A Lineage of Grace: Ruth Trivia Quiz

Answer: Moab

Moab was on the eastern side of the Dead Sea (Canaan where the Israelites lived being on the west). The story of Ruth took place during the time of the Judges when Moab was one of the nations oppressing Israel. Ruth would therefore have been regarded as someone from an enemy nation.

Answer: Bethlehem

Bethlehem was the home town of Naomi, her husband, Elimelech, and their two sons, Mahlon and Kilion. They left Bethlehem due to a severe famine and went to live in Moab. While in Moab, Elimelech, Mahlon and Kilion all died so Naomi decided that the best thing for her to do was to return home.

There was presumably more hope of finding family members to care for her there than in Moab. She begged her daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth, to stay in Moab in order to have the opportunity to marry again and raise children. Orpah agreed to do this but Ruth refused to leave her mother-in-law.

Her beautiful response to Naomi can be read in Ruth 1:16-18.

Answer: Barley

Ruth 1:22 tells us that as Naomi and Ruth arrived in Bethlehem the barley harvest was just beginning. The wheat harvest came after that (Ruth 2:23).

Answer: Because she took care of Naomi

Boaz was impressed by the way that Ruth had been voluntarily prepared to leave her home country and her family to come to a foreign land with Naomi. He says to Ruth in Ruth 2:12, "May the Lord repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge." (NIV)

Answer: Her lunch leftovers

Having seen how well Ruth was looking after Naomi, Boaz wanted to make sure that Ruth spent the whole harvest gleaning in his fields where he could make sure that she in turn was well cared for. At meal times he invited her to come and eat with him and his workers, sharing the food which he provided for them. Ruth was given more food than she could eat so she saved her leftovers and took them home to Naomi (Ruth 2:18).

Answer: He was a close relative

Boaz was a close relative of Naomi's late husband, Elimelech, and was one of the family's kinsman-redeemers. A kinsman-redeemer was someone who volunteered to care for his extended family. In Jewish law, if a woman's husband died and she had no children, it was the responsibility of her dead husband's brother to marry her and have children by her in order to continue his brother's name. If (as in the case of Ruth) there were no more brothers to marry the widow the kinsman-redeemer could be called upon to marry her, if he so wished. If the closest kinsman-redeemer didn't want to then the next closest would be approached.

Knowing that Ruth had caught the eye of one of her family's kinsmen-redeemers must have given Naomi renewed hope for the future!

Answer: The threshing floor

Naomi obviously put a lot of thought into the plan of how Ruth was to approach Boaz to ask him to act as kinsman-redeemer. Once the harvest was gathered in Boaz probably practically lived at the threshing floor until all the grain was threshed. It was the obvious place to find him and approach him in private.

Answer: By lying at his feet

In modern Western culture this act is probably a bit difficult for us to understand - Ruth was not climbing into bed with Boaz and offering herself to him in that way! In those days in Israel it was common for a servant to lie at the master's feet and even to share part of his blanket.

In lying at Boaz's feet Ruth was letting him know that she wanted him to act as her kinsman-redeemer and marry her or find someone else to marry her. She would be obedient to whatever he decided.

Answer: A piece of land

We first hear about the land when Boaz went to the city gate at the beginning of Ruth 4 to talk to the one family kinsman-redeemer who had higher rights to take Ruth as his wife than Boaz. Boaz mentioned the land first and the man was certainly up for buying that. Once he heard though that he would also have to take Mahlon's Moabite widow as his wife he decided that the land didn't sound so attractive! We don't know his reasons for not wanting to marry Ruth but Boaz must have been very happy that the way was now open for him to marry her himself.

Answer: Obed

Ruth and Boaz's son was Obed, his son was Jesse and his son was David. Thus Ruth and Boaz were great-grandparents to King David.

Salmon, by the way, was Boaz's father. He married Boaz's mother, Rahab, the prostitute rescued when the walls of Jericho collapsed.