Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Ruth 1:1

Clarke's Commentary

THE BOOK OF RUTH

-Year before the common year of Christ, 1186.

-Year from the Flood, 1162.

-Year before the first Olympiad, 410.

-Creation from Tisri, or September, 2818.

-This chronology is upon the supposition that Obed was forty years of age at the birth of Jesse; and Jesse, fifty at the birth of David.

CHAPTER I

Elimelech, his wife Naomi, and their two sons, Mahlon and

Chilion, flee from a famine in the land of Israel, and go

to sojourn tn Moab, 1, 2.

Here his two sons marry; and, in the space of ten years, both

their father and they die, 3-6.

Naomi sets out on her return to her own country, accompanied by

her daughters-in-law Orpah and Ruth; whom she endeavours to

persuade to return to their own people, 7-13.

Orpah returns, but Ruth accompanies her mother-in-law, 14-18.

They arrive at Beth-lehem in the time of the barley harvest,

19-22.

NOTES ON CHAP. I

Verse Ruth 1:1. When the judges ruled — We know not under what judge this happened; some say under Ehud, others under Shamgar. See the preface.

There was a famine — Probably occasioned by the depredations of the Philistines, Ammonites, c., carrying off the corn as soon as it was ripe, or destroying it on the field.

The Targum says: "God has decreed ten grievous famines to take place in the world, to punish the inhabitants of the earth, before the coming of Messiah the king. The first in the days of Adam the second in the days of Lamech; the third in the days of Abraham; the fourth in the days of Isaac; the fifth in the days of Jacob; the sixth in the days of Boaz, who is called Abstan, (Ibzan,) the just, of Beth-lehem-judah; the seventh in the days of David, king of Israel; the eighth in the days of Elijah the prophet; the ninth in the days of Elisha, in Samaria; the tenth is yet to come, and it is not a famine of bread or of water but of hearing the word of prophecy from the mouth of the Lord; and even now this famine is grievous in the land of Israel."

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

1:1-22 TEN YEARS OF HARDSHIP IN MOAB

When a severe famine struck Israel, Elimelech took his wife Naomi and their two sons across the Jordan and south to the land of Moab, in the hope of finding a living there. But Elimelech died, and within ten years his two sons, who had married Moabite wives, died also (1:1-5).
Naomi saw no future for herself in Moab, so, upon hearing that the famine in Israel had passed, she decided to return home. Her daughters-in-law loved her and decided to go with her to ease her burden (6-10).

As the daughters-in-law were thoughtful of Naomi, so she was thoughtful of them. They were both childless and would remain so if they stayed with her, as she had no other sons whom they could marry. (The custom was that if a man died childless, his brother was to have a temporary marital relation with the widow so that she might produce a son. This son would be reckoned as belonging to the dead brother, and so would carry on his name and inheritance; see Deuteronomy 25:5-10; Mark 12:19.) Naomi made it clear that they should feel no obligation to go with her. They were free to remain with their own people and begin new lives by remarrying and having families of their own (11-13).

One daughter-in-law accepted Naomi’s offer and returned to her family in Moab. The other, Ruth, was determined to go on to Israel with Naomi, trusting in Naomi’s God, whatever the cost (14-18). Although Naomi was welcomed home by the local townspeople, she was sad when she thought of all she had lost over the previous ten years (19-22).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

THE AFFLICTIONS OF NAOMI AND HER RETURN TO BETHLEHEM
ELIMELECH FLEES THE FAMINE IN JUDAH TO SOJOURN IN MOAB

"And it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem-Judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons. And the name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife Naomi, and the name of his two sons Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem-Judah. And they came into the country of Moab and continued there. And Elimelech, Naomi's husband, died; and she was left, and her two sons. And they took them wives of the women of Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth: and they dwelt there about ten years. And Mahlon and Chilion died, both of them, and the woman was left of her two children and of her husband."

The scene for this narrative is the high plateau east of the Dead Sea and south of the Arnon river, some sixty miles from Bethlehem, and on a clear day it was visible from Bethlehem. Bethlehem was the birthplace of both King David and of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and is located only six or seven miles south of Jerusalem. Some believe that Elimelech was NOT justified in making this move. Matthew Henry labeled it as "unjustified."Matthew Henry Commentaries, p. 253. And the Targum suggests that the death of all three of these men was due to their leaving the land of Israel in the case of Elimelech and because of their marrying strange women in that of the two sons.

Regarding the wives of the two sons, Josephus states that Elimelech arranged those marriages, but the text here does not support that assertion. From him, we also learn that Chilion married Orpah and that Mahlon married Ruth.Josephus, Antiquities, p. 167.

"Ephrathites" The fact of Elimelech and his family being called by this name seems to indicate some special honor, power, or ability that belonged to them when they departed from Bethlehem. Ephrathah was an ancient name of Bethlehem (Micah 5:2) and was also applied to the region in which Bethlehem was located, and the term seems to indicate some connection with the ancient aristocracy of the place. We have been unable to find out the basis of it, but Adam Clarke and others have suggested that the names Chilion and Mahlon are identified with the Joash and Saraph who are mentioned as having some kind of dominion in Moab (1 Chronicles 4:22).Adam Clarke's Commentaries, Vol. 2, p. 193. Naomi's statement later in this chapter that the family went out "full" also seems to indicate their prominence and affluence.

THE MEANING OF THE THESE PERSONAL NAMES

One of the interesting features of this paragraph is the meanings which scholars have found in the personal names.

Elimelech means, `my God is king';Arthur S. Peake Commentary, p. 271. Naomi signifies `pleasant,'Beacon Bible Commentary, Vol. 2, p. 470. `my sweet one,'Arthur S. Peake Commentary, p. 271. or `amiable.'Matthew Henry Commentaries, p. 260. Chilion and Mahlon are said to mean `sickness' and `consumption'Ibid. or `sickly' and `wasting.'Wycliffe Bible Commentary, O.T., Ruth, p. 268. Orpah is said to mean `stiff-necked,'The Interpreter's Bible, Vol. 2, p. 834. and Ruth has been assigned the meaning of `friend,'Ibid. `refreshment,' `satiation,' or `comfort.'Robert L. Hubbard, Jr., p. 94. Very obviously, somebody is guessing.

Regarding the names of the Moabite wives and that of Elimelech's two sons, perhaps the most dependable analysis is that of Joyce G. Baldwin who declares that, "The suggested meanings of Mahlon `weakly' and Chilion `pining' are merely conjectural, and the meanings of Orpah and Ruth are not known."The New Bible Commentary, Revised, p. 279. Hubbard agreed that in the case of Orpah, "The meaning remains an unsolved mystery."Robert L. Hubbard, Jr., p. 94.

The critical allegation against the Book of Ruth that makes it a production of some post-exilic narrator bases their theory on the false proposition that the names of Elimelech's sons are fictitious, invented for them centuries later and designed to fit what happened to them, but Leon Morris cites plenty of proof that the names Mahlon and Chilion, "Are actually good old Canaanite names."Leon Morris in the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries, p. 249 This fact drives us to the conclusion that the usual meanings assigned to the names of these sons of Elimelech are not to be trusted. Since they indeed appear to be authentic Canaanite names, the usual meanings assigned by commentators could not possibly be correct, because, no parent in his right mind would fasten upon a helpless little child a name with the kind of meaning that "scholars" have assigned to the names Mahlon and Chilion.

Nothing but the stark and brutal facts of the disasters which befell this family in Moab are related here. We are not told why Elimelech or either of his sons died, merely that they died and left Naomi, Orpah, and Ruth widows in Moab with no visible means of support.

Speaking of the marriage of the two sons to Moabite women, this was NOT forbidden in the Law of Moses at the early period of this narrative, but severe restrictions against Moabite descendants were later imposed. The Moabites were descendants of Lot and his incestuous union with one of his daughters (Genesis 19). They accepted the pagan deity Chemosh as their god, and as a whole, the Moabites were perpetual enemies of Israel. However, there were notable instances of exceptions, as in that episode in which David's parents were cordially received by the king of Moab (1 Samuel 22:3-4).

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

In the days when the Judges ruled - “Judged.” This note of time, like that in Ruth 4:7; Judges 18:1; Judges 17:6, indicates that this Book was written after the rule of the judges had ceased. The genealogy Ruth 4:17-22 points to the time of David as the earliest when the Book of Ruth could have been written.

A famine - Caused probably by one of the hostile invasions recorded in the Book of Judges. Most of the Jewish commentators, from the mention of Bethlehem, and the resemblance of the names Boaz and Ibzan, refer this history to the judge Ibzan Judges 12:8, but without probability.

The country of Moab - Here, and in Ruth 1:2, Ruth 1:22; Ruth 4:3, literally, “the field” or “fields.” As the same word is elsewhere used of the territory of Moab, of the Amalekites, of Edom, and of the Philistines, it would seem to be a term pointedly used with reference to a foreign country, not the country of the speaker, or writer; and to have been specially applied to Moab.

Smith's Bible Commentary

Shall we turn now to the book of Ruth?

As we were studying the book of Judges last week, we pointed out that at the end of chapter sixteen, the end of the story of Samson, you actually came to the end of the history part of the book of Judges. What followed in chapter seventeen and onto the end were a couple of incidents, or scenes, that took place during the time of the Judges, just to show that it was a time of spiritual confusion and moral decay as far as the nation was concerned. When the Danites moved their area of inheritance, a portion of them went on up to the northern part of the land. How that they captured this young priest, and how he had these teraphims and so forth, these little images that had been made. It was just a time of spiritual confusion. Then it was a time of moral decay as we saw the conditions of the Benjamites, and the sodomy that was beginning to be practiced by the men of Gibeah, and it's consequences.

Now that gives you one side of what was happening. There was another story that took place and the book of Ruth opens.

Now it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled ( Ruth 1:1 ),

So the story of Ruth again is sort of an appendix to the book of Judges, in that this story fits back into the period when the Judges were ruling over Israel.

Now it was a time of spiritual confusion, it was a time of apostasy, a time of moral declension, but yet in the midst of it all, God was working out His plan in those hearts and lives that were open to Him. This is always true. Though you may look at an overall condition of a nation, or a people and say, "Boy, they're really in a mess," yet God is always working out His plan in the hearts and in the lives of those that are open unto Him.

So here God was working in the period of moral declension, in this period of confusion, yet God was working in a very special way. The book of Ruth gives us the insight into the work of God.

Now quite often when we live in a corrupted society, such as we live today, and where in our whole educational philosophy they teach that the morals of society determine what is right and wrong conduct. Thus, having established that as a sociological fact, as we look around and see the morals, we say, "Well, everybody's doing it," and that becomes the criteria, "it must be right."

It is interesting that the Bible declares that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Now that is the biblical account of creation. You have in the educational circles today the humanistic philosophy that is actually prevailing within our educational system. The humanistic philosophy rather than saying that, "God created man," declares that, "Man created God for his own convenience because he needed something to believe in. He needed to have some kind of a guide for moral conduct and all, and so man created God." That actually man's moral conduct is determined by the morals of his society. The Bible declares "In the beginning God created man." The moral conduct were standards that were established by God which are absolutes. Humanism, "God created," or "Man created God for his own convenience," and man establishes his own standards, his own morals; and thus, they are relative to the situations.

Now living, and all of you have in some degree been affected by the humanistic philosophy that prevails in every level of our society today. The danger is falling into that trap of thinking, "Well, everybody is doing it. I'm weird or out of step because I'm not following along with the same pattern of the world in which I live. And to be accepted, I must join the crowd. After all if everybody's doing it, it must be all right." False. That is the philosophy of humanism expressed in its existentialism. Not so, God has established standards. Man is always trying to get a little twist on the standard that God has established. "Well, what if this?" and "What if that?" Trying to make it relate to a special case. But God has established the standards by which we are to live. God created man and established the moral standards for that man.

So God is always working. And in this confused, corrupted society in which we live, God still desires to work in the hearts and the lives that are open to the work of God. Oh God help me that my heart might be open to God, so that He can work in my life in the midst of this corrupted society.

Now the Bible foresaw the corruption in which you are living today. The Bible very aptly expressed sort of the scientific attitudes of uniformitarianism that have prevailed, that have set the stage for revolutionary thesis, which has of course set the stage for the whole humanism, because "God is no longer needed, man evolved from the protozoa," and the whole thing is tied together.

Peter said, "In the last days there will be scoffers that will come and say, Where is the promise of the Father?" that is of the coming again of Jesus Christ. "Where is the Lord? He hasn't come. Since our fathers have fallen asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning"( 2 Peter 3:3-4 ). I defy you to find me a better definition of uniformitarianism. "All things have continued as they were from the beginning." That is exactly what the dogma, or the theory of uniformitarianism declares. All of the phenomena that has ever existed in the creation and the evolving of man, into the present day, can be observed in the world today. There have been no catastrophes, and so forth, no dramatic changes.

It is interesting that Peter foresaw this scientific theory before it was ever propounded, and he actually gave the greatest flaw within it. "For this they were willingly ignorant, that God destroyed the world that was with a flood." They closed their eyes to that, the fact of the universal flood, which is by far a better explanation of the geological column, and of geology itself than is this theory of evolution. The geological column does not prove at all the theory of evolution, in fact, it raises great questions in regards to the theory of evolution, because within the geological column there is a total absence of any transitional forms. If the transitional forms took place over millions of years of evolving, surely we would have fossils that would show the transitional forms. So absent is the fossil record of transitional forms that has led one of the professors at Stanford to come up with the magic bird kind of a theory. Whereas a snake one time laid an egg, and a bird flew out. It's the hopeful monster theory. He had to come up with that because of the absence of the transitional forms of the geological column. Rather than there being gradual changes, they're now saying, "Suddenly in the Cambrian state there appeared multitudes of many faceted animals in highly developed forms." Remarkable. Hocus pocus dominocus!

So it's a thing that we are in this society of which the Bible said perilous times would come, men would be lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. They would be fierce. They'd be incontinent, which speaks of this sexual freedom that people are advocating today, and goes on to describe our modern day society. Jesus in referring to these things said, "Because the iniquity of the earth is going to abound, the love of many is going to wax cold" ( Matthew 24:12 ). But in the midst of this crooked and perverse world, God is still working in the hearts and lives of those that are opened and surrendered unto Him.

So in the period of Judges, a time much as today, when the gays were parading and declaring their normalcy, and declaring to actually propagate their own thing there in Gibeah, and were publicly parading their perverse style of life, God was working in the hearts and lives of those that were open to God.

Now the book of Ruth is another insight. It shows us how God can work, and does work His purposes on the earth even under adverse circumstances.

So,

It came to pass when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. A certain man of Bethlehemjudah and he went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons. And this man was an Elimelech, and the name of his wife was Naomi, and the name of his sons were Mahlon and Chilion, and he was an Ephrathite ( Ruth 1:1-2 ).

Now Ephrathite or Ephratah was the area, the general in which Bethlehem was situated. Like Santa Ana is situated in Orange County, Bethlehem was situated in the area called Ephratah. So, he was called an Ephrathite, like you might be called an Orange Countian because you live in Orange County.

Now the names are always interesting because the names are oftentimes significant to the story. They named their children, and every name had a meaning. Now they say that names have meanings today, and you can look back to the meaning of your names in some of the dictionaries, what your name actually means. The name Elimelech means, "My God is King!" Beautiful name. The name Naomi means "Pleasantness," a very beautiful name indeed. But the name Mahlon means "Sickly," and the name Chilion means "Pining."

Now often the children were named after circumstances of their birth. When Esau was born he was all covered with hair, and so they called him "Hairy." The word Esau means "Hairy," and he's just a hairy little kid so it's a good name. When his brother was born, his twin brother, he reached out and grabbed hold of Hairy's heel. So they said, "Look at that he's a heel catcher." They called him Jacob, "Heel catcher."

So they were named after circumstances of their birth. Probably when Mahlon was born perhaps he was premature, maybe it was touch and go for awhile, he just didn't look well. They said, "Oh he's sickly, he's Mahlon." So he picked up the name Mahlon, "Sickly." Later when his brother was born, he didn't look much better so they called him "Pining." Sickly and Pining. No wonder they died young, they were sickly and pining.

So in the land of Bethlehem there was a famine, there was a drought, which does take place periodically over there. Last year they had a drought. They heard that there was good land over in Moab and so Elimelech decided to sell out and with his wife, and two sons move over to Moab, which is the high plateau country against a great rift, the Jordan river, the Dead sea. Over on the other side, the high plateau country which is very fertile area. So they moved over to Moab. While they were there Elimelech died. So the boys married girls from Moab. The one married a girl by the name of Orpah, the other married a girl by the name of Ruth. And it came to pass in time that both of the boys also died without having any children.

So Naomi said to the two daughters in law, Go back and return to your families, to your mother's house: and may the Lord deal kindly with you, even as you have dealt with the dead and with me ( Ruth 1:8 ).

So during this time of family tragedy these two girls actually brought, showed a real depth of character. They were very kind to Naomi, and comforting of Naomi. They took their tragedy very well. So Naomi is wishing them that they also might receive this same degree of kindness that they had displayed unto her.

And the Lord grant that you find rest, each of you in the house of her husband ( Ruth 1:9 ).

So, "May, may you both find some good boys and get married. May you have a happy, married life. May you find someone else, and may you live at rest in the house of your husband." So she's just encouraging the girls, "Hey girls, you know you're better off here, you're better off with your families. You're better off just getting married with someone else."

So the two girls went with her for awhile on the way back. So they wept and all, and then Ruth, I mean, Naomi said to them again, "Look girls, I'm really too old to have any more sons. Even if I have a hope of having sons, let's say that I was married now and became pregnant tomorrow, would you want to wait until my sons grew up old enough to get married? They don't want to wait, and anyhow it's not gonna happen. So you just go ahead and return home, and get your husbands and get married.

So Orpah [fell on her neck and] kissed her, [and bid her farewell, and returned to her mother's house]; but Ruth [then uttered these beautiful words], Entreat me not to leave thee [or to forsake thee], or to return from following after thee: because where you will go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge: your people will be my people, and your God will be my God: God forbid if anything but death should separate between us ( Ruth 1:14 , Ruth 1:16-17 ).

So the, the devotion of Ruth to her mother-in-law. "Look I'll go with you. Don't ask me to leave you, or to forsake you, or to return back to my family. For wherever you go," evidently there was a beautiful bond that was created between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law. "Wherever you go I will go, wherever you lodge, I will lodge. You're people will be my people, your God will be my God. God forbid if anything but death should separate us." So they came back into the land.

When she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, then she left speaking unto her. So the two went until they came to Bethlehem ( Ruth 1:18-19 ).

Now when they arrived in Bethlehem, the people said, "Oh Naomi has returned!" And she said, "Don't call me Naomi." Now let's put it in their language. They said, "Oh pleasantness has returned!" She said, "Don't call me pleasant."

Call me bitter: for the Lord dealt bitter with me ( Ruth 1:20 ).

Mara, "bitter." "Don't call me "Pleasant," call me "Bitter," the Lord has dealt bitterly with me."

Now it is interesting that she sort of blames the tragedy on God. "The Lord has dealt bitterly with me." There seems to be a natural inclination for us to blame God for our tragedies, especially for death. When Jesus arrived in Bethany at the time of the death of Lazarus, he had been very sick. His sister sent the urgent message down to the Jordan where Jesus was staying, "Come quickly the one you love is sick!" Jesus tarried there at the Jordan for two days, and then headed off for Bethany.

Now for a message to get from Bethany to Jordan took two days. Jesus stayed there an extra two days, and it took Him two days to get back to Bethany. So in the meantime, six days had transpired from the time the message went out, "Your friend is very sick, the one you love is very sick." It was six days later that Jesus was arriving in Bethany, and the girls knew that it was too late. They knew that it was actually later than it should be. He could've arrived earlier. They were aware that He was delayed, they didn't know why. Martha came out to meet Him, and in an accusing way said, "Lord, if You would only had been here, my brother would not have died! Lord, where were You when we needed You? Lord, why didn't You come quicker? We told You come quickly, the one You love is sick! Lord, what took You so long? Why didn't You respond, Lord?" Really the idea is she was blaming the death of her brother on the Lord. "Lord, You could've averted this!"

Now we know that that is true. We know that God does hold life in His hands. We know that God is able to sustain life. We know that God is able to restore life. We know that the days of man are appointed of God. Thus, there is this inclination to blame God for death, and in a sense that is right. But in another sense we only feel bitterness because we have a totally wrong concept of death as it being the end, "Oh, he had his whole life in front of him, everything going for him. Oh, what a shame."

I heard this so much when my younger brother was killed. Handsome, good-looking, big guy, just had everything going for him. Good sense of business, and he was making investments and just everything falling into line. Bought an airplane so he could get back and forth between his business better. Crashed in his airplane. People said, "Oh, what a shame. Whole life in front of him, what a shame." Yeah, what a shame. He got there before I did! By the time I arrive, he's gonna know every nook and cranny. Gonna take me awhile to catch up.

You know he's with the Lord. What's so bad about that? He's there in God's kingdom; what's so sad? The sad part is that I miss him. The sad part that I miss all the fun that we used to have together. He was an exciting person. He used to always be doing crazy things and exciting things. I miss that. I sorrow because what I have lost, but I don't sorrow for him. I'm jealous of him being with the Lord, how glorious. Not having to hassle with gas lines, with bills, and all of the kind of things that we have to experience. How wonderful. I'll catch up with him one of these days.

But we have the wrong attitude, you see, concerning death. We look at this life as though, "Oh, it is so precious. It's so wonderful. Hang onto it." That's because of the uncertainty of that life that He has promised to us, our lapses of faith. "Don't call me pleasant, call me bitter!" That's sad. It's sad whenever you become bitter over any experience of life, because bitterness only hurts you. We are warned to be careful of any root of bitterness within our lives because of the effect that it can have on your total life. The bitter roots can bring forth bitter fruit in your life. We must guard against bitterness. Bitterness is an attitude that I choose because of the circumstances that I face. I don't have to become bitter, I choose to become bitter. For there are other people who go through the exact similar circumstances and they become better people because they learn to commit and trust in God all the more. They say, "Well it's all in the Lord's hands, and I belong to the Lord, and God is just given me strength, and God has just given me capacities and all." They become actually better people.

Some of the greatest people I know are people who have suffered incessantly through life. And through the suffering there has been a depth of character developed that is unparalleled by others who have never experienced suffering or sorrow. Out of suffering, out of sorrow, the roots can go deep into God and the life can become beautiful, and strong, and powerful. Or you can root into bitterness and your life becomes bitter and tight, and tense.

It's tragic when a person gives himself over to bitterness. It's all in how you look at the situation. I can look at it and I can become bitter and say, "If God loved me then why did He allow that to happen to me?" My life becomes tense, and I become tight, and my blood vessels begin to constrict and there's not a real flowing anymore. My whole life is so tense. I begin to actually get the effects of it physically.

Or I can say, "Well, the Lord has given, the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord! All things work together for good, and God has a plan and He loves me, and I know that He's watching over me. Whatever it is God's working out a plan in my life. Praise the Lord! God you know that I need to have this worked out. You're just seeking to conform me into Your image, have Your perfect work within my life, God." I can become a better person, an open person, and filled with God's love. I can flow out the beautiful fruits, of love, and faith, and hope to others.

Naomi for the moment was responding in the wrong way, "Don't call me Pleasant, call me Bitter!" Oh sad, that's sad when you've allowed the circumstances of your life to jaundice your feelings and you turn bitter against God, and bitter against the circumstances of life. Naomi thought it was all over. She thought that was the end of the road. She didn't know the plan God was working out.

She said,

I went away full, and the Lord hath brought me home again empty: why do you call me Pleasant, seeing the Lord has testified against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me? So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter in law, with her, they came out of the country of Moab: they came to Bethlehem in the beginning of the barley harvest ( Ruth 1:21-22 ).

"

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

A. The deaths of Naomi’s husband and sons 1:1-5

God had promised the Israelites that if they departed from Him He would discipline them by sending famine on the Promised Land (Deuteronomy 28:17; Deuteronomy 28:23; Deuteronomy 28:38-40; Deuteronomy 28:42). [Note: See George M. Harton, "Fulfillment of Deuteronomy 28-30 in History and in Eschatology" (Th.D. dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1981).] The famine on Israel at this time indicates God’s judgment for unfaithfulness. As Abram had migrated to Egypt as a result of a famine in his day (Genesis 12:10), so Elimelech migrated to Moab to obtain food for his family. Compare also Lot’s migration in Genesis 13:1-13. There are many motifs that occur in the patriarchal narratives in Genesis and reappear in Ruth. [Note: See Hubbard, pp. 39-41.] This repetition seems to indicate that one of the writer’s purposes was to present Ruth as another of Israel’s notable matriarchs who, despite many natural barriers, provided important leaders for the nation by God’s grace.

"The story is never delightful when a member of the chosen seed leaves the Land of Promise and goes into the far country. It makes no difference whether he is Abraham going into Egypt to escape the famine or the prodigal son going to the far country and into the face of a famine there; the results are negative and the ending tragic. Elimelech should not have gone into the land of Moab, regardless of the conditions in the Land of Promise." [Note: McGee, p. 48. ]

Jacob received a special revelation from God directing him to migrate from the Promised Land to Egypt (Genesis 46:1-4). Another view is that since the writer did not draw attention to the famine, the migrations of Elimelech, Mahlon, and Chilion to Moab, and their deaths, he did not intend the reader to read significance into these details. He only intended to present them as background for the story of Ruth. [Note: Frederic W. Bush, Ruth, Esther, p. 67.]

Famines, according to the biblical record, usually advanced God’s plans for His people, despite their tragic appearances (cf. Genesis 12:10; Genesis 26:1; Genesis 41-50; Exodus 1-20). [Note: Hubbard, p. 85.] The chapter opens with famine but closes with harvest (Ruth 1:22). Likewise the whole book opens with a bad situation but ends with a good one. God was at work blessing His people in the times and events that this book recounts. The restoration of seed (food, husband, redeemer, and heir) is one of the main motifs in Ruth. [Note: See Barbara Green, "The Plot of the Biblical Story of Ruth," Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 23 (July 1982):55-68.]

The fact that Elimelech (lit. my God is king, a theme of the book) was from Bethlehem (lit. house of bread, i.e., granary) is significant. "Elimelech" is a theophoric name, a name that combines a term for deity with another ascription. Elimelech’s parents probably gave him this name hoping that he would acknowledge God as his king, but he failed to do that when he moved from Israel to Moab.

Two stories make up the appendix to the Book of Judges. The first of these is the story of the grandson of Moses who left Bethlehem to lead the Danites into idolatry (Judges 17-18). The second is the story of the concubine from Bethlehem who became the focus of discord in Israel that resulted in civil war and almost the obliteration of the tribe of Benjamin (Judges 19-21). The Book of Ruth also features Bethlehem. God may have given us all three of these stories because David was from Bethlehem in Judah. In the two stories in Judges just referred to we can see that the Israelites would have looked down on Bethlehem after those incidents. However, Ruth reveals how God brought great blessing to Israel out of Bethlehem in the person of David. This is in harmony with God’s choice to bring blessing out of those things that people do not value highly naturally. Bethlehem in Ruth’s day did not have a good reputation. It was not the environment in which David grew up that made him great but his relationship with God. That relationship, we learn from Ruth, was a heritage passed down to him from his ancestors, godly Boaz and Ruth. [Note: For further study of the "Bethlehem trilogy," see Merrill, Kingdom of . . ., pp. 178-88; or idem, "The Book of Ruth: Narration and Shared Themes," Bibliotheca Sacra 142:566 (April-June 1985):131-33.]

The unusual association of Ephratah and Bethlehem here (Ruth 1:2) recalls the first use of both names describing the same town, called Ephrath in Genesis 35:16-19. There Rachel died giving birth to Benjamin.

"Does this incident in which Benjamin is the occasion of the death of the patronymic’s favorite wife at Bethlehem anticipate in some way the Saul-David controversy in which the Benjaminite again proves antagonistic to one who has Bethlehem associations?" [Note: Ibid., p. 133.]

". . . it is best to understand Ephrathite as the name of a clan. If this clan descended from Caleb [which seems probable since Caleb settled near there], the author may have identified this family as Ephrathite to picture it as an aristocratic one-one of the ’first families of Bethlehem.’ [Note: See W. Fuerst, The Books of Ruth, Esther, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, Lamentations, p. 10; Morris, p. 249; and A. Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative, p. 103.] He thereby underscored the humiliating tragedy involved: the Vanderbilts have suddenly become poor sharecroppers. Worse yet, he cleverly disallowed any hope of a temporary visit." [Note: Hubbard, p. 91.]

Ephrathah was probably also the name of an older settlement that stood near Bethlehem or that became Bethlehem (cf. Genesis 48:7). Some scholars believe it was the name of the district in which Bethlehem stood, or the name may reflect that Ephraimites had settled there. [Note: E.g., F. B. Huey Jr., "Ruth," in Deuteronomy-2 Samuel, vol. 3 of The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, p. 519.] This seems less likely to me. The unusual way of describing Bethlehem hints at connections to David that become clear at the end of the book (Ruth 4:22), since this is the way Bethlehem became known after David’s appearance (cf. 1 Samuel 17:12). [Note: Bush, p. 67.]

It is also unusual in a patriarchal society that the writer described Elimelech as Naomi’s husband (Ruth 1:3). This puts Naomi forward as the more important person of the two. Elimelech’s death may have been a punishment for leaving the land rather than trusting God (cf. Leviticus 26:38), though the text does not say so. It was not contrary to the Mosaic law for Israelite men to marry Moabite women (Deuteronomy 7:3), but apparently they could not bring them into the congregation of Israel for public worship (Deuteronomy 23:3-4). The unusual names of both Mahlon and Chilion seem to have been connected with circumstances of their births. Mahlon may have looked sickly when he was born, and Chilion probably looked as though he was failing.

Gann's Commentary on the Bible

JUDGES

parWalking Thru The Bible

RUTH

RUTH

    Author: The 4 chapter book of Ruth does not contain the name of its author. Therefore, we cannot speak with any certainty, but most scholars think Samuel penned the book

.

    Situation: The book is another important part of Jewish history. It gives a link in the seed-line of the coming Christ. Perhaps this part of Jewish history pertaining to the coming Christ is most memorable because it is presented as a love story. There is pictured a loving husband, Elimelech, in a time of famine (Ruth 1:1), a loving wife who was supportive of her husband’s move (Ruth 1:4), two loving sons, Mahlon and Chilion (Ruth 1:1-2) who became husbands (Ruth 1:4), and two loving daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth (Ruth 1:6-14).

    However, the primary love story has to do with the love of Ruth for her mother-in-law (Ruth 1:14-22). The love was repaid with a husband, Boaz, and the blessing of bearing a child who would be in the seed-line of the Christ (Ruth 4:17-22). How this brief bit of history must have thrilled the Jews when they heard and read it.

    When Written: The events of the book of Ruth took place during the period of the Judges (verse 1 says "when the judges ruled") and hence it’s location in the Old Testament following that book. Ruth 4:17-22 gives an abbreviated genealogy from Pharez to David. David was the second of Israel’s kings under the united kingdom (1 Samuel 9:27; 1 Samuel 10:1; 1 Samuel 15:1, 1 Samuel 15:12-13). Thus David had been born at the time the book was written down. With these facts we can date the writing of the book of Ruth to around 1100 BC. The last verses of the book date its composition in the days of Samuel whom we believe to have penned it by inspiration.

    Why Written: There is no stated purpose within the book itself, however, we see one thing that is most important--information about the lineage of the Christ. God’s providence is seen in His care for the seed through which Jesus would come. (Compare Matthew 1:5-6, "And Boaz begat Obed of Ruth; and Obed begat Jesse; and Jesse begat David the king." Matthew goes on to show that Christ came through that line (cf. Matthew 1:16). What God has promised He is able and faithful to do.

    New Testament Ties: Matthew 1:5 refers to Ruth 4:13-17 and so does Luke 3:31-32. The principles of family ties exemplified in Ruth are magnified in the second covenant. It serves as an example of God’s love for the Gentiles also.

Ruth 1.1

Verse Comments

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

Now it came to pass, in the days when the judges ruled,.... So that it appears that this history is of time and things after the affair of Micah, and of the concubine of the Levite, and of the war between Israel and Benjamin; for in those times there was no king nor judge in Israel; but to what time of the judges, and which government of theirs it belongs to, is not agreed on. Josephus o places it in the government of Eli, but that is too late for Boaz, the grandfather of Jesse, the father of David, to live. Some Jewish writers, as Jarchi, say it was in the times of Ibzan, who they say p is the same with Boaz, but without proof, and which times are too late also for this history. The Jewish chronology q comes nearer the truth, which carries it up as high as the times of Eglon, king of Moab, when Ehud was judge; and with which Dr. Lightfoot r pretty much agrees, who puts this history between the third and fourth chapters of Judges, and so must belong to the times of Ehud or Shamgar. Junius refers it to the times of Deborah and Barak; and others s, on account of the famine, think it began in the times the Midianites oppressed Israel, and carried off the fruits of the earth, which caused it, when Gideon was raised up to be their judge; Alting t places it in the time of Jephthah; such is the uncertainty about the time referred to:

that there was a famine in the land; the land of Canaan, that very fruitful country. The Targum says this was the sixth famine that had been in the world, and it was in the days of Boaz, who is called Ibzan the just, and who was of Bethlehemjudah; but it is more probable that it was in the days of Gideon, as before observed, than in the days of Ibzan

and a certain man of Bethlehemjudah; so called to distinguish it from another Bethlehem in the tribe of Zebulun, Joshua 19:15 which had its name from the fruitfulness of the place, and the plenty of bread in it, and yet the famine was here; hence this man with his family removed from it:

and went to sojourn in the country of Moab; where there was plenty; not to dwell there, but to sojourn for a time, until the famine was over:

he and his wife, and his two sons; the names of each of them are next given.

o Antiqu. l. 5. c. 9. sect. 1. p T. Bab. Bava Bathra, fol. 91. 1. Tzemach David, par. 1. fol. 8. 2. Jarchi & Abendana in loc. q Seder Olam Rabba, c. 12. p. 33. r Works, vol. 1. p. 48. s Rambachius in loc. & Majus in ib. so Biship Patrick. Lampe Hist. Eccl. l. 1. c. 5. p. 22. t Theolog. Hist. loc. 2. p. 84.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      1 Now it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Beth-lehem-judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons.   2 And the name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife Naomi, and the name of his two sons Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Beth-lehem-judah. And they came into the country of Moab, and continued there.   3 And Elimelech Naomi's husband died; and she was left, and her two sons.   4 And they took them wives of the women of Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth: and they dwelled there about ten years.   5 And Mahlon and Chilion died also both of them; and the woman was left of her two sons and her husband.

      The first words give all the date we have of this story. It was in the days when the judges ruled (Ruth 1:1; Ruth 1:1), not in those disorderly times when there was no king in Israel; but under which of the judges these things happened we are not told, and the conjectures of the learned are very uncertain. It must have been towards the beginning of the judges' time, for Boaz, who married Ruth, was born of Rahab, who received the spies in Joshua's time. Some think it was in the days of Ehud, others of Deborah; the learned bishop Patrick inclines to think it was in the days of Gideon, because in his days only we read of a famine by the Midianites' invasion, Judges 6:3; Judges 6:4. While the judges were ruling, some one city and some another, Providence takes particular cognizance of Bethlehem, and has an eye to a King, to Messiah himself, who should descend from two Gentile mothers, Rahab and Ruth. Here is,

      I. A famine in the land, in the land of Canaan, that land flowing with milk and honey. This was one of the judgments which God had threatened to bring upon them for their sins, Leviticus 26:19; Leviticus 26:20. He has many arrows in his quiver. In the days of the judges they were oppressed by their enemies; and, when by that judgment they were not reformed, God tried this, for when he judges he will overcome. When the land had rest, yet it had not plenty; even in Bethlehem, which signifies the house of bread, there was scarcity. A fruitful land is turned into barrenness, to correct and restrain the luxury and wantonness of those that dwell therein.

      II. An account of one particular family distressed in the famine; it is that of Elimelech. His name signifies my God a king, agreeable to the state of Israel when the judges ruled, for the Lord was their King, and comfortable to him and his family in their affliction, that God was theirs and that he reigns for ever. His wife was Naomi, which signifies my amiable or pleasant one. But his sons' names were Mahlon and Chilion, sickness and consumption, perhaps because weakly children, and not likely to be long-lived. Such are the productions of our pleasant things, weak and infirm, fading and dying.

      III. The removal of this family from Bethlehem into the country of Moab on the other side Jordan, for subsistence, because of the famine, Ruth 1:1; Ruth 1:2. It seems there was plenty in the country of Moab when there was scarcity of bread in the land of Israel. Common gifts of providence are often bestowed in greater plenty upon those that are strangers to God than upon those that know and worship him. Moab is at ease from his youth, while Israel is emptied from vessel to vessel (Jeremiah 48:11), not because God loves Moabites better, but because they have their portion in this life. Thither Elimelech goes, not to settle for ever, but to sojourn for a time, during the dearth, as Abraham, on a similar occasion, went into Egypt, and Isaac into the land of the Philistines. Now here, 1. Elimelech's care to provide for his family, and his taking his wife and children with him, were without doubt commendable. If any provide not for his own, he hath denied the faith,1 Timothy 5:8. When he was in his straits he did not forsake his house, go seek his fortune himself, and leave his wife and children to shift for their own maintenance; but, as became a tender husband and a loving father, where he went he took them with him, not as the ostrich, Job 39:16. But, 2. I see not how his removal into the country of Moab, upon this occasion, could be justified. Abraham and Isaac were only sojourners in Canaan, and it was agreeable to their condition to remove; but the seed of Israel were now fixed, and ought not to remove into the territories of the heathen. What reason had Elimelech to go more than any of his neighbours? If by any ill husbandry he had wasted his patrimony, and sold his land or mortgaged it (as it should seem, Ruth 4:3; Ruth 4:4), which brought him in to a more necessitous condition than others, the law of God would have obliged his neighbours to relieve him (Leviticus 25:35); but that was not his case, for he went out full, Ruth 1:21; Ruth 1:21. By those who tarried at home it appears that the famine was not so extreme but that there was sufficient to keep life and soul together; and his charge was but small, only two sons. But if he could not be content with the short allowance that his neighbours took up with, and in the day of famine could not be satisfied unless he kept as plentiful a table as he had done formerly, if he could not live in hope that there would come years of plenty again in due time, or could not with patience wait for those years, it was his fault, and he did by it dishonour God and the good land he had given them, weaken the hands of his brethren, with whom he should have been willing to take his lot, and set an ill example to others. If all should do as he did Canaan would be dispeopled. Note, It is an evidence of a discontented, distrustful, unstable spirit, to be weary of the place in which God hath set us, and to be for leaving it immediately whenever we meet with any uneasiness or inconvenience in it. It is folly to think of escaping that cross which, being laid in our way, we ought to take up. It is our wisdom to make the best of that which is, for it is seldom that changing our place is mending it. Or, if he would remove, why to the country of Moab? If he had made enquiry, it is probable he would have found plenty in some of the tribes of Israel, those, for instance, on the other side Jordan, that bordered on the land of Moab; if he had had that zeal for God and his worship, and that affection for his brethren which became an Israelite, he would not have persuaded himself so easily to go and sojourn among Moabites.

      IV. The marriage of his two sons to two of the daughters of Moab after his death, Ruth 1:4; Ruth 1:4. All agree that this was ill done. The Chaldee says, They transgressed the decree of the word of the Lord in taking strange wives. If they would not stay unmarried till their return to the land of Israel, they were not so far off but that they might have fetched themselves wives thence. Little did Elimelech think, when he went to sojourn in Moab, that ever his sons would thus join in affinity with Moabites. But those that bring young people into bad acquaintance, and take them out of the way of public ordinances, though they may think them well-principled and armed against temptation, know not what they do, nor what will be the end thereof. It does not appear that the women they married were proselyted to the Jewish religion, for Orpah is said to return to her gods (Ruth 1:15; Ruth 1:15); the gods of Moab were hers still. It is a groundless tradition of the Jews that Ruth was the daughter of Eglon king of Moab, yet the Chaldee paraphrast inserts it; but this and their other tradition, which he inserts likewise, cannot agree, that Boaz who married Ruth was the same with Ibzan, who judged Israel 200 years after Eglon's death, Judges 12:8-10

      V. The death of Elimelech and his two sons, and the disconsolate condition Naomi was thereby reduced to. Her husband died (Ruth 1:3; Ruth 1:3) and her two sons (Ruth 1:5; Ruth 1:5) soon after their marriage, and the Chaldee says, Their days were shortened, because they transgressed the law in marrying strange wives. See here, 1. That wherever we go we cannot out-run death, whose fatal arrows fly in all places. 2. That we cannot expect to prosper when we go out of the way of our duty. He that will save his life by any indirect course shall lose it. 3. That death, when it comes into a family, often makes breach upon breach. One is taken away to prepare another to follow soon after; one is taken away, and that affliction is not duly improved, and therefore God sends another of the same kind. When Naomi had lost her husband she took so much the more complacency and put so much the more confidence in her sons. Under the shadow of these surviving comforts she thinks she shall live among the heathen, and exceedingly glad she was of these gourds; but behold they wither presently, green and growing up in the morning, cut down and dried up before night, buried soon after they were married, for neither of them left any children. So uncertain and transient are all our enjoyments here. It is therefore our wisdom to make sure of those comforts that will be made sure and of which death cannot rob us. But how desolate was the condition, and how disconsolate the spirit, of poor Naomi, when the woman was left of her two sons and her husband! When these two things, loss of children and widowhood, come upon her in a moment, come upon her in their perfection, by whom shall she be comforted?Isaiah 47:9; Isaiah 51:19. It is God alone who has wherewithal to comfort those who are thus cast down.

Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible

From: Lectures Introductory to the Earlier Historical Books of the Old Testament.

That the book of Ruth stands most fitly in the place where it is actually found must have been felt by the spiritual mind. Indeed it is apparent to every attentive reader of Scripture; for by outward marks it clearly belongs to the place where God has presented it to us. As to the time of what is brought before us, it belongs to the days of the Judges, as we are expressly told, and thus was clearly before the immense change which God was pleased to bring in and to have recorded for our instruction in 1 Samuel. Nevertheless, its character being singularly different from that which we find in Judges, none need wonder that it stands in a distinct book.

It is true that there is an old tradition that it formerly belonged to the book of Judges, but I doubt the fact extremely, being convinced on internal grounds that it forms a separate book, no matter what that will-o' the-wisp may say; for we can never trust the traditions of men, though of course they may occasionally fall in with truth. There is nothing more certain than that God has shown us the tendency, even of apostles themselves, to fail whenever tradition was leaned on; for we know of a tradition that went forth among the disciples, and this too not before the Lord's death, but after it; but even this, brief as it was, and heard by several witnesses, they failed to hold immaculate. For in consequence there went about a report that the disciple whom the Lord loved was not to die. Now the Lord had said nothing of the kind. So strikingly does Scripture warn, not only as to the principle, but in fact. There may have been a certain difficulty on the surface of the words uttered, not only because of the immense depth of that which lay underneath the Lord's intimation, but because He saw fit to present it in a form to exercise their thought in pondering His words. But it seems evident that God teaches us by such an instance the valuelessness even of primitive tradition; how much more of subsequent writers, who almost always show the grossest incapacity to understand the plain written word of God! Show another tradition which has such a character as this; and yet Scripture has itself given us here in the most striking way the warning that we are in no case to trust tradition, but only what inspiration has written. If it be found then that it was thus even among the disciples, we certainly dare not trust the Jews. The Lord made use of them, and we have every reason to bless God for His own care of the written word, though committed to man's responsibility.

But while there can, to my mind, be no reasonable question that the book of Ruth fittingly follows the Judges, it is equally plain, I think, to such as give the matter a little reflection, that it appropriately forms a book to itself, and this as the natural and, one may say, necessary prelude to the book that follows. That is, we are here in presence of a wholly different line of truth; so much so that it could easily be proved utterly incongruous to piece on the story of Ruth to anything found in the book of Judges. Indeed, if there be a contrast, as it appears to me, complete and well-defined in this part of Scripture, it is between the real and proper appendix of the book of Judges (Judges 17:1-13; Judges 18:1-31; Judges 19:1-30; Judges 20:1-48; Judges 21:1-25) and this book of Ruth, which man and tradition tell us once made another supplement. If they can be conceived as so put together, one certainly was the appendix of the most grievous disorders; the other, of the beautiful ways of divine grace. The one exhibits all lawlessness, when there was not even a magistrate in the land that might put them to shame in anything; the other is among the loveliest tales of genuine piety that God Himself has given us, and this not merely in the generous man who does the part of the Kinsman-Redeemer, but also in her who in unobtrusive faith served in love no less than faith where it could be the least expected. Thus does the grace of God meet us in the book of Ruth, clothing itself in its most attractive form, and so much the more giving,, evidence of its power, when we think of the material on which it wrought, in her at least whose name it bears.

Besides, the story itself is of very great importance, as preparing the way, not for David only, but for his greater Son. This, however, does not at all link itself with Judges, admirable as it is where God has given it to us. It is neither a part of Samuel on the one hand, nor of Judges on the other, though morally far more of a preface to the former than a supplement to the latter. It is just what God has made it, a most suitable transition scene between the two, but, in fact, a book to itself on the gracious words of which it is our happy privilege to dwell for a little together.

What is that which we find here? It is not yet the day for royalty on the throne of Jehovah, not even in any imperfect form. Nor is it what we have been seeing the intervention of grace to deliver the people from time to time from oppression often in uncomely forms, as regards the men or measures employed; and I think that every one who has followed with attention the course of Judges must have recognised the truth, when pointed out, that one of the special lessons of that Book is that? although divine mercy wrought in power, the human instrument was marked with some striking drawback.

In the Book before us we see grace working so as to secure promises. There was ruin in Israel; yet a Moabite stranger engages our interest and respect singularly. For, above all, faith was there. It is not a drawback where one might have looked for much, but beauty morally where one could expect nothing. At the very time when even the deliverers that God gave His poor people partook of the utter weakness and of the painful failures then found universally prevalent in Israel, on the other hand He was pleased to magnify His own mercy in a Moabitess. Granted that she was one of those excluded according to law from the congregation of Jehovah. But if law is just and good, grace is better and the only means of rescuing the guilty and fallen from ruin. If the law is suited to break down and expose man in his sinful self-confidence, grace is God's secret for the lost and wretched to bless and save them. Nevertheless, just because grace suits God's love and glory, how admirably it suits us, when we are brought down, to renounce self, and to cast our souls on His Son!

In this shape very attractive to faith we shall find the principles of grace throughout the Book of Ruth, brought out as fully as could then be, conspicuously in Ruth, though not in herself exclusively. Even at that time, full of sorrows and of great humiliation for the people, Ruth was not alone. We greatly mistake when we so narrow the intimations of the word of God. We must leave room for what meets the eye or ear; and surely the day will tell what hidden beauties there were even in the darkest times. What fulness of joy for our hearts when we know as we are known! But it is a joy to take in the hope, and assure ourselves of the largeness of grace now. Traces of this too we may find, unless I am greatly mistaken, in traversing the Book of Ruth.

What then is the great aim and object here? What does the Spirit of God appear to propose to Himself in this short but remarkably delightful book? The state of the people seems to have been one of great distress. There was a famine where least of all it ought to be felt, in the land where God's eyes rested; a famine which surely could not have been but for Israel's profound departure from God. But His mercy would employ it to exercise His people's hearts before Him in self-judgment, as well as in looking to Himself, whose grace is ever above all failure. Sorrowful to have it brought in for their sins; but turned to good, as God knows how to use everything in His grace. So it was then that "a certain man in Bethlehem-Judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab." It was not only distresses and oppressions and enemies that afflicted men in the land, as we see was the occasion for deliverance in the Judges throughout, and without exception. Here is the first pointed contrast between it and the Book of Ruth. The pressure is of such a character, at least its effect such, that this Israelite and his wife and sons are found outside the land of the Lord. The name of the man too seems clearly significant, Elimelech he to whom God is King. Yet was he an outcast for want! A strange and painful anomaly that so it should be; but so it was. Nor need we wonder that a false position in Elimelech is followed by the marriage of his sons with the women of Moab. It is no longer God shown as specially taking His place, and dwelling in the midst of the people, but now a result deplorable in His people and land.

Thus Naomi brings before us the condition of Israel, to be verified on a larger scale another day, but plainly enough shown in a little summary then; that is, not merely the enemies let loose on the people in the land, but the Israelites themselves, through sheer distress, are seen out of the land. This cannot be denied to have been a novel character of humiliation for Israel that any who were particularly and publicly identified with the government of God over His people and His land should be forced to quit it because there was no bread to eat there. Elimelech being now dead, all testimony that they had God to govern Israel, as far as he was concerned, is lost. She who ought to have been a pleasant one found bitterness, as she tells us in her desolation and widowhood in a strange land. Most vivid picture of the condition which was ere long to befall Israel! And such we know has been their portion for weary centuries. No doubt their kings contributed to the result; but here it is most strikingly prefigured before they had kings. For great, and in the end gracious, purposes did the principle of royalty come in afterwards; but here God prepares us for the result, if we only look at the unfaithful people. Where was the faith to avail themselves of God's presence?

Naomi then was left with her two sons: "And they took them wives of the women of Moab: the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth." And thus they continued to dwell for about ten years. After this the sons died also, when the woman Naomi, hearing that Jehovah had been pleased to give His people bread in His own land, turns back in her heart, lays the case before her daughters, and sets forth for the land. It was then that a most interesting difference comes out; for one of the daughters, though not without natural affection and hence unwillingness to leave her mother-in-law, lets us see that she had no faith in the God of Israel, and accordingly drops behind. Ruth for an opposite reason shines, and so much the more because of lowly unconsciousness of anything as to herself. The liveliest affection to her mother-in-law, and the faithful remembrance of the dead, were there, but above all the mighty attraction of the God of Israel. All these wrought powerfully in the heart of Ruth; and so she in the happiest manner tells out the purpose of her soul to her mother-in-law. Her portion is taken for ever with Naomi. As she said herself for there are no words capable of expressing the truth so well as those that her heart poured forth with God before her eyes "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodges", I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: Jehovah do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me." Out of the abundance of her heart did her mouth speak; and what so sweet as this devotion to the living God, not to speak of the dead, where it could be unlooked for? If Orpah shows us the failings of nature, Ruth certainly the power of grace.

This decided the mother; and they are next seen approaching Bethlehem. All the town was moved for Naomi; but, be sure of this, not less when they reflected on the strange sight of a Moabitess who turned her back for ever upon her gods and her land and every natural tie, come to take her part with a desolate widow, under the shadow of Jehovah.

That Naomi typifies Israel under the first covenant can scarcely be questioned by any one who admits the prophetic character of scripture; Israel who had experienced a famine in the land, who had lost husband, sons, everything out of it. "Call me Mara; for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me."

And who then is pictured to us by Ruth? What can she be? There is a great difficulty to many minds in the fact that Ruth was a Gentile a Moabitess. This perplexes them, and it has often led persons in times past to think she must be the church. No doubt if Naomi had been seen clearly by the same principles to represent Israel, they would have been rather confirmed at first sight in their thought; but it is not really so. Ruth does not represent the church. That there is a life flow of the grace of God in this case, that the same grace has gone out beyond measure towards us and brought us in as the body of Christ, is most true; and if people mean nothing more by the church than the objects of divine grace, we can understand why to them it should seem a settled question. There can be no doubt that Ruth does set forth the grace of God towards a stranger who had no claims on His promise or covenant, as being a Gentile, and under the ban of the law expressly.

But I am persuaded that there is profound wisdom in the fact that Ruth does represent, spite of all appearances to the contrary, a Jewish connection. How can this be? For the simple reason that the Jewish people have lost their distinctive title, and are merged amongst the Gentiles. This is so true that even the prophet Jeremiah, who was called up at a time when God was about to bring in this great change, is distinctly ordained to be a prophet to the nations; and when the cup of trembling is put in his hand by Jehovah (as shown in Jeremiah 25:1-38), it is to give to the nations to drink. But who are these "nations"? The very first of them is Judah and Jerusalem. This proves, then, that the judgment of God did put down judicially even His chosen people in the place where their sins had brought them morally.

When Israel ceased to preserve their separateness to Jehovah when the idols and false gods of the heathen came so to overshadow the true God as to attract their heart, so that, in point of fact, they abandoned the God of Israel, kings as well as people and priests it is evident that nothing could be more righteous than that God should sentence to public exile from Himself, and from all their old position of favour and comparative possession of His name in their land, those who had already gone away from Him morally, after all discipline had failed to recover them, and there was no remedy. Such indeed is invariably the way of God. He never sentences to a distance from Himself one who has not gone away in heart already. It is only therefore His judicial hand sealing them in the place to which their own unbelief had consigned them. Hence accordingly if it were wanted to indicate the quasi-Gentile position of the Jewish remnant in the latter day if this had been the object of the Spirit of God I cannot conceive how it could have been done more effectually or with more graphic power than in the very manner in which the Holy Ghost has here brought the story before us.

Had Ruth been a strictly Jewish woman, or widow, if you please now had she been of the chosen people rather than of Moab she could not have set forth the peculiar circumstances out of which the Jewish remnant will be called; for when God begins to work with them in the latter day, in what condition will they be? Loammi "not my people." Indeed it is the sentence of God on Israel ever since the day of the Babylonish captivity. They were His people before, but not His people from that time; and the evidence to all the world that they were not is given in this, that God handed over imperial power to the golden head of the great image, as we know; that is, to Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar. When the whole case is thus looked into, it confirms the accuracy of the type, instead of being a difficulty.

The same principle is in other parts of scripture. Take, for instance, a familiar chapter in the New Testament, where the apostle sets forth doctrinally our relation to the Jew. I purposely refer to Romans 11:1-36 now as the first example, because there are persons who own their difficulties about the prophecies, but who feel them much less in the epistles. The truth is, they have allowed a false principle to guide them in looking at the prophets. They there endeavour to turn aside Israel, and Judah, and Zion from their regular meaning to other objects quite distinct, the effort being to make all, at least what is bright, apply to the Christian or the church in some form or another. ButRomans 11:1-36; Romans 11:1-36 resists such a diversion from its true channel. For the object of that chapter is to show that the Jewish branches were broken off their own olive-tree because of unbelief; that the Gentile who had been a wild-olive (ourselves, in fact, who had no claim and no privilege previously) became the object of the divine favour expressly and distinctly, in consequence of Israel having rejected the Messiah and afterwards rejected the gospel. And to what end has God done this? A most merciful one as well as marvellous and wise. He means to bless Israel fully; but when the day is come for it, He will bless them strictly and solely on the ground of mercy. When they repent in truth of heart before God, when they take the place of being no better than the despised Gentiles that is, when they are broken down to feel their need of mercy, and of nothing but mercy then are they to become objects of God's restoring grace; "for the gifts and calling of God," as we know, "are without repentance:" God will hold them fast and apply them in his faithfulness. They are indefeasible.

Now, it is precisely this that Ruth, I believe, is intended to set forth. The peculiarity of her origin and of her national condition, the very fact that she was not of the Jews by birth but a Gentile, fitted her to represent the condition of the Jews in the latter day, because, although they had been really of Israel at the beginning, they had lost their place for the time, and He had designated them Lo-ammi; so that, on the very ground of being "Not-His-people," will the mercy of God take them up in the latter day, and bring them into the place of His people, never to forfeit His favour more.

There is a remarkable expression in the prophet Micah that falls in with the same thought, but often misunderstood, where he says, "Then shall the remnant of his brethren return to the children of Israel;" that is, instead of as now having a sort of Gentile place, mixed up with all the other nations (even at best the olive-tree having a Gentile character for the present), the remnant of those whom the Judge of Israel is not ashamed to call brethren will return to the children of Israel. Thus the whole scene is brought briefly out in the most vivid way before us; and, remarkable to say also, in connection with Bethlehem, the very place that comes before us historically. For the Judge of Israel is seen struck on the cheek; He is put to shame; He is smitten in the house of His friends. And in full accord with other scriptures He is here shown to have a double character. He springs as man from a family in this little village, on the one hand; on the other hand, "His goings forth are from of old, from everlasting." He belongs to the seed of David, the lineage of the king, as we all know, from many prophecies; but, besides that, He has a divine character which none but Himself could possess among those who ruled Israel.

Thus the Judge of Israel here predicted this singular ruler, who stands alone marked out from all others is smitten by His brethren; a fact which, after the parenthesis of so momentous a nature just discussed, is followed up by the words, "Therefore will He give them up." Therein we have their anomalous or Gentile phase since the cross "therefore will He give them up," because the distinctive privilege that makes Israel to be Israel is that God owns them as His people; but He who has been thus shamefully rejected by them gives them up, and God puts the seal upon that rejection. They are given up, not only on the ground of idolatry, but here on that of the rejection of Christ the Messiah (the two counts pressed in the later chapters of Isaiah); for after their past unfaithfulness and grievous idolatry He was willing to have taken them up, and made good all the promises, had they received Him. Instead of this they rejected the Judge who would have been their deliverer. They refused the God of Israel by going after idols. They refused the Judge of Israel, who deigned, though Jehovah, to be man of their own flesh and blood, of the stock of David: "Therefore will He give them up till she which travaileth hath brought forth;" that is, till the accomplishment of the purpose of God which is constantly set forth by a travailing woman.

The abandonment of the Jews as a people by God must be till the man-child is born that will bring joy into the world. This clearly cannot here, and in a few other places, refer to the birth of Christ; for the scripture before us supposes that He had already come and been rejected. The attempt to apply it therefore to His birth, as has been done in a learned book which has recently appeared, and which I was reading only a day or two ago, is evidently fallacious; for Christ must have already come if He be already rejected, and smitten on the cheek. Consequently, according to the context itself, He must have been born before this travail, and the birth there referred, not to the literal nativity of the Messiah, but to the development of that purpose of blessing God will bring out of Israel's last sorrow. It is clearly the joy that will follow the unparalleled and final tribulation of His people.

Hence when this long-looked-for purpose of God has come to the birth, then, as the prophet puts it, the remnant of the Judge's brethren shall return unto the children of Israel, instead of being taken out of Jewish relations to form the church, as at Pentecost and since. Whenever a Jew now believes in Jesus he leaves his nationality, and merges his old earthly hopes in higher and heavenly things; but in the latter day it will not be so. Then only will the type of Ruth be realized. Up to that time they will have long been, as it were, Gentiles, in point of forfeited privileges; but then, instead of being left in so dismal and desolate a condition, they will return to the children of Israel; they will take up the ancient national hopes for which God is waiting, and which depend on His chosen people being put in living relationship with their long-despised Messiah for the glory of the latter day.

This, I think, tends greatly to clear the Book of Ruth for any one who desires to have no system except God's, but would understand it as it is, without warping it to bear on our own circumstances or comfort. The truth is, brethren, that we Christians are so blessed of God, so met in all the fulness of His grace and glory in the Lord Jesus, that in the measure in which we believe it we are capable of understanding His word; but where there is the predisposition to divert scripture to ourselves, we are in the same proportion turned aside from the just interpretation of scripture. In short, the one constant, blessed, and blessing object of scripture is Christ; and where the single eye looks to Him and is filled with Him we shall certainly have the whole body full of light; where, on the contrary, anything of ours is the object that we are searching for in the word of God, so far we are in danger of being a prey to our own thoughts or those of other men.

It appears plain then, that Ruth most naturally was a Gentile, in order fitly to show the condition of the Jewish remnant in the latter day perhaps, one might say, she must have been one, if the previous Lo-ammi state was to be marked. At the same time we may observe that she was not simply such, but nearly connected with the Jew, where again we see an element of propriety for the purpose in view. For thus the two things that must have been thought quite heterogeneous and unlikely to be found in the same person seem exactly required to meet in order to give an adequate type of that which was before God in respect of Israel's future. She had been united to a Jew. This undoubtedly was not according to the law, but a manifest irregularity. Was not the history of Israel similarly anomalous? Were not the Jews guilty of no less irregularities? And scripture goes forward worthy of admiration in this as in other respects, that it does not stop, as the rule, to explain the irregularity, never to apologize for it. Scripture assumes that we have confidence in God, and that no saint will take licence from such facts as these. It just simply states them, and leaves us to form a spiritual judgment from the word of God in general upon them. There is nothing that more stamps the divine word than this; whereas, where the source is human, and evil cannot be denied or hidden, you will always find an excuse for this thing and a palliation of that, the result being altogether beneath the dignity of real inspiration. There, on the contrary, God is moving in His love, holiness, and righteous ways, and hence does not require to make apologies. To expect otherwise is an entire forgetfulness that scripture is not the work of the writer, but the word of God. This sort of unbelief is the root of ninety-nine out of a hundred of the difficulties commonly felt.

Ruth then lets us see what I have ventured to call the quasi-Gentile condition of those that will form the remnant: Jews undoubtedly, but Jews that have been out of their land, and dispersed among the nations, where they will have learned their ways, in whom God will begin to work. He will attract their heart and face towards Himself; He will decide them to turn their back upon the Gentiles' pride and idolatry; He will use the frightful evils of the last days, the antichristian times, to produce true repentance and a cleaving in faith to the God of Israel, and the Branch He has made strong for Himself. This will be the work which grace will then carry forward in the godly Jewish remnant, of whom Ruth, it appears to me, is so clear a prefiguration.

As once by birth and in all her natural associations Ruth had been a Gentile, it was the more clear now that her heart was firmly devoted in love and honour for Jehovah; and this soon brings down the blessing of God upon it; for "Naomi had a kinsman of her husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabitess said unto Naomi, Let me now go to the field, and glean ears of corn after him in whose sight I shall find grace. And she said unto her, Go, my daughter. And she went, and came, and gleaned in the field after the reapers: and her hap was to light on a part of the field belonging unto Boaz, who was of the kindred of Elimelech. And, behold, Boaz came from Beth-lehem, and said unto the reapers, Jehovah be with you. And they answered him, Jehovah bless thee." And Boaz, perceiving the stranger, enquires, "Whose damsel is this? And the servant that was set over the reapers answered and said, It is the Moabitish damsel that came back with Naomi out of the country of Moab: and she said, I pray you, let me glean and gather after the reapers among the sheaves: so she came, and hath continued even from the morning until now, that she tarried a little in the house. Then said Boaz unto Ruth, Hearest thou not, my daughter? Go not to glean in another field, neither go from hence, but abide here fast by my maidens: let thine eyes be on the field that they do reap, and go thou after them: have I not charged the young men that they shall not touch thee? and when thou art athirst, go unto the vessels, and drink of that which the young men have drawn. Then she fell on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and said unto him, Why have I found grace in thine eyes, that thou shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger? And Boaz answered and said unto her, It hath fully been showed me, all that thou hast done unto thy mother in law since the death of thine husband: and how thou hast left thy father and thy mother, and the land of thy nativity, and art come unto a people which thou knewest not heretofore. Jehovah recompense thy work, and a full reward be given thee of Jehovah God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust." (Ruth 2:1-23)

Thus we see that where the heart is simple and the eye towards the Lord, He knows how to make it a testimony for Himself. We are apt to mistake by making testimony our object; nor does it really succeed except in the eyes of those who are not competent judges. The real strength and spring and value of testimony is in the self-forgetfulness that is occupied with Christ; and this is beautifully exemplified in the conduct of Ruth. There was nothing more evident in all her conduct than that she gave herself up to the path of simple duty. Nevertheless that duty had an immense dignity stamped on it, because, whilst it was bound up with love to Naomi it was not in her mind separated from the glory of the true God; and when those two qualities unite, how blessed the result! In its own sphere of relations affection is admirable; but when it springs from, and is guided by God Himself, what a reality it is in such a world as this! And this won the heart of Boaz, who had already heard her good report. Little thought she that a poor and stranger damsel could have had her history brought fully before what man would call the lord of the soil, Boaz a man, it clearly appears, of admirable character, of good position, and of unsullied honour in the land of Israel. It was strange to the Moabitess to hear that such an one so knew and estimated all. How it must have filled her heart with thankfulness to God who had even thus, had it been all, looked upon Naomi and herself! He who had decided her heart was giving her to feel already that it was no vain thing to trust under the wings of the God of Israel. Why should we ever care for ourselves? Had Ruth sought her own things, she had never found them so well, nor even so fast. How deeply err those who make character their idol, lowering it just as they are self-occupied! Still farther off are they who seek things beneath, like the Gentiles who know not God. It was God before her eyes that gave Ruth such moral weight and grace.

The lowly woman had been seeking to do what she owed her mother-in-law before the Lord, and she was right. But was not He thinking of her, and taking care that others too should know what His grace had wrought for and in that Moabitess? Accordingly, "Boaz said to her, At mealtime come thou hither." But we need not dwell on the details of this beautiful book. It is enough for my purpose to point out what is not so obvious.

Suffice it here to say that her return and its supplies astonish her mother-in-law. "Where hast thou gleaned today? and where wroughtest thou?" The blessing of Jehovah it maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it. Naomi looks for more for all. "Blessed be he that did take knowledge of thee. And she showed her mother in law with whom she had wrought, and said, The man's name with whom I wrought to day is Boaz. And Naomi said unto her daughter in law, Blessed be he of Jehovah who hath not left off his kindness to the living and to the dead. And Naomi said unto her, The man is near of kin unto us, one of our next kinsmen. And Ruth the Moabitess said, He said unto me also, Thou shalt keep fast by my young men, until they have ended all my harvest. And Naomi said unto Ruth her daughter in law, It is good, my daughter, that thou go out with his maidens, that they meet thee not in any other field." Nothing can be more genuinely charming than the artlessness of Ruth's character; nothing more in keeping with the mother-in-law than the looking out for her daughter, and such a daughter. At the same time faith gives a sense of propriety which, in my opinion, we none of us can afford to neglect. By this I do not mean the human prudence which seeks its own objects and in its own way. Not so; but that strong sense of what is comely in the sight of God and man, which assuredly shines here in both mother and daughter. "So she kept fast by the maidens of Boaz to glean unto the end of barley harvest and of wheat harvest; and dwelt with her mother-in-law."

Now gradually comes to view a purpose which faith seizes deeper than the apron full of corn from day to day. "Then Naomi her mother-in-law said unto her, My daughter, shall I not seek rest for thee, that it may be well with thee? And now is not Boaz of our kindred, with whose maidens thou wast? Behold, he winnoweth barley to night in the threshing floor." (Ruth 3:1-2) Thus she gives directions, and Ruth acts on them. We need not pursue the minute history of all. No doubt it is familiar to almost every hearer in this room. Suffice it to say that God was with the course suggested by Naomi. It might have seemed bold to some, it was really a believing one with love to Ruth also; but when God is with us, if there be on the one hand the attractive grace of a chaste conversation, coupled with fear, there is also on the other the boldness of faith, which is just as remarkably blessed of God. Ruth 2:1-23 shows us the one as the third chapter does the other. It was possible that the course that Naomi directed her daughter-in-law to take might have turned away completely the heart of the great man from the Moabitess; but God ordered otherwise according to faith, and therefore difficulties disappeared one after another. God would have us confide in Him, dear brethren; for He is not more mighty than simple in His ways. It is we who are not, and how much blessing do we not lose from the lack of it? Let none doubt that the place of finding His blessing is in what some despise ignorantly, the path of duty. This is always right, though grace gives us occasions in that path which leave room for higher things, suffering not only for righteousness' but for Christ's sake. In such cases faith does not fail to see that which suits His name, and is not a mere question of duty. In short righteousness is in itself good, but grace is better; only it is not grace where righteousness is either sacrificed or not respected. Grace therefore will not fail to honour righteousness whilst rising above it. Thus, in Ruth 2:1-23, Ruth is in the path of what we may call righteousness; certainly of relative comeliness and propriety, which was not forgotten of God. In Ruth 3:1-18 we find her taking a bolder flight by faith, wherein God led and honoured it too.

Nor again was this faith unappreciated by Boaz, however desirous he may be that the Moabitess should not by the boldness of her faith jeopardize the smallest atom of that which had drawn out to her the confidence of all who loved Jehovah's name. Hence, in jealousy lest the breath of suspicion should blight or wound such a one, he gives her directions quite as carefully as the mother, if not more so, and hides not from her the difficulty which the law placed in the way. "Tarry this night, and it shall be in the morning, that if he will perform unto thee the part of a kinsman, well; let him do the kinsman's part: but if he will not do the part of a kinsman to thee, then will I do the part of a kinsman to thee, as Jehovah liveth." Thus the woman rests with implicit confidence in the Lord who had wrought in His servant Boaz. When she rejoins her mother, there was more to praise Him for than the measure of barley. There was a tale to tell, delightful to her mother-in-law's heart. "Then said she, Sit still, my daughter, until thou know how the matter will fall: for the man will not be in rest, until he have finished the thing this day." (Ver. 18)

"Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there: and, behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake came by; unto whom he said, Ho, such a one! turn aside sit down here. And he turned aside, and sat down." There is not a finer picture in the Bible of the ordinary rural habits of an Israelite in the olden time; and here again we are let into the ways of their civil life in that day. The Book of Ruth may be little, but it furnishes us with a great deal. "And he took ten men of the elders of the city, and said, Sit ye down here. And they sat down. And he said unto the kinsman, Naomi that is come again out of the country of Moab, selleth a parcel of land, which was our brother Elimelech's: and I thought to advertise thee, saying, Buy it before the inhabitants, and before the elders of my people. If thou wilt redeem it, redeem it: but if thou wilt not redeem it, then tell me, that I may know: for there is none to redeem it beside thee; and I am after thee." (Ruth 4:1-4) The kinsman was ready enough for property and its purchase. "And he said, I will redeem it." Boaz next tells him the condition that goes along with the redemption of the piece of land. "Then said Boaz, What day thou buyest the field of the hand of Naomi, thou must buy it also of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance." (Ver. 5) This was quite another matter, though God's mind in the law could not be doubted. The kinsman at once draws back with the words of excuse, "I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I mar my own inheritance: redeem thou my right to thyself; for I cannot redeem it." (Ver. 6)

"What the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." The law fails not because itself is bad, for it is good, but because man is bad the first man, be his advantages what they may; and this is precisely what is set forth by the kinsman. It is the impossibility for him of raising up the name of the dead; the impossibility to Israel of having their blessing according to the purpose of God in connection with the law and the first man. No doubt this was the nearer kinsman; for first is that which is natural, afterwards that which is spiritual. What was natural must first be tried; and this is the near kinsman who simply furnishes room for the display not only of the goodness of God, but of His power; and indeed this is involved in the very name of Boaz. There was strength in him.

No doubt therefore we have in Boaz the type of Christ, but I suppose not so much of Christ coming in order to atone for man, the first man, but after the settlement of every moral question before God was over of Christ when raised from the dead by the power of God and the glory of the Father, when the forlorn remnant is received back in grace and the inheritance made good in every way by the Kinsman-Redeemer. In short, Boaz represents Christ risen, as the vessel of power to come in and bear fruit for God where there had already been death, ruin, rejection, and completeness of desolation, as we have already seen in the history of him (Elimelech, God the King) who had a pleasant purpose in Naomi. He was dead, she changed to bitterness, as all had failed in both sons away from the land of Jehovah; till on the good news of divine mercy to Israel there is a return, and the widowed one is united to him who is strength (Boaz), and the royal line appears in due time. It is Christ risen who makes the mercies of David sure.

Thus then, as it appears to me, the whole case opens out as simply as possible; that is, we see here the Redeemer, but this by power rather than by blood, the Goel or Kinsman-Redeemer. Such Boaz was, and such Christ will be to Israel; but this is not the way in which we know Him; for, as the apostle says so forcibly, in2 Corinthians 5:1-21; 2 Corinthians 5:1-21, "Henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more." To us it is all an entirely new creation and circle of associations; not sin only, but old things passed away, and all things become new. Israel will not be called on to see the change so absolutely great as it will undoubtedly be. But He is and will be then known as their Kinsman in a way which does not so apply to us of the Gentiles, and less, if possible, as the church His body, another and far more intimate relationship. What we see in Ruth is most surely in connection with Israel.

In truth, God magnifies His grace towards us, inasmuch as we have no claim, nor link with Israel. We cannot in any way take the ground of kinsmanship with Jesus. Think not that we lose by this. No doubt in principle it is true that, because the children were partakers of flesh and blood, He likewise partook of the same; but then you will remember that this truth is laid down for the seed of Abraham in the Epistle to the Hebrews. With striking propriety it is addressed to the Hebrew Christians, though no doubt the general truth pertains to all others.

Let none suppose that it is meant that we have not all the blessing revealed in that epistle, for I believe we have thoroughly, and that it is very precious. Indeed I should not like to give the right hand of fellowship to any one so enamoured of his crotchets as to allow of doubts that we have a living portion in that scripture as in the rest. Such theorising is highly to be deprecated and dangerous, my brethren; and the more we value the mercy which has given back to us the truth in all its definiteness, as honouring the Lord and confiding in the word and Spirit of God during this dark and evil day, the more are we bound to discountenance all such trifling with the scriptures as would blunt their edge in dealing with those souls, no matter who or what the theorists may be; for they are men that allow their minds to run riot with the precious word of God.

Nevertheless, affirming this distinctly, I think that there is special propriety in the epistle to the Hebrews referring to this, and hence it will be observed that we hear of the children here: "Behold, I and the children which God has given me." There was a natural link between the Israelite and the Lord Jesus, though it all came to nothing in His cross. But then, grace having intervened, we find them taken up where we Gentiles can be met equally on the new ground of resurrection; and thus the force of this and other kindred scriptures is made manifest by the Spirit.

Does this then detract from us who were outside? Our real and proper relationship to Christ is founded on death and resurrection-life, not on flesh. Even those that had natural relationship are, after all, obliged to come into the same place. All that is connected with flesh has met its end; so that it would be an altogether inferior ground even for a believing Jew now to found his connection with Christ on anything short of that which is equally open to us as to them. In connection then with the term "Kinsman-Redeemer" I merely make this remark, that it has a beauty and a force in speaking about Israel in which, as far as I am aware, it is not applied in any part of the direct scriptures which speak of us Gentiles that are brought in now in the infinite grace of God.

The rest of the story is then brought before us. The man who failed had to bear a mark of his failure which was very significant. "Now this was the manner in former time in Israel concerning redeeming and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour: and this was a testimony in Israel. Therefore the kinsman said unto Boaz, Buy it for thee. So he drew off his shoe. And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's, and all that was Chilion's and Mahlon's, of the hand of Naomi. Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance." Thus two of the features of God's dealing with Israel rather than with us are brought before us here; for it is plain that the earthly people and the land go together. This has no application whatever to the church of God. You may, no doubt, use the figure; and I am not in the least saying that you should not employ the moral truth both individually and corporately if you will; only it requires a delicacy of touch which I think is apt most of all to fail where the practice is most common. I grant you that there are those that could handle the type of Ruth the Moabitess, and gather, so far as it goes, all the spiritual blessedness in the truths of the book which would apply to a Christian man or to the church of God; but employed, as it usually is, with a rough and vague indiscriminateness as being a distinct type of the one or the other, I am persuaded that it is an error, and must have mischievous consequences, as indeed is notorious. For the distinctive character of the Christian and the church is lost thereby, or rather was never known to those who thus teach.

Here then the land and the widow went together; and Boaz in the most solemn manner takes both, as the Lord will another day. "And all the people that were in the gate, and the elders, said, We are witnesses. Jehovah make the woman that is come into thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which two did build the house of Israel."

In the latter part of the chapter we are told that "Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife." A son was born; "and the women said unto Naomi, Blessed be Jehovah, which hath not left thee this day without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel." But how sweet that things should have come down to the last pass perhaps found in any house in Israel! If there was a woman whose condition seemed not only calamitous but hopeless, it was Naomi, as she confessed herself. Her appeal to Orpah and Ruth was founded upon the impossibility (humanly speaking) that deliverance should come, or the name of the dead be raised upon the inheritance. But impossibility is a word never to be named with God, save indeed that He should lie or act below Himself. It is a good thing that we should feel our utter weakness; it is intolerable that we should ever limit Him. No doubt it is just, and may be turned to profit by grace, that we have been brought utterly low; and so it was with Naomi. But now what joy filled the heart of the aged mother-in-law, once so forlorn, when she took the child of Ruth, Moabitess though she had been (for all this was now merged in her husband Boaz), and the women said for her, "He shall be a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thine old age: for thy daughter-in-law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, hath born him. And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse unto it. And the women her neighbours gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed; he is the father of Jesse, the father of David." (Vers. 15-17)

And will it not be so, beloved brethren in that bright day when the Lord Jesus will come, and when He will take the long widowed Israel, and when every trace of shame and want, as well as of death and sorrow, will have passed away for ever? Then the mighty course of God's grace will flow, not only in old channels to the overflowing of their banks in goodness, but when the knowledge of the glory of Jehovah will fill all the earth as the waters the sea. And this is what we know will be the fruit of Christ's assumption of the inheritance, the true Heir of all things.

For as the women felt and said, so will it be yet in the goodness of God. The welcome Seed of promise, the Messiah, will be "a son born to Naomi," to Israel, but on a new ground of grace, as set forth by her who had no title to promise. "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The Father of the age to come, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of Jehovah of hosts will perform this." (Isaiah 9:6-7)

Let us then rejoice that He has given us such a prospect, even as regards the earth and not merely Israel and their land. When we look at the world now, and at the madness and infatuation of men; when we hear how they glory in what is really their shame; when we see insubjection to God put forth in the proudest and most frantic forms, we may in some little degree realize what a deliverance it will be when Jesus will take the reins. We know well now that the best men are those that most of all feel their powerlessness, and theirs is the truest judgment of that which is found upon the earth where it is followed with sadness and sorrow and sighs and groans. These are not fruitless, as some men count them, nor is it in anywise according to the will of the Lord, that we should shirk this confession of our weakness, or our sense of total ruin here below. I am persuaded that when all the efforts of those who value themselves on their energy have come to nothing, and the attempts to stem the tide of evil will have only increased it, even by the most well-meant endeavours, then the prayers, the tears, the groans that have gone up to the Lord of glory will be answered, and the Lord Himself will prove that He alone can fill the void of this earth, as He only fills the heavens to the praise and glory of God the Father.

May the Lord then; soon to be the exalted and confessed of all on earth, give us to delight in all that He has revealed to us in His precious word, having a heart for each and every part of it for His name's sake. So blessed are we as members of His body, as of His flesh and of His bones, that it becomes us to share the outgoings of His love to Israel ungrudgingly. And if we are to be with Him on high, it is meet that He should have a special object of His affection on earth; and who is this to be but the people who had been called out from the nations, but alas! slipped back again like a deceitful bow; who in that day will return penitently and in faith, and find plenteous mercy and redemption. Thus will the grief and shame, bitter though it was, be forgotten in the joy and glory of her who will then lay aside for ever her Gentile proclivities and belongings only to be a true and enduring channel of divine blessing to all the families of the earth as long as it endures.