Interpreting Interpreter: Gathering a Gentile Ruth

The Takeaway

Francisco outlines an interpretation of the story of Ruth where it represents Christ (Boaz) gathering in faithful gentiles (Ruth) into the House of Israel (the family of Naomi), helping to support and restore that house after it abandons its covenant status, as fulfilled via the Latter-day restoration of the Gospel.

The Summary

In this article, Jan Francisco explores the symbolism of the story of Ruth in the Old Testament. Likely written in the upheaval of the Babylonian exile, each of the characters has a plausible symbolic representation that tie them to the latter-day restoration of the gospel, with the characters’ names themselves supporting that symbolism. This includes:

• Naomi, meaning “pleasant one” “or delight”, who Francisco suggests represents the Israelites, becoming disconnected from their covenant connection to God via the death of her husband, Elimelech. Prior to his death, she and her husband leave Israel in a kind of “inverted exodus” that represents Israel’s apostasy.
  
• Elimelech, meaning “God is King”, and his marriage to Naomi making her “the delight of God”.
  
• Mahlon and Chilion, meaning “sickness” and “destruction” respectively, are Noami’s sons who marry Moabite wives—another indication of their rejection of God’s covenants.
  
• Orpah, meaning “obstinate, stiff of neck”, who marries one of Naomi’s sons, and who abandons Naomi when her sons die. She represents the gentile nations that turn their back on Israel and God’s covenant promises.
  
• Ruth, meaning “friend, female companion”, placing her in symbolic contrast with Orpah as a gentile who befriends and supports Naomi following the death of Ruth’s husband.
  
• Boaz, meaning “strength” and “swiftness”, the relative of Elimelech who acts as a redeeming kinsman—rescuing Ruth in a marriage that symbolizes the adoption of faithful gentiles into God’s covenant.
  

Ruth’s sacrifice and devotion to Boaz allows them to embody the concept of hesed, “kindness” or covenantal love, a love from which the kingly line of both David and Christ would come. This places the faithful gentiles in an important role in God’s kingdom, as predicted by Nephi in the Book of Mormon, helping to support and gather Israel as they are restored to their status as God’s covenant people. Francisco suggests that “The restoration of the Gospel through Joseph Smith and subsequent Latter-day prophets is the fulfillment of these prophecies”, in both a spiritual and geo-political sense—the nation of Israel and God’s kingdom have both been restored to the earth through the action of Gentiles.

As the traditional reading of the festival of Pentecost, the story of Ruth has been long connected with the symbolism of harvest and gathering, and the harvest in Boaz’s fields is an important part of the story’s plot. For Israel that harvest is conducted in phases as different crops mature, which can be symbolic of the phased gathering of souls into heaven’s storehouse. Francisco points to the day of Pentecost in the New Testament as the start of a new phase in which the Gentiles began to be gathered into God’s kingdom, fulfilling a centuries’ old promise foretold through Ruth’s story.

The Reflection

As the husband of someone who adores the story of Ruth (and who had “Ruth” on a short-list of baby names for the next generation of Rasmussen), I can appreciate the importance and prophetic nature of this narrative gem. We rightly emphasize the reality of the scriptural narrative—the literal nature of Christ’s resurrection and Nephi’s journey to the New World—but Ruth shows that fictional stories (of which Ruth is almost certainly one) can still be inspired, still be prophetic, and still point generations of Jews and Gentiles to their covenants and their God.