Rut 3:1

Naomi Instructs Ruth

3:1 At that time, ¹  Naomi, her mother-in-law, said to her, “My daughter, I must find a home for you so you will be secure. ² 

Rut 3:6

Ruth Visits Boaz

3:6 So she went down to the threshing floor and did everything her mother-in-law had instructed her to do. ³ 

Rut 3:17

3:17 She said, “He gave me these sixty pounds of barley, for he said to me, ⁴  ‘Do not go to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’” ⁵ 

[3:1]  ¹ tn The phrase “sometime later” does not appear in Hebrew but is supplied to mark the implicit shift in time from the events in chapter 2.

[3:1]  ² tn Heb “My daughter, should I not seek for you a resting place so that it may go well for you [or which will be good for you]?” The idiomatic, negated rhetorical question is equivalent to an affirmation (see 2:8-9) and has thus been translated in the affirmative (so also NAB, NCV, NRSV, TEV, CEV, NLT).

[3:6]  ³ tn Heb “and she did according to all which her mother-in-law commanded her” (NASB similar). Verse 6 is a summary statement, while the following verses (vv. 7-15) give the particulars.

[3:17]  ⁴ tc The MT (Kethib) lacks the preposition אֵלַי (’elay, “to me”) which is attested in the marginal reading (Qere).

[3:17]  ⁵ sn ‘Do not go to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’ In addition to being a further gesture of kindness on Boaz’s part, the gift of barley served as a token of his intention to fulfill his responsibility as family guardian. See R. L. Hubbard, Jr., Ruth (NICOT), 225-26, and F. W. Bush, Ruth, Esther (WBC), 187.