But Ruth said,
“Do not press me to leave you
or to turn back from following you!
Where you go, I will go;
where you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God.
Where you die, I will die—
there will I be buried.
May the LORD do thus and so to me,
and more as well,
if even death parts me from you!”
When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.
19 So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them; and the women said, “Is this Naomi?”
She said to them,
“Call me no longer Naomi,[1 (#ulink_2d8b20ba-9cad-526f-9aad-bd7ec622d978)]
call me Mara,[2 (#ulink_d7f8fe8b-7005-5735-99ae-4ef2718610de)]
for the Almighty[3 (#ulink_f28101b4-9a0f-5f3c-a13b-5b780135750b)] has dealt bitterly with me.
I went away full,
but the LORD has brought me back empty;
why call me Naomi
when the LORD has dealt harshly with[4 (#ulink_c98263bc-e8de-52ec-9fdf-c11b38d7d186)] me,
and the Almighty[3 (#ulink_f28101b4-9a0f-5f3c-a13b-5b780135750b)] has brought calamity upon me?”
22 So Naomi returned together with Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law, who came back with her from the country of Moab. They came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.
ALMS FOR THE POOR
Charity” now means simply what used to be called “alms”—that is, giving to the poor. Originally it had a much wider meaning. (You can see how it got the modern sense. If a man has “charity,” giving to the poor is one of the most obvious things he does, and so people came to talk as if that were the whole of charity. In the same way, “rhyme” is the most obvious thing about poetry, and so people come to mean by “poetry” simply rhyme and nothing more.) Charity means “Love, in the Christian sense.” But love, in the Christian sense, does not mean an emotion. It is a state not of the feelings but of the will; that state of the will which we have naturally about ourselves, and must learn to have about other people.
—from Mere Christianity
For reflection
Ruth 2:4–18
2 Now Naomi had a kinsman on her husband’s side, a prominent rich man, of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz.
And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain, behind someone in whose sight I may find favor.” She said to her, “Go, my daughter.”
So she went. She came and gleaned in the field behind the reapers. As it happened, she came to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech.
Just then Boaz came from Bethlehem. He said to the reapers, “The LORD be with you.” They answered, “The LORD bless you.”
Then Boaz said to his servant who was in charge of the reapers, “To whom does this young woman belong?”
The servant who was in charge of the reapers answered, “She is the Moabite who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab.
She said, ‘Please, let me glean and gather among the sheaves behind the reapers.’ So she came, and she has been on her feet from early this morning until now, without resting even for a moment.”[5 (#ulink_20096119-f453-518e-ae06-28bb1467b732)]
8 Then Boaz said to Ruth, “Now listen, my daughter, do not go to glean in another field or leave this one, but keep close to my young women.
Keep your eyes on the field that is being reaped, and follow behind them. I have ordered the young men not to bother you. If you get thirsty, go to the vessels and drink from what the young men have drawn.”
Then she fell prostrate, with her face to the ground, and said to him, “Why have I found favor in your sight, that you should take notice of me, when I am a foreigner?”
But Boaz answered her, “All that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband has been fully told me, and how you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before.
May the LORD reward you for your deeds, and may you have a full reward from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge!”
Then she said, “May I continue to find favor in your sight, my lord, for you have comforted me and spoken kindly to your servant, even though I am not one of your servants.”
14 At mealtime Boaz said to her, “Come here, and eat some of this bread, and dip your morsel in the sour wine.” So she sat beside the reapers, and he heaped up for her some parched grain. She ate until she was satisfied, and she had some left over.
When she got up to glean, Boaz instructed his young men, “Let her glean even among the standing sheaves, and do not reproach her.
You must also pull out some handfuls for her from the bundles, and leave them for her to glean, and do not rebuke her.”
17 So she gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley.
She picked it up and came into the town, and her mother-in-law saw how much she had gleaned. Then she took out and gave her what was left over after she herself had been satisfied.
Her mother-in-law said to her, “Where did you glean today? And where have you worked? Blessed be the man who took notice of you.” So she told her mother-in-law with whom she had worked, and said, “The name of the man with whom I worked today is Boaz.”
Then Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, “Blessed be he by the LORD, whose kindness has not forsaken the living or the dead!” Naomi also said to her, “The man is a relative of ours, one of our nearest kin.”[6 (#ulink_1d25d02a-bb6f-54fd-803b-19bdb0c5817d)]
Then Ruth the Moabite said, “He even said to me, ‘Stay close by my servants, until they have finished all my harvest.’”
