The story of Ruth falls near the end of the Period of Judges. Despite the hideous idolatry and debauchery of the times, some people still did the right thing.
During a famine in Israel, a man from the Tribe of Judah named Elimelech traveled to Moab, most likely because he got word the drought wasn’t so bad there. Chances are he leased his own land out for the duration until the next Jubilee. He moved to Moab with his wife and two young sons. During their stay there, the man died rather young. His two sons tried to keep things going and married local women. Eventually the two sons also died rather young. There was now no one to take care of Naomi as a widow, so she returned to her ancestral home back in the Bethlehem area.
Because her two daughters-in-law were young and free to marry, she released them back to their fathers’ homes. One of them refused, but was determined to support her mother-in-law. We know her as Ruth, and the two went back to Naomi’s home. They were welcomed back, but things were still tough, so support was thin at best. Still, word got around quickly what the situation was with Naomi and Ruth. Taking advantage of what few opportunities there were, Ruth went out into the fields during the barley harvest and gleaned, permitted according to the Covenant. At some point she ended up in the field belonging to Boaz, someone related to Naomi.
Boaz was impressed with Ruth’s devotion and convinced her to stay with his reapers. He instructed the workers to treat her as a VIP and to make sure she had plenty to keep her busy, dropping enough for her to pick up. They also protected her from any young fellows who might try to take advantage of her vulnerability. Out in the fields, she would be an easy target for harassment as a foreigner, and even rape. Boaz protected her as best he could without embarrassing anyone. She worked the fields of Boaz during the entire Feast of Weeks, nearly two months in the spring, bringing home enough grain to keep her and Naomi alive. This was pretty good, considering that Naomi had no way to reclaim anything Elimelech had owned, since it was under a long term lease.
Our focal passage starts with Naomi realizing that Ruth was still a desirable young lady. But it was complicated. The Covenant emphasized keeping land ownership with the clan. If Naomi did nothing, eventually Elimelech’s land would pass to some relative anyway. The only way to help Ruth was to find a kinsman redeemer who had was willing to marry her and raise up grandchildren in Elimelech’s name to inherit that property. That meant convincing some kinsman to carry out that duty at some expense to himself — buying back the leased land, paying for a wedding, and raising a family separate from his original household. With everyone struggling to survive this ongoing drought (due to Israel’s idolatry), spending money on an additional wife and children with no payback at all was a tough sell. About the only fellows who would be willing were young men with no wife and children’s livelihood to risk, or someone pretty wealthy.
Boaz was apparently a rich and older bachelor. Having seen how he was kindly disposed to Ruth, Naomi instructed her daughter-in-law to claim him as her kinsman redeemer. This would leverage the land as the issue, but it was quite a bonus to Boaz to have a young wife after all these years. It was a sacrifice on her part, knowing she was quite likely to be widowed again in too short a time. On the other hand, it would make life for Naomi in her declining years comfortable again. Readers unfamiliar with all of this background would not realize just what kind of dedication and sacrifice Ruth demonstrated here.
The Lord was taking care of Boaz; his crop was decent. It was common during a good grain harvest for the owner to host a big party, particularly at the Feast of Unleavened Bread. It was customary for him to sleep next to his big pile of threshed grain, symbolizing a man protecting his harvest. For Ruth to show up and hang out on the fringes of those invited would not surprise anyone at this point, given how he had treated her. As the festivities wound down, she hid in the shadows until Boaz bedded down next to the grain.
She slipped down onto the threshing floor and laid next to him, pulling his cloak over onto herself, and uncovering his feet in the process. As the temperature of the night dropped, his feet got cold and he shivered (English translations usually miss the point here). As he rolled over seeking to pull his cloak over his feet, it wasn’t off due to a breeze or flopping, but because of a woman there. He asked who she was, and instantly recognized the symbolic gesture she had made, and the import of her words. He was quite flattered that she would choose him over more conventional options she might have had.
He was the right man. He warned her that one other kinsman would have to surrender the right of redemption first. He told her to keep things quiet, then loaded her up with as much grain as she could possibly carry and sent her home.
In the next chapter, we learn that this other fellow was not willing to take up the expense of redeeming Elimelech’s land if he had to raise up grandsons to inherit the land, none of which would go to his own family. But Boaz had nothing to lose. From this marriage was born King David a few generations later.
