Adam Clarke

On Ruth 4:13-15

So Boaz took Ruth - The law of Moses had prohibited the Moabites, even to the tenth generation, from entering into the congregation of the Lord; but this law, the Jews think, did not extend to women; and even if it had, Ruth's might be considered an exempt case, as she had been already incorporated into the family by marriage; and left her own country, people, and gods, to become a proselyte to the true God in the land of Israel.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

On Ruth 4:12-16

let thy house be like the house of Pharez - that is, as honorable and numerous as his. He was the ancestor of the Beth-lehem people, and his family one of the five from which the tribe of Judah sprang.

John Gill

On Ruth 4:13

So Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife,.... Without any other rites or ceremonies than what are here expressed; for as yet the rites and ceremonies now in use with the Jews (o), in marriages had not obtained: and when he went in unto her; which is a modest expression of the conjugal duty performed him:

the Lord gave her conception; for this is of God, let the circumstance of the person, as to age, be as it may:

and she bare a son; at the year's end, as Josephus (p) relates,

(o) Vid. Buxtorf. Synagog. Jud. c. 39. Leo Modena's History of the Rites of the present Jews, part 4. c. 3.((p) Ut supra. (Antiqu. l. 5. c. 9. sect. 4.)

Keil & Delitzsch

On Ruth 4:13-17

This blessing began very speedily to be fulfilled. When Boaz had married Ruth, Jehovah gave her conception, and she bare a son.

Rut 4:14

At his birth the women said to Naomi, "Blessed be the Lord, who hath not let a redeemer be wanting to thee to-day." This redeemer was not Boaz, but the son just born. They called him a redeemer of Naomi, not because he would one day redeem the whole of Naomi's possessions (Carpzov, Rosenmller, etc.), but because as the son of Ruth he was also the son of Naomi (Rut 4:17), and as such would take away the reproach of childlessness from her, would comfort her, and tend her in her old age, and thereby become her true gol, i.e., her deliverer (Bertheau). "And let his name be named in Israel," i.e., let the boy acquire a celebrated name, one often mentioned in Israel.

Rut 4:15

"And may the boy come to thee a refresher of the soul, and a nourisher of thine old age; for thy daughter-in-law, who loveth thee (who hath left her family, her home, and her gods, out of love to thee), hath born him; she is better to thee than seven sons." Seven, as the number of the works of God, is used to denote a large number of sons of a mother whom God has richly blessed with children (vid., Sa1 2:5). A mother of so many sons was to be congratulated, inasmuch as she not only possessed in these sons a powerful support to her old age, but had the prospect of the permanent continuance of her family. Naomi, however, had a still more valuable treasure in her mother-in-law, inasmuch as through her the loss of her own sons had been supplied in her old age, and the prospect was now presented to her of becoming in her childless old age the tribe-mother of a numerous and flourishing family.

Rut 4:16

Naomi therefore adopted this grandson as her own child; she took the boy into her bosom, and became his nurse.

Rut 4:17

And the neighbours said, "A son is born to Naomi," and gave him the name of Obed. This name was given to the boy (the context suggests this) evidently with reference to what he was to become to his grandmother. Obed, therefore, does not mean "servant of Jehovah" (Targum), but "the serving one," as one who lived entirely for his grandmother, and would take care of her, and rejoice her heat (O. v. Gerlach, after Josephus, Ant. v. 9, 4). The last words of Rut 4:17, "he is the father of Jesse, the father of David," show the object which the author kept in view in writing down these events, or composing the book itself. This conjecture is raised into a certainty by the genealogy which follows, and with which the book closes.

Matthew Henry

On Ruth 4:13-22

Here is, I. Ruth a wife. Boaz took her, with the usual solemnities, to his house, and she became his wife (Rut 4:13), all the city, no doubt, congratulating the preferment of a virtuous woman, purely for her virtues. We have reason to think that Orpah, who returned from Naomi to her people and her gods, was never half so well preferred as Ruth was. He that forsakes all for Christ shall find more than all with him; it shall be recompensed a hundred-fold in this present time. Now Orpah wished she had gone with Naomi too; but she, like the other kinsman, stood in her own light. Boaz had prayed that this pious proselyte might receive a full reward of her courage and constancy from the God of Israel, under whose wings she had come to trust; and now he became an instrument of that kindness, which was an answer to his prayer, and helped to make his own words good. Now she had the command of those servants with whom she had associated and of those fields in which she had gleaned. Thus sometimes God raiseth up the poor out of the dust, to set them with princes, Psa 113:7, Psa 113:8.

II. Ruth a mother: The Lord gave her conception; for the fruit of the womb is his reward, Psa 127:3. It is one of the keys he hath in his hand; and he sometimes makes the barren woman that had been long so to be a joyful mother of children, Psa 113:9; Isa 54:1.

III. Ruth still a daughter-in-law, and the same that she always was, to Naomi, who was so far from being forgotten that she was a principal sharer in these new joys. The good women that were at the labour when this child was born congratulated Naomi upon it more than either Boaz or Ruth, because she was the match-maker, and it was the family of her husband that was hereby built up. See here, as before, what an air of devotion there was then even in the common expressions of civility among the Israelites. Prayer to God attended the birth of the child. What a pity it is that such pious language should either be disused among Christians or degenerate into a formality. "Blessed be the Lord that has sent thee this grandson," Rut 4:14, Rut 4:15. 1. Who was the preserver of the name of her family, and who, they hoped, would be famous, because his father was so. 2. Who would be hereafter dutiful and kind to her, so they hoped, because his mother was so. If he would but take after her, he would be a comfort to his aged grandmother, a restorer of her life, and, if there should be occasion, would have wherewithal to be the nourisher of her old age. It is a great comfort to those that are going into years to see any of those that descend from them growing up, that are likely, by the blessing of God, to be a stay and support to them, when the years come wherein they will need such, and of which they will say they have no pleasure in them. Observe, They say of Ruth that she loved Naomi, and therefore was better to her than seven sons. See how God in his providence sometimes makes up the want and loss of those relations from whom we expected most comfort in those from whom we expected least. The bonds of love prove stronger than those of nature, and there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother; so here there was a daughter-in-law better than an own child. See what wisdom and grace will do. Now here, (1.) The child is named by the neighbours, Rut 4:17. The good women would have it called Obed, a servant, either in remembrance of the meanness and poverty of the mother or in prospect of his being hereafter a servant, and very serviceable, to his grandmother. It is no dishonour to those that are ever so well born to be servants to God, their friends, and their generation. The motto of the princes of Wales is Ich dien - I serve. (2.) The child is nursed by the grandmother, that is, dry-nursed, when the mother had weaned him from the breast, Rut 4:16. She laid it in her bosom, in token of her tender affection to it and care of it. Grandmothers are often the most fond.

IV. Ruth is hereby brought in among the ancestors of David and Christ, which was the greatest honour. The genealogy is here drawn from Pharez, through Boaz and Obed, to David, and so leads towards the Messiah, and therefore it is not an endless genealogy.

Tyndale Study Notes

On Ruth 4:13

4:13 the Lord enabled: See study note on 1:6.

Tyndale Open Study Notes · CC BY-SA 4.0