Ruth 4:7

_NOW THIS WAS THE MANNER IN FORMER TIME IN ISRAEL CONCERNING REDEEMING AND CONCERNING CHANGING, FOR TO CONFIRM ALL THINGS; A MAN PLUCKED OFF HIS SHOE, AND GAVE IT TO HIS NEIGHBOUR: AND THIS WAS A TESTIMONY IN ISRAEL._ A man plucked off his shoe. Where the kinsman refused to perform his duty to the family of his deceased relation, his widow was directed to pull off the shoe, with some attendant circumstances of contemptuous disdain. But as in this case there was no refusal, the usual ignominy was spared, and the plucking off the shoe the only ceremony observed, as a pledge of the transaction being completed. The symbolical import of the observance was, that the party surrendered his interest in the land by giving another his shoe, wherein he used himself to walk, in order that he to whom he gave it might enter in and take possession of it. The use of the shoe as a token of right or conve...

1-8 This matter depended on the laws given by Moses about inheritances, and doubtless the whole was settled in the regular and legal manner. This kinsman, when he heard the conditions of the bargain, refused it. In like manner many are shy of the great redemption; they are not willing to espouse religion; they have heard well of it, and have nothing to say against it; they will give it their good word, but they are willing to part with it, and cannot be bound to it, for fear of marring their own inheritance in this world. The right was resigned to Boaz. Fair and open dealing in all matters of contract and trade, is what all must make conscience of, who would approve themselves true Israelites, without guile. Honesty will be found the best policy....

Verse Ruth 4:7. _A MAN PLUCKED OFF HIS SHOE_] The law of such a case is given at large in Deuteronomy 25:5. It was simply this: If a brother, who had married a wife, died without children, the eldest brother was to take the widow, and raise up a family to the brother deceased; and he had a right to redeem the inheritance, if it had been alienated. But if the person who had the right of redemption would not take the woman, she was to pull off his shoe and spit in his face, and he was ever after considered as a disgraced man. In the present case the _shoe_ only is taken off, probably because the circumstances of the man were such as to render it _improper_ for him to redeem the ground and take Ruth to his wife; and because of this reasonable excuse, the _contemptuous_ part of the ceremony is...

IN FORMER TIME IN ISRAEL - Showing that the custom was obsolete in the writer’s days. The letter of the law (see the marginal reference) was not strictly followed. It was thought sufficient for the man to pull off his own shoe and give it to the man to whom he ceded his right, in the presence of the elders of his city....

EXPOSITION RUTH 4:1 AND BOAZ WENT UP, TO THE GATE, AND SAT THERE. He "went up," for the city stood, as it still stands, on a ridge (see on Ruth 1:1; Ruth 3:6). "And sat there," on one of the stones, or stone benches, that were set for the accommodation of the townsfolk. The gateway in the East often corresponded, as a place of meeting, to the forum, or the market-place, in the West. Boaz had reason to believe that his kinsman would be either passing out to his fields, or passing in from his threshing-floor, through the one gate of the city. AND LO, THE KINSMAN OF WHOM BOAZ HAD SPOKEN WAS PASSING; AND HE SAID, HO, SUCH A ONE I TURN HITHER AND SIT HERE. And he turned and sat down. Boaz

NOW THIS WAS THE MANNER IN FORMER TIME IN ISRAEL CONCERNING REDEEMING,.... It is a custom, and not a law, that seems here referred to, when an estate was bought and sold; not the law in Leviticus 25:25, though that respects the redemption of an estate by a near kinsman, yet no such manner was enjoined as here practised afterwards, made mention of; nor the law in Deuteronomy 25:5 which does not concern the redemption of estates, nor a kinsman's marrying the widow of a deceased kinsman, but a brother's marrying the widow of a deceased brother, and the rites and ceremonies there enjoined upon refusal are different from those here used; though Josephus i is express for it, that the law is here referred to; but this is not only concerning purchase of estates, but "concerning changing" also one field f

CHAPTER 4 THE REDEMPTION AND MARRIAGE _ 1. The other kinsman (Ruth 4:1)_ 2. His refusal (Ruth 4:6) 3. Boaz's redemption (Ruth 4:9) 4. The marriage (Ruth 4:11) 5. Naomi's happiness (Ruth 4:14) 6. The ancestry of David (Ruth 4:18) And now the other redeemer, who cannot redeem, appears. Boaz sits in the gate and hails the one whom he knew as he passeth by. He calls him not by name but said, “Ho, such a one! turn aside, and sit down here.” If Boaz had not called

RUTH 4. RUTH'S MARRIAGE. Ruth 4:1. Instead of such an one! Boaz called the person's actual name, which the narrator either does not know or does not see any need for bringing into the story. Ruth 4:2. The elders of the city are called in as witnesses of an important transaction affecting the rights of a family. For selleth we ought to read hath sold. The point is that the property had passed out of the family's hands and required to be redeemed. Ruth 4:5. Here the meaning is entirely missed in our translation. Read, Thou buyest Ruth also (_cf._ Ruth 4:10). Marriage by purchase was the ancient Semitic practice, but no more is meant here than t

A MAN. Hebrew. _'ish_. App-14. A custom that grew up outside the Law....

_in former time in Israel_ Cf. 1 Samuel 9:9, which begins similarly. Driver (_Introd._8, p. 455) thinks that the present verse is also an explanatory gloss, because it is not needed in the narrative, and has the appearance of being a later addition; see, however, the Introduction, p. xiv. _a man drew off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour_ This old custom was not altogether intelligible in the writer's day, so he gives an explanation of it. When _property was transferred_, as in the present case, to take off the sandal and hand it to the person in whose favour the transfer is made, gave a symbolic attestation to the act and invested it with legal validity (Driver, _Deut._, p. 283). The same symbolism was used on other occasions, and with varying significance. Thus, when a deceased husband's brother declined to contract a levirate marriage, the widow loosed his sandal