22): the first glimmer of hope.

The gleaner and the field of Boaz

Poor and destitute, Ruth avails herself of the right of gleaning that the Law grants to the poor: following the harvesters to pick up the fallen ears. “By good fortune”, she enters the field of Boaz, “a rich owner of the same clan” as Elimelech (Rt 2, 1-3). Boaz arrives from the city and greets his workers with a formula that expresses all the piety of the character: * “The Lord be with you! »* — and they respond: “May the Lord bless you!” » (Rt 2, 4).

Noticing the stranger, Boaz takes her under his protection, invites her to drink and eat, and orders his people to drop corn for her. When Ruth is surprised at so much consideration for “a stranger”, Boaz reveals that he knows everything about her loyalty to Naomi, and he pronounces a blessing over her which announces the outcome of the book:

“May the Lord reward you for what you have done!” May the reward be complete with which the Lord, the God of Israel, will fill you, under whose wings you have come to shelter! » — Boaz to Ruth, Rt 2, 12^[13]

The image of the "wings" of God under which Ruth shelters herself will return, turned upside down, in the following chapter: it is Ruth who will ask Boaz to spread over her "the skirt of his cloak" - the same Hebrew word, kanaf, which means both "wing" and "tail of clothing". The redeemer thus becomes the instrument by which God himself responds to his own blessing^[14]. Ruth brings back in the evening “forty measures of barley” (Rt 2, 17); Naomi recognizes in Boaz "one of our close relatives, one of those who have the right of redemption over us" (Rt 2, 20). The plot is launched.

At night on the threshing floor

The third act is the most daring. Naomi, wanting to “establish” Ruth, dictates a delicate plan to her: at night, when Boaz sleeps on the threshing floor after the winnowing, Ruth must discreetly “uncover her feet” and lie there, waiting for him to tell her what to do (Rt 3, 1-4). The scene, charged with tension, remains absolutely restrained: there is no fault, but a marriage proposal presented according to the codes of the time. Waking up in the middle of the night, Boaz discovers a woman at his feet.

“He asked: “Who are you?” She answered: "I am Ruth, your handmaid. Spread the skirt of your mantle over your handmaid, for it is you who has the right of redemption." » — Rt 3, 9^[15]

Far from being scandalized, Boaz blesses Ruth, because she could have looked for a young husband, “poor or rich”, and prefers to honor family duty. He gives him this public testimony:

• “And now, my daughter, do not be afraid; whatever you say, I will do for you, because everyone here knows that you are a perfect woman. »* — Boaz to Ruth, Rt 3, 11^[16]

The expression translated by "perfect woman" (Hebrew éshèt hayil, literally "valiant woman", "woman of valor") is exactly the one which opens the praise of the accomplished woman in the book of Proverbs (Pr 31, 10) - a nod which elevates Ruth to the rank of ideal of the wisdom of Israel. But Boaz reveals an obstacle: there exists “a closest relative”, priority for redemption. The matter will have to be resolved in broad daylight.

Redemption at the city gate

The city gate was, in Israel, the place of transactions and judgments, where the elders sat. Boaz summons the priority parent in front of ten witnesses and first offers to buy back Naomi^[17]'s field. The man accepts - until Boaz specifies the condition attached: whoever buys the field must also marry "Ruth the Moabite" so that "the name of the dead remains attached to his inheritance" (Rt 4, 5). The other then recuses himself, for fear of "destroying his own heritage", and cedes his right by the ritual gesture of the sandal, a custom "formerly in Israel" that the text takes care to explain to its readers (Rt 4, 7-8)^[18].

Boaz publicly proclaims that he is buying out all of Elimelek's inheritance and taking Ruth as his wife. The assembly blessed him by invoking the matriarchs of Israel:

“May the Lord make the woman who enters your house like Rachel and like Leah who, between them, built the house of Israel! » — the elders of Bethlehem, Rt 4, 11^[19]

A son is born, and the women of Bethlehem sing of the fullness returned to Naomi, now nurse of her grandson:

• “This child will bring you back to life, he will be the support of your old age: he was born of your daughter-in-law who loves you, and who is better for you than seven sons. »* — the women of Bethlehem in Naomi, Rt 4, 15^[20]

That of a Moabite foreigner we can say that she “is better than seven sons” - while seven sons were the height of blessing in Israel - gives the measure of the reversal brought about by the book. The child receives the name Obed; and the story closes with a genealogy which reveals the hidden issue: “It was the father of Jesse, who was the father of David” (Rt 4, 17).

The plot of Ruth is entirely governed by three social institutions of ancient Israel, which the modern reader must know to understand the story. All three aim for the same goal: protect the weak — the poor, the widow, the orphan, the stranger — within the Alliance community.

The right to glean: the law that protects the poor

The Law of Moses prohibits the owner from harvesting to the edges of his field or going back over his harvest: “You will leave this to the poor and the immigrant” (Lv 19, 9-10; Lv 23, 22; Dt 24, 19-21). It is this right that allows Ruth, a landless stranger, to feed herself. The Catechism of the Catholic Church still ranks this “right to gather and glean” among the institutions which respond to the exhortation to help others in need^[21]. Boaz is not content with observing the law: he exceeds it out of charity, ordering that ears of corn be dropped on purpose for Ruth (Rt 2, 16)^[22]. The story thus illustrates the difference between strict justice and the superabundance of kindness.

Goël, the “redeemer” of the family

The central institution of the book is that of the goel — a word often translated as “redeemer” or “repurchaser”. In Israel, the closest relative had the duty to redeem what an impoverished member of the family had had to sell, starting with the patrimonial land, so that the inheritance did not leave the clan: "If your brother falls into trouble and has to sell part of his property, his closest relative will come and exercise his right of redemption" (Lev 25, 23-25)^[23]. The goel was also the avenger of blood and, more broadly, the protector of the weak of relatives. It is this role that Ruth invokes by asking Boaz to spread the skirt of his cloak over her: she is not begging for alms, she claims a right in the name of family solidarity desired by God. The word goël and its derivatives come up around twenty times in this short book — twenty-two occurrences of the root in the Hebrew text (Rt 2, 20; 3, 9.12-13; 4, 1.3-4.6-8.14): it is the key word^[24].

Levirate: creating descendants for the deceased

This duty of redemption is joined by a second institution, the levirate (from the Latin levir, "brother-in-law"): when a man died without children, his brother - or a relative - had to marry the widow for him "to raise descendants", and the firstborn bore the name of the deceased so that "his name is not erased from Israel" (Dt 25, 5-10)^[25]. The book of Ruth combines in an original way redemption of the land and levirate: Boaz marries Ruth "so that the name of the dead remains attached to his inheritance" (Rt 4, 10). This fusion of the two customs, debated by exegetes, shows that the book is not reduced to a legal case: it puts the letter of institutions at the service of life, against the fear of the anonymous parent who refuses to compromise his heritage.

The traditional attribution to Samuel

Jewish tradition, collected in the Babylonian Talmud, attributes the writing of the book to the prophet Samuel: “Samuel wrote his book, Judges and Ruth”^[26]. This attribution, which logically links Ruth to the work of the prophet who anointed David, is not demonstrable: the Catholic Encyclopedia calls it “groundless” and rejected by almost all critics^[27]; the true author remains anonymous. But it expresses a correct intuition about the function of the book: to prepare the story of David, of which Samuel is the herald^[28].

The modern debate: monarchy or return from exile?

The date of composition is one of the most discussed issues in the introduction to the Old Testament, and several levels must be carefully distinguished. The time of the story is clear: it takes place in the time of the Judges, around the 11th century BC. The date of putting into writing is debated between two main positions.

The defenders of an old date point out that the legal uses of the book - the gesture of the sandal presented as a custom "formerly in Israel" (Rt 4, 7) which must be explained to the reader - suppose a long gap with the period described, and that the language remains, for the most part, classical Hebrew. Above all, the Catholic Encyclopedia notes that the book was “most likely written before the Babylonian exile”, while recognizing that the internal data of the book remain “indecisive” with regard to the precise date of its composition^[29]. Caution is therefore necessary: neither of the two dates is certain, and it would be imprudent to present the low date as an achievement of science.

A fragile thesis: Ruth writes against Ezra and Nehemiah?

Part of 20th century exegesis wanted to make Ruth a late pamphlet directed against the policy of disapproval of mixed marriages led by Ezra and Nehemiah upon their return from Exile (Esd 9-10; Ne 13): by showing that a Moabite woman became David's grandmother, the author would have protested against the exclusion of foreign women. This attractive reading must be received with reservation for several reasons.

First, it is conjectural: the book bears no trace of polemic, no allusion to Ezra or Nehemiah; it must be assumed. Then, the Catholic Encyclopedia judges this reading “an inference” drawn not from the content of the book, but from a presupposed late date — an inference “no less uncertain than that date itself” — and prefers (“with greater probability”) to see in it above all "an edifying story" held up as an example to its time^[30]. Finally, Ruth's universalism has no need of a post-exilic context to be explained: it is inscribed from the beginning in the promise made to Abraham, in whom "all the nations of the earth will be blessed" (Gen 22, 18)^[31]. To reduce Ruth to a circumstantial leaflet is to reduce a story of universal significance to the rank of an argument of circumstance. The coherence of the book is better understood as celebration of God's faithfulness than as anti-reformer libel.

The historicity of the story

The book presents itself as a real story, not as a fable: it places its characters in a precise genealogy which leads to David, and both Jewish and Christian tradition have always received it in this sense. Flavius ​​Josephus, in the 1st century, included the story of Ruth in his Jewish Antiquities as an episode in the history of Israel^[32]. That the story is composed with great literary art – symbolic names, careful structure, crafted dialogues – in no way contradicts its historical background: Scripture knows how to tell the truth with beauty. Recognizing literary genres, recalls the Second Vatican Council, is necessary to grasp "the exact intention of the hagiographers"^[33] - but this recognition does not dissolve the reality of the facts, it illuminates their meaning.

God's hidden providence

No miracle, no theophany occurs in the book of Ruth. And yet God is the true protagonist. He acts not in bursts, but through the ordinary pattern of events: a famine, a gleaner who falls “luckily” on the right field, a man sleeping on a threshing floor, a parent who recuses himself. The book thus teaches, by its very form, hidden providence: God leads history through the free decisions and humble loyalties of men. The characters confess this on each page - Boaz blesses Ruth "in the name of the Lord", Naomi recognizes the hand of God in misfortune as in reversal - but God never speaks directly. It is precisely this divine discretion which makes the book a school of faith for ordinary times, where grace does not manifest itself through miracles.

The hèsèd: the faithful kindness at the heart of the book

The theological key word of the book is the Hebrew hèsèd — an almost untranslatable term which is rendered as “goodness”, “fidelity”, “loyal love”, “mercy”. hèsed is the major attribute of God in the Old Testament: love which keeps its promises beyond all obligation. Now the genius of the book of Ruth is to show this hèsèd circulating between men: of Ruth towards Naomi and towards her deceased husband, of Boaz towards Ruth, and of God enveloping all. “He is blessed of the Lord, he who has not forgotten his goodness (hèsèd) towards the living and the dead”, says Naomi of Boaz (Rt 2, 20)^[34]. By acting toward each other with this gratuitous and faithful kindness, the characters make God present. The book thus suggests a profound theology: divine fidelity continues and is made visible in the fidelity of human hearts.

The universality of salvation: a Moabite among the people of God

The scandal and the greatness of the book can be summed up in one word: moabite. Now the Law declared: * “The Ammonite and the Moabite shall not be admitted into the assembly of the Lord; even in the tenth generation, they will not be admitted”* (Dt 23, 4)^[35]. How, then, can a Moabite woman become the grandmother of King David, the Lord's anointed? The book responds not with an abrogation of the Law, but with the conversion of Ruth and the sovereign freedom of grace. It is not blood that brings into the people of God, but faith: “Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God” (Rt 1, 16)^[36]. Ruth, the foreigner excluded by the letter, is integrated by the fidelity of her heart - a striking prefiguration of the call of the nations to the same Alliance. From the Old Testament, God thus inscribes in the very lineage of the Messiah the sign that salvation extends beyond Israel.

Since the Fathers of the Church, the book of Ruth has been read on two levels: the literal sense of a beautiful story of fidelity, and a spiritual sense where the story announces the mystery of Christ and the Church. This typological reading is not an added fantasy: it is ordered by the last line of the book, which places Ruth in the lineage of the Messiah. Three figures emerge - Boaz the redeemer, Ruth the Church of the nations, the child Obed, link in the Davidic genealogy - before the Catechism makes the book a witness to the dignity of marriage.

Boaz, figure of Christ the redeemer

Saint Ambrose of Milan, refuting the Arians, read in the husband of the book of Ruth a prefiguration of Christ. The source is the goel, the “redeemer”: the close relative who marries the foreign woman, after the prior relative has loosened his shoe, announces Him who was to be born of Judah and to whom the Law, in its spiritual sense, “assigned the sandal of marriage, for the espousals of the Church” — for “None other is the Bridegroom but Christ alone”^[37]. The name of Boaz, “in-him-the-strength”, and his role as a voluntary redeemer outline the features of the Savior: the redemption costs the redeemer, and it is out of love that he assumes it — a reading taken up by some contemporary exegetes^[38]. Where the Law alone excluded the foreigner, the redeemer introduces her into the house and gives her a name - an image of the salvation offered.

Ruth, figure of the Church of the nations

If Boaz is a figure of Christ, Ruth is a figure of the Church, and more precisely of the Church gathered among the pagan nations. Saint Ambroise of Milan, commenting on the genealogy of Christ in his Exposition of the Gospel according to Saint Luke, focuses on the presence of this Moabite: a foreigner excluded by the Law, she nevertheless entered the people of God and shares in the lineage of the Savior - a guarantee that the pagans, formerly strangers to the Alliance, are called to enter the Church^[39]. Ruth, coming from far away, poor and hungry, then fed and married by the redeemer, becomes the image of the people of the nations welcomed, saved and united with Christ. This patristic reading makes the little book of Ruth an announcement of the catholicity - of the universality - of the Church.

An ancestor of the Messiah: Ruth in the genealogy of Jesus

The point of the book is in its last line: Ruth is the great-grandmother of David (Rt 4, 17), and therefore an ancestor of Christ. The evangelist Matthew underlines this by registering it by name in the genealogy of Jesus: "Boaz, from his union with Ruth, begat Jobed" (Mt 1, 5)^[40]. However, Matthew only names five women, all with a unique history or a foreign origin: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, the wife of Uriah (Bethsheba), and finally Mary^[41]. By including these women - including two foreigners, the Canaanite Rahab and the Moabite Ruth - the evangelist shows that God has long been preparing a salvation for all nations and that he willingly chooses the little and the excluded to accomplish his plan.

Ruth and the dignity of marriage

Finally, the book of Ruth has its place in the Catholic doctrine of marriage. The Catechism of the Catholic Church expressly cites it, alongside the book of Tobit, as a testimony to the high meaning of the union of spouses:

“The books of Ruth and Tobit give moving testimonies of the high meaning of marriage, of the fidelity and tenderness of spouses. » — Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1611^[42]

The fidelity of Ruth, the respect of Boaz, the modesty of the scene at the threshing floor, the horizon of fertility opened by their union: everything combines to make this story an icon of marriage according to God, where human love is part of a story greater than itself - that of salvation. The Catechism also ranks Ruth among those women through whom, “against all human expectation”, God demonstrated his fidelity to his promise, from Sarah to Mary^[43].

• The Bible — the Catholic canon of 73 books, its languages, its transmission and its inspiration.
• The Old Testament — the first Covenant and its major groups.
• The book of Judges — the troubled times to which Ruth follows.
• The books of Samuel — the story of David, of which Ruth is preparing the genealogy.
• The Book of Tobit — the other great biblical story of godly marriage.