Dual Panel1Boaz meanwhile had gone up to the town gate and was sitting there when the next-of-kin of whom he had spoken came past. Calling him by name, Boaz cried, “Come over here and sit down.” He went over and sat down.
2Boaz also stopped ten of the town's elders and asked them to sit there. When they were seated,
3he addressed the next-of-kin: “You will remember the strip of field that belonged to our kinsman Elimelech. Naomi is selling it, now that she has returned from Moab.
4I promised to open the matter with you, to ask you to acquire it in the presence of those sitting here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you are going to do your duty as next-of-kin, then do so; but if not, someone must do it. So tell me, and then I shall know, for I come after you as next-of-kin.” He answered, “I shall act as next-of-kin.”
5Boaz continued: “On the day you take over the field from Naomi, I take over the widow, Ruth the Moabite, so as to perpetuate the name of the dead man on his holding.”
6“Then I cannot act,” said the next-of-kin, “lest it should be detrimental to my own holding; and as I cannot act, you yourself must take over my duty as next-of-kin.”
7Now it used to be the custom when ratifying any transaction by which property was redeemed or transferred for a man to take off his sandal and give it to the other party; this was the form of attestation in Israel.
8Accordingly when the next-of-kin said to Boaz, “You must take it over,” he drew off his sandal and handed it over.
9Then Boaz addressed the elders and all the other people there: “You are witnesses this day that I have taken over from Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Chilion and Mahlon;
10and, further, that I have taken over Mahlon's widow, Ruth the Moabite, to be my wife, in order to keep alive the dead man's name on his holding, so that his name may not be missing among his kindred and at the gate of his native town. You are witnesses this day.”
11All who were at the gate, including the elders, replied, “We are witnesses. May the LORD make this woman, who is about to come into your home, to be like Rachel and Leah, the two who built up the family of Israel. May you do a worthy deed in Ephrathah by keeping this name alive in Bethlehem.
12Through the offspring the LORD gives you by this young woman may your family be like the family of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah.”
13So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When they had come together the LORD caused her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son.
14The women said to Naomi, “Blessed be the LORD, who has not left you this day without next-of-kin. May the name of your dead son be kept alive in Israel!
15The child will give you renewed life and be your support and stay in your old age, for your devoted daughter-in-law, who has proved better to you than seven sons, has borne him.”
16Naomi took the child and laid him in her own lap, and she became his foster-mother.
17Her women neighbours gave him a name: “Naomi has a son; we shall call him Obed,” they said. He became the father of Jesse, David's father.
The ancestry of David
18THIS is the genealogy of Perez: Perez was the father of Hezron,
19Hezron of Ram, Ram of Amminadab,
20Amminadab of Nahshon, Nahshon of Salmon,
21Salmon of Boaz, Boaz of Obed,
22Obed of Jesse, and Jesse of David.