Ruth 4King James Version
Boaz goes up to the gate of the city and meets the nearer kinsman publicly. The other man will not marry Ruth because it would endanger his own inheritance. Boaz buys the field and marries Ruth. She bears a son named Obed. Naomi takes the child in her arms. The women of the town say a son has been born to Naomi. Obed becomes the father of Jesse, the father of David.
Boaz goes to the city gate the next morning and convenes a legal proceeding before ten elders. He offers the nearer kinsman the right to redeem Elimelech's land. The man agrees until Boaz adds the condition: he must also marry Ruth and continue Mahlon's name. The man declines, not wanting to complicate his own inheritance. Boaz redeems everything, marries Ruth, and the women of Bethlehem celebrate when Naomi holds the newborn son in her arms. That son is Obed, grandfather of David.
Redemption costs something. The nearer kinsman walks away because the price is too high. Boaz pays it gladly, and the child born from that choice ends up in the line of both David and Jesus.
"Blessed be the LORD, which hath not left thee this day without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel." (4:14) The women of Bethlehem who mourned with Naomi at her return in chapter 1 are now the ones singing over her, completing a circle from bitter to blessed.
The city gate in Bethlehem was the public square where legal transactions, commerce, and civic life happened. Ten elders as witnesses made a proceeding binding. The sandal exchange was a recognized legal gesture, a public signal that one party was transferring a right to another. The whole scene is small-town, formal, and deeply human: a man conducting careful business that will quietly change the course of a dynasty.
Boaz acts with speed and integrity, covering every legal formality publicly. The unnamed nearer kinsman is not villainized; he simply weighs the cost and steps back. Ruth is strikingly quiet in chapter 4, her story now carried forward by the child she has borne. Naomi receives Obed and nurses him, her emptiness visibly filled. Obed becomes Jesse's father, Jesse becomes David's father.
The genealogy at the end of Ruth is not a postscript. It is the point. A Moabite woman's loyalty to a destitute Israelite widow produces the lineage of Israel's greatest king and, by extension, of Jesus of Nazareth. The book answers a question the entire Hebrew Bible keeps raising: who belongs to this story? The answer Ruth gives is capacious and surprising. Faithfulness, not bloodline, is what the story tracks.
The closing image is Naomi holding the child the women call a son born to her. She started chapter 1 demanding to be renamed Bitter. She ends cradling new life. The book does not resolve grief with explanation. It resolves it with presence, with a child, with neighbors who bear witness.
1Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there: and, behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake came by; unto whom he said, Ho, such a one! turn aside, sit down here. And he turned aside, and sat down.
2And he took ten men of the elders of the city, and said, Sit ye down here. And they sat down.
3And he said unto the kinsman, Naomi, that is come again out of the country of Moab, selleth a parcel of land, which was our brother Elimelech's:
4And I thought to advertise thee, saying, Buy it before the inhabitants, and before the elders of my people. If thou wilt redeem it, redeem it: but if thou wilt not redeem it, then tell me, that I may know: for there is none to redeem it beside thee; and I am after thee. And he said, I will redeem it.
5Then said Boaz, What day thou buyest the field of the hand of Naomi, thou must buy it also of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance.
6And the kinsman said, I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I mar mine own inheritance: redeem thou my right to thyself; for I cannot redeem it.
7Now this was the manner in former time in Israel concerning redeeming and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour: and this was a testimony in Israel.
8Therefore the kinsman said unto Boaz, Buy it for thee. So he drew off his shoe.
9And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's, and all that was Chilion's and Mahlon's, of the hand of Naomi.
10Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance, that the name of the dead be not cut off from among his brethren, and from the gate of his place: ye are witnesses this day.
11And all the people that were in the gate, and the elders, said, We are witnesses. The LORD make the woman that is come into thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which two did build the house of Israel: and do thou worthily in Ephratah, and be famous in Bethlehem:
12And let thy house be like the house of Pharez, whom Tamar bare unto Judah, of the seed which the LORD shall give thee of this young woman.
13So Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife: and when he went in unto her, the LORD gave her conception, and she bare a son.
14And the women said unto Naomi, Blessed be the LORD, which hath not left thee this day without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel.
15And he shall be unto thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thine old age: for thy daughter in law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, hath born him.
16And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse unto it.
17And the women her neighbours gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed: he is the father of Jesse, the father of David.
18Now these are the generations of Pharez: Pharez begat Hezron,
19And Hezron begat Ram, and Ram begat Amminadab,
20And Amminadab begat Nahshon, and Nahshon begat Salmon,
21And Salmon begat Boaz, and Boaz begat Obed,
22And Obed begat Jesse, and Jesse begat David.