Ruth 1King James Version
A famine drives a family from Bethlehem to Moab. The father dies. The two sons marry Moabite women and then also die, leaving their mother Naomi with two foreign daughters in law. Naomi decides to go home. She tells both women to stay behind. Orpah kisses her and turns back. Ruth clings to her: 'Whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.' One of the most beloved vows in the Bible.
During the time of the judges, famine drives the Israelite family of Elimelech from Bethlehem to Moab. He dies there. His two sons marry Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth, then also die. Naomi, left alone with her daughters-in-law, decides to return to Bethlehem. Orpah tearfully turns back. Ruth refuses, binding herself to Naomi with one of the most devoted pledges in all of Scripture.
Loyalty and love are chosen, not just inherited. Ruth crosses every boundary of nationality, religion, and self-interest to stay with a destitute widow.
"Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God." (1:16) This pledge is the moral center of the entire book, spoken not to a husband but to a grieving mother-in-law with nothing left to offer.
Set around 1100 BC in the era of the judges, a period of repeated national failure in Israel. Bethlehem in Judah is a small agricultural town. The famine is real and severe enough to push a family across the Jordan River into Moab, a neighboring nation with its own gods. The journey back to Bethlehem would be on foot, arriving just as the barley harvest was beginning in the spring.
Elimelech dies early but his name and land drive the plot. Naomi is gutted by loss, bitter toward God, honest about her pain. Ruth chooses her. Orpah loves Naomi but chooses the familiar road home. Mahlon and Chilion are mentioned but leave no children.
Ruth is a Moabite, a foreigner from a people historically hostile to Israel. Her inclusion in the covenant community, and eventually in the direct genealogical line to King David and to Jesus, shows that divine faithfulness cuts across ethnic and national lines. The story begins to dismantle any reading of the Law that would wall out the outsider who genuinely turns.
Chapter 1 sits in grief without rushing past it. Naomi asks to be called Mara, meaning bitter, because she left full and came back empty. That kind of naming your pain out loud is rare in Scripture and worth sitting with.
1Now it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehemjudah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons.
2And the name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife Naomi, and the name of his two sons Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehemjudah. And they came into the country of Moab, and continued there.
3And Elimelech Naomi's husband died; and she was left, and her two sons.
4And they took them wives of the women of Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth: and they dwelled there about ten years.
5And Mahlon and Chilion died also both of them; and the woman was left of her two sons and her husband.
6Then she arose with her daughters in law, that she might return from the country of Moab: for she had heard in the country of Moab how that the LORD had visited his people in giving them bread.
7Wherefore she went forth out of the place where she was, and her two daughters in law with her; and they went on the way to return unto the land of Judah.
8And Naomi said unto her two daughters in law, Go, return each to her mother's house: the LORD deal kindly with you, as ye have dealt with the dead, and with me.
9The LORD grant you that ye may find rest, each of you in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them; and they lifted up their voice, and wept.
10And they said unto her, Surely we will return with thee unto thy people.
11And Naomi said, Turn again, my daughters: why will ye go with me? are there yet any more sons in my womb, that they may be your husbands?
12Turn again, my daughters, go your way; for I am too old to have an husband. If I should say, I have hope, if I should have an husband also to night, and should also bear sons;
13Would ye tarry for them till they were grown? would ye stay for them from having husbands? nay, my daughters; for it grieveth me much for your sakes that the hand of the LORD is gone out against me.
14And they lifted up their voice, and wept again: and Orpah kissed her mother in law; but Ruth clave unto her.
15And she said, Behold, thy sister in law is gone back unto her people, and unto her gods: return thou after thy sister in law.
16And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God:
17Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the LORD do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me.
18When she saw that she was stedfastly minded to go with her, then she left speaking unto her.
19So they two went until they came to Bethlehem. And it came to pass, when they were come to Bethlehem, that all the city was moved about them, and they said, Is this Naomi?
20And she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara: for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me.
21I went out full, and the LORD hath brought me home again empty: why then call ye me Naomi, seeing the LORD hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted me?
22So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter in law, with her, which returned out of the country of Moab: and they came to Bethlehem in the beginning of barley harvest.