The Pulpit Commentary — Ruth — Section 12

elo~ont of bodily delicacy, was afflicted with that the step taken was blamable or blamed. feolmgs of morbid despondency, it is hard "No man ought," says Lawson, "to be con- to come to the conclusion that he would demned, whether dead or alive, witb.out deliberately stereotype his most hypochon- proofs of guilt; and no certain proofs of driacal anticipe.tions in the names of his guilt appear in the present case." "The children. The probability is, that the beam of Elimelech's judgment," says Dr. names, as names, would originally have Thomas Fuller, "is justly weighed down to some other import. Dr. Cassel supposes go from Bethlehem, Judah, into the land of that they meant, respectively, joy and Moab." ornament; but he trusts to impossible Vers. 3-5. - " In these words " says etymologies. Raabe, taking his cue from Fuller, "we have two marriages 'ushered Sanscrit roots, interprets the one thus- and followed by funerals." " He who brings gifts with him;" and the Ver. 3.-And Elimelech Naomi's husbe.nd other thus-" He who conceals his wife in died. Apparently soon after the settlement his house." W emer, taking his cue from of the family. No details however are Chaldee cognates, interprets the former of given, as, on the one hand, no bla~e is the two names as meaning ready to forgive, attached to the conduct of Elimelech, and and the latter as holding forth the idea of II.'!, on the other, the line of biographical hopeful. All of them unlikely derivations. interest runs in another direction. And she And yet something quite distinct from the was left, and her two sons. Not only was ideas of sickliness and consumption, but the mother her husband's relict; they were lying so far on parallel lines of thought, all left behind. He had gone somewhither may be conceived. The primary import in advance, and they "remained." So the of ~P1i, the root of Machlon, is apparently word is frequently rendered. Ver. 4.-And they took to themselves to be t&nder. Thence the word came b;r one wives of the women of Moab. It was their line of thought to mean to be physically o_wn act. J osephns, reproducing the narra- tender, that is, to be sick; and by another tive from memory, represents the event as that runs out in Chaldee it came to mean occurring in the father's lifetime, and as to be mrwally tender, to be mild or for- brought about by his arrangement. He says giving. Machlon may mean mildness or of Elimelech, " Coming into the territory of tender-heartedness. Again, the primary Moab, he sojourns there, and, things pros- idea. of il,~~. the root of Cbilion, is to com- pering according to his mind, he gives iu plete. But, besides the completion that is marriage to his sons (ayH·a, roic vioid realised in consuming, consumption, or Moabitish wives." Theological critics have ending, there is moral completeness, the here again raised the question, Was it sinful completeness or finish that is realised in in these emigrant Hebrews to take in mar- perfecti-On (see Ps. cxix. 96 : "I have seen riage daughters of the land! The Chaldee an end of all perfection"). This idea of Targumist did not hesitate in his decision. beautiful completeness, or perfection, is more He begins his paraphrase of the verse thus : likely to be the meaning of the name than "And they transgressed the edict of the the idea of consumptiveness, or consumption. word of the Lord, and took to themselves Ephrathites of Bethlehem Judah. It is alien wives of the daughters of Moab." Dr. not simply the two sons who a.re so desig- Thomas Fuller represents Naomi as passion- nated. It is the whole group. They were ately remonstrating with her sons. He says Ephrathites, that is, Bethlehemites, for 'the of himlielf, "My mouth denieth to be the old name of Bethlehem was Ephrath, or , •orator .of an· unjust action:• "Nothing can . Ephratha. As, however, the word Eph- be brought," he adds, " for the defence of rathite also meant Ephraimite (see Judges these matches. Something may be said for xii. 5; 1 Sam. i. 1; and 1 Kings xi. 26), the excuse of them, but that fetched not it gave precision to the designation, al- from piety, but from policy." It is note- though at the expense of a little redund- worthy, however, that in the text itsel~, ancy, to say "Ephrathites of Bethlehem and throughout the entire Book, there IS Judah." And they came into the country nothin<> of the nature of condemnation, not of Moe.b. The Hebrew emigrants reached tbe the lea~t hint of blame. There was a law, fields or pastoral territory of Moab. And indeed, which laid an interdict upon mar- continued there. The phrase in tho original ria<>es with Canaanites (see Deut. vii. 3). But is of primitive simplicity-' and were there." th~e Cnnaanites occupied a peculiar relation It has been asked by theological critics to the Hebrews. They were within the line whether Elimelech w11s justifiable in re- of that Canaan which had become the land moving to an "idolatrous country" to avoid of Israel. Israelites aml Cu.ua,,nitcs were the iuconveniences of a famine in the hm(! thus liviu"0 within the same bonlern as rival of his nativity. It is enough to say in ch1imants of the same territory. It was no reply that there is no hint in the text itself wonder that the Canaanites' cl:.im was not ll 2  4 THE BOOK OF RUTH. [CH. I. 1--5,