The purpose of this blog is to be an encouragement to those in some sort of Christian ministry. We long for our home to be a space for those who are in Christian ministry to be able to come to in order to find a place of rest. But until such a time as that becomes possible, we want to live, and as part of living to write in such a way as to encourage others.
And so in this space to reflect on Scripture I will turn to look at the book of Ruth. My natural tendency, if I were to write a sermon series on the book of Ruth would be to divide it up into the 4 chapters and allocate one sermon to each chapter. As I’ve read Ruth I’ve wondered if that would be the best way or not. I wondered if it would actually work better to read – or even perform – the book as a whole in one session – to have it read, and read well, with different readers for the different characters. Then, following that session, to have a series on Ruth that picks up major themes – perhaps by looking at the key characters in the story and teases out what those themes have to say to us today, and how we can relate to them in our very different context.
And so, I think in this series, I will aim to look at different themes/concepts as they appear in Ruth, and see how looking at these themes in Ruth, in the context of the whole Bible, then impacts on how we live today. That is my aim at least.
And to start with we turn to the very first words of the book. At first glance in our English bibles it is hardly a surprise that Ruth is set in the time of the judges – because Ruth is placed straight after judges, and before 1 Samuel. But in the Hebrew Bible Ruth is placed in the “writings” section, and comes straight after Proverbs.
The Hebrew Bible is divided into “Torah” (Genesis – Deuteronomy), “Prophets” (Joshua-Judges, 1 Samuel – 2 Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the ‘Book of the Twelve’ – our minor prophets), and “Writings” (everything else – ‘wisdom literature’ plus Daniel, Ruth, Esther, 1-2 Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah). It is possible that this reflects a general chronological order of writing, and certainly of putting the books together.
Ruth then, is not part of the early history – but it is a story deliberately told in that earlier setting. And so we need to see who the characters are at the start of the book of Ruth, and why it is so important that this story happens in the time of the judges.
In Ruth chapter 1 we learn that a man from Bethlehem (sounds like “house of bread”) leaves, with his wife and two sons, and settles in Moab because there is a famine in the land. Famines are common throughout the bible. Sometimes this man, who we learn next is called Elimelek (sounds like “El is King” – where El is the generic term in the Bible for God, and also the name of a Canaanite deity), is condemned by commentators for heading out of Israel at the first sign of trouble.
The narrative doesn’t make any comment – but then Hebrew narrative very often doesn’t. We are left to wonder – was this a lack of trust in God to provide? Or did there simply seem to be no other option? Moab, however, has not been a promising place prior to this – it is the place where Israel was seduced into idolatry and immorality on the very borders of the land. No Moabite to the 10th generation could become part of God’s people.
Whatever the reasoning behind the move, the outcome is devastating. In Moab, Elimelek and his two sons (who marry Moabite women in the meantime) die. Elimelek’s widow, Naomi, is left with her two daughters-in-law, one of whom returns to her own people. We will return to Naomi, and her remaining daughter-in-law, Ruth, and their conversation in a later post. But for now we read the beginning and end of chapter 1 together:
In the days when the judges judged, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab.
Ruth 1:1
22 So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.
Ruth 1:22
Two women are walking back into Bethlehem, in the time when the judges judged. To feel the weight of that sentence we need to remember how the judges ruled. Is this likely to be a time when two women feel safe walking back into Judah? Will the judges help them do that? A quick look back in Judges leads us to think that two women would have every reason to be afraid. The last story in Judges tells us of a man who threw his concubine out into the market square to be raped by a local mob, so that they would leave him alone. The last judge in Judges, Samson, appears to see women only in one dimension, and is ultimately brought down by this blindness. An earlier judge sacrifices his daughter as an offering in repayment of a vow.
Judges is not a pleasant read, and with one or two exceptions, the time of the judges seems no place to be a woman, and seems to be a place where good examples of manhood are few and far between. It is a world where the leaders do not obey the rules that everyone else is supposed to, a world where leaders operate as seems good in their eyes, and their followers follow the same principles. So perhaps it is not an entirely unknown world for us too.
For two women to walk back into Israel is not necessarily the safe option that they are longing for. One of them is a foreigner in a world where foreigners could expect trouble. The fear must be that they will not be treated well. Ruth 2:1 introduces a key character in the book:
Now Naomi had a relative on her husband’s side, a man of standing from the clan of Elimelek, whose name was Boaz.
Ruth 2:1
“A man of standing” sounds reasonably positive – until you remember what we have remembered above – men of standing do not necessarily turn out to be great. The words used can also be used to describe someone as a “mighty warrior” – and indeed are used as such in Judges 6 when the angel of Yahweh describes Gideon in such language. And Gideon starts obediently, but ends up heading down the wrong road. Is this Boaz going to be a true “man of worth” – or is he going to be like all the other important men we meet in Judges who take advantage of others, especially women, for their own ends?
We need to return to Boaz and see how his portrayal shows how a true man should act, and what real manhood is all about. He is one of the Bible’s few portrayals of a worthy man who lives up to his reputation. He shares that honour in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus with Joseph – but we will return to that theme in another post.
For now, observe that looking at a few key phrases and locations and then looking at other parts of scripture helps us to set the scene for what is happening here. It helps us tune into the background music and understand the difficult journeys these characters are making. It will help us as we look at the characters in more detail, to understand the contrasts that the text is making.
God has given us this story, not just to put another piece into David and Jesus’ genealogy, but to show us that an ordinary story of vulnerable refugees and an honourable man has a key role to play in his plans. In this story each of the three main characters plays a key role. Each has lines that only they can say, and actions only they can take. None of them are passive. None of them can be removed. Each has something to show us of what it means to trust in this God and live out our lives in a way that honours him in a world that seems increasingly like “when the judges judged”.
To be continued…
Joshua's Tree Rooted 