Ruth – Gentile Bride

Boaz responds with acts of kind­ness to her.

Ruth acknowl­edges her sta­tion as lower than Boaz ser­vants and is invited to join Boaz for bread and a type of diluted wine (trans­lated vine­gar). The sig­nif­i­cance of the bread and wine sym­bol­ism must not be missed.

v 14. Ruth eats the meal with the work­ers of the har­vest and she is sat­is­fied at the hand of the Provider. Boaz com­mands his work­ers to allow her to glean among the stand­ing sheaves and to drop bar­ley for her on pur­pose. At the end she gleaned an ephah of bar­ley or about 60lbs and what she had left over of the meal was enough to sat­isfy Naomi also. Con­trast this with the famine in Moab.

Naomi asked about the rich har­vest Ruth brought home and praised God for His rich bless­ing to them.  Note in these inter­ac­tions with Boaz and Ruth and Naomi and Ruth – the elder speaks first and then Ruth answers.  The beauty of the prose is shown as the elders speech is in a very for­mal style while Ruth answers in a more com­mon form of the language.

Naomi sees the poten­tial in Boaz inter­est and com­mands Ruth to stay with his maid­ens.  Ruth obeys and the scrip­ture says she worked the bar­ley har­vest by day and lived with Naomi by night. The scrip­ture is care­ful to main­tain Ruth’s virtue because of the his­tory and rep­u­ta­tion of the Moabites.

Ruth Chapter 3 the Harvest

At the end of the Bar­ley har­vest Naomi knows that Boaz would be win­now­ing the bar­ley in the thresh­ing floor. A thresh­ing floor is a spe­cially flat­tened sur­face made either of rock or beaten earth where a farmer would thresh the grain har­vest.  The thresh­ing floor was either owned by the entire vil­lage or by a sin­gle fam­ily. It was usu­ally located out­side the vil­lage in a place exposed to the wind. The con­cept of win­now­ing (sep­a­rat­ing wheat from the chaff) was done at night due to the heat and he needed breeze to blow the chaff away from the heav­ier wheat.

For the prophetic sig­nif­i­cance of the Thresh­ing floor see study called “Zion Thresh­ing floor of God.”  Through­out the para­bles Yeshua made ref­er­ences to Har­vests and the end time sep­a­ra­tion of wheat and chaff.  John the Bap­tist announced Yeshua as com­ing Matthew 3 v12 His win­now­ing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his thresh­ing floor, gath­er­ing his wheat into the barn and burn­ing up the chaff with unquench­able fire.”

Naomi sug­gests that Ruth wait until the end of the har­vest and approach Boaz while he is sleep­ing at the Thresh­ing floor. Ruth 3 v3 — Her prepa­ra­tions to approach Boaz the kins­man redeemer included 1) Wash­ing and 2) anoint­ing with oil and 3) clean rai­ment.  This is the same process the priests went through when Moses con­se­crated them for Priestly ser­vice on the 8^th day.  Again do not miss the type Ruth plays as a model of the Gen­tile bride of Messiah.

When Boaz had feasted with the work­ers and eaten and drank – Recall that Yeshua said He would not drink again until He does so with his ser­vants at that end time feast. Like the com­ing Bride­groom at the hour of mid­night Ruth lays at Boaz feet and she asks Him to cover her with his Wings….or His author­ity. Note the con­trast to Lot who also drank and then he entered an inces­tu­ous rela­tion­ships with his daugh­ter, whose off­spring are the peo­ple of Moab (Ruth’s kin).  Now Boaz chooses a dif­fer­ent response and the way of honor and responsibility.

Boaz once com­mented on her plac­ing her trust in the shel­ter of the God of Israel and under His wings — now she asks that Boaz also cover her with his wings. See notes Heal­ing Hem.

She asks Boaz to marry her under the terms of the Levi­rate mar­riage and with that came the oblig­a­tion on Boaz to raise up a son to be heir of Elimelech’s  and to redeem the fam­ily land.  Boaz is pleased and com­pli­ments her virtue.

Boaz notes there is another rel­a­tive that is a nearer rel­a­tive and has first right of refusal and swears that the mat­ter will be resolved that day. He sends a mes­sage to her mother in law — Naomi by pour­ing six mea­sures of bar­ley into Ruth’s veil also called a wim­ple in Is 3v22 a large outer cloak – not an ordi­nary veil,  and send­ing her home.

Naomi right­fully under­stands the 6 mea­sures hint of Fri­day and the mat­ter must be set­tled that day before the Sab­bath.

We can look at a hid­den mean­ing of yet a greater 6^th day as prepa­ra­tion for the greater wed­ding of a gen­tile Bride and her kins­man redeemer when mans 6000 years are done. Ruth is told to sit and wait for the mat­ter will be set­tled that day.