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name of Naomi for Mara ("bitter"), for that "Jehovah" had "testified against," and
"Shaddai"^328 afflicted her. Whether or not Naomi and her acquaintances really
understood the true meaning of this "testifying" on the part of Jehovah, certain it is, that
the temporary excitement of her arrival soon passed away, and the widow and her
Moabite companion were left to struggle on alone in their poverty. Apparently no other
near relatives of Elimelech were left, for Boaz himself is designated in the original as
"an acquaintance to her husband,"^329 though the term indicates also relationship. And
thus through the dreary winter matters only grew worse and worse, till at last early
spring brought the barley-harvest.
It was one of those arrangements of the law, which, by its exquisite kindness and
delicacy - in such striking contrast to the heathen customs of the time - shows its Divine
origin, that what was dropped, or left, or forgotten in the harvest, was not to be claimed
by the owner, but remained, as a matter of right, for the poor, the widows, and
emphatically also for the "stranger." As if to confute the later thoughts of Jewish
narrowness, "the stranger" alone is mentioned in all the three passages where this
command occurs (Leviticus 19:9, 10; 23:22; Deuteronomy 24:19-22).^330
Thus would the desolate share in Israel's blessings - and that as of Divine right rather
than of human charity, while those who could no longer work for others might, as it
were, work for themselves. Yet it must have been a bitter request, when Ruth, as if
entreating a favor, asked Naomi's leave to go and glean in the fields, in the hope that she
might "find favor" in the sight of master and reapers, so as not to be harshly spoken to,
or roughly dealt with. And this was all - all that Ruth had apparently experienced of the
"blessedness of following the Lord," for Whose sake she had left home and friends! But
there is a sublimeness in the words of Scripture which immediately follow - a
carelessness of effect, and yet a startling surprise characteristic of God's dealings. As
Ruth went on her bitter errand, not knowing whither, Scripture puts it: - "her hap
happened the portion of field belonging to Boaz" - the same Divine "hap" by which
sleep fled from Ahasuerus on that decisive night; the same "hap" by which so often,
what to the careless onlooker seems a chance "occurrence," is sent to us from God
directly.
The whole scene is most vividly sketched. Ruth has come to the field of Boaz; she has
addressed herself to "the servant that was set over the reapers," and obtained his leave to
"glean" after the reapers, and to "gather in the sheaves."^331 From early morn she has
followed them, and, as the overseer afterwards informs Boaz (2:7), "her sitting in the
house," whether for rest or talk, had been "but little."^332
And now the sun is high up in the heavens, when Boaz comes among his laborers. In
true Israelitish manner he salutes them: "Jehovah with you!" to which they respond,
"Jehovah bless thee!" He could not but have known "all the poor" (in the conventional
(^)