[233] THE ARGUMENT

This is an elaboration of the genealogy of the Patriarch Juda, from his son, Phares, to David, the ancestor of Christ. Its purpose is to show that Christ, who is the goal and purpose of all Scripture, was born from Juda, as Jacob had foretold and promised when blessing his son at Genesis 49:10. In this genealogy, mention is made of Ruth, a pagan Moabite who became a woman of faith and a convert. For through a wonderful accident, or rather, in the providence of God, she entered in the same way as Rahab, the Canaanite woman. "This was to show," as St. Jerome said, "that he, who had come to wipe away the sins of all, did not disdain to be born of sinners, and to foreshadow in Ruth, the pagan ancestor of Christ, the vocation and election of the gentiles, which Christ was to make after the exclusion of the Jews." In a tropological reading, the purpose of the book is to present Ruth as the ideal example of a devout, modest, and holy wife. Symbolically, it is to indicate that nobility is a gift of God, since he adopted Ruth, a poor and lowly gentile, into the family of Abraham and Juda and made her the progenitor of David and his offspring, and indeed of Christ himself. For this reason, the Rabbis, St. Chrysostom, and Peter Damian call her "the mother of the kingdom and the kings"; for all the kings of Juda descended from her.

This book is an appendix to the book of Judges, and so it is attached to it by the Hebrew scribes; for these events occurred at the time of the Judges, as chapter 1, verse 1, makes clear. It is also a prelude and introduction to the books of Kings, in which are described the deeds of David and the other kings who were descended from Ruth. Hence, it is correct to place this book between the books of Judges and Kings. Moreover, it has been considered canonical by all Catholics and heretics alike (except the Manichaeans, who blasphemously rejected the entire Old Testament and consequently the Book of Ruth as the work of the bad god, as St. Augustine testifies In Answer to Faustus). Nevertheless, it is not extant in some Arabic versions, at least in manuscript form.

The authorship of the book is uncertain. Some think its author was the king, Ezechias; others, Esdras. Many think that he was Samuel, and this seems more likely, both because Samuel lived at the time and because he wrote the first book of Kings, to which this book is oriented.

Writers on the book of Ruth are Rupert, Abulensis, Lyranus, Hugh, Dionysius, Cajetan, Serarius, and Fevardentius, who draws many beautiful moral teachings from it.

[234] CHAPTER 1

SYNOPSIS OF THE CHAPTER

Elimelech of Bethlehem goes with his wife Noemi and two sons into the land of Moab, driven there by famine. When all the others have died, Noemi, now a widow, returns to Bethlehem with her daughter-in-law, Ruth.

[1] In the days of one of the judges, when the judges ruled, there came a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem Juda, went to sojourn in the land of Moab with his wife and his two sons. [2] He was named Elimelech, and his wife, Noemi: and his two sons, the one Mahalon, and the other Chelion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem Juda. And entering into the country of Moab, they abode there. [3] And Elimelech the husband of Noemi died: and she remained with her sons. [4] And they took wives of the women of Moab, of which one was called Orpha, and the other Ruth. And they dwelt there ten years. [5] And they both died, to wit, Mahalon and Chelion: and the woman was left alone, having lost both her sons and her husband.

[6] And she arose to go from the land of Moab to her own country with both her daughters in law: for she had heard that the Lord had looked upon his people, and had given them food. [7] Wherefore she went forth out of the place of her sojournment, with both her daughters in law: and being now in the way to return into the land of Juda, [8] She said to them: Go ye home to your mothers: the Lord deal mercifully with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. [9] May he grant you to find rest in the houses of the husbands which you shall take. And she kissed them. And they lifted up their voice and began to weep, [10] And to say: We will go on with thee to thy people. [11] But she answered them: Return, my daughters: why come ye with me? have I any more sons in my womb, that you may hope for husbands of me? [12] Return again, my daughters, and go your ways: for I am now spent with age, and not fit for wedlock. Although I might conceive this night, and bear children, [13] If you would wait till they were grown up, and come to man's estate, you would be old women before you marry. Do not so, my daughters, I beseech you: for I am grieved the more for your distress, and the hand of the Lord is gone out against me. [14] And they lifted up their voice, and began to weep again: Orpha kissed her mother in law and returned: Ruth stuck close to her mother in law. [15] And Noemi said to her: Behold thy kinswoman is returned to her people, and to her gods, go thou with her. [16] She answered: Be not against me, to desire that I should leave thee and depart: for whithersoever thou shalt go, I will go: and where thou shalt dwell, I also will dwell. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. [17] The land that shall receive thee dying, in the same will I die: and there will I be buried. The Lord do so and so to me, and add more also, if aught but death part me and thee. [18] Then Noemi, seeing that Ruth was steadfastly determined to go with her, would not be against it, nor persuade her any more to return to her friends: [19] So they went together and came to Bethlehem. And when they were come into the city, the report was quickly spread among all: and the women said: This is that Noemi. [20] But she said to them: Call me not Noemi, (that is, beautiful,) but call me Mara, (that is, bitter,) for the Almighty hath quite filled me with bitterness. [21] I went out full, and the Lord hath brought me back empty. Why then do you call me Noemi, whom the Lord hath humbled and the Almighty hath afflicted? [22] So Noemi came with Ruth the Moabitess her daughter in law, from the land of her sojournment: and returned into Bethlehem, in the beginning of the barley harvest.

[235] [1] IN THE DAYS OF ONE OF THE JUDGES -- You will ask, who was the judge in whose time this famine and the marriage of Ruth and Booz occurred? In the first place, Josephus, Zonara, and the Master of the Historia Scholastica believe that he was the high priest, Heli. But this is impossible, for Heli judged for forty years, followed by Samuel and Saul for the same number of years. These were immediately succeeded by David in his thirtieth year. David was sired by Jesse, and Jesse by Obed, whose father was Booz. All these generations could not have occurred in the few years, namely, eighty, in which Heli, Samuel, and Saul were in authority.

Second, the Rabbis and Lyranus think that the judge was Abesan, who is mentioned in Judges 12--indeed, that Abesan and Booz were one person, for the letters of both names are the same. Nevertheless, this is precluded by a reckoning of the time. Abesan became judge 272 years after Jericho was captured by Josue, chapter 6, when Salmon married Rahab, who had received Josue's spies; from her he sired Booz, the husband of Ruth. Therefore, Booz, if he were the same as Abesan, would have been 272 years old--which would have been extraordinary and indeed impossible, since no one at the time lived for so long.

Third, the Seder Olam believes he was Aod, the second judge.

Fourth, Abulensis, in chapter 4 of Ruth, Question 90, thinks this was Barac, and that the famine occurred in his last years. Torniellus agrees, except that he believes that it occurred in the twentieth year of Barac's judgeship.

Fifth, and very appositely, our man Salianus believes that the famine occurred at the time of Abimelech, the son of Gideon, and that the marriage of Ruth and Booz took place under his successor, Thola. More will be said about the latter at chapter 4, verse 21.

THERE CAME A FAMINE IN THE LAND, -- not a universal famine, but only in Israel, as the Chaldee has it. To avoid this, Elimelech withdrew to Moab, since there was no famine there. It is likely that the famine was sent by God because of the sin of the people, for God commonly chastises the people's crimes with a general famine or pestilence. The parricides and idolatries of Abimelech and the Sichimites were crimes of this type.

The rabbis tell a story that before the famine the sun stood still, as it did at the time of Josue, and that the famine was caused by this event. They also say that Elimelech, a holy man, prayed to God for the standstill; therefore, it is to him that 1 Paralipomenon 4:22 refers, saying, "he that made the sun to stand." I will discuss this at length in my comment on that passage.

[2] HE WAS NAMED ELIMELECH. -- Josephus, Zonaras, and Theodoretus erroneously call him "Abimelech." In Hebrew, Elimelech means My god [is] king or King of my God or King of my strong one. He was a prominent and wealthy man, since he belonged to the household of Salmon, the leader of the tribe of Juda, and was related to the latter's son, Booz.

EPHRATHITES, -- that is, from Bethlehem, which was also called Ephrata. Thus, David too is called the son of an Ephrathite, i.e., a Bethlehemite, in 1 Kings 12:12.

Elsewhere, an Ephrathite is someone from the tribe of Ephraim, as in Judges, chapter 12, verse 5, and I Kings, chapter 1, verses 2 and 3.

AND HIS WIFE, NOEMI-- Noemi in Hebrew means beautiful, sweet, pleasant--and Noemi was such in both word and deed. R. Simon says that she was named from Psalm 89:17, "Let the brightness of the Lord our God be upon us"; the Hebrew word for brightness is noam.

The Rabbis say that she was the daughter of Salmon's brother and thus the grand-daughter of Nahasson, who was the head of the tribe of Juda; for Nahasson was the father of Salmon and his brother, who was Noemi's father. The heroic virtues of Noemi in this book have been collected by Serarius. The first of these is her constancy in worshipping the true God, even when she was driven into a land of idolaters. The second is her zeal in bringing her step-daughter Ruth to her own religion. Third, her prudence, as she skillfully tested and confirmed Ruth's intention. Fourth, her endurance in harsh and adverse circumstances, particularly hunger, want, and a kind of exile. Fifth, her love of her own country, since she wished to return to it despite her advanced age and debilitated condition. Sixth, her wisdom in preserving, guiding, and advancing Ruth to a happy marriage, the issue of which was Jesus Christ, the salvation of the world, the gladness of the earth, and the joy of the heavens.

AND HIS TWO SONS, THE ONE MAHALON, THE OTHER CHELION, -- Mahalon in Hebrew means infirmity or chorus; Chelion means defect or deficiency. The names are apposite, since both died prematurely in Moab. The Rabbis say that these are the ones who, in 1 Paralipomenon, chapter 4, are named Joas and Saraph, which our Translator renders as Secure and Burning. Since they had no hope that Israel would be freed from the famine, they lived too carelessly and negligently in Moab, i.e., the land of idolaters, and married Moabite women. It was for this reason, the Rabbis say, they were condemned by God to death and burning. But these comments--or rather, inventions--are typical of them.

AND THEY TOOK WIVES OF THE WOMEN OF MOAB. -- The Rabbis, as I mentioned, say that they sinned gravely in this matter; nor is there any reason to excuse them, according to Abulensis. Nevertheless, they can be excused in part by necessity, since in Moab they would not have found Israelite women to marry, and it would have been difficult and dangerous for them as young men, at that fervent time of life, to remain celibate. Again, their mother, Noemi, who was a devout woman, seems to have advised them at the prompting of God, who ordained that Ruth should give birth to David, and that from him should come the Christ. Some add that Ruth and Orpha were converted from idols to the true God, and so they could licitly marry the Hebrews, Mahalon and Chelion, just as Salmon married Rahab, the Canaanite woman who converted to Judaism in Josue, chapter 2. Hebrews were permitted to marry Canaanite women if the latter converted to Judaism. {footnote: The object of the Hebrews' law was to prevent the Moabites from becoming part of the People of Israel.} This reply, however, is unsuitable, [236] for Orpha returns to her idols and Ruth converts when she follows Noemi and migrates with her from Moab to Bethlehem, as the following verses make clear.

OF WHICH ONE WAS CALLED ORPHA.-- The Talmudic scholars assert that she was the mother of the giant, Goliath, who was laid low by David. They agree with Philo, or rather Pseudo-Philo, in his Biblical Antiquities, and Prudentius in the Hamartigenia, who says that, rather than follow Noemi, Orpha preferred "to nurse the half-wild stock of Goliath." Their rationale is that the mother of Goliath is called Rapha or Harapha in 1 Kings, chapter 21, verses 19 and 22, and 1 Paralipomenon, chapter 20, verses 6 and 7; Haraph appears to be identical with Orpha. But they are mistaken, in the first place, because Harapha was a Philistine woman, while Orpha was a Moabite; second, because Harapha was from Geth, a city of Palestine, while Orpha was from Petra; third, Harapha lived at the time of Saul and David, while Orpha lived long beforehand, i.e., at the time of Ruth and Booz, who was the great-grandfather of David; fourth, Orpha is written in Hebrew with the letter ע, ayin, while Harapha is written with ה, he. Moreover, Orpha in Hebrew means pertaining to the neck or with face uncovered. Hence R. Samuel in the Sutha, chapter 8, says that the mother of Goliath was a prostitute and was called Horpha because she was unveiled, pushed down, and dishonored by all as a harlot; she was called Harapha because she was trampled like grains of wheat, which are called harpithoth in 2 Kings, chapter 29, and Proverbs, chapters 27 and 31.

Nevertheless, Orpha is not Harapha, the mother of Goliath, as I have just shown. Indeed, it is not the mother but the father of Goliath who is called Rapha or Harapha in 1 Paralipomenon chapter 20, verses 6 and 7; after him, giants were called Raphaim, as I explain regarding that passage. There is more in my comment on 1 Kings chapter 21, verses 19 and 22.

AND THE OTHER RUTH.--The Talmudic scholars say that Ruth was the daughter of Eglon, king of Moab, who was killed by Aod in Judges, chapter 2; in this way they associate their David with the royal house of Moab. But this is nonsense. Why would the king of Moab have given his daughter to foreigners who were poor and nearly dying from a famine?

Moreover, Ruth was from Moab, which was a part of Arabia Petrea. Its capital was the aforementioned Petra, so called because it was situated on a rocky cliff (Bellonius, book 2, chapter 53, thinks that this is Mecca, where the tomb of Muhammad is found; but he is mistaken). This is clear from a passage in Isaias, chapter 16: "Send forth, O Lord, the lamb, the ruler of the earth, from Petra of the desert, to the mount of the daughter of Sion." "This was understood as the Messiah, who would come from the sons of David. David himself belonged to the family of Ruth, he who was to come from a city of Moab, which was called the rock of the desert." So Abulensis in Question 16. See my comment on Isaias, chapter 16, verse 1.

Moreover, Ruth in Hebrew means watered or drunk, from the root רוה, rava, i.e., to water. Or, it means vision or prophecy, from the root ראה, raa, i.e., to see, as if Ruth were the same as Rauth. Or, it means inspiration, as the Auctor imperfecti says on Matthew, chapter 1, taking it from the root רוח, ravach, as if Ruth were the same as Rachut; for without the inspiration of God, she could neither have done nor said what she did and said. Hence, the same author says, one praises in her the love, simplicity, obedience, and faith of the people of Israel. The Cabalists say that by anastrophe Ruth is Tur, i.e., a turtle dove, because she mourned her dead husband by wailing like a dove. The Talmudic scholars say that she was called Ruth because she was an ancestor of David, whom God foresaw would be בשירות, besciroth, that is, in the psalms, canticles, and praises of men.

Finally, it appears that Ruth was not the sister of Orpha, nor was she related by blood, but rather by marriage, as I will explain on verse 15.

[8] GO YE HOME TO YOUR MOTHERS. -- The Hebrew and the Seventy have, Go, return, each of you to the house of your mother. This makes it clear that they were not sisters and did not have the same mother. Noemi urges her daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpha, to return to their Moabite kinsmen, so that they may live more comfortably among them and that she may be relieved of the burden of caring for them; also, that she may not lead them while they are still unbelievers to the faithful people of Israel, for this would have been a scandal. Thus, she tacitly urges them (as she had otherwise often done openly) to convert to the religion of the Israelites, as if to say: If you want to come with me to Israel, you must live in the Israelite way, in the faith and worship of the one true God. If you are unwilling to do this, go back to your unbelieving Moabites.

THE LORD DEAL MERCIFULLY WITH YOU, AS YOU HAVE DEALT WITH THE DEAD AND WITH ME; -- While they lived, you treated your dead husbands (who were my sons) with due reverence and respect, for you have given them a decent burial, mourned them, remembered them, honored them, and for their sakes have remained widows with me thus far, feeding, helping, and dealing kindly with me. Hence, the Chaldee has: The Lord will do good with you just as you did with your husbands who sleep, for you have refused to take husbands after their death; and with me, because you have fed and supported me.

The faithful show much greater mercy to their dead loved ones when they pray and sacrifice for their souls--the kind of mercy that St. Ambrose showed to Theodosius the emperor, as he himself narrates in the speech On the Death of Theodosius: "I have loved him, and so I accompany him to the land of the living, and I will not abandon him until, by my tears and prayers, I have led the man whither his merits summon, unto the holy mountain of God, where there is eternal life, where there is no corruption, no sickness, no mourning, no sorrow, no companionship with the dead. It is the true land of the living where this mortal body shall put on immortality and this corruptible body shall put on incorruption. It is the great repose which fulfills the prayer of the living, a most glorious promise" [tr. Deferari].

[11.] HAVE I ANY MORE SONS OF MY WOMB, THAT YOU MAY HOPE FOR HUSBANDS OF ME? From this it is surmised that the law given in Deuteronomy, chapter 20 [sic, chapter 25], which commands the Jews to raise up seed (i.e., offspring) for a brother who has died without children, was observed by the Gentiles. Hence, well before the Law and Moses, Tamar, the Canaanite woman, raises up seed for the sons of Juda and for Juda himself; Genesis, chapter 38. When a woman married into a family, [237] she belonged to that family when her husband died, and she waited for another husband from the same family rather than pass on to another. This was done to preserve the respectability and affinity that she had contracted with it.

Moreover, Cajetan and Serarius have supposed that raising up seed for a dead brother occurred also when the brothers merely had the same mother, for if Noemi had married another man and given husbands born from that union to Ruth and Orpha, they would have been only half-brothers to Mahalon and Chelion, their first husbands. Consequently, if brothers by the same mother had different fathers who were from the same tribe and family, and one of the brothers died without children, his wife raised up seed from his brother or a relative of the same family, but she does not seem to have been so obliged if the second brother was sired by a father from another tribe or family.

YOU WOULD BE OLD WOMEN BEFORE YOU MARRY. --In Hebrew, the word is תעגנה, teagena, which some, deriving it from עוג, og, burn, consume, interpret as follows: Surely you would not burn without a husband? The Apostle would then be alluding to this passage when he said, "It is better to marry than to be burnt," 1 Corinthians, chapter 7. Germanius, the Seventy, the Chaldee, Vatablus, Pagninus, Marinus, and other more recent authorities translate as follows: Surely you will not be hindered or delayed, so that you remain widows until I give birth to new husbands for you? That is to say: Surely you will not bind yourselves (this is the meaning of κατέχεσθαι in the Seventy) to remain in widowhood until I procreate new sons, who would become your husbands? The Hebrew text is obscure, but it becomes plain and clear if you interpret it this way: If I should say: I have hope; I was with a man this night; and even, I bore sons; would you then wait until they become grown? Would you put off being with a man? The text of the Seventy, which is equally obscure, can be explained according to this sense.

[15] BEHOLD...IS RETURNED; -- because Orpha loved Noemi less than Ruth did. Hence Ruth clung to Noemi, while Orpha returned from her to her own people.

THY KINSWOMAN.-- Orpha, your sister-in-law, who was married to the brother of your husband; for you married two brothers, and so you are kinswomen, i.e., relatives, through your marriages. This is the meaning of the Hebrew, יבמה, iebama.

TO HER PEOPLE, AND TO HER GODS. -- It is not as if Noemi were urging her daughter-in-law, Ruth, to return, like Orpha, to the gods of the pagans, which she had worshiped previously in the land of Moab, for to have done so would have been a sin. But wishing to console her, she urges her to return to her own people and there to be married again, and she permits her to continue worshiping her gods (a necessary adjunct, and which she knew Ruth would do if she returned to her own people, who were idolaters). She also does this to test the sincerity and constancy of her daughter-in-law, Ruth, for these qualities would be required for changing her religion along with her country and retaining it steadfastly, lest she later complain that Noemi, her mother-in-law, caused her by wiles and deception to pass into an alien and less agreeable religion. So Abulensis.

AND TO HER GODS. -- From this it is clear that Orpha did not convert to God, but always adhered to her native idols and religion. Ruth, however, because she changed her country with Noemi, also changed her religion and passed into the territory and synagogue of the Israelites. Learn from this how harmful it is for people to live among infidels, heretics, and wicked people, and how good to live among the pious and faithful; for the former remain or become unfaithful, heretical, and wicked, while the latter remain or become faithful, orthodox, and pious, as it says in Psalm 17: With the holy, thou wilt be holy; and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted. Thus Orpha, by returning to her infidel companions, became unfaithful, while Ruth, by passing over to the faithful, became so herself.

BE NOT AGAINST ME, TO DESIRE THAT I SHOULD LEAVE THEE, -- The Chaldee has, Do not vex me, do not compel me. Hence it is clear that Ruth had been initiated into the Jewish rites through baptism--not the sacramental kind, but a washing of the body, just as men were initiated through circumcision. Hear the Talmudic authors as they describe this rite of initiation: "For anyone who wishes to be a proselyte, if that person is a male, three things are necessary: to be circumcised, to be baptized, and to offer in sacrifice either a beast or a pair of turtle doves or pigeons. If that person is a woman, she should proceed to do two things: to be baptized and to offer a sacrificial victim."

THY PEOPLE SHALL BE MY PEOPLE, AND THY GOD MY GOD, -- Such was the love, respect, and faithfulness of Ruth for her mother-in-law, Noemi, that she determined to exchange her home country for a foreign land and her home-grown religion for the alien faith of the Jews. For she saw that Noemi was so wise and upright and so endowed with virtue and grace that she became convinced that Noemi had the true faith and religion and that her god was the true one. In his first book On Job, Origen recommends that daughters-in-law follow this example: "Blessed Ruth deferred to her elder mother-in-law to such an extent that she could not bear to leave her, even unto death. For this reason she is perpetually glorified in Scripture, and she is made blessed forever in the presence of God. Nonetheless, in the resurrection, she will judge and condemn all the spiteful and wicked women who have abused or wounded their in-laws, not keeping in mind that the latter have begotten and raised husbands for them and have taken on work for their food and upkeep." From the foregoing he draws this conclusion: "Therefore, woman, if you love your husband, love also those who have begotten and raised up a son for themselves and a husband for you. Do not separate a son from his father or mother. Do not compel a son to dishonor his father or mother, lest you fall into condemnation by the Lord God on the terrible day of inquest and judgment. Let it be enough for you, woman, to possess a husband that you have not nourished and a living that you have not acquired, to come into a house that you have not built, [238] and to be a mistress and have power over the work of others, for which things you have not labored. Do not repay with evil those who have prepared and labored to acquire all these things, both a husband and a living. Woman, let not a curse from the Lord God come over you."

Likewise, St. Jerome (or whoever the author was, since the style does not agree with his, although it is eloquent), in volume 9 of the treatise On the True Circumcision, asserts that this brave and dutiful answer qualified Ruth to be the mother, i.e., the ancestor, of Christ. Thus he exclaims: "O virtue more estimable than a man's! A woman of an uncircumcised race imitates the faith of Abraham, which manly circumcision has forsaken, and she enters with foreign steps into the merit of justification, from which the hereditary successors have deviated in their blindness. The Moabite scorns her own gods, while you, Israel, desire the gods of others; she swears by the one God, having already forgotten her own, and you go fornicating after a multitude of idols. Thus she becomes an Israelite in mind, not race; by faith, not blood; by virtue, not tribal affinity. Hence, she is blessed to the extent that she is called the mother of your prophets and kings."

THE LORD DO SO AND SO TO ME, AND ADD MORE ALSO, -- in other words, Let him send me disease, poverty, persecution, and add things worse than these. This was implicit in the oath of the Hebrews, but they left it unsaid through euphemism, for the sake of a good omen, lest the curses that they called down on themselves should actually come to pass. Such also was the oath of the Romans in making treaties, which Festus reviews in book 11 [sic, book 10]: "Those who intend to swear by Jupiter Lapis take up the sacred stone (silex) and use these words: 'If I knowingly swear falsely, let Jupiter cast me out of my property, with no harm to the city or citadel, as I do this stone.' And then he would cast the stone from his hand."

Allegorically, Ruth is a type of the Church passing over from the pagan nations to Christ. Hear what St. Chrysostom says in his third homily On Matthew: "See, for instance, what befell Ruth, how like it is to the things which belong to us. For she was both of a strange race, and reduced to the utmost poverty, yet Booz when he saw her neither despised her poverty nor abhorred her mean birth, as Christ having received the Church, being both an alien and in much poverty, took her to be partaker of the great blessings." He adds the means: "But even as Ruth, if she had not before left her father, and renounced household and race, country and kindred, would not have attained unto this alliance; so the Church too, having forsaken the customs which men had received from their fathers, then, and not before, became lovely to the Bridegroom. Of this therefore the prophet discourses unto her, and saith, "Forget thy people, and thy father's house, so shall the king have pleasure in thy beauty." This is what Ruth did, and because of this she became a mother of kings, even as the Church did. For of her David himself sprung" [tr. Schaff, adapted].

Here also what St. Ambrose says in book 3 On Luke, after the middle: "How then does she enter the Church, if not because, being holy and undefiled in her conduct, she was put on top of the law? If indeed the Law is made for the wicked and the sinners, it is certain that Ruth, who escaped the limitations of the Law, who entered the Church and became an Israelite, who deserved to be among the ancestors of the the race of the Lord, chosen because of an affinity of the soul, not of the body, is a great example to us: for in her is our entrance into the Church of the Lord, to all of us gathered among the nations, prefigured. Let us imitate her then; and since her manners have earned her the privilege of being admitted to this society, as history teaches us, we too, thanks to the excellence of our manners, are welcomed into the Church of Christ in consideration of our merits" [tr. Anonymous, adapted].

[20] CALL ME NOT NOEMI (that is, beautiful; also: becoming, agreeable, pleasant, joyful) BUT CALL ME MARA, (that is, bitter) FOR THE ALMIGHTY HATH QUITE FILLED ME WITH BITTERNESS. -- For he has deprived me of my husband and both sons, making me a widow and childless. The Blessed Virgin could say the same, seeing her son dead on the cross.

Tropologically: when we are praised for some gifts, let us look into our defects, and so turn praise to lament, as St. Gregory did, using Noemi as an example, in book 2, Letter 64, when he had been praised by Narses: "In your kindness, you have said much in praise of my good works. To this I reply in brief: Call me not Noemi (that is, beautiful), but call me Mara (that is, bitter), because I am full of bitterness" [my translation]. And to the same man in book 1, Letter 6, lamenting that he has been taken away from the peace of the monastery to the responsibilities of a Pope, writes: "You call an ape a lion. Herein we see that you do as we often do, when we call mangy whelps pards or tigers. For I, my good man, have, as it were, lost my children, since through earthly cares I have lost works of righteousness. Therefore call me not Noemi, that is fair; but call me Mara, for I am full of bitterness" [tr. Barmby].

He made the same response to St. Leander in book 7, Letter 125. So did St. Digna, a virgin who was martyred in Spain in 853 under Muhammad the Saracen. St. Eulogius, a contemporary who was martyred in the same persecution, writes about her in his Memorial of the Saints, book 3, chapter 7: "Although this girl, in keeping with her great humility and obedience, ranked herself last among her fellow virgins and was obliging to an incomparable degree, never allowed herself to be called Digna (worthy), and would say tearfully, 'Do not call me Worthy, but rather Unworthy, because I ought to be named for the merit I possess.'"

For Almighty, the Hebrew has Saddai, which also signifies a horn of plenty, or God who abounds in every good thing, who is overflowing but also chastising and ravaging. Either meaning is suited to this passage, as if to say: God, as Saddai, Overflowing, once honored me with a good marriage, children, and wealth, but now, as Saddai, Ravaging, has deprived me of these and ravaged me. Yet he will, I hope, have pity on me, and being again Saddai bring me solace, wealth, and happiness. For "the Lord killeth and maketh alive, he bringeth down to hell and [239] bringeth back again." See my comment on Saddai at Genesis 17:1.

[22] AND RETURNED INTO BETHLEHEM, IN THE BEGINNING OF THE BARLEY HARVEST, -- in other words, at Passover. For on the second day of Passover the Hebrews offered to God the first fruits of the ears of corn, and on the third day harvested the same. The Chaldee renders it thus: They (Noemi and Ruth) went up to Bethlehem in the ascents of Passover, i.e., when the day of Passover arrived, and on that day the sons of Israel began to harvest the gomer or sheaf, which was customarily raised up, that is, offered to God; and it was the beginning of the harvest.

Likewise Josue, as he led the Hebrews out of Egypt and slavery, entered the promised land on the Passover; Josue, chapter 3.