book of ruth – Feminism and Religion

I spend a lot of time on Zoom these days and my current life in New York City is not tremendously familiar to me. Home schooling, uncertainty about work, and concern for relatives are all part of my world right now. So I’ve been keeping myself sane, between the various kinds of curve balls thrown by social distancing, by walking in the park. I now know when everything comes into season. I’ve watched the cherry blossoms bloom and the wisteria flower and the magnolia petals fall. In this time, I’ve become more in tune with the piece of land I live on and its cycles. And that helps me tune in to the mysteries of the Book of Ruth.

The Jewish holiday of Shavuot, first fruits festival and season of the giving of Torah, begins this Thursday night. It is a custom that during this holiday, Jews read the story of the giving of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. And, there is also another story read: the book of Ruth. The book of Ruth tells of a family who finds support and shelter at the time of the grain harvest, and Shavuot is a grain harvest festival. The book of Ruth also describes the journey of Ruth to join the Israelite people, and so it is often understood as a conversion story. The reason I love to read the Book of Ruth at this time is because I understand this story to have undercurrents out of Near Eastern myth—the joining of a priestess and a king, and the return from death to life. While Ruth is usually seen as a devoted daughter-in-law, a feminist analysis might see her as the engine for redemption. Continue reading “Ruth the Priestess: Redemption and the Returning Grain by Jill Hammer”

The Trouble with Boaz (1)

I’ve always been troubled by the story of Boaz found in the Book of Ruth. While there are plenty of biblical narratives that horrify me–Hagar, Tamar, and other “texts of terror” as Phyllis Trible called them–the story of Boaz is uniquely problematic in how it has been interpreted and applied by some Christian traditions, particularly among evangelicals. What is so insidious about this biblical re-telling is how the relationship between Boaz, a wealthy landowner, and Ruth, a foreign widow, is idealized as some kind of romantic love story.

Ruth and Boaz social media meme

Waiting for your Boaz is a popular blogging platform among single white evangelical women who desire a husband. Their Facebook page alone has nearly 300,000 likes. For purchase on the main site is a book entitled 31 Days of Prayer for your Future Husband: Becoming a Wife Before the Wedding Day. The premise of Waiting for your Boaz is that if single women quit searching for a husband (i.e. dating) and pray for one instead, God will “write your love story” and like a matchmaker, will bring them one eventually.

While there are many troubling theological issues at play in this framework, for this particular piece I will focus on the cooption of the biblical narrative to uphold a worldview in which the fate of women is left to the whims of men and a male God.

In the biblical narrative Boaz is the distant relative of Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law. When the women are widowed suddenly and thus left destitute, they return to Naomi’s homeland in Bethlehem. (Orpah, Naomi’s other daughter-in-law who is also a widow, remains in Moab.) With no other known male relatives available to help them, Boaz is the women’s only hope for sustenance. He permits Ruth to glean the leftover crops after his fields have been harvested and instructs the workers not to bother her while she gathers food. While I acknowledge that Boaz acts kindly–or at least neutrally–toward Ruth, we ought not forget the immense power dynamics at play: Boaz is a native, wealthy, land-owning man while Ruth is a foreign, widowed woman with no rights.

At no other point in the narrative is this difference in power more evident than when Naomi insists that Ruth put herself at even greater risk–again for their collective well-being–by offering herself sexually to a drunk Boaz in the hopes that doing so might result in their continued protection.

This is not a fairytale. This is a story of survival.

In the end Boaz does offer Ruth and thus Naomi his protection through marriage. For two widows with no rights whatsoever, this is the best possible outcome, but it comes at great cost: namely Ruth’s bodily safety and autonomy which are threatened not only by her being a foreign woman working in the field, but also by her own mother-in-law’s admonition that Ruth offer herself as sexual collateral.

Single women ought to be praying for this? I think not.

Ruth does not wait. She cannot wait. Like many women, both ancient and contemporary, she uses what little power she has to do what is necessary in order to stay alive at great risk to her personal safety. Instead of admiring Boaz and his benevolent paternalism, our focus ought to be on removing the restrictions and confronting the injustices that leave women like Ruth and Naomi in such desperate circumstances in the first place.

Katey Zeh, M.Div is a strategist, writer, and speaker who inspires communities to create a more just, compassionate world. She has written for outlets including Huffington Post, Sojourners, Religion Dispatches, Response magazine, the Good Mother Project, the Journal for Feminist Studies in Religion, and the United Methodist News Service. She is the co-host of Kindreds, a podcast for soul sisters. Her book Women Rise Up will be published by the FAR Press in March of 2018. Find her on Twitter at @kateyzeh or on her website kateyzeh.com.