A Marriage Made in Heaven – Part I

[This is part of the A Marriage Made In Heaven Series. Have you seen the other posts yet?]

One of the smaller books of the Bible is the book of Ruth. In one sense, it can be a really beautiful love story of a young widow who finds love. However, there is so much more to the story if you really understand what is going on. It is a small book, but jam-packed with meaning and background. As such, I’m going to break up the study into at least two parts.

In this post, I think it’s worthwhile to give some background information on the law of levirate marriage as well as other supporting information. Some of this may not make sense since it is out of context, but it will make sense when we start discussing Ruth.

Background on the Moabites

When God was giving the people the law in Deuteronomy, he gave certain commands with regard to who can be admitted into the assembly. One law is:

“No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the Lord; none of their descendants, even to the tenth generation, shall ever enter the assembly of the Lord, because they did not meet you with food and water on the way when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you. Nevertheless, the Lord your God was not willing to listen to Balaam, but the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing for you because the Lord your God loves you. You shall never seek their peace or their prosperity all your days.” –Deuteronomy 23:3-6.

Just a few points on this to keep in mind. First, the masculine forms of “Ammonite” and “Moabite” is meant here, which infers that females from Ammon and Moab can enter the assembly through marriage. Ruth is a Moabitess.

Secondly, who were the Moabites? In Genesis, we are introduced to Lot, who is Abraham’s nephew. Lot was the man who separated from Abraham and went to Sodom and Gomorrah. You may also recall it was Lot’s wife, after escaping from the destruction of the city, looked back and was turned into a pillar of salt. In any event, Lot had daughters who, unfortunately, got caught up in the “lifestyle” of Sodom and Gomorrah. These girls decided to get their father drunk and, through incest, conceived sons. The oldest daughter gave birth to a son she named “Moab,” a name meaning “from the father.” This is the ancestor of Ruth.

Law of Levirate Marriage

God, in His infinite wisdom, gave laws to protect those who would be at risk or weak in Israel. One such protection is the law of levirate (from the Latin meaning “husband’s brother”) marriage.

“When brothers live together and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a strange man. Her husband’s brother shall go in to her and take her to himself as wife and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her. It shall be that the firstborn whom she bears shall assume the name of his dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out from Israel. But if the man does not desire to take his brother’s wife, then his brother’s wife shall go up to the gate to the elders and say, ‘My husband’s brother refuses to establish a name for his brother in Israel; he is not willing to perform the duty of a husband’s brother to me.’ Then the elders of his city shall summon him and speak to him. And if he persists and says, ‘I do not desire to take her,’ then his brother’s wife shall come to him in the sight of the elders, and pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face; and she shall declare, ‘Thus it is done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.’ In Israel his name shall be called, ‘The house of him whose sandal is removed.’” –Deuteronomy 25:5-10.

It’s a long passage, but there are a few items to mention. First, it was a great tragedy in Israel to die with no descendants. If you think about it, although God is sovereign and would have found a way around it, let’s say Ruth didn’t have any children. That means that David’s grandfather would not have been born, which means David would not have been born which means–theoretically–Christ would not have been born. It’s hypothetical of course, but the point being heirs were, and still are, important today. This law sought to prevent any loss in a bloodline. We will explore how vital this law will become for Ruth.

The other point to mention is the removing of the sandal and spitting in the face. While the former seems a little odd, both sought to bring the brother who refused into open shame, based on what we just mentioned about keeping the bloodline going. Refusing to give your dead brother an heir was most shameful. God Himself passed this law down to the people! That’s how serious it is.

Gleaning

God also commanded the people with regard to harvesting their crops. God told the people that they were to leave some grain for the needy to allow them to glean.

“When you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it; it shall be for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow, in order that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.” –Deuteronomy 24:19

Also,

“When you reap the harvest of your land, moreover, you shall not reap to the very corners of your field nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the needy and the alien. I am the Lord your God.” –Leviticus 23:22

This was God’s divine protection for the poor and those that could not buy or own grain fields for themselves. We will see how vital this law becomes. In fact, we’ll see how this quaint law becomes strategic in the lineage of Christ Himself!

Kinsman-Redeemer

Through levirate marriage, the man that takes his brother’s widow, is the kinsman-redeemer, or “goel” or “ga’al.” The responsibilities of this person include:

1. Redeeming family property that had changed ownership, and
2. Marrying a childless widow to raise up children in her dead husband’s name.

It could also include: redeeming from slavery or exacting vengeance. We talked about the latter in the Cities of Refuge post. This role is so vital to understand because it is permeated throughout the Bible from God redeeming Israel from slavery in Egypt, to redeeming them from slavery in Babylon, to Jesus redeeming us from slavery to sin, to eventually Jesus redeeming the earth from Satan at His Second Coming in Revelation chapter 5.

Now that we’ve covered some background, we can go through Ruth and see all of this at work.

Question: have you sought to be redeemed by The Redeemer, Jesus Christ? If not, you can. He is willing and able to redeem you from sin this very moment. You just need to call upon Him.

[This is part of the A Marriage Made In Heaven Series. Have you seen the other posts yet?]

May He Increase!