Three Funerals and a Wedding

Ruth and Naomi reach Bethlehem, where the villagers are astonished by the change in the woman who left ten years earlier. Naomi says her joyful name no longer fits and demands to be called Mara, meaning bitter. She believes God has brought her home empty, though she acknowledges that Ruth is now her only joy.

Oren visits with an offer to let the women glean in his fields during the barley harvest. He reminds Naomi that her land would already be productive if Elimelech had accepted his control. Naomi sees that he still wants the family inheritance and refuses charity carrying such a price. Without workers, seed, or income, she and Ruth must find another way to survive.

Ruth invokes the law that allows poor people, widows, and foreigners to gather grain dropped by harvesters. By apparent chance, she enters the fields of Boaz. Some Israelite widows resent the Moabite stranger and try to deny her water and grain, but Boaz reminds them that God’s law protects someone who is all three: poor, widowed, and foreign.

Boaz has heard how Ruth left her homeland and family out of love for Naomi and placed herself beneath the care of Israel’s God. He orders his workers not to trouble her, invites her to eat with them, and secretly instructs the reapers to drop extra barley where she can collect it. Ruth works all day and returns with a full bushel and leftover food.

Naomi recognizes Boaz’s name and praises God. He is Elimelech’s close relative and one of the men entitled to redeem the family property and protect its line. Ruth remains in his fields through the barley and wheat harvests. As she brings home food and reports his continued kindness, Naomi’s bitterness gradually gives way to hope.

Naomi sees that Ruth and Boaz love each other, although neither has spoken. Since no male relative is available to arrange a proposal, she tells Ruth to approach Boaz at the threshing floor after he sleeps and lie at his feet. By asking him to spread his robe over her, Ruth will request the protection of marriage under the family law.

Boaz wakes at midnight and is overjoyed to find Ruth. He had assumed she would prefer a younger man, while she assures him that her heart belongs to him. Boaz loves her too and eagerly imagines their wedding - until he remembers that Oren is a closer relative and possesses the first legal right to redeem both Ruth and the property.

The next morning Boaz gathers Oren and ten elders at the city gate. He reveals Elimelech’s sandal as proof that the land has remained under his protection, then announces that Naomi wishes to sell. Oren immediately claims his right to buy it. Only after Oren commits does Boaz explain that acquiring the property also requires marrying Ruth and preserving Mahlon’s family line.

Oren fears that Ruth’s future children would gain a claim upon his inheritance. He renounces his right and tells Boaz to take both woman and land. Another exchanged sandal seals the decision. Before the witnesses, Boaz purchases Elimelech’s property from Naomi and accepts Ruth as his wife, ensuring that her first husband’s family name will continue.

Boaz and Ruth marry with the blessing of Bethlehem. God gives them a son named Obed, and Naomi joyfully becomes his nurse. The child grows to father Jesse, who fathers David, the shepherd who becomes Israel’s king. Ruth, once a widowed foreigner gathering fallen barley, enters the family line that will lead to Jesus.