Mennonite Weekly Review

Like Jonah, Ruth is a well-written short story, with a beginning, middle and end. Classes who use these lessons in Sunday school should read the entire book in order to understand plot, characters and setting. Though the lessons omit chapter 4, it is the climax to the plot!

Halteman Finger

In a way, this plot is opposite of Jonah’s. For him, events go from bad to worse, with an unresolved ending. But for Naomi and Ruth, loss and poverty are overcome through love, loyalty, hard work and their ingenious use of levitical laws. But the challenge to Israel’s ethnic insularity is similar.

The story did not reach final written form until at least the time of the monarchy, since David is named as a descendant of Ruth and Boaz (4:17-18). Though set during the time of the Judges, the contrast is striking. Judges records the growing apostasy and lawlessness of the 12 tribes in Canaan until total anarchy reigns (21:25). But the Book of Ruth portrays post-famine Bethlehem as a place of order and law-observance.

Nevertheless, eyebrows would have risen at Elimelech’s decision to move his family to Moab, on the other side of the Dead Sea. Moab was Israel’s enemy. The origin of the people was incestuous (Lot and his daughter; Gen. 19:30-38), and there are various accounts of armed conflicts between Israel and Moab (for example, Numbers 22-24). Deut. 23:3 bans Moabites “from the assembly of the Lord, even to the 10th generation.”

Names symbolize character

Hebrew names in biblical stories sometimes have symbolic significance. Bethlehem means “house of bread.” Thus we learn that, ironically, there is no bread in the “house of bread.”

In a poem in 1:20-21, Naomi, meaning Pleasant, tells the villagers to call her Mara (Bitter) from now on because “the Lord has dealt harshly with me.” Elimelech (My God Is King) suggests a time before human kings reigned in Israel. Mahlon and Chilion mean “sickness” and “spent.” Orpah comes from the Hebrew oreph, which means the “back of the neck.” When someone walks away, as did Orpah, the back of the neck is seen. Ruth, in contrast, probably means “friendship,” since the Hebrew verb ra’ah means “to be a special friend.” Boaz means “quickness” or “strength.”

Although this story seems like a peaceful oasis amid the bloody massacres, rapes and child sacrifice described in Judges, Naomi’s observations are accurate. She has lost all her family and every hope for the future. With no more reason to stay in Moab, she will go home to Bethlehem and die there.

‘Where you go, I will go’

Naomi’s widowed daughters-in-law accompany her part way down the road toward Bethlehem (1:6-7), and then she tells them to return to their own mother’s house. They still had a chance to remarry and produce children. As foreigners, there was nothing for them in Israel.