Ruth 2:8

So Boaz said to Ruth, “Listen carefully, ¹  my dear! ²  Do not leave to gather grain in another field. You need not ³  go beyond the limits of this field. You may go along beside ⁴  my female workers. ⁵ 

So Boaz said to Ruth, "My daughter, listen to me. Don’t go and glean in another field and don’t go away from here. Stay here with my servant girls.

Then Boaz said to Ruth, "Listen carefully, my daughter. Do not go to glean in another field; furthermore, do not go on from this one, but stay here with my maids.

Boaz went over and said to Ruth, "Listen, my daughter. Stay right here with us when you gather grain; don’t go to any other fields. Stay right behind the women working in my field.

Then Boaz spoke to Ruth: "Listen, my daughter. From now on don't go to any other field to glean--stay right here in this one. And stay close to my young women.

Then said Boaz to Ruth, Give ear to me, my daughter: do not go to take up the grain in another field, or go away from here, but keep here by my young women:

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.

Then Boaz said to Ruth, "You will listen, my daughter, will you not? Do not go to glean in another field, nor go from here, but stay close by my young women.

So Boaz said to Ruth, “Listen carefully, ¹  my dear! ²  Do not leave to gather grain in another field. You need not ³  go beyond the limits of this field. You may go along beside ⁴  my female workers. ⁵ 

¹ tn Heb “Have you not heard?” The idiomatic, negated rhetorical question is equivalent to an affirmation (see F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther [WBC], 119, and GKC 474 §150.e).

² tn Heb “my daughter.” This form of address is a mild form of endearment, perhaps merely rhetorical. It might suggest that Boaz is older than Ruth, but not necessarily significantly so. A few English versions omit it entirely (e.g., TEV, CEV).

³ tn The switch from the negative particle אַל (’al, see the preceding statement, “do not leave”) to לֹא (lo’) may make this statement more emphatic. It may indicate that the statement is a policy applicable for the rest of the harvest (see v. 21).

⁴ tn Heb “and thus you may stay close with.” The imperfect has a permissive nuance here.

⁵ sn The female workers would come along behind those who cut the grain and bundle it up. Staying close to the female workers allowed Ruth to collect more grain than would normally be the case (see O. Borowski, Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 61, and F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther [WBC], 121).