This word conveniently describes this unique quality of the judges. It derives from the Greek noun charisma, meaning a ‘free favour’, ‘gift’ or ‘endowment’, and was first used in this connection by the prominent German sociologist, Max Weber.
Cf. Noth, p. 42.
C. A. Simpson, The Composition of the Book of Judges (Blackwell, 1957), is one of the exceptions to this statement. The author claims to detect three main sources (J1, J2, and E), with a further subsidiary source (chapters 19–21) which he calls C. Few contemporary scholars would be so confident of tracing the underlying sources with such precision.
The usual designation for the region extending from Egypt, through Palestine, Syria and Mesopotamia to the Persian Gulf.
It has been observed that the point of view of the whole narrative is often called ‘deuteronomic’ because its finest expression is found in Deuteronomy. Our use of the adjective, however, does not automatically indicate an acceptance of a late date for the promulgation of Deuteronomy. There has been increasing support in recent years for an early date for Deuteronomy.
J. P. U. Lilley, ‘A Literary Appreciation of the Book of Judges’, in Tyndale Bulletin, 18, 1967, pp. 98f.
As well as the books listed in the Selected Bibliography the following may be consulted concerning the dating of the Exodus and Conquest. Supporting the fifteenth-century date for the Exodus are J. W. Jack, The Date of the Exodus, 1925, and T. H. Robinson, Expository Times, XLVII, 1935–6, pp. 53–55. Supporting the thirteenth-century date are C. F. Burney, Israel’s Settlement in Canaan (Schweich Lectures), 1917, and H. H. Rowley, From Joseph to Joshua (Schweich Lectures), 1948, pp. 11f. All three books listed in section 3 of the selected Bibliography support the later date.
The most reasonable explanation of the 480 years of 1 Kgs 6:1 is that it represents twelve generations, possibly the great national leaders Moses and Joshua, the six major judges, and Eli, Samuel, Saul and David. That this figure is approximately correct may be deduced from the priestly genealogies (1 Chr. 6) which note eleven or twelve generations.
W. M. Flinders Petrie, Egypt and Israel (SPCK, 1925), pp. 54ff.
Albright, p. 119.
Albright, pp. 117, 118.
A full discussion of this point will be found in the commentary on 8:22, 23 (see pp. 118–119).
D. J. Wiseman, ‘Archaeology’, in NBD, p. 70. The whole article is probably the best general introduction to the subject of biblical archaeology.
See also section c., below.
Myers, p. 776.
See p. 149.
See pp. 40ff.
A full discussion of these problems may be found in Burney, pp. cxxiiff.
See p. 21.
E. C. B. MacLaurin, in VT, XV. 4, 1965, pp. 468–474, produces strong reasons for assuming a connection between the sons of Anak and the Philistines.
An obvious problem is how a Canaanite city so close to David’s capital could remain uncaptured during his long and successful reign. It has been plausibly conjectured that the reference to Gezer should read Gerar, a town probably situated 11 miles south-east from Gaza and noted in Genesis 26:1, 8 (cf. Gen. 21:32, 34) as being in the ‘land of the Philistines’.
See J. A. Thompson, The Ancient Near Eastern Treaties and the Old Testament (Tyndale Press, 1964).
Cf. J. Gray, The Canaanites (Thames & Hudson, 1964). The author points out (p. 16) that the word ‘Canaanite’ denotes a culture rather than a distinct ethnic group, and covers the mainly Semitic population of Syria and Palestine in the second millennium BC.
Driver, p. 6.
See pp. 17ff.
See pp. 59–60.
D. J. Wiseman, ‘Mesopotamia’, in NBD, p. 811. See also J. J. Finkelstein, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, XXI, 1962, pp. 73–92.
Burney, p. 64.
See Introduction p. 34.
See Introduction, section 5. c., pp. 43ff.
Cf. Burney, p. 76.
See also K. A. Kitchen, Ancient Orient and Old Testament (Tyndale Press, 1966), pp. 67f.
J. P. U. Lilley, ‘Harosheth’, in NBD, p. 505.
Myers, p. 712.
Such coalitions are found frequently in this period, e.g. Josh. 9:17; 10:3; and the instance including Hazor itself in Josh. 11:1ff.
See p. 85.
See p. 91.
Albright, p. 117.
See p. 89.
Heb. gibbôr ḥayil. Since Jephthah (11:1) and Boaz (Ruth 2:1) are similarly described, this expression has been regarded as the designation of a military aristocracy ‘who owned and operated large plantations in time of peace, quite like the Homeric heroes’ (C. H. Gordon in a review, JSS, VIII, 1963, p. 93). But is there any evidence of vast estates until the time of the eighth-century prophets? Their condemnation of ‘land-grabbing’ rested upon the fact that Yahweh was the real landlord, with the individual Israelites holding their allotted portion as a sacred trust from Him.
Myers, p. 736.
Driver, p. 13.
Burney, p. 231.
Driver, p. 14.
See Introduction, section 5. c., pp. 43ff.
G. Henton Davies, ‘Judges 8:22–23’, in VT, XIII. 2, 1963, pp. 151–157.
See F. D. Kidner, Genesis (Tyndale Press, 1967), pp. 194f.; K. A. Kitchen, Ancient Orient and Old Testament (Tyndale Press, 1966), p. 119.
See W. F. Albright, The Biblical Period from Abraham to Ezra (Harper Torchbooks, 1963).
A. E. Cundall, ‘Sanctuaries in Pre-Exilic Israel’, in Vox Evangelica, IV (Epworth, 1965), pp. 12–17.
W. F. Albright, Archaeology and the Religion of Israel (John Hopkins Press, 1953), P. 113.
Bruce, p. 248.
See p. 32.
Quoted from G. A. Cooke, The Book of Judges (CUP, 1913), p. 148.
See Introduction, section 5. c., pp. 43ff.
Further information on the ‘solar-myth’ theory, which is rarely put forward today, may be found in Burney, pp. 391ff.
For a view which discerns a more complex stylistic arrangement in these chapters see J. Blenkinsopp, ‘Structure and Style in Judges 13–16’, in JBL, LXXXII, 1963, pp. 65–76.
The article ‘Sacrifice and Offering’, in NBD, pp. 1113ff., may be commended for further study.
See p. 150.
See Introduction, pp. 17ff.
R. de Vaux, Ancient Israel (Darton, Longman & Todd, 1962), p. 43.
See Introduction, section 5. c., p. 45.
See p. 156.
Burney, p. 366.
See Introduction, pp. 43ff.
Burney, p. 372.
See p. 134.
See Introduction, p. 27.
J. A. Motyer, ‘Curse’, in NBD, p. 283.
See p. 176.
Driver, p. 19.
DOTT, p. 124.
See F. D. Kidner, Genesis (Tyndale Press, 1967), pp. 143–147.
Cf. R. E. D. Clark, ‘The Large Numbers of the Old Testament’, in Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute, LXXXVII, 1955, pp. 82–92.
R. A. H. Gunner, in his article ‘Number’, in NBD, pp. 895–898, discusses fully the issues involved. See also J. W. Wenham, ‘The Large Numbers of the Old Testament’, in Tyndale Bulletin, 18, 1967, pp. 24ff.
Noth, p. 105.
DOTT, p. 216.
Driver, p. 20.
M. Noth comments, ‘But possibly at this early period an occasional change of the central place of worship was provided for because the Ark was formerly a travelling shrine which it was not intended should become the object of a local cult after the manner of the Canaanites’ (Noth, p. 94).
See, for example, his authoritative study entitled ‘Moabite Syntax’ in Orientalia, 35, 1966, pp. 81–120.
A. Weiser cites Goethe’s view that Ruth is ‘the loveliest complete work on a small scale’, and that of Rud. Alexander Schröder: ‘No poet in the world has written a more beautiful short story’ (Introduction to the Old Testament (Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961, p. 305).
Gerleman, p. 1.
Contra Apion, i. 8.
Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentliche Wissenschqft, XLVII, 1956, p. 201.
Op. cit., p. 199.
The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, ed. R. H. Charles, II (Oxford, 1963), p. 624. The point is made clear by H. B. Swete, An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek (Cambridge, 1902), pp. 220f.
Historia Ecclesiastica, iv. 26. 13f., cited from the Loeb edn., ed. K. Lake (Heinemann, 1926).
See the Note entitled ‘A Hebrew-Aramaic List of Books of the Old Testament in Greek Transcription’, by J.-P. Audet, Journal of Theological Studies, New Series, I, 1950, pp. 135–154.
The Cairo Geniza (Blackwell, 1959), p. 218.
Lattey, p. xxxviii.
Rudolph, p. 24.
Cf. W. W. Cannon, Theology, XVI, 1928, p. 318.
Lattey, p. 39.
Cassel, in loc.
D. J. Wiseman informs me that ‘Aramaic’ words are now known from the Middle Babylonian and Middle Assyrian period, c. 1400 BC! He points out that the evidence for early Aramaisms is abundant. Cf. the article, ‘Studies in Aramaic Lexicography’, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 82, 1962, pp. 290–299.
Old Testament Essays, papers read before the Society for Old Testament Study (Charles Griffin, 1927), p. 119.
KD, p. 469. Cf. Cassel: ‘The narrative exhibits life in its popular aspect, and probably makes use of popular forms of speech which to us seem Chaldaizing’ (Cassel, p. 6). ‘He makes his rustics talk in rustic fashion, while yet, when Boaz speaks on elevated subjects, the language rises to the level of the theme’ (ibid., p. 8).
Wright, p. 42.
Myers, p. 19.
Myers, p. 28. Cf. also A. Bentzen, ‘The Aramaisms in the book are not numerous enough to account for a late date’ (Introduction to the Old Testament, ii [Copenhagen, 1949], p. 185). Similarly S. R. Driver decides that the language does not point to a late date. It is classical, and ‘stands on a level with the best parts of Samuel’ (An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament [T. & T. Clark, 1909], p. 454). He gives it as his opinion that ‘the general beauty and purity of the style of Ruth point more decidedly to the pre-exilic period than do the isolated expressions quoted to the period after the exile’ (op. cit., p. 455). W. W. Cannon finds that the language, so far from indicating a post-exilic date, is ‘almost incompatible’ with it (op. cit., p. 317), while W. F. Albright says roundly, ‘a post-exilic date is impossible’ (Journal of Biblical Literature, LXI, 1942, p. 124).
Joüon, p. 11.
Rudolph, p. 28.
Lattey, p. xxxiv.
Learoyd, p. 214.
Myers, p. 4.
Ibid., p. 27. See also p. 222, n. 20 above.
Ibid., p. 20.
Ibid., p. 16.
Ibid., p. 10.
Ibid., p. 19.
Ibid., pp. 19f. We should add that the archaic character of these forms largely concerns morphology, the grammatical forms, rather than orthography, the spelling.
Cooke, p. xv.
Myers, p. 12.
Ibid., p. 20. F. I. Andersen speaks of ‘the alleged confusions of gender’ as ‘among the most authentic archaisms in the book’. Some he thinks of as ‘duals, used correctly, which have survived later normalization.’
Ibid., pp. 31f.
Ibid. p. 32.
Lattey, p. xxxiii.
Op. cit., p. xxxiv.
The references are given by H. H. Rowley, Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, p. 78, n. 4.
Rudolph, pp. 26–29.
Journal of Biblical Literature, LXI, 1942, p. 124.
Cooke maintains that ‘it argues a singular lack of imagination and literary insight to treat the Book of Ruth as a counterblast or manifesto … We may question whether Jewish readers in the time of Nehemiah would have detected a protest against his policy any more readily than we do in such a guileless piece of literature’ (Cooke, p. xiii).
Hertzberg, p. 258.
Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, p. 78.
Joüon, p. 6.
Herbert, p. 316.
KD, p. 469.
The Hebrew Literary Genius (Princeton, 1933), pp. 121, 122.
A problem is posed by the very first word of this book, namely, whether the book of Ruth was originally an appendage to some other writing or whether it existed from the first as a separate entity. The now of AV represents a Hebrew waw consecutive. In Hebrew narrative of past events the first verb is usually in the perfect tense, and succeeding verbs go into the imperfect with waw prefixed, but are understood as though they were perfects. (I am here, of course, using commonly accepted terms. I am not unmindful of G. R. Driver’s suggestion that the waw consecutive construction is the survival of an ancient preterite; cf. Problems of the Hebrew Verbal System (Edinburgh, 1936), pp. 85–97. If this is correct there is no reason why a book should not begin with the construction.) Here, however, we have waw + imperfect as the opening of the book and it is not surprising, accordingly, that some have suggested that originally something preceded. However, this phenomenon is not confined to Ruth. We find it also at the beginning of Leviticus, Numbers, Joshua, Judges, 1 Samuel, 2 Kings, Ezekiel, Esther, Nehemiah and 2 Chronicles. While it may well be that some of these books originally followed others and were not in origin complete wholes, it is difficult to think that this was so in every case. Davidson suggests that Hebrew showed a dislike for beginning a sentence without ‘and’ (HS, 136 RI). This is a possible explanation, though in point of fact there are many sentences which do just that. It is probably better to think that the waw consecutive construction so dominated the language that speakers and writers used it instinctively without stopping to inquire whether they were at the beginning of a narrative or not. This construction then is no reason for doubting that Ruth was always a unit.
See on this my The Biblical Doctrine of Judgment (Tyndale Press, 1960), chs. I, II.
Myers, p. 9. So also Rudolph. F. I. Andersen has no doubt about its being a singular. He points out that in this book an individual ‘field’ is ḥelqat-haśśădeh.
In letter No. 290 there is a reference to ‘a town of the land of Jerusalem, Bit-Lahmi by name’ (cited from Ancient Near Eastern Texts, ed. J. B. Pritchard [Princeton, 1955], p. 489). This almost certainly refers to our Bethlehem, and in a form favouring a meaning ‘house of Lahmi’. But this is scarcely sufficient to establish the point.
W. E. Staples brings the names into an argument to show that the book is to be explained in terms of the fertility cults (American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, LIII, 1937, pp. 145–157). This whole thesis is most unconvincing and few have been persuaded.
In these verses there are some grammatical points of interest. Although the reference is to women, there are masculine forms both for the suffixes denoting the personal pronouns and also for the verb. Similar forms are found in verses 11, 13, 19, 22; 4:11 and cf. ḥayyîm in 2:20. Some hold that this indicates a late date for the book when there was a weakening of grammatical gender. But this is not proved and as, in any case, grammarians seem agreed that the masculine was the prior gender, the point does not prove much. F. I. Andersen gives his opinion that these forms ‘are perfectly good Old Hebrew duals (common gender and so distinguishable from plurals in consonantal writing only for feminines)’. They may be colloquial forms (except for 1:19, 22 all are in conversation). All that can be said with certainty is that the forms are not used with the precision required in later times. The verb rendered that ye may find is unusual. It is a feminine imperative but, very exceptionally, lacks the final he. We might have expected a jussive in this place, but the imperative is somewhat more vigorous.
This appears to be the distinctive Old Testament idea. Levirate marriage was widespread in the Ancient Near East and there is an extensive literature. See particularly H. H. Rowley, ‘The Marriage of Ruth’, Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, pp. 77–99, and the literature there cited; M. Burrows, The Basis of Israelite Marriage (American Oriental Society, 1938), ‘The Ancient Oriental Background of Hebrew Levirate Marriage’, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 77, Feb. 1940, pp. 2–15; E. Neufeld, Ancient Hebrew Marriage Laws (Longmans, 1944), pp. 23–55; H. Granqvist, ‘Marriage Conditions in a Palestinian Village’, ii (Commentationes Humanarum Litterarum, Helsingfors, 1935), pp. 303–310. H. H. Rowley cites Morgenstern on levirate marriage as a means of raising up a son to the deceased. ‘This is an altogether new motif, not without occasional, though not frequent, parallels in the marriage practice of other, non-Semitic peoples, but entirely without parallel in Semitic practice, at least so far as present evidence goes. It is this motif which is characteristically Israelite, and which indicates that the institution of levirate marriage must have had an independent development in Israel’ (Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, p. 82, n. 21). In Rabbinic times levirate marriage does not appear to be required with a Gentile woman (Yeb. 2:5), but there is no reason for thinking that this attitude is as old as the book of Ruth.
Lattey, p. xxxvii.
Miscellanea Orientalia, dedicata Antonio Deimel annosLXXcomplenti (Pontificio Istituto Biblico, 1935), pp. 64–66. Myers also doubts whether this is Aramaic. He notes the possibility and proceeds, ‘but in view of LXX reading and the constant confusion of gender in Ruth that cannot be proved’ (Myers, p. 27).
Simeon, p. 91.
D. J. Wiseman informs me that the same formula is found at Mari and Alalakh in the eighteenth century BC.
There are some minor grammatical peculiarities. Thus the pronoun they is masculine in form, though referring to two woman (or it may be dual; see note on 1:8, 9). The form rendered which returned in the consonantal text appears to be the participle preceded by the article. The Massoretes, however, inserted the vowels of the perfect, a tense which could not have the article. The reason for this is far from clear, unless it is that they wanted to bring out the past tense. Joüon thinks that they have given the article the value of a relative pronoun.
J. Mauchline in Documents from Old Testament Times, ed. D. Winton Thomas (Nelson, 1958), p. 201. Mauchline speaks of the Calendar as ‘the most ancient inscription in Early Hebrew writing, as old as the age of Saul or David’ (ibid.). J. B. Segal dates it in ‘the tenth to ninth century, the period to which it is already assigned by most scholars’ (Journal of Semitic Studies, VII, 1962, p. 218).
‘A New Interpretation of the Divine Name “Shaddai” ’, Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 72, 1960, pp. 64–66.
Op. cit., p. 66.
Titles of the Triune God (Marshall, Morgan & Scott, 1955), p. 38.
Genesis, International Critical Commentary (T. & T. Clark, 1951), pp. 290f.
S. R. Driver could say, ‘The real meaning of Shaddai is extremely uncertain, neither tradition nor philology throwing any certain light upon it’; ‘as regards the real meaning of Shaddai, we are entirely in the dark: neither Hebrew nor any of the cognate Semitic languages offers any convincing explanation of it’ (The Book of Genesis [Methuen, 1904], pp. 404, 406). The choice of this word he sees as due sometimes at any rate to the thought of God’s power either in the way of blessing and protection, or of punishment.
As is often the case the verb lqṭ is followed by bĕ (cf. RSV, glean among the ears). This is classed by BDB (sub lqṭ) as b loc. or partitive, i.e. it designates the place where the gleaning is carried on, or that one gleans some of the ears. The former is unsatisfactory for one gleans ears, not among ears, so we accept the latter. Joüon, however, rejects this in favour of what he calls ‘bĕ participatif’, i.e. ‘I will work at the gleaning of the ears’. W. L. Moran points out that Ugaritic use has clarified our understanding of certain Hebrew prepositions, and specifically that it shows that the preposition bĕ is often used where we would say ‘from’ (The Bible and the Ancient Near East, ed. G. E. Wright [New York, 1961], p. 61).
The Land and the Book (Nelson, 1880), p. 648.
See T. J. Meek, Journal of Biblical Literature, LXXXI, 1962, p. 153.
TWNT, iv, p. 331. C. Ryder Smith thinks that ‘to do the part of a kinsman’ is the best translation of the verb, and he comments, ‘One could wish that there were some such English verb as “to kinsman” ’ (The Bible Doctrine of Salvation [Epworth, 1946], p. 19). Interestingly he thinks that ‘The Book of Ruth is largely based on the idea’ (ibid.). Lattey thinks that ‘The primary function of the Goel was to represent the clan in the assertion of its rights and duties; his first duty was towards the clan, in virtue of his solidarity with it’ (Lattey, p. xv). Lattey’s whole discussion is valuable. So also is that of A. R. Johnson in Supplements to Vetus Tastamentum, I (Brill, 1953), pp. 67–77, though he probably goes too far in his idea that the word group has to do with protection.
G. R. Driver has produced evidence to show that the verbs ‘go up’ and ‘go down’ may occasionally be used in the senses ‘go up country’, i.e. ‘northwards’ and ‘go down country’, i.e., ‘southwards’ (Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 69, 1957, pp. 74–77). It is thus possible that in the present passage the meaning is that the threshing-floor lay to the south of Bethlehem. But the passages Driver cites are few and the use exceptional. It is more likely that we should understand our verse to mean that the threshing-floor was below the level of Bethlehem itself.
The Hebrew Literary Genius (Princeton, 1933), p. 122.
See E. Neufeld, Ancient Hebrew Marriage Laws (Longmans, 1944), pp. 31f. There is also the well-known statement of Ṭabari quoted by W. Robertson Smith, ‘In the Jāhilĭya, when a man’s father or brother or son died and left a widow, the dead man’s heir, if he came at once and threw his garment over her, had the right to marry her under the dowry (mahr) of (i.e. already paid by) her (deceased) lord (ṣāḥib), or to give her in marriage and take her dowry. But if she anticipated him and went off to her own people, then the disposal of her hand belonged to herself’ (Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia [Black, 1903], p. 105).
Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 144, December 1956, p. 21. He draws attention to the Akkadian bābtu, familiar in the Code of Hammurabi in the sense, ‘district, quarter’, and which ‘is known to be an extension of bābu “entrance, gate” ’ (loc. cit.). The Akkadian, I am told, more commonly refers to a ‘ward’ or ‘quarter’ of a city, but bābu may have a meaning rather like that in the present passage. The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary cites, for example, a passage referring to ‘the people of Ugarit … together with the aliens living within their gates’ (op. cit., B, p. 23).
D. J. Wiseman points out that the omission of the standard of measure is common in Semitic languages generally (cf. Deut. 22:29). Thus in the Alalakh tablets the term ‘shekels’ is normally omitted when listing amounts of money. See his The Alalakh Tablets (The British Institute of Archeology at Ankara, London, 1953), p. 13.
The Hebraist will notice that the first dābār (the matter) lacks the article, while the second (the thing) has it. The article on the second occasion is explicable as referring back to the first instance. But it is curious that the first is without the article.
L. Köhler brings out the importance of the gate in an Appendix entitled ‘Justice in the Gate’ in Hebrew Man (SCM, 1956), pp. 149–175.
Ancient Israel: its Life and Institutions (Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), p. 54. He contrasts the Babylonian and Nuzi usage.
Ancient Hebrew Marriage Laws (Longmans, 1944), pp. 240f.
Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, p. 89, n. 45.
See M. Tsevat, Hebrew Union College Annual, XXIX, 1958, p. 112. In Babylon it appears that a widow had a life interest in her dead husband’s estate (G. R. Driver and J. C. Miles, The Babylonian Laws, I [Oxford, 1952], pp. 334f.). Among the Assyrians the widow could not inherit (G. R. Driver and J. C. Miles, The Assyrian Laws [Oxford, 1935], pp. 238f.). There was clearly a wide divergence of custom in the ancient world, with a tendency to restrict the rights of the widow. The diversity makes it difficult to reason from the custom elsewhere to that in Israel.
Knight, p. 37.
Rudolph is of opinion that a brother was obliged to marry the widow of the deceased, but that a more remote kinsman was under no obligation. He might do so if he chose (Rudolph, p. 62).
Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 77 (February, 1940), pp. 15–18. E. R. Lacheman also makes use of the Nuzi texts, citing passages which indicate change of ownership, etc., like ‘My foot from my fields and houses I have lifted up, and the foot of Urhi-Sharri I have placed’ (this text concerns a mortgage rather than a sale). The pulling off of the shoe he sees as a further development of the same idea (Journal of Biblical Literature, LVI, 1937, pp. 53–56).
E. Neufeld thinks that this was part of the actual marriage ceremony and he cites Gen. 24:60 and Tobit 10:11f. as further examples of the same thing (Ancient Hebrew Marriage Laws (Longmans, 1944), p. 150). But it is difficult to see the marriage ceremony in any of the three examples cited. In fact we have very little information as to how a marriage ceremony was performed in ancient Israel.
This is accepted by H. H. Rowley (Harvard Theological Review, XL, 1947, pp. 98f.). This verse is strangely overlooked by many commentators who affirm the genealogy to be a late addition partly on the grounds that the book elsewhere does not regard Obed as the son of Boaz. Plainly the villagers did look for a son who would belong to Boaz and establish his ‘house’.
