Shavuot, 6 Sivan 5786

Confirmation Shabbat May 23rd, 2026 / 7 Sivan 5786

Dear TBE Community,

On Shavuot, we celebrate matan Torah, the giving of the Torah; revelation. Yet one dominant theme of the Book of Ruth, the megillah read on this ancient harvest festival, is redemption, another vertex, to echo Franz Rosenzweig, of Jewish theology (the third one being creation). Or rather, more poetically speaking, the Book of Ruth is about seeds of redemption, revealed.

In modern religious language, “redemption” is associated with something grand, cosmic, messianic, whatever that may mean. Redemption can be understood as the end of exile, the healing of the world, the coming of a future prophets rave about though we can hardly imagine it.

The noun for the harbinger of redemption is redeemer, in Hebrew, גֹּאֵל, go’el. The first time go’el is mentioned in Torah, it conjures up a release from all bad things, as a teshuva of sorts from life and the universe, the bestowing of eternal blessings, the justification for an everlasting claim to continuity of a family.

Jacob uses the word, more as a participle than as a noun, when he blesses Menachem and Ephraim near the end of his life:

The Angel who has redeemed me from all harm (the Angel-Redeemer) – bless the lads. In them may my name be recalled, and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and may they be teeming multitudes upon the earth. (Genesis 48:16)

This presages much of Judaism’s essential tenets in a nutshell. The other important tenet (explicitly) missing from Jacob’s statement is the connection to land, soil, earth. That comes up the second time the word is used in Torah, in Leviticus 25:25:

If one of your kin is in straits and has to sell part of a holding, the nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what that relative has sold.

Here, a redeemer means the closest relative able to redeem, i.e. buy the land back, so that it remains within the family, thereby also helping the impoverished relative. There is a similar passage in Jeremiah, Chapter 32 that clearly explains the matter, and that also adds the layer of hope to the concept of redemption.

My cousin Hanamel came to me (…) and said to me, “Please buy my land in Anathoth, in the territory of Benjamin; for the right of succession is yours, and you have the duty of redemption. Buy it.” Then I knew that it was indeed the word of God. So I bought the land in Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel. (…) I wrote a deed, sealed it, and had it witnessed; and I weighed out the silver on a balance. I took the deed of purchase, the sealed text and the open one according to rule and law, and gave the deed to Baruch son of Neriah son of Mahseiah (…) I charged Baruch as follows: Thus said God of Hosts, the God of Israel: “Take these documents, this deed of purchase, the sealed text and the open one, and put them into an earthen jar, so that they may last a long time.” For thus said God of Hosts, the God of Israel: “Houses, fields, and vineyards shall again be purchased in this land.” (for the full quote see Jeremiah 32:7-15) That’s hope right there, hope not lost.

In its legal origin, redemption is connected to land possessions. The idea that evolved into messianic hope begins with debt, with poverty, with family relations. With people in danger of losing their holding in this world, and their hope. And a redeemer is a relative stepping in to restore and secure something that was almost lost.

The same happens in the Book of Ruth.

Ruth’s mother-in-law Naomi has lost everything: her husband, her sons, her security, her place in the societal order, in the world. While Ruth has attached herself to Naomi with extraordinary loyalty, loyalty does not feed them. Back in Judah, Naomi sends Ruth to the fields of one Boaz to glean. When Ruth comes home, her hands full of barley, Naomi explains to Ruth who this kind and generous man Boaz is:

The man is related (close) to us; he is one of our redeeming kinsmen. (Ruth 2:20)

According to Leviticus 25, Boaz has the power — and the obligation — to rescue, take out, save, redeem — you name it — Naomi, and Ruth from the precarity they live in. He can buy, i.e. redeem, land that belonged to the family of Elimelech, Naomi’s deceased husband. Thus, Boaz can restore Naomi’s (and Ruth’s) holding, her or their place in the world and with that, their future.

This all transpires on the human plane. But Ruth, with her choice of words, adds another layer to this redemption story. In Chapter 3, on the threshing floor at night, she says: Spread your wing over your servant, for you are a redeemer. (Ruth 3:9)

Her language merges the agricultural and legal layers of redemption with the Divine. The language used here echoes the language in many of our prayers that ask for God’s redeeming shelter, for example, the Hashkiveinu.

For Ruth, the Moabite in Bethlehem and her mother-in-law however, the situation is tricky, as immediate help – redemption – is in reach but for now, unattainable, as Boaz tells Ruth: Although it is true that I am a redeemer, there is also a redeemer closer than I. (Ruth 3:12)

Adhering to the legal hierarchical order within the clan, that closer kinsman must be asked first. And if he agrees to buy, to redeem, to take care of Naomi and Ruth, Boaz can’t prove himself the gibor chail, the shining knight. But redemption comes – is more likely to come – not only when governance processes are followed, but when responsibility is taken. This is a cornerstone of the modern, Reform understanding of redemption, tikkun olam: We are obligated to play our part, we must take responsibility to ensure a future for the world.

Boaz knows that not everyone is ready for the task. And sometimes, in order to bring on redemption, a little helping maneuver is needed. Boaz knows how to get that other kinsman, who has become some sort of rival, out of the picture: By listing to him all the obligations he would have to take on: Buy the field, take care of that old bitter widow Naomi, continue the names of her deceased husband and sons and –also care for the foreigner who’s with her, that Moabite woman, Ruth. Whether ingeniously or not, Boaz paints the responsibility of redemption as an undesirable burden, and his appeal to the kinsman’s bigotry, resentment, or maybe purely financial risk-avoidance works. Now Boaz can step up in front of the witnesses at the city gate:

And Boaz said to the elders and to the rest of the people, “You are witnesses today that I am acquiring from Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Chilion and Mahlon. I am also acquiring Ruth the Moabite, the wife of Mahlon, as my wife, so as to perpetuate the name of the deceased upon his estate, that the name of the deceased may not disappear from among his kinsmen and from the gate of his hometown. You are witnesses today.” (Ruth 4:10)

Redemption here, then, is not only the saving of land. It is the saving of a name, of a line. It is a restoration of a place in the world. It is securing for continuity something that was threatened to be lost forever. One can look at this in plainly human terms – and wouldn’t be hard pressed to contextualize these actions within a religious layer either.

And the women of Bethlehem know that when they say to Naomi (Naomi, not Ruth, but that’s for another davar): Blessed is Adonai, who has not withheld a redeemer from you today. (Ruth 4:14)

Interestingly, in this moment, the women are not speaking about Boaz. They are referring to the child born to Ruth and Boaz, Obed: the future that has been secured. That is why Obed is referred to as meishiv nefesh, a restorer of the soul.

Again, there are loud religious and theological undertones here that can also be read as poetic descriptions of human interactions and emotions: Another instance for the merging of the human and divine perspectives on redemption, and a good example for how to trace the evolution of the concept of go’el, redeemer: What began as land redemption, as the obligation of a relative, becomes soul restoration, becomes a promise for the future well beyond Naomi’s days.

In the end, the Book of Ruth opens this lens even wider. Obed, the child of Ruth and Boaz, is the father of Jesse, and Jesse is the father of David. The local redemption of one family in Bethlehem becomes the emergence of the Davidic line — in Jewish imagination or theology, the Messianic line.

In my session that I am teaching at our joint Shavuot learning event tonight at Congregation Ner Tamid, I will also bring in Genesis 38, the story of Tamar and Judah, as yet another seed of the redemption story revealed in the Book of Ruth.

For now, I would like to close with the thought that the Book of Ruth teaches that any layer of redemption begins when someone close to or further removed from us chooses responsibility. It begins when property is restored, when names are remembered and kept alive, when the vulnerable are not abandoned. When a future is made possible.

Shabbat Shalom and Hag Shavuot Sameach,
Rabbi Julia Knobloch