Naomi bids her follow the reapers of Boaz according to his wish; and she did so “through the barley-harvest, and through the wheat-harvest, and she dwelt with her mother-in-law.” It was at the close of the harvest that Ruth, following Naomi's directions, laid herself down at night, at the feet of Boaz, as he slept on the threshing-floor; an act by which she reminded him of the law that the nearest of kin should marry the childless widow. This act has been very severely commented on. Upon this ground only, M. de Voltaire has not scrupled to apply to Ruth one of the most justly opprobrious words in human language; and several noted skeptics of the English school have given this as one among their objections against the Holy Scriptures.[1] As though in a state of society wholly simple and primitive, we were to judge of Ruth by the rules of propriety prevailing in the courts of Charles II. and Louis XV. Ruth and Boaz lived, indeed, among a race, and in an age, when not only the daily speech, but the daily life also, was highly figurative; when it was the great object of language and of action to give force and expression to the intention of the mind, instead of applying, as in a later, and a degenerate society, all the powers of speech and action to concealing the real object in view. The simplicity with which this peculiarly Jewish part of the narrative is given, will rather appear to the impartial judge a merit. But the Christian has double grounds for receiving this fact in the same spirit as it is recorded, and upon those grounds we may feel confident that, had Ruth been a guilty woman, or had Boaz acted otherwise than uprightly toward the young widow, neither would have been spared the open shame of such misconduct. The Book of Ruth
- ↑ See Letters of the Jews to Voltaire.
