BY ZY

 

The unique Love story of Ruth & Boaz

 You could suggest Helen of Troy & Paris (igniting the Trojan War dramatised in the Iliad), Cleopatra and Mark Antony (whose love bound Rome in a civil war with Octavian / Augustus Caesar), Romeo & Juliet, Beauty & the Beast, or even Cinderella & Prince Charming, if you were to mention any classic love storeys.In them, in offering passionate love storeys that captivate our souls, emotions and imaginations, history, pop culture and romantic fiction come together.

Ruth & Boaz Love Story

Incredibly, the love that ignited between Ruth & Boaz has proved much more lasting and honourable than all of these love affairs, and in reality still affects the lives of all the billions of us who live today – more than three thousand years after those lovers met. Their romance is also an image of the magical and divine love you and I have been given.In today's # MeToo age, the tale of Ruth and Boaz deals with cross-cultural & prohibited love, immigration and the relationship between a powerful man and a weak woman. For us, this is a template for how to build a stable marriage. By either of these steps, Ruth & Boaz 's love storey is worth learning.

Their love is documented in the Bible in the Book of Ruth. It is a short book and is well worth reading (here)-only 2400 words long. It is set at around 1150 BCE, making this the oldest of all love storeys documented. It was made into several films.

The Love Story of Ruth

Naomi and her husband leave Israel with their two sons to avoid drought and settle in the neighbouring Moab country (today's Jordan). The two sons die after they marry local women, as does Naomi's husband, leaving her alone with her two daughters-in-law. Naomi chooses to return to her native Israel, and she is joined by one of her daughters-in-law, Ruth.After a long absence, as a destitute widow accompanied by Ruth, a young and insecure Moabite refugee, Naomi is back in her native Bethlehem.

Ruth & Boaz meet

Bereft of wages, Ruth goes out in the fields to collect grain left behind by the local harvest crews. As a social safety net, the Law of Moses had ordained harvesters to leave some grains in their fields, so that the poor could gather food. Randomly, it would appear, Ruth finds herself in the fields of a wealthy landowner named Boaz picking grain.Among the others working hard to collect the grains left behind by his work crews, Boaz finds Ruth. In order to raise more, he instructs his foremen to leave extra grain behind in the field.

Since she can gather in abundance in his fields, every day Ruth returns to the fields of Boaz to gather grain left over. Boaz, ever the defender, makes sure that none of his crews harass or molest Ruth. Ruth and Boaz are interested in each other but neither makes a move due to disparities in age , social standing and nationality. As match-maker Naomi moves in here.After celebrating the harvest meeting, she instructs Ruth to lie down boldly by Boaz 's side at night. Boaz sees this as a proposition for marriage, and agrees to marry her.

Kinsman Redeemer

But the scenario is more nuanced than just love between them. Naomi is Boaz's relative, and since her daughter-in - law is Ruth, Boaz and Ruth are kin by marriage. As a 'kinsmen redeemer', Boaz must marry her. It meant that he would marry her 'in the name' of her first husband (Naomi's son) under the Law of Moses and thus provide for her.This will require that Boaz purchase the family fields of Naomi. While it would prove expensive for Boaz, it was not the biggest hurdle. There was another closer relative who had first rights to purchase fields from Naomi's family (and thus also marry Ruth). So Ruth 's marriage to Boaz relied on whether another man wanted the obligation to care for Naomi and Ruth.

This first-in-line refused the marriage at a public meeting of the city elders because it puts his own estate at risk. Therefore, Boaz was free to buy and redeem the family estate of Naomi, and to marry Ruth.

Legacy of Ruth & Boaz

There was a boy in their marriage, Obed, who, in turn, became King David 's grandfather. David was promised to come from his family 'a Christ.' More prophecies were given, and Jesus Christ was finally born in Bethlehem, the same city where Ruth and Boaz had met long before.Their romance, marriage and family lineage culminated in offspring that today is the basis of our modern calendar, and global holidays like Christmas & Easter – not bad for a romance over 3000 years ago in a dusty village.

Picturing a Greater Love Story

Ruth, the destitute foreign woman, is a paradigm that compares the abuse and exploitation now prevalent in our # MeToo day with the chivalry and reverence with which the rich and wealthy Boaz handled Ruth. The historical influence of the family line created by this romance and marriage, detectable every time we notice the date on our equipment, gives an everlasting legacy to this love tale.But the love storey of Ruth & Boaz is also an image of an even greater love, one into which you and I are welcomed.

The Bible describes us in a manner evoking Ruth when it says:

I'll plant her in the field for myself;

I'm going to express my love to the one who I call 'Not my loved one.'

-Hosea 2:23

In his own broken union, the Old Testament prophet Hosea (ca. 750 BC) used the reconciliation to imagine God reaching out to us with His affection. Like Ruth, who came into the land as one unloved, but then Boaz showed love, He desires to show His love even to those of us who feel far from His love.This is quoted in the New Testament (Romans 9:25) to illustrate how far God comes to love those who are far from Him.

How does it show His love? Jesus, the son of Boaz & Ruth, is a come-in-the-flesh Deity and is thus our 'kinsman,' just as Boaz was to Ruth. Jesus paid on the cross our debt of sin to Heaven, and thus he paid our debt of sin to Heaven.

He gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people his own, anxious to do that which is nice.

-Titus 2:14

Since Boaz was a 'kinsman-redeemer' who paid a price to redeem Ruth, Jesus is our 'kinsman-redeemer' who paid to redeem us (with his life).

A Model for our marriages

The way Jesus (and Boaz) paid to redeem, and then win versions of his bride how we can create our marriages. Why we create our marriages is clarified in the Bible:

Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Women, just as you do to the Lord, apply yourself to your own husbands. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, whose flesh the Saviour is. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so should wives in all things submit to their husbands.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, to cleanse her by washing her with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a luminous church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and without blame. 28 Husbands should love their wives in the same way as their own bodies.He who loves his wife loves himself.29 After all, no one has ever despised their own bodies, but they feed and take care of their bodies, just as Christ does the church—30 because we are members of his bodies. 31 For this cause, a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and all will become one flesh. 32 This is a profound mystery, but I am speaking of Christ and the church.33 Each of you, however, must love his own wife, whom he respects himself, and the wife must honour her own husband.

-Ephesians 5:21-33

As Boaz and Ruth built their marriage on love and reverence, and the care of Jesus for the church is a model for husbands to sacrificially love their spouses, so we do well to draw on those same values for our marriages.

A Wedding Invitation for you and me

The Bible ends with a wedding as in all good love storeys. Just as the price Boaz charged for redempting Ruth paved the way for their wedding, so the price Jesus charged paved the way for our wedding. That marriage is not figurative but actual, and those who accept the invitation to his wedding are called 'Christ's Bride.' As it reads:

Let us rejoice and be joyful and give glory to him! For the marriage of the Lamb is at hand, and his bride is ready for herself.

- Revelation 19:7

Those who obtain the redemption offer of Jesus become his 'bride.' We're all being given this celestial wedding. The Bible finishes with this invitation to come to His wedding for you and me

"The Spirit and the bride say to each other," Come! "And let him that hears say, 'Come! "Let the thirsty come; and let the want tobe take the free gift of the water of life.

- Revelation 22:17

A paradigm of love that is still making itself felt today is the relationship between Ruth & Boaz. It is an image of God's celestial romance which loves us. He marries all those who approve His marriage proposal as His Bride. His offer should be weighed, as with all marriage proposals, to see whether you should consider it.Start here with the 'plan' set out in the beginning and follow its creation from the beginning of human history. Note how long beforehand something is projected to prove it really is the Proposal of God.

Another adaptation of the Book of Ruth in film