Ruth 1:12

Go back home, my daughters! For I am too old to get married again. ¹  Even if I thought that there was hope that I could get married tonight and conceive sons, ² 

Ge 17:17; 1Ti 5:9

¹ sn Too old to get married again. Naomi may be exaggerating for the sake of emphasis. Her point is clear, though: It is too late to roll back the clock.

² tn Verse 12b contains the protasis (“if” clause) of a conditional sentence, which is completed by the rhetorical questions in v. 13. For a detailed syntactical analysis, see F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther (WBC), 78-79.