Shavuot, 5762, Maggie Bond
Shavuot, 5762
Maggie Bond: Shavuot, 5762
Ruth and Naomi are supposed to have this great relationship. In fact, it's the best relationship between women in the Torah. But that's not saying much. Think about Sarah and Hagar or Rachel and Leah. Some of the things Ruth does for Naomi are too sugar-coatedly perfect to feel healthy. Why should Ruth give Naomi her own child? This relationship isn't all that it seems.
"For wherever you will go I will go. Wherever you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die and there I will be buried. Thus and more may the Lord do to me if anything but death parts me from you."
Here Ruth seems strong and decisive, a person who knows what she wants, but the irony is that her strength is in being a follower. In fact, from this point on she becomes totally passive and does whatever Naomi says.
This seems totally inconsistent at first - she's really strong and then she becomes Naomi's puppet - but there is a pattern in her behavior because everything she does is for Naomi.
I was trying to understand Ruth's behavior. Why someone would change their identity and follow another person so completely. I see it as something very basic to humans. I was thinking about how my friends influence me. I hang out with a person for a while and I start to talk like them and like the same things. For instance, at first I was an individualist just because a friend of mine was. How ironic. This embarrassing fact made me sympathize with how Ruth is influenced by Naomi and why she might want to connect with her so deeply and be like her in every way. But she does seem to over do it a bit.
Why did Ruth like Naomi so much? Did she crave approval or even just a reaction? Someone professes such profound love and loyalty and gets no reaction? If you look at the text you will see that Naomi says nothing in response to Ruth's declaration. But I kind of like the fact that Naomi says nothing. That's one thing I think Shakespeare got wrong. People don't always have responses to everything. Sometimes there's nothing to say. Sometimes when someone says something that big you are in shock, or you might not feel the same way as they do and you feel guilty and embarrassed for them.
I wonder what Naomi was feeling? Maybe she realized that she had some kind of power over Ruth and she didn't want to say anything to ruin that. All Ruth needed was a reaction to know how to act towards Naomi, without a reaction Ruth becomes insecure and needs to continually prove her love and loyalty. For example, she brings home extra food and eventually gives Naomi her child… and at no point does Naomi ever thank Ruth or say a nice thing to her. At this rate she will be taking care of Naomi until she dies, as she promised.
But the feelings Naomi does express are: bitter and angry (as she says when she returns from Moab - call me "Mara" bitter) and she may have used Ruth out of her total despair of ever having anything good in her life again, but in the end it helped Ruth too... helping Ruth was the only way to help herself.
Does that make Naomi cruel? Or just manipulative? Or is it just that Naomi understands people better than Ruth? She knows why Ruth acts the way does and therefore stays out of the whole "feelings area" and that way she keeps Ruth doing things for her. In her relationship with Ruth, Naomi seems to a "user" - she uses people around her to her advantage. For example: she has no man to give her status and she manages to get Ruth to marry Boaz in order to elevate both of them. But I actually really admire Naomi.
I like Naomi because she knows what she wants and in her society she has no choice but to act the way she does if she doesn't want to just be poor or have her family line die with her. Naomi's behavior give us insight into human nature because it mirrors a kind of hierarchy that runs all of our lives. We use people who are "below us" to get ahead but sometimes it benefits them in the process.
I don't relate to Ruth so much but I do understand the need for reaction... like if I tell a joke and no one laughs or even says, "oh Maggie," then I feel stupid and awkward. People need reactions.
When I think about women in the Bible and how their relationships are so bad like Sarah and Hagar or Rachel and Leah I think it is because they have to fight over the role of leader. But with Ruth and Naomi, Ruth makes it so clear that she is willing to be the follower. So it is a good relationship not because it was healthy. It was a good relationship because they work together and ultimately help one another.