This second part, I explore the threshing floor scene paying particular attention to Ruth’s approval and consent to Naomi’s plan to approach Boaz at the threshing floor. Then, examine Boaz’s ḥesed to Ruth, the one in privileged position; and to Ruth’s ḥesed to Boaz. Naomi hatched up a plan to “seek security” for Ruth (3:1), meaning she seeks a husband for her (1:9). When she gave instruction to Ruth to “wash”, “perfume”, put on her “best clothes” to go to the threshing floor to approach Boaz after he has “finished eating and drinking” and lie down. She is to “uncover his feet” and lie down and wait until Boaz tells Ruth to do (3:3-5). Rabbis have pondered: “How could Naomi propose the secretive, nighttime encounter between Boaz and Ruth …show more content…
She innovated at the scene because Boaz did something unexpected—he asks her, “Who are you?” This question granted her permission to speak voice her identity and intentions. Unexpected, because Naomi’s instructions are loaded with double entendrees, rendering the threshing floor scene “sexually charged.” A typical man would assume that the woman coming in the middle of the night would be a loose woman or prostitute, and simply assume she came for sex and perhaps simply proceed in having sex with that woman. If a man’s sole inclination is sex, he would simply make love to that woman and not even know the woman’s identity until daylight (perhaps like Jacob when he made love to Leah he did not even know it was not Rachel until he woke up the following morning (Gen. 29:23-25). However, Boaz is not a typical man, he is a man of honor. Though in a tempting situation, he would not simply have sex with any woman who comes to him. Ruth Rabbah and Rashi interprets Boaz as frightened and identifies Ruth as demon spirit. I suggest, Boaz was true to his noble character. He did not prejudged Ruth in assuming that she came for sex, but rather gave her an opportunity to voice her identity and …show more content…
As supported by Boaz’ response. He praises Ruth and expresses her request as even a greater ḥesed than her commitment to Naomi: “May you be blessed of the LORD, my daughter. You have shown your last kindness to be better than the first by not going after young men, whether poor or rich (3:10). The Targum is more explicit to signify Ruth’s piety and chastity: May you be blessed from before the Lord, my daughter. You have made your latter deed better than the former one, the former one being that you became a proselyte and the latter that you have made yourself a woman who waits for a minor brother in law until the time that he is grown up, in that you have not gone after young men to commit fornication with them, whether poor or rich (Tg Ruth 310). Targum is explicit that Ruth’s vow to Naomi is a commitment to God and now Ruth’s request to Boaz to redeem her signifies that Ruth has truly become an Israelite. Ruth’s resilience rooted in her declaration of commitment to Naomi, God, and his people (1:16-17) proves true even until the end when the community blesses her marriage to Boaz. Through her resilience she not only move herself and Naomi from emptiness to fullness, but the whole nation as well—as attested by the genealogy