Ruth 1:21

1:21 I left here full, ¹  but the Lord has caused me to return empty-handed. ²  Why do you call me ‘Naomi,’ seeing that ³  the Lord has opposed me, ⁴  and the Sovereign One ⁵  has caused me to suffer?” ⁶ 

Ruth 2:23

2:23 So Ruth ⁷  worked beside ⁸  Boaz’s female servants, gathering grain until the end of the barley harvest as well as the wheat harvest. ⁹  After that she stayed home with her mother-in-law. ¹⁰ 

Ruth 3:17

3:17 She said, “He gave me these sixty pounds of barley, for he said to me, ¹¹  ‘Do not go to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’” ¹² 

Ruth 4:7

4:7 (Now this used to be the customary way to finalize a transaction involving redemption in Israel: ¹³  A man would remove his sandal and give it to the other party. ¹⁴  This was a legally binding act ¹⁵  in Israel.)

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¹ sn I left here full. That is, with a husband and two sons.

² tn Heb “but empty the Lord has brought me back.” The disjunctive clause structure (vav + adverb + verb + subject) highlights the contrast between her former condition and present situation. Cf. TEV “has brought me back without a thing.”

sn Empty-handed. This statement is highly ironic, for ever-loyal Ruth stands by her side even as she speaks these words. These words reflect Naomi’s perspective, not the narrator’s, for Ruth will eventually prove to be the one who reverses Naomi’s plight and “fills” her “emptiness.” Naomi’s perspective will prove to be inaccurate and the women will later correct Naomi’s faulty view of Ruth’s value (see 4:15).

³ tn The disjunctive clause structure (vav [ו] + subject + verb) here introduces either an attendant circumstance (“when the Lord has opposed me”) or an explanation (“seeing that the Lord has opposed me”).

⁴ tc The LXX reads “humbled me” here, apparently understanding the verb as a Piel (עָנָה, ’anah) from a homonymic root meaning “afflict.” However, עָנָה (“afflict”) never introduces its object with בְּ (bet); when the preposition בְּ is used with this verb, it is always adverbial (“in, with, through”). To defend the LXX reading one would have to eliminate the preposition.

tn Heb “has testified against me” (KJV, ASV both similar); NAB “has pronounced against me.” The idiom עָנַה בִי (’anah viy, “testify against”) is well attested elsewhere in legal settings (see BDB 773 s.v. עָנָה Qal.3.a; HALOT 852 s.v. I ענה qal.2). Naomi uses a legal metaphor and depicts the Lord as testifying against her in court.

⁵ sn The divine name translated Sovereign One is שַׁדַּי (shadday, “Shaddai”). See further the note on this term in Ruth 1:20.

⁶ tn Or “brought disaster upon me”; NIV “brought misfortune (calamity NRSV) upon me”; NLT “has sent such tragedy.”

⁷ tn Heb “she”; the referent (Ruth) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁸ tn Heb “and she stayed close with”; NIV, NRSV, CEV “stayed close to”; NCV “continued working closely with.”

⁹ sn Barley was harvested from late March through late April, wheat from late April to late May (O. Borowski, Agriculture in Ancient Israel, 88, 91).

¹⁰ tn Heb “and she lived with her mother-in-law” (so NASB). Some interpret this to mean that she lived with her mother-in-law while working in the harvest. In other words, she worked by day and then came home to Naomi each evening. Others understand this to mean that following the harvest she stayed at home each day with Naomi and no longer went out looking for work (see F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther [WBC], 140). Others even propose that she lived away from home during this period, but this seems unlikely. A few Hebrew mss (so also Latin Vulgate) support this view by reading, “and she returned to her mother-in-law.”

¹¹ tc The MT (Kethib) lacks the preposition אֵלַי (’elay, “to me”) which is attested in the marginal reading (Qere).

¹² sn ‘Do not go to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’ In addition to being a further gesture of kindness on Boaz’s part, the gift of barley served as a token of his intention to fulfill his responsibility as family guardian. See R. L. Hubbard, Jr., Ruth (NICOT), 225-26, and F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther (WBC), 187.

¹³ tn Heb “and this formerly in Israel concerning redemption and concerning a transfer to ratify every matter.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “a man removed his sandal and gave [it] to his companion”; NASB “gave it to another”; NIV, NRSV, CEV “to the other.”

¹⁵ tn Heb “the legal witness”; KJV “a testimony”; ASV, NASB “the manner (form NAB) of attestation.”