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Ruth 4:1–6, King James Version
Italic words were supplied in the English translation for clarity.
Ruth 4:1–6
The Nearer Redeemer Hears the Whole Matter
Boaz sits in the gate and calls the nearer kinsman
He goes up to the gate. When the nearer kinsman passes, Boaz says, Ho, such a one! turn aside, sit down. He takes ten men of the elders and they sit down. He tells the man Naomi sells a parcel of land that was Elimelech's. If the man will redeem it, redeem it before the inhabitants and elders; if not, Boaz is after him. The man says he will redeem it.
Then Boaz names Ruth, and the man draws back
Boaz continues: the day you buy the field of Naomi, you also buy it of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance. The kinsman says he cannot redeem it for himself, lest he mar his own inheritance, and tells Boaz to redeem it.
Complete information is given before witnesses. The refusal clears Boaz's way. It also shows a system in which land, lineage, and a living woman can be discussed by men at the gate. Ruth is not seated among the ten.
How this should shape us
Do not hide caregiving, inheritance, or a person's future inside an attractive property decision. Bring affected people into the room with independent counsel, not only as a condition attached after someone has said yes.
Teach it back
Explain Ruth 4:1–6 in your own words. Include the scene's movement, one source-supported detail, one material uncertainty, and one misuse the context rules out.
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Go deeper
The explanation above is meant to stand on its own. Open these notes only if you want language, history, disagreements, or source locations.
Where careful interpreters disagreeThe strongest options and their difficulties
Where do careful interpreters disagree?
Best judgment: Major reconstructions include ordinary land redemption plus voluntary marriage, a customary levirate-like extension, literary legal fiction combining laws, and other kinship practices. The text gives the dialogue but not a complete legal code or the nearer man's calculations.
How certain? probableResearch trail and exact locationsThe source record behind this section
Supports: Exact reader-facing KJV wording and complete verse coverage for this thought unit.
Ruth 4:1–6, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Supports: Hebrew forms, morphology, repeated roots, clause relationships, names, and base wording behind translation discussion.
Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Ruth.xml, Masoretic words and morphology for 4:1–6
Supports: Material lexical, grammatical, textual, social, legal, genealogical, and translation notes within the unit.
NET Bible Ruth PDF, printed pp. 501–503, translation and translator notes on 4:1–6
Supports: Authorship and dating alternatives, vulnerability, foreignness, field danger, threshing-floor risk, and legal-social interpretation within directly inspected sections.
Jones, Reading Ruth in the Restoration Period, pp. 188–199, especially pp. 195–199 (linguistic limits, land redemption, levirate distinctions, and Ruth 4)
Supports: A major legal-literary model distinguishing land redemption from levirate marriage and explaining Ruth's purposeful combination.
Berlin, 'Legal Fiction: Levirate cum Land Redemption in Ruth,' printed pp. 3–18, especially pp. 7–13 on the distinct institutions and their literary combination
Supports: A skeptical alternative concerning mixed motives and the limits of personal kindness within unequal social structures.
Kugler and Magori, 'Hesed in Ruth,' article pp. 1–10, especially literary-social readings of Naomi, Ruth, Boaz, survival, hesed, and structural constraint
Sources for This Section
These records identify the source, the claim it supports, and the exact location used. A source remains evidence to evaluate; it does not replace the biblical text.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact reader-facing KJV wording and complete verse coverage for this thought unit.
Exact location: Ruth 4:1–6, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: Ruth
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Hebrew forms, morphology, repeated roots, clause relationships, names, and base wording behind translation discussion.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Ruth.xml, Masoretic words and morphology for 4:1–6
Open source ↗translation and translator notes
NET Bible: Ruth with translators' notes
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Material lexical, grammatical, textual, social, legal, genealogical, and translation notes within the unit.
Exact location: NET Bible Ruth PDF, printed pp. 501–503, translation and translator notes on 4:1–6
Open source ↗open access doctoral thesis
Reading Ruth in the Restoration Period: A Call for Inclusion
Edward Allen Jones III
University of St Andrews, 2012
Supports: Authorship and dating alternatives, vulnerability, foreignness, field danger, threshing-floor risk, and legal-social interpretation within directly inspected sections.
Exact location: Jones, Reading Ruth in the Restoration Period, pp. 188–199, especially pp. 195–199 (linguistic limits, land redemption, levirate distinctions, and Ruth 4)
Open source ↗peer reviewed journal article
Legal Fiction: Levirate cum Land Redemption in Ruth
Adele Berlin
Journal of Ancient Judaism 1, 2010
Supports: A major legal-literary model distinguishing land redemption from levirate marriage and explaining Ruth's purposeful combination.
Exact location: Berlin, 'Legal Fiction: Levirate cum Land Redemption in Ruth,' printed pp. 3–18, especially pp. 7–13 on the distinct institutions and their literary combination
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access article
Hesed in Ruth: A Frail Moral Tool in an Inflexible Social Structure
Gili Kugler and Ohad Magori
Religions 14.5, article 604, 2023
Supports: A skeptical alternative concerning mixed motives and the limits of personal kindness within unequal social structures.
Exact location: Kugler and Magori, 'Hesed in Ruth,' article pp. 1–10, especially literary-social readings of Naomi, Ruth, Boaz, survival, hesed, and structural constraint
Open source ↗