Ruth 1.6-13.
1.6 Hearing, in Mo’av, that Yahweh had taken charge of His people and given them food, she took her daughters-in-law and returned from Mo’av, 7 left where she was staying with her daughters-in-law, and they walked on the road to return to the land of Judah.
8 Naómi told her daughters-in-law, “Go. Return, each of you, to your mother’s house. May Yahweh be gracious to you like you’ve been with the dead men, and with me. 9 May Yahweh bless you so that you each go out, peacefully, to a new husband’s house.”
She kissed them, and they raised their voices and wept, 10 and told her, “We are returning to your people with you.”
11 Naómi said, “Return, my daughters. Why are you walking with me? Are there sons in my belly? Will they be your husbands? 12 Return, my daughters. Walk. For I’m too old to marry. Say there’s hope, and I meet a man tonight, and bear sons. 13 You’ll lay up hope for when they grow up? You’ll abstain from being with a man till then? No, my daughters. My life is far more bitter than yours. Yahweh’s hand has left me.”
Word finally reached Mo’av that the recession in Judah (v1) had ended and God “had taken charge of His people.” (v6) The KJV has “visited,” a word which, 400 years ago, didn’t imply that this was only a brief appearance; it meant—as
So Naomi, with nothing left in Mo’av but her daughters-in-law, decided to head home to Judah. Her daughters-in-law went with her… but somewhere along the route, Naomi changed her mind and decided they shouldn’t.
We have no clue as to why she did this. We can speculate, and of course many commentators have. The optimists say that Naomi was giving her daughters-in-law the best chance for a happy life: They’d get to stay with their people, and marry Mo’avi men, and not have to risk poverty and prejudice in Judah. The pessimists say that Naomi never really wanted her kids to marry pagan foreigners in the first place, or she was concerned that there might not be enough food to go around and the young women would cramp her style—in other words, there’d be poverty and prejudice within their own home. Me, I figure since Ruth eventually talked her out of it, she wasn’t prejudiced, but she definitely had her doubts about God’s provision.
Even though she was invoking God’s blessings on her daughters-in-law, she really didn’t recognize any of those blessings in her own life. According to her, “Yahweh’s hand has left me.” (v13) She didn’t recognize that her daughters-in-law were some of His blessing upon her. It’s jumping ahead of the story to point out that Ruth was more valuable to Naomi than seven sons, (4.15) but while we recognize that, she was too bound by the prejudices of her day to recognize their value.
To her, they were dependents whom she’d need to care for. Her sarcastic little speech—how, if she got lucky and managed to give birth to more sons for her daughters-in-law, they’d likely not wait for them (vv11-13) —was not entirely hyperbole. In Naomi’s culture, if a man died before having children, the custom was that his widow would marry his brother and have “his” children in his place. (Dt 25.5-6) The fact that Naomi pitched this implausible scenario indicated that, to a degree, she still had that mentality: Their future was her responsibility. She had to take care of them. She didn’t envision them as taking care of her.
So, Naomi argued, since her own life was crap, they would do best to just go back to Mo’av and leave her, and may God bless them, ’cause He hadn’t done jack for her. Now, I don’t know how much of this was over-exaggeration on Naomi’s part, to convince them to leave by painting a much better image of Mo’av, but there was definitely something to Naomi’s bitterness, as we’ll soon see in vv20-21.
Still, here’s a good example of the attitude we ought not to have. God calls us to be optimistic. Naomi’s attitude understandably sucked, but the reason her turnaround seems so dramatic in this book is because things weren’t as bad as she made them sound here. They never are when God is involved.
Ru 1.6: וַתָּקָם הִיא וְכַלֹּתֶיהָ וַתָּשָׁב מִשְּׂדֵי מוֹאָב & she’d arisen, she, & brides of her, & she’d returned from fields of Mo’áv, כִּי שָׁמְעָה בִּשְׂדֵה מוֹאָב for she’d heard in fields of Mo’áv, כִּי־פָקַד יְהוָה אֶת־עַמּוֹ לָתֵת לָהֶם לָחֶם׃ for he’d overseen, Yahweh, to people of him, to give to them bread; 1.7: וַתֵּצֵא מִן־הַמָּקוֹם אֲשֶׁר הָיְתָה־שָׁמָּה & she’d gone out from the locations which she’d been there, וּשְׁתֵּי כַלֹּתֶיהָ עִמָּה & two brides of her with her, וַתֵּלַכְנָה בַדֶּרֶךְ לָשׁוּב אֶל־אֶרֶץ יְהוּדָה׃ & they’d walked on [the] road to return towards [the] land of Yehudá; 1.8: וַתֹּאמֶר נָעֳמִי לִשְׁתֵּי כַלֹּתֶיהָ לֵכְנָה שֹּׁבְנָה & she’d said, Na’omí, to [the] two brides of her, you all go! you all return! אִשָּׁה לְבֵית אִמָּהּ [each] woman to house of mother of her; יַעֲשֶׂה [יַעַשׂ] יְהוָה עִמָּכֶם חֶסֶד כַּאֲשֶׁר עֲשִׂיתֶם עִם־הַמֵּתִים וְעִמָּדִי׃ he’s making [making], Yahweh, with them, grace like which you all have made with the dead [ones], and with me; 1.9: יִתֵּן יְהוָה לָכֶם he’s giving, Yahweh, to you all; וּמְצֶאןָ מְנוּחָה אִשָּׁה בֵּית אִישָׁהּ & you all go out! peacefully, [each] woman [to] house of man of her, וַתִּשַּׁק לָהֶן וַתִּשֶּׂאנָה קוֹלָן וַתִּבְכֶּינָה׃ & she’d kissed to them, & they’d lifted voices of them, & they’d wept; 1.10: וַתֹּאמַרְנָה־לָּהּ כִּי־אִתָּךְ נָשׁוּב לְעַמֵּךְ׃ & they’d said to her that “with you we are returning to people of you”; 1.11: וַתֹּאמֶר נָעֳמִי שֹׁבְנָה בְנֹתַי & she’d said, Na’omí, you all return! daughters of me; לָמָּה תֵלַכְנָה עִמִּי to what you all are walking with me? הַעוֹד־לִי בָנִים בְּמֵעַי again to me sons in belly of me? וְהָיוּ לָכֶם לַאֲנָשִׁים׃ & they’d been to them men? 1.12: שֹׁבְנָה בְנֹתַי לֵכְן you all return! daughters of me; you all walk! כִּי זָקַנְתִּי מִהְיוֹת לְאִישׁ for I’ve been old from being to man, כִּי אָמַרְתִּי יֶשׁ־לִי תִקְוָה for I’ve said there is to me hope, גַּם הָיִיתִי הַלַּיְלָה לְאִישׁ also I’ve been night to [a] man, וְגַם יָלַדְתִּי בָנִים׃ & also I’ve borne sons; 1.13: הֲלָהֵן תְּשַׂבֵּרְנָה עַד אֲשֶׁר יִגְדָּלוּ so you all are hoping until when they’re growing up? הֲלָהֵן תֵּעָגֵנָה לְבִלְתִּי הֱיוֹת לְאִישׁ so you all are abstaining until [then] being to man? אַל בְּנֹתַי כִּי־מַר־לִי מְאֹד מִכֶּם no, daughters of me, for he is bitter to me greatly from you all, כִּי־יָצְאָה בִי יַד־יְהוָה׃ for it’d gone out from me, [the] hand of Yahweh.
