The Expositor's Bible: Judges and Ruth

Yet suppose Ruth had not been married to Boaz or to any other good and wealthy man, would she have been less admirable and deserving? We attribute nothing to accident. In the providence of God Boaz was led to an admiration for Ruth and Naomi's plan succeeded. But it might have been otherwise. There is nothing, after all, so striking in her faith that we should expect her to be singled out for special honour; and she is not. The divine reward of goodness is the peace of God in the soul, the gladness of fellowship with Him, the opportunity of learning His will and dispensing His grace. It is interesting to note that Ruth's son Obed was the father of Jesse and the grandfather of David. But was Ruth not also the ancestress of the sons of Zeruiah, of Absalom, Adonijah and Rehoboam? Even though looking down the generations we see the Messiah born of her line, how can that glorify Ruth? or, if it does, how shall we explain the want of glory of many an estimable and godly woman who fighting a battle harder than Ruth's, with clearer faith in God, lived and died in some obscure village of Naphtali or dragged out a weary widowhood on the borders of the Syrian desert?

Yet there is a sense in which the history of Ruth stands at the gates of the gospel. It bears the lesson that Jehovah acknowledged all who did justly and loved mercy and walked humbly with Him. The foreign woman was justified by faith, and her faith had its reward when she was accepted as one of Jehovah's people and knew Him as her gracious Friend. Israel had in this book the warrant for missionary work among the pagan nations and a beautiful apologue of the reconciliation the faith of Jehovah was to effect among the severed families of mankind. The same faith is ours, but with deeper urgency, the same spirit of reconciliation reaching now to farther mightier issues. We have seen the Goël of the race and have heard His offer of redemption. We are commissioned to those who dwell in the remotest borders of the moral world under oppressions of heathenism and fear or wander in strange Moabs of confusion where deep calleth unto deep. We have to testify that with One and One only are the light, the joy, the completeness of man, because He alone among sages and helpers has the secret of our sin and weakness and the long miracle of the soul's redemption. "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation: and lo, I am with you." The faith of the Hebrew is more than fulfilled. Out of Israel He comes our Menuchah, Who is "an hiding place from the wind and a covert from the tempest, as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land."

INDEX

Achsah, 20.

Adoni-bezek, 12.

Adventurer, the, 211.

Agnosticism, 156.

Altars, local, 338.

Amalek, 78.

Amorites, 64.

Angel of Jehovah, 147.

Ascendency of races, 14.

Astarte, 52.

Baal, 52.

Baal-berith, the modern, 221.

Baal-peor, 51.

Balaam, 70.

Barak, the Lightning Chief, 99;

agreement with Deborah, 122.

Barbarism, the new, 140.

Bethlehem, 364.

Canaan, its population, 6;

central position, 6;

degeneracy of its people, 8;

god of, 52.

Character, national, 205;

of Arabs, 239;

decision of, 378.

Charity, careless, 399.

Christ, the Strengthener, 42, 43;

and the inquirer, 124;

and the church, 152, 177;

critics of, 154;

personal pledge to, 160, 383;

enemies of, 181;

priesthood of, 208;

kingship of, 228;

sacrifice of, 251, 332;

manliness of, 264;

the temple, 343;

His teaching as to wealth, 388.

Christianity secularized, 330.

Church, the opposition to, 79, 82;

leaders in, 123;

custody of truth by, 124;

world in, 133;

elation of, 139;

right spirit of, 152;

confusion in, 171;

national, 176;

attacks upon, 186;

perpetual duty of, 353.

Completeness of life, 416.

Compromise, 88, 402;

with heathens, 98.

Concentration, 175;

and breadth, 275.

Conscience, correlative of power, 303;

and life, 353, 354;

insanity of, 357.

Conversion, 27, 159;

imperfect, 41;

helped by circumstances, 158;

complete, 160;

Ruth's, 381.

Co-partnery, with the world, 220;

between Hebrew and Philistine, 284.

Creed, the old, 172.

Culture, 20, 88;

affecting religion, 228.

Cushan-rishathaim, 69.

Custom, old, why recorded, 408.

Danite migration, 340.

Date of Book of Ruth, 409.

Deborah, 91;

inspiration of, 96, 102, 108;

her wisdom, 100;

not unmerciful, 117;

her judgeship, 135.

Dependents, duty to, 414.

Dependence, ignoble, 297.

Divine judgment, 11;

of Meroz the prudent, 132.

Divine Vindicator, the, 394.

Doubt, religious, 26.

Earth-force in man, 149.

Ecclesiasticism, 167, 201.

Education, 273.

Ehud, 83.

Emigration, 366.

Entanglements, base, 301.

Equipment for life, 184.

Evil, despotic, 287.

Evolution, spiritual, 4, 85, 109.

Ezra, 38.

Faint yet pursuing, 191.

Faith, development of, 4;

conflicts of, 27;

link between generations, 49;

army of, 128;

recuperative power of, 141;

power through, 203;

ebb and flow of, 233;

saves, not doing, 300;

courage forced on, 347.

Fidelity depends on religion, 405.

Fittest, survival of, 9.

Fleece, Gideon's, 169.

Freedom, cradle of faith, 85, 86, 90;

right of the rude, 258.

Free-lance, 304.

Gibeah, crime of, 348

Gideon, 144;

his fleece, 169;

his three hundred, 173;

kingship refused by, 196;

his caution, 197;

desire for priesthood, 198;

his ephod-dealing, 202;

a storm of God, 204.

Gilead, its vigour, 235.

God with man, 146.

Goël, duty of, 398.

Gospel, at the gates of, 420.

Heathenism, rites of, 53.

Hebrews, language of, 31;

intermixture with Canaanites, 68;

national spirit of, 234.

Heroism, 149.

History, key to, 5, 295.

Hittites, 65.

Honey from the carcase, 289.

Humanity, priesthood of, 208.

Ideal, of life, 29;

for Israel, 48, 242.

Idolatry, 33;

unpardonable, 49.

Intolerance, moral, 354.

Israel, mission of, 13;

oppressed by Cushan-rishathaim, 72;

by Jabin, 92;

by Midianites, 137;

tribes of, 97, 132, 167;

its idea of Jehovah, 107, 118;

superiority of, 55, 69, 90.

Jael, 103, 134;

her tragic moment, 105.

Jealousy, tribal, 255.

Jebusites, 28.

Jephthah, the outlaw, 235;

chosen leader, 236;

his peaceful policy, 240;

his vow, 243;

his daughter, 247.

Jerusalem, 15.

Joash of Abiezer, 156.

Joshua, 45.

Jotham's parable, 214.

Judges, their vindication, 57.

Justice, passion for, 58;

human effort for, 104;

should be open, 412.

Kenites, 24.

Kingship, refused by Gideon, 196.

Kiriath-sepher, 18.

Leaders, uncalled, 163.

Leadership, incomplete, 161.

Levites, 338.

Life, the law of, 294, 299;

hindrances to, 296;

fear hindering, 297;

complete, 314.

Literature, 19;

Danites of, 345, 346.

Love, 380.

Luz, 28.

Marriage, 20;

a failure? 24;

rash experiments in, 284.

Marriages, mixed, 38.

Master-strokes in providence, 158.

Meroz, 132.

Micah, 335.

Midianites, 137, 195.

Missionary spirit, 137.

Moab, 77, 367.

Moderatism, 166.

Monotheism, 32.

Moral intolerance, 354.

Moses, 13, 19.

Motherhood, 268.

National church, 176.

Nature, God revealed in, 111-15;

and supernatural, 266.

Nature-cult, 42, 418.

Nazirite vow, 276.

Nomadism, religious, 25.

Opportunism, 166.

Organized vice, 179.

Orpah, 376.

Othniel, 22, 73.

Parentage, 271.

Past, the, returning, 71;

lessons of, 410.

Pastors, unspiritual, 344.

Patriotism, religious, 226.

Personal ends engrossing, 136.

Personality, 15;

in religion, 379.

Pessimism, 230.

Pharisaism, 39;

danger of, 356.

Philistines, 26, 62.

Philistinism, 310, 329.

Phœnicians, 63.

Polygamy, 21, 351.

Polytheism, its development, 54.

Prayer, 142, 143, 231.

Predestination, 269.

Priesthood, Gideon's desire for, 198;

true, 206;

Roman Catholic, 246.

Prophets, unrecognized, 162;

their preparation, 270.

Prosperity, misunderstood, 388.

Providence, imperfect instruments of, 58, 84.

Public office, 216.

Purity, 350.

Reconciliation, religion always for, 395.

Reformer, his character, 153.

Reformation, the true, 155.

Religion, emotional, 130;

and the state, 36, 75.

Remnant, the godly, 126, 131.

Repentance, imperfect, 40.

Responsibility, 300;

in advising, 370.

Retribution, 138.

Rich, obligations of, 390.

Rights and duties, 30, 256.

Ruth, her choice, 377;

conversion of 381;

goodness commending her, 392;

her danger, 401;

her marriage, 416.

Sacred places, 33.

Salvation, personal, 151.

Samson, his loneliness, 279;

boyhood of, 280;

character of, 281;

his marriage, 290;

his riddle, 291;

no reformer, 308.

Schism, 342, 345.

Science, dogmatism of, 112;

Danites of, 345.

Self-respect, 312.

Self-sacrifice, 249, 331, 333.

Self-suppression, 16, 251, 375.

Self-vindication, 358.

Separations in life, 383.

Shechem, 210.

Shibboleths, of reform, 262;

allowable, 263;

Christ used none, 264.

Sibboleths, of egotism, 260;

of bad habit, 260;

of literature, 261.

Sisera, 101.

Spiritual brotherhood, 151;

strength, 321, 324;

service, 369;

pauperism, 400.

Strength and character, 193.

Struggle, the law of existence, 10.

Success, sanctified, 80;

succeeding, 189.

Succoth and Penuel, 190.

Supernatural in human life, 267.

Temptation, 287;

process of, 317.

Theocracy, 3, 46;

Jotham's idea of, 214, 218.

Tribal religion, 328.

Truth and charity, 228.

Unscrupulous helpers, 133.

Veracity of the narrative, 359.

Vicarious suffering, 355.

Voluntary churches, 176.

Wars of conquest, 5.

Women, treatment of, 21;

their freedom, 22;

duties of, 125;

social bondage of, 372;

helpless, 373;

submission preached to, 375;

problems in their life, 416, 418.

Wrong never strong, 182.

Zephath, 25.

1

Maspero.

2

"The Hittites," by A. H. Sayce, LL.D., p. 36.

3

See Conder's Tent Work in Palestine.

4

Ewald.

5

Ewald.

6

Henri Perreyve.

7

Richter, Levana.

8

Browning: Rabbi Ben Ezra.