Thomas J Parlette
“Survivor: A Biblical Edition”
Ruth 1: 1-18
Ruth 3: 1-5, 4: 13-17
11/10/24
One of the longest-running TV reality shows is the Survivor series. Renewed last May for its 48th season, the series continues to underequipped and scantily clad adventurers to desert islands and other remote places, challenging them to live off the land for more than a month. The contestants compete to see who avoids getting “voted off the island” – in hopes of claiming bragging rights as the “sole survivor.” But it’s not just bragging rights they win. A $1 million prize helps make up for the starvation rations, bug bites and sunburn.
In 1997, when the first Survivor series premiered on Swedish TV under the name Expedition Robinson, few could imagine how successful the show, in all its various incarnations, would become. As tired as the concept may seem, audiences still love it nearly 30 years later. (1)
You could say that the Bible has a number of survivor stories. Job, Jonah and David could be thrown in the mix, but one of the most enduringly popular survivor story is this story we consider today – the story of Ruth and Naomi. How does it happen that these two ordinary women end up so lost and desperate?
Well, the short answer is – marriage happened to them, which in that day and age was not such a great deal for women. Not that they had any choice in the matter. Women back then were just one step up from property. They had no real rights to speak of. They were utterly and completely dependent on their husbands.
It could work out alright, more or less, if the husband was kind, loving and caring. Yet, in one circumstance, it didn’t matter how good or righteous the husband may have been. That circumstance was widowhood.
When a husband in that time died – especially if he died young – it was catastrophic for his wife. There was no pension, no Social Security, no economic “safety net” other than the kindness and pity of others.
When such a thing happened, the woman turned to the only place of refuge available – her in-laws. The closest in-laws, according to the law of Moses, were her own grown sons, if she had any. She would go stay with them, and they’d have to take her in. If the widow was still young and her husband had a brother still alive, that brother, more likely than not, would marry her himself. He would do this even if he already had a wife. Remember, this was a polygamous society, strange as that might sound to our modern ears. To marry the wife of one’s dead brother was pretty much a social obligation, laid out in the law of Moses. It even as a name – “levirate marriage,” as the biblical scholars call it.
In our story for today, an Israelite woman, Naomi, loses her husband, Elimelech. Naomi and Elimelech had moved, many years before, to a foreign land – Moab. The newly widowed Naomi is all right for now because she has two sons. Each of them have married local Moabite girls, and between them, the two sons take good care of their mother.
That is until the two of them die in rapid succession. Now, Naomi really has a problem. Her situation is bleak. It’s just her and her two daughters-in-law – who aren’t even Israelites. The daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah are young. Because they’re so young, they have the option of returning to their father’s families, where someone will surely look after them. If they’re lucky, they may even find new husbands. But Naomi, she is truly on her own.
Naomi tries to cut her two daughters-in-law loose, to send them away for their own good. After a tearful goodbye. Orpah goes – but Ruth stays. “Are you nuts?” asks Naomi – maybe not in so many words, but that’s what the Bible implies.
“Well, I guess so,” says Ruth, “because I’m staying with you.”
The Ruth utters perhaps the most famous words in the Book of Ruth, words we commonly hear in weddings:
“Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you!
Where you go, I will go;
Where you lodge, I will lodge;
Your people shall be my people,
And your God my God.
Where you die, I will die – there will I be buried.
May the Lord do thus and so to me,
And more as well, if even death parts me from you!”
The words of that solemn vow mark the beginning of Ruth and Naomi’s survivor story. Today’s second scripture passage marks the second episode.
The scene now shifts back to Israel, where Naomi and Ruth have journeyed. Remember, Israel is a foreign country to Ruth, one she has never seen before. As for Naomi, it has been years since she left home as young woman. She has no way of knowing if any of her late husband’s family or relatives are still alive.
Lucky for her, they are. “Can this be Naomi?” her relatives ask, in wonderment.
Naomi’s reply is bleak indeed. “Don’t call me Naomi,” she groans. “Call me Mara” – a word that means “bitter.”
“Call me bitter, for the Almighty has dealt bitterly with me.
I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty.”
Not only that, but the Lord has brought her back with a widowed daughter-in-law in tow, a young woman she loves dearly, but who – in harsh economic terms – is just another mouth to feed.
Now, there’s a man in Bethlehem named Boaz, a relative of Naomi’s late husband. So, the two women head for his farm, hoping he’ll be able to help them.
The story notes that it’s the time of the harvest, with lots of workers out in the fields, bringing in the crops. Ruth and Naomi follow behind the harvesters, picking up the grain that has been left behind. This is a time-honored custom known as “gleaning.” The law of Moses commanded Israelite farmers to leave a little grain behind in the fields, so poor people could have something to eat.
Boaz notices the young woman, Ruth, following behind his hired laborers. By now, he has heard her tale – the story of his kinsman’s widow Naomi, and the extraordinary loyalty of her daughter-in-law. Boaz places the two women under his protection. He assures them they will always have enough food to eat, as long as they are on his land.
And there, the story might have ended. It’s a pretty happy ending. Ruth and Naomi had run out of options and had found a kind-hearted soul in Boaz. It looked like they were going to be okay – they were survivors.
But Naomi had bigger things in mind for her daughter-in-law.
Now we move to the third episode of our story. It’s one that sounds strange to our modern ears. But to fully understand what’s going on, you must put aside everything you know about contemporary, modern marriage and family life.
An essential part of the harvest was threshing the grain. Farmers would take the newly harvested stalks of grain to a pavilion with a hard-packed dirt floor. There, they would beat the grain on the ground, separating the edible portions from the chaff, which blows away in the wind. During a busy harvest season, it was not uncommon for the workers to labor from sun up to sun down, rolling out their bedrolls right on the threshing floor.
This is the harvest, the season of fertility. It’s a time when men and women entertain thoughts of love. Late at night on the threshing floor, things happen that aren’t mentioned in polite company.
Boaz is asleep, wrapped up in his bedroll. Naomi taps Ruth on the shoulder – “Go to him. He’s a good man. He has already noticed you. He admires your beauty. Lift up the corner of his bedroll and crawl in beside him.”
Wow – that sounds a little promiscuous to our ears. Are you sure this a bible story preacher? Yet, there you have it, right in the Bible.
Now, remember, this is a polygamous society. There are wives, and there are also concubines – female slaves who have physical relationships with their master. From our standpoint, this is completely unacceptable – this is a horrible, oppressive system. But it was a different place, a different time, and a different set of social ethics. Recall that even Abraham and Jacob, patriarchs of Israel, fathered children by so-called “handmaidens” of their wives. In no way can we endorse such a practice in our day and time, but we can acknowledge it in biblical times as a historical fact.
Ruth and Naomi are in desperate straits. They have no means of financial support. There’s nothing ahead of them but slavery – and, among all the forms of slavery or near-slavery, to be the concubine of a good and kind man such as Boaz was about as good as a homeless Moabite refugee like Ruth could expect. Both she and Naomi are fully aware of this. Ruth has resigned herself to her fate and seems content. She welcomes the prospect of three square meals a day and a roof over her head.
Yet, on this night, nature does not take its course. Boaz is a man of principle. He thinks to highly of Ruth to have her as his concubine. Early the next morning, before anyone else is awake, he quietly sends her away. The he goes about the necessary steps to marry Ruth, legally.
This is far more than Ruth or Naomi could have ever expected. Remember how, upon arriving in Bethlehem, Naomi had moaned, “Call me Bitter, for the Lord has dealt bitterly with me?”
Now, hearing the glad news that Ruth is about to become Boaz’s wife – her dirge of despair has become a joyous hymn of praise.
It’s a happy tale, this survivor story of Ruth and Naomi – which is probably why so many people have come to love it. We all experience losses in life, and sometimes those losses seem catastrophic. Yet, there is always hope. A loving God is always working silently behind the scenes to bring triumph out of tragedy.
The real reason we remember this survivor story though, is found in the post script. Ruth and Boaz have a son, whose name is Obed. This child will grow up to father a son of his own, named Jesse – who will in turn, father a boy named David, who will one day become King over Israel. Remember what the gospels say about Jesus – he is of the house of David. This makes that strange, late-night encounter on the threshing floor between Boaz and Ruth, an essential link in the chain of events leading to the birth of another baby in Bethlehem – Jesus Christ, Savior of the World.
And for that – May God be praised. Amen.
1. Wikipedia, retrieved 10/28/24.
