Rut 1:12

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 

Rut 2:4

Boaz and Ruth Meet

2:4 Now at that very moment, ³  Boaz arrived from Bethlehem ⁴  and greeted ⁵  the harvesters, “May the Lord be with you!” They replied, ⁶  “May the Lord bless you!”

Rut 2:11

2:11 Boaz replied to her, ⁷  “I have been given a full report of ⁸  all that you have done for your mother-in-law following the death of your husband – how you left ⁹  your father and your mother, as well as your homeland, and came to live among people you did not know previously. ¹⁰ 

Rut 2:18

Ruth Returns to Naomi

2:18 She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw ¹¹  how much grain ¹²  she had gathered. Then Ruth ¹³  gave her the roasted grain she had saved from mealtime. ¹⁴ 

[1:12]  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.

[1:12]  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.

[2:4]  ³ tn Heb “and look”; NIV, NRSV “Just then.” The narrator invites the audience into the story, describing Boaz’s arrival as if it were witnessed by the audience.

[2:4]  ⁴ map For location see Map5 B1; Map7 E2; Map8 E2; Map10 B4.

[2:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “said to.” Context indicates that the following expression is a greeting, the first thing Boaz says to his workers.

[2:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “said to him.” For stylistic reasons “replied” is used in the present translation.

[2:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “answered and said to her” (so NASB). For stylistic reasons this has been translated as “replied to her.”

[2:11]  ⁸ tn Heb “it has been fully reported to me.” The infinitive absolute here emphasizes the following finite verb from the same root. Here it emphasizes either the clarity of the report or its completeness. See R. L. Hubbard, Jr., Ruth (NICOT), 153, n. 6. Most English versions tend toward the nuance of completeness (e.g., KJV “fully been shewed”; NAB “a complete account”; NASB, NRSV “All that you have done”).

[2:11]  ⁹ tn The vav (ו) consecutive construction here has a specifying function. This and the following clause elaborate on the preceding general statement and explain more specifically what she did for her mother-in-law.

[2:11]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “yesterday and the third day.” This Hebrew idiom means “previously, in the past” (Exod 5:7,8,14; Exod 21:29,36; Deut 4:42; 19:4,6; Josh 3:4; 1 Sam 21:5; 2 Sam 3:17; 1 Chr 11:2).

[2:18]  ¹¹ tc MT vocalizes ותרא as the Qal verb וַתֵּרֶא (vattere’, “and she saw”), consequently of “her mother-in-law” as subject and “what she gathered” as the direct object: “her mother-in-law saw what she gathered.” A few medieval Hebrew mss (also reflected in Syriac and Vulgate) have the Hiphil וַתַּרְא (vattar’, “and she showed”), consequently taking “her mother-in-law” as the direct object and “what she gathered” as the double direct-object: “she showed her mother-in-law what she had gathered” (cf. NAB, TEV, CEV, NLT). Although the latter has the advantage of making Ruth the subject of all the verbs in this verse, it would be syntactically difficult. For one would expect the accusative sign אֶת (’et) before “her mother-in-law” if it were the direct object of a Hiphil verb in a sentence with a double direct object introduced by the accusative sign אֶת, e.g., “to show (Hiphil of רָאָה, ra’ah) your servant (direct object marked by accusative sign אֶת) your greatness (double direct object marked by accusative sign אֶת) (Deut 3:24). Therefore the MT reading is preferred.

[2:18]  ¹² tn Heb “that which”; the referent (how much grain) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[2:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “she”; the referent (Ruth) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[2:18]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and she brought out and gave to her that which she had left over from her being satisfied.”