Unshaken (9 page)

Naomi didn’t ask why Ruth had ventured so far, seeing the bruise on her cheek. She was afraid she knew the answer. “What was the landowner’s name?”

“The man I worked with today is named Boaz.”

Naomi put her hand to her throat. “Boaz?”

“Yes, Boaz.” Ruth took the bread she had saved and handed it to Naomi. “He invited me into the shelter where his maidservants and reapers ate the midday meal, and gave me a double portion!” She held out a piece of bread. “I’ve never heard of a man in his position stooping to serve his workers.”

Naomi took the bread with trembling fingers. She hadn’t given a thought to Boaz when she returned to Bethlehem. She had forgotten all about him. Or maybe the truth was that she had deliberately put the man out of her mind. Just thinking about him made her cringe with shame. Many years ago, he had come to her father and made an offer of marriage for her. How she had carried on as soon as he left the house! How she’d wept and pleaded that her father accept Elimelech instead.

“But he hasn’t even offered for you!” her father had said, red-faced with anger.

“He will. His sister told me he has spoken to his father about it.”

“Boaz is a man of unquestioned virtue, my daughter.”

Indeed, but he was not a man to make a girl’s heart beat with love. She wanted a tall husband, ruddy and handsome with laughing eyes and winning ways. She wanted Elimelech. His name meant “my god, a king.” Surely that was an indication of his character. The love she saw in Boaz’s eyes had embarrassed her. She had been impatient with his attention, repulsed by it. Why wouldn’t he go away? Why wouldn’t he look for some other girl, one as plain as he?

She had known none of those reasons would sway her father against Boaz, but one thing would—a fact he seemed to have forgotten. “Boaz has unquestioned virtue, Father, but questionable blood.” His mother was Canaanite. And a prostitute.

Naomi lowered her head and closed her eyes tightly.
Oh, Lord God, that Boaz of all men should be so kind!
What shallowness she had shown toward this man. And to look down upon his mother, who had proven herself a woman of such strong faith! Unthinkable! Unpardonable! Yet, despite Naomi’s sins against him, Boaz welcomed Ruth and poured a double blessing out for her. “Praise the Lord for a man like that! May the Lord bless him!” she said, her words choked with tears. She deserved his condemnation but received his compassion. She hadn’t recognized his worth when she was young, but life had taught her hard lessons. She was older now and far wiser.

A tiny spark of hope came to life within her.

Raising her head slowly, she looked at Ruth. “He is showing his kindness to us as well as to your dead husband.” She saw confusion in the girl’s eyes. There were so many things yet to teach her about Hebrew ways and the Law. What would be her response if she were to tell Ruth the fullness of Boaz’s obligations to them? Would Ruth respond the same way she herself had all those years ago, seeing only the outer shell of the man and not his lion heart? She had never known a man to be more bent upon pleasing God than Boaz. Sadly, a young woman’s heart was not often won by a man’s character.

“That man is one of our closest relatives, one of our family redeemers, Ruth.”

“No wonder he was so kind to me.”

“No,” she said quickly, not wanting her daughter-in-law to misunderstand. “Boaz is not the sort of man to limit his kindness to family members, Ruth. He has always been kind to anyone in need.”

“Even foreigners?”

“His mother was a Canaanite. In fact, she was a prostitute who lived in the wall of Jericho.” When Ruth’s eyes widened, Naomi hastened to explain. “She was a woman of great faith, but there were many people who looked down upon Boaz when he was a young man because he was of mixed blood. Hebrew on his father’s side, and Canaanite on his mother’s. Rahab hid two spies sent out by Joshua before our people took the land promised us by God. She declared her faith in Yahweh and saved the men’s lives by letting them down from her window by a rope. They went back for her and brought her out when the city was being destroyed, and she lived among our people from that time on. One of the spies took Rahab as his wife.”

“Then perhaps Boaz was kind to me for his mother’s sake.”

Naomi was certain that was not the only reason. “He would understand better than anyone that God calls whom He chooses.” If God had called Rahab to be of His own people, then He could call a young Moabite widow as well. She leaned forward. “Did he say anything else to you?” Had Boaz mentioned her?

“Boaz even told me to come back and stay with his harvesters until the entire harvest is completed.”

Naomi felt a rush of relief. Surely Boaz wouldn’t have encouraged Ruth if he held the ill will of a long-ago rejected suitor. “This is wonderful! Do as he said, Ruth. Stay with his workers right through the whole harvest. You will be safe there, unlike in other fields.”

As she ate the bread Boaz had given Ruth, Naomi smiled to herself. She watched her daughter-in-law pour the barley into a basket, careful not to lose a single seed of grain. It seemed all was not lost after all. There was one door left to open so that Ruth could walk through into a future and a hope. And, if God was willing, the door would stay open for her as well.

Naomi awakened when she heard a soft cascading of rocks just outside the cave. The sun was barely up and Ruth was coming up the slope, carrying a large skin of water. “You’re awake early,” Ruth said, smiling.

“I thought I would go into Bethlehem today and talk with some of my old friends.”

Ruth poured the water from the skin into a large earthen jug. “Good. I’m sure they’ve missed you and will have plenty to talk about with you.” She hung up the empty skin and swung her black shawl over her hair and shoulders. “I’ll try to be back before dark.”

“God be with you, Ruth.”

Ruth smiled brightly. “And with you, Mother.”

Naomi rose. Dragging a blanket around her shoulders, she went to the mouth of the cave and watched Ruth head down the road. Naomi stood amazed that God had blessed her with such a daughter-in-law. Ruth had left behind opportunities and possibilities. She had turned away from a secure future in Kir-hareseth so that she could come here to Bethlehem and live in this cave with a tired, despairing, complaining old woman. At any time, her daughter-in-law could have returned to the home of her affluent parents, but instead she went off every morning to do the work of the poorest of the poor. Not once had she uttered a word of complaint. Every evening, she returned with a smile, grain, glad tidings, and a grateful heart.

A man of discernment like Boaz would appreciate a young woman with Ruth’s virtues, Moabitess or not.

Naomi drew herself up before she allowed her thoughts to run rampant. It wouldn’t do to make plans for Ruth’s future before learning the facts. Naomi had no intention of rushing into Bethlehem, seeking out the elders, and making a case. No, she would move slowly. There was no hurry, now that she and Ruth had shelter and food. She would take time to observe, take time to let people get to know her daughter-in-law . . . for who could not respect her when they did? Was there a finer young woman than her precious Ruth? Above all, Naomi would take time to pray for God’s guidance, even though it was surely God Himself who had planted this seed of hope in her mind.

For the first time since burying her last son, Naomi saw what life could hold in the future instead of what life had held in the past.

And the women were saying . . .

“I think she’s pretty.”

“That’s because you like her.”

“You’re just jealous because Rimon, Netzer, and Tirosh were trying to talk with her today.”

“Have you noticed how she never works near the men?”

“She never even gives them a second glance.”

“She must have loved Mahlon very much.”

“She’s certainly loyal to her mother-in-law.”

“My mother said Ruth comes to the well early every morning and takes water back to her mother-in-law before she comes to the fields.”

“Then she must be up well before dawn.”

“Shamash keeps an eye on her.”

“So do all the men!”

“No one’s going to marry a Moabitess who’s already had a husband.”

“I would be sorry to see Ruth and her mother-in-law live out their days in that cave.”

“They live in a cave?”

“The one just below town where the shepherds keep their flocks in the winter. Didn’t you know?”

“I thought they lived in the city.”

“Naomi spends her time in the city, visiting with friends and bartering.”

“What about the house that belonged to her husband?”

“I heard my father say Naomi’s husband mortgaged it and all his land before taking the family to Moab.”

“Everybody is talking about them.”

“Especially about Ruth, I would imagine.”

“You’re jealous!”

“I’m not jealous!”

“Then why do you dislike her so much?”

“Foreign women rouse the worst kind of interest in our men.”

“Foreign women don’t make a habit of going to the synagogue.”

“Now you’re telling me she’s a proselyte?”

“Ruth attends every Sabbath with her mother-in-law, drinking in every word the priest reads from the Law. They stand at the back with the other widows. That’s probably why you haven’t noticed them. You’re up front near the screen where you can look through and see Netzer.”

“How you talk, Tirzah, when you’re no better, gawking at Lahad all day.”

“Can I help myself? He’s so handsome.”

The young women entered Bethlehem laughing together.

“He’s not married?” Naomi said in surprise, feeling a pang of guilt at this bit of information given to her by Sigal, a friend from years past. “What’s wrong with the man that he’s not taken a wife by this age?”

“Nothing.” Sigal poured grains of wheat onto the grinding stone. “He probably never had time to seek a wife. He’s poured his life into building up his estate. Boaz isn’t like other landowners. He’s out there in the fields every day. And when he’s not, he’s at the city gate helping settle disputes.”

“What good is an estate without sons to inherit?”

“He’s not in the grave yet, Naomi. He can still look for a wife, if he has a mind to do so. Believe me, there are plenty of fathers who would throw their daughters at Boaz if he broached the subject of marriage. He’s become the wealth-iest man in Bethlehem.”