An Atheist Explores the Bible Part 48: The Biblical Guide to Getting Your Man (Ruth 1-4)

Ruth 1-4

The Biblical Guide to Getting Your Man.

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

Ruth 1

“And Naomi said unto her two daughters in law, Go, return each to her mother's house: the LORD deal kindly with you, as ye have dealt with the dead, and with me.”

I believe this is the only book of the bible named after a woman (edit: no, there’s Esther), and after all the unpleasantness at the end of judges it’ll be interesting to get a female perspective.

Elimelech and his wife Naomi leave Bethlehem for Moab to escape a famine (and there is a hint that this is because of the misrule of the judges as well), and they have two sons, who take a wife each. However all the men die in short order, leaving Naomi with her two daughters-in-law Orpah and Ruth (and am I right in thinking that Oprah Winfrey is named after a misread version of Orpah?).

Naomi decides to return to Bethlehem and sends her daughters-in-law back to their homes, because she will have no more sons for them to marry, but Ruth stays with her and returns to Bethlehem with her. Orpah, we are left to assume, goes home. Naomi changes her name to Mara, which perhaps means bitter given the explanation.

Ruth 2

“Then said Boaz unto Ruth, Hearest thou not, my daughter? Go not to glean in another field, neither go from hence, but abide here fast by my maidens”

Ruth helps with the harvest where she catches the eye of Boaz, a kinsman of Naomi. There’s a sort of courtship going on here, although it’s not that clearly written. Part of it seems to be showing courtesy to a stranger, as written in Leviticus, but there’s also a singling out for favour for Ruth by Boaz. There’s also mention a couple of times that Boaz “had knowledge” of Ruth, although this doesn’t seem to have happened in the biblical sense, (a.k.a. “entered in unto her”). Well, I guess that’s what’s going on here, a growing closeness between Ruth and Boaz.

Ruth 3

“And it shall be, when he lieth down, that thou shalt mark the place where he shall lie, and thou shalt go in, and uncover his feet, and lay thee down; and he will tell thee what thou shalt do.”

Okay, so it seems that Ruth and Boaz have not yet “known” each other in that sense, as here she is sent to lie at his feet when he rests, and he considers her to be a virtuous woman (which I guess she would not be if they’d done anything else). Boaz gives her some barley to give to her mother-in-law, but there’s also some strange custom involving a closer kinsman – possibly this other person has more claim to marry Ruth than Boaz, as far as I can tell.

Ruth 4

“Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there: and, behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake came by; unto whom he said, Ho, such a one! turn aside, sit down here. And he turned aside, and sat down.”

I guess I was mostly right last chapter – the closer (un-named) kinsman has a higher claim to Ruth’s hand in marriage, but also the land left by Naomi’s dead husband and sons, but he eschews it and allows Boaz to take the land and marry Ruth. Which they do, and have a son Obed, who will become father of Jesse, father of David.

Okay, so that was a compact little book which I guess sets up the ancestry of David, but it’s strange that it has a book all to itself when similar stories are told as part of larger books that follow a dynasty. And really, not a lot happens; it’s more of an example of courtship custom and marriage laws than a folk tale, and maybe that is the reason for its inclusion.