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Ruth: Where You Go, I Will Go · Behind the Bible Verse: The Stories and History Behind Scripture

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This is a story about two widows on a road, one old and one young,
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and a promise one of them made that the other never asked for.
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Behind the Bible Verse. This is made with the assistance of AI.
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Our reading is from the book of Ruth, chapter one, verses one to
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twenty-two, in the World English Bible, British Edition.
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In the days when the judges judged, there was a famine in the land.
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A certain man of Bethlehem Judah went to live in the country of Moab with his wife
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and his two sons. The name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife Naomi.
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The names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem Judah.
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They came into the country of Moab and lived there. Elimelech, Naomiâ€™s husband,
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died; and she was left with her two sons. They took for themselves wives of the
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women of Moab. The name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other was Ruth.
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They lived there about ten years. Mahlon and Chilion both died,
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and the woman was bereaved of her two children and of her husband.
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Then she arose with her daughters-in-law, that she might return from the
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country of Moab; for she had heard in the country of Moab how the LORD had visited
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his people in giving them bread. She went out of the place where she was,
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and her two daughters-in-law with her. They went on the way to return to the land of
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Judah. Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, â€œGo, return each of you to her
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motherâ€™s house. May the LORD deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead
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and with me. May the LORD grant you that you may find rest, each of you in the house
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of her husband.â€ Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices, and wept.
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They said to her, â€œNo, but we will return with you to your people.â€ Naomi
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said, â€œGo back, my daughters. Why do you want to go with me? Do I still have sons in
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my womb, that they may be your husbands? Go back, my daughters, go your way;
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for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say, â€˜I have hope,â€™ if I should even
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have a husband tonight, and should also bear sons, would you then wait until they
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were grown? Would you then refrain from having husbands? No, my daughters,
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for it grieves me seriously for your sakes, for the LORDâ€™s hand has gone out against
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me.â€
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They lifted up their voices and wept again; then Orpah kissed her
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mother-in-law, but Ruth stayed with her. She said, â€œBehold, your sister-in-law has
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gone back to her people and to her god. Follow your sister-in-law.â€ Ruth said,
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â€œDonâ€™t urge me to leave you, and to return from following you, for where you go,
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I will go; and where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people,
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and your God my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.
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May the LORD do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.â€
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When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
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So they both went until they came to Bethlehem. When they had come to
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Bethlehem, all the city was excited about them, and they asked, â€œIs this Naomi?â€ She
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said to them, â€œDonâ€™t call me Naomi. Call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very
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bitterly with me. I went out full, and the LORD has brought me home again empty.
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Why do you call me Naomi, since the LORD has testified against me, and the Almighty
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has afflicted me?â€ So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law,
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with her, who returned out of the country of Moab. They came to Bethlehem in the
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beginning of barley harvest.
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So that's where the story begins. Let's walk back through it, and then follow
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it to the end. The book of Ruth is only four chapters long, and the rest of it is
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worth hearing.
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First, when. The book opens "in the days when the judges judged," the
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period the Bible describes before Israel had kings, when local leaders rose up in
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times of trouble. That's why Christian Bibles place Ruth right after the book of
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Judges. The Hebrew Bible places it among the Writings, as one of five short scrolls
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read at festivals through the year. When the story was actually written down is a
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separate question, and scholars differ. Some place it in the time of the kings,
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others after the exile in Babylon, centuries later. The text doesn't say,
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so I won't settle it for you.
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Now the map. Bethlehem is a town in the hill country of Judah,
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south of Jerusalem. Its name is often translated as "house of bread," which makes
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the opening a little pointed: a famine, in the house of bread. Moab was a
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neighbouring kingdom on the far side of the Dead Sea, in land that is now part of
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Jordan. Close enough to walk to. Foreign enough to feel like another world.
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So Elimelech takes his family to Moab to survive the famine, and for a while
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it works. His sons marry local women, Orpah and Ruth. Then,
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in a handful of short sentences, the family falls apart. Elimelech dies.
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Ten years pass. Both sons die. Naomi is left in a foreign country with no
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husband, no sons, and two daughters-in-law who aren't from her people.
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It's worth sitting with how hard that was. In the world of this story,
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a woman's security came mostly through the men of her family, and land passed
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through them. A widow with no sons was among the most exposed people in that
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society. It's why the laws of Israel name the widow again and again,
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alongside the orphan and the foreigner, as people the community must not leave
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behind.
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Then the famine at home ends, and Naomi sets out for Bethlehem with
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both young women. On the road, she turns and tells them to go back.
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She isn't being cold. She's being practical, and generous. She blesses them,
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and she uses a Hebrew word here, hesed, which our translation gives as "deal
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kindly." It means more than kindness. It's loyal love,
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faithfulness that goes beyond what you strictly owe. Hold onto that word.
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The whole book turns on it.
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Naomi's argument is simple. I have nothing left to give you.
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I'm too old for more sons, and you'd hardly wait for them to grow up. There's a
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future for you in Moab, and there isn't one with me.
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Orpah listens. She kisses Naomi goodbye and goes home, and the story doesn't
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blame her. She does the sensible thing, the thing Naomi asked her to do.
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Ruth doesn't. She clings to Naomi and says the words this book is best known
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for. Where you go, I will go. Your people will be my people,
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and your God my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.
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Notice how much she's giving up. Her country. Her family.
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Her people's gods. Even the place her bones will rest. And notice who she's
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promising it to: not a husband, but her mother-in-law, an older woman who has just
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told her she has nothing to offer. Those words are often read at weddings.
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In the story, they're spoken between two widows on a road.
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When they arrive, the town recognises Naomi. "Is this Naomi?"
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And she answers with bitter wordplay. Her name means "pleasant."
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Call me Mara, she says. Bitter. I went out full, and I've come home empty.
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She says it with Ruth standing right beside her.
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But the chapter's last line drops a quiet hint. They arrived at the beginning
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of the barley harvest.
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That matters because of a law. In Leviticus and Deuteronomy,
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landowners are told not to harvest the very edges of their fields, and not to go
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back for stalks they'd dropped. That grain was left for the poor, the foreigner and
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the widow to gather. It's called gleaning. Ruth is all three of those people at
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once. So in chapter two, she goes out to glean.
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And, as the text puts it, she happened to come to the part of the field
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belonging to a man named Boaz, a relative of Naomi's late husband and a man of
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standing in Bethlehem. When he arrives, he greets his workers with a blessing,
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and they bless him back, which tells you something about the kind of employer he is.
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He notices Ruth and asks who she is. When he hears, he goes out of his way
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for her. Stay in my field, he tells her, with my women workers.
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He tells the young men to leave her alone. He invites her to drink from their water
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jars and eat with the harvesters. And quietly, he tells his workers to pull some
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stalks out of the bundles and leave them on the ground for her to find.
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Ruth asks him why he'd notice her, a foreigner. Boaz says he's heard
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everything she's done for Naomi, how she left her father and mother and her homeland
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for a people she didn't know. And he blesses her in the name of the God of Israel,
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"under whose wings you have come to take refuge." Keep that image of wings in mind.
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By evening, Ruth has gathered about an ephah of barley, roughly twenty-two
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litres, a generous day's gleaning. She carries it home. And when Naomi hears the
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name Boaz, something wakes up in her. He's one of our near kinsmen,
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she says. For the first time in the story, Naomi speaks a blessing instead of a
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lament, and she uses that word again, hesed. May he be blessed by the LORD,
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who has not abandoned his kindness to the living and to the dead.
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A bit of context helps with what comes next. In Israel's law,
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when a family fell on hard times and had to sell its land, a close relative had the
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right and the duty to buy it back and keep it in the family. That relative is called
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the go'el, often translated "kinsman redeemer." There was also a custom in
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Deuteronomy that if a man died without children, his brother would marry the widow
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so the dead man's name would carry on. Boaz isn't a brother, so the story doesn't
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fit that law exactly, and scholars still discuss how these customs fit together
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here. But that's the world of obligations the characters are thinking in.
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The barley harvest ends, then the wheat harvest. And Naomi, who began by
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telling Ruth to go away and find rest, now makes a plan to find rest for her.
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She tells Ruth to wash, dress in her best, and go down at night to the
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threshing floor, where Boaz will be winnowing barley and sleeping beside the grain.
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Ruth is to wait until he's asleep, then uncover his feet and lie down there.
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Readers and scholars have long discussed what exactly that gesture meant in its
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world. The story itself handles it quietly and with dignity.
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At midnight Boaz wakes, startled, to find a woman at his feet. "Who are you?"
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Ruth answers with a request: spread the corner of your garment over your servant,
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for you are a near kinsman. In Hebrew, the word for the corner of a garment is the
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same word Boaz used for God's wings. He blessed her for taking refuge under God's
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wings. Now she's asking him to be part of the answer to his own blessing.
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Boaz is moved. He calls this a greater kindness than the first,
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hesed again, because she chose to act for the family rather than look for a younger
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man. But there's a complication. Another relative is closer in line and has the
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first right. Boaz promises to settle it properly, and sends Ruth home before dawn
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with six measures of barley, so she won't go back to Naomi empty-handed.
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Empty. That's Naomi's word from the road home. Now Boaz sends grain so
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that she won't be empty. The book is careful like that.
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Chapter four takes place at the town gate, where legal business happened
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in public. Boaz calls over the closer relative and gathers ten elders as
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witnesses. He explains that Naomi is selling the land that belonged to Elimelech.
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The relative says he'll buy it. Then Boaz adds that whoever buys the land also takes
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on Ruth, to raise up the name of the dead on his inheritance. And the relative backs
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out. He can't, he says, without putting his own inheritance at risk.
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They seal it the old way. The book explains that in former times,
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to confirm a transaction, a man took off his sandal and gave it to the other.
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The relative takes off his sandal, and Boaz declares before everyone at the gate
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that he has bought the land and taken Ruth as his wife. The people bless them,
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praying that Ruth will be like Rachel and Leah, the mothers of Israel's tribes.
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The woman from Moab is being folded into the founding story of the people she chose.
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Boaz and Ruth marry, and she has a son. And the last scene isn't about Ruth
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and Boaz at all. It's about Naomi. The women of the town gather around her and bless
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the LORD, who has not left her without a near kinsman. They tell her this child will
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restore her life and care for her in old age, because her daughter-in-law,
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who loves her, is better to her than seven sons. Naomi takes the baby in her arms
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and becomes his nurse. And the neighbours say, "A son is born to Naomi."
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The woman who came home empty is holding a child.
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Then the book adds a short family line. The boy is named Obed.
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Obed is the father of Jesse, and Jesse is the father of David, Israel's most famous
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king. The foreign widow from Moab becomes David's great-grandmother.
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That's not a small detail. In Deuteronomy, the law says a Moabite may not
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enter the assembly of the Lord. And here is a Moabite woman at the root of Israel's
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royal family. Readers across the centuries have weighed those two texts against each
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other, and they don't all come out in the same place. Some read Ruth as an answer to
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a narrower view of who belongs. Others reconcile the two texts in other ways.
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What's clear is that the book keeps calling her "Ruth the Moabitess" right to the
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end. It never lets you forget where she came from.
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The story lives on in more than one tradition. In Jewish practice,
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Ruth is read at Shavuot, the festival of weeks, which falls at the time of the grain
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harvest. Christian readers also meet Ruth at the opening of the Gospel of Matthew,
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named in the family line of Jesus. And Ruth and Esther are the only two books of the
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Hebrew Bible named after women.
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Maybe the simplest way to hold this story is through that one word,
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hesed. Naomi hopes for it at the start. Boaz sees it in Ruth.
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Naomi finds it again when she thought it was gone. And Ruth lives it,
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on a road out of Moab, when nobody required it of her, and when the sensible thing,
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the thing Orpah did, would have been to go home.
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So here's a question to sit with, and there's no right answer to it.
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When have you seen kindness go further than anyone required,
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and what did it change?
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Thanks for listening to Behind the Bible Verse. Scripture readings are from
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the World English Bible, British Edition, which is in the public domain.
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Every episode is checked against the text and the historical record.