Ruth 4:11,12 – “Amazing”

As always, here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹¹And the all of the people which [were] in the gate and the elders said, “Witnesses. May YHVH make the woman coming into your house like Rachel and like Leah which both built the house of Israel. May you have standing in Ephratah and proclaim a name in Bethlehem ¹²and may your house be as the house of Perez which Tamar bore to Judah, from the seed of which YHVH will give to you from this young woman.”

What an enjoyable study! My mind is spinning with thoughts to record. Not necessarily in any order: I had the thought as I was studying this and pondering that Ruth is probably about 25 as all of this happens. Girls in ancient cultures tended to marry anywhere from 14 to 18. Naomi had lived in Moab for about 10 years and somewhere in there Mahlon had married Ruth. So she is probably somewhere in her 20’s. This is supported by her here (and elsewhere in the book) being referred to as a “young woman.” I would also suggest this is supported by the fact that the Bethlehemites just naturally compare her to Rachel and Leah with the idea that she will bear Boaz many children. Obviously, if she were older, that assumption would be less likely.

Another thing: I have hesitated, as I studied, to draw much from this benediction which the people pronounce, upon the fear it is just a ritual pronounced at Jewish weddings – and therefore not really something to draw applications from. However, having studied, I am inclined to think that not the case. I think it wasn’t just a ritual benediction, that it actually was a deliberate and intentional prayer specifically for Boaz and Ruth. I’m seeing this in the comparison between this marriage and that of Judah and Tamar. Perhaps the “Rachel and Leah” part was common enough at Jewish weddings, but I think they were being quite deliberate when they pray, “Through the offspring the Lord gives you by this woman, may your family be like that of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah.” Tamar was apparently a Canaanite girl and the circumstances of her union with Judah were less than honorable. In spite of it all, however, the Lord blessed and Perez and his family had gone on to be leaders in Judah (Num 2:3, I Chron 2:10) and certainly in the area around Bethlehem. I believe this is a very polite acknowledgment that Ruth is a Moabitess, and yet the Lord’s fullest blessing may be pronounced upon Boaz’ and her wedding.

Also note from this benediction itself, two things: First of all, the people of Bethlehem openly acknowledge that children are from the Lord. “Through the offspring the Lord gives you …” This is one of those divine mysteries that offer one of the greatest encouragements in life – put together a man and a woman and the very natural result is a baby. It happens with cattle and raccoons and rabbits. But it is so much more than a simple biological fact. Every child ever conceived is “from the Lord” – a unique creation, deliberately formed not by evolutionary chance but by the direct agency of the God of the universe (Psalm 139). A man and a woman may choose to have a sexual union, but from that point on, everything is totally out of their control. Whether or not the woman becomes pregnant is entirely out of their hands. And the child conceived, whether it be a boy or a girl, and what characteristics it will possess – hair color, eye color, height, build, talents, personality traits, etc. – all remain entirely in the hands of the Lord. We are who we are not because our parents purposed it so, but because God did. There is no such thing as a “mistake.”

Secondly, observe from this blessing, they go on to specifically say, “Through the offspring the Lord gives you by this young woman …” It is by this young woman. Boaz is a great man and a wealthy man. Any day he wishes, apparently, he can buy a field and marry a girl. He has servants, both men and women, to work his fields. Any given morning, he can convene a court of elders at the city gate. He is a man who can do much and command much. But there is one thing he cannot do. He cannot give himself a family. As great and powerful and wealthy as he or any other man may be, they’ll die childless without a woman. Ruth may be “just” a Moabitess, a foreign girl, and she may be abjectly poor and a widow, but there is one thing she can give Boaz that he cannot buy – a family, and that of course in the end is the greatest possession of all. At the end of any man’s life, all the money, all the lands, all the awards, and everything else mean nothing in comparison to the blessing of being surrounded by children and grandchildren – and all of that was provided to him by his wife. In a sense, in the end, the greatest blessing of all for a man is simply to have a wife. Through her he receives all that really matters in life.

I guess I’m just marveling at how amazing it all is. Here is Boaz rich and powerful. Yet, this poor, widowed, foreign girl can provide him with the one thing his money can’t buy and the only thing that really matters. How totally awesome is that? I guess what I mean is that, on the one hand, how totally wonderful all of this is for Ruth. She woke up yesterday just a poor widowed and basically hopeless young girl. And suddenly today, she gathers up her few belongings and goes to live in a wealthy man’s home. You can bet Boaz wasted no time that day buying his pretty young wife a whole new wardrobe of clothes. And rather than a few handfuls of barley, today she’ll sit down to a real meal of sumptuous cuisine. Tonight she’ll not go to bed alone on a mat, but crawl into a real bed with a strong man who loves her. What a fairy tale for Ruth. But is she the only one who benefits? Hardly. This young woman is going to give this man the greatest blessing of all – children. A woman needs a man. But a man needs a woman. They need each other.

And for Boaz and Ruth, it is the greatest union of all because they both love the Lord. They are both virtuous people. Ruth will do Boaz “good and not evil, all the days of her life,” and Boaz will be to her a strong provider and defender. She’ll be a wonderful mother to their children and Boaz will be a wonderful father. They’ll do it all for each other, what neither could do alone. It is all just a wonderful mystery and a wonderful relationship that God alone could have conceived from the beginning.

One last thought – it is always a good thing to pronounce blessings on people. These people gathered at the gate pronounce this blessing on Boaz and Ruth and think of how it was fulfilled! “May you have standing in Ephratah and be famous in Bethlehem.” I don’t know what they each might have envisioned in their minds, but no one could have imagined that the great grandson of this couple would be David, the greatest king in earth history, from whose line eventually would come the very Messiah Himself. Let us all pray blessings on the people around us and may Boaz and Ruth teach us to remember that we pray to the God who does “exceedingly abundantly above all that we can ask or think!”