Ruth: A Migrant’s Tale

This enlightening entry in Yale’s Jewish Lives Series by Pardes (The Song of Songs), a professor of comparative literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, dissects the biblical Ruth. Pardes suggests that though the Book of Ruth “offers the most elaborate tale of a woman to be found in the Bible,” it is “astonishingly laconic” and requires those studying it to gather “bits and pieces from sparse scenes replete with lacunae” to fully understand it. Pardes is more than up to the challenge and details Ruth’s biography, from her Moabite antecedents to her decision to stay with her late husband’s mother in Bethlehem after his death rather than return to her homeland. Examining shifting historical interpretations of Ruth, the author relates how rabbis came to view Ruth as the “exemplary convert,” as well as how pastoral paintings of her downplay her foreign origins. Pardes complicates Ruth’s reputation as the quintessential convert by noting that the Bible makes no reference to conversion because non-Jews were not asked to convert at the time. The author effortlessly combines scholarly erudition with an accessible tone, providing an insightful exploration of the book’s themes of otherness, kindness, and loyalty. This is a valuable contribution to the literature on Ruth. (Oct.)