Book Description

The book of Ruth appears to be part of a Samaritan story designed to splice the Moabites into the royal genealogy. The Book of Deuteronomy, which was likely written in Samaria, uses Moabite names of locations instead of Judahite names, indicating that a Moabite priesthood was active in Samaria before the kingdom fell to the Assyrians. The Book of Judges refers to King Abimelech as the bastard son of Gideon by a prostitute, which speaks volumes about his memory, however, he was an Ephrathite, as was the Abimelech in the Book of Ruth, indicating that he could not have been viewed that badly a century after his death, when Ruth’s father in law would have been born. Ruth, the step-daughter of Abimelech in the Book of Ruth, ultimately became an ancestor of King David, meaning it is possible that some Israelites were connecting the two Abimelechs in the Second Temple era, claiming that David was a descendant of King Abimelech. The setting of the Ruth is the lands of Judah and Moab in the early-1000s BC, when the Book of Judges claimed there was no king. The last judge under the Pelesets in the books of Judges was Samson's father Manoah, who ruled until 1090 BC when the Peleset Kingdom apparently collapsed. This was just over a decade before the collapse of the Egyptian New Kingdom in 1077 BC, which began the Third Intermediate Period, when Egyptian records became sparse. This collapse of civilization in Canaan and Egypt was mirrored by collapses across the Mediterranean, sparking what the Greeks would later call the Dark Age. This Dark Age is not in doubt, however, is poorly understood due to the sparse records from the era. The story would have taken place around the same era as the Benjaminite genocide in the Book of Judges, which is likely the reason the book of Ruth was placed directly behind the book of Judges in the Septuagint. It is not clear when the Book of Ruth was written, however, it is not generally considered to date back to the era it is set in. Based on the connection between the Book of Ruth and King David, it seems likely that the book was written no earlier than the era of King David, however, the book is generally dated to the time of Ezra the Scribe circa 350 BC. It is generally interpreted as an attempt to bridge the older books of Joshua and Judges with the newer books of the Kingdoms (Masoretic Samuel and Kings), which are generally accepted as having been compiled during the time of Ezra the scribe.