Ruth 1:16

16 But Ruth said, "Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.

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Ruth 1:16 Meaning and Commentary

Ruth 1:16

And Ruth said, entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from
following after thee
Do not make use of any arguments to persuade me to go back: or "do not meet me", or "be against me" F8; do not meet me with objections, or be in my way, or an hinderance to me, in going along with thee; do not be against it, for to be against that was to be against her inclination, desires, and resolutions, and against her interest:

for whither thou goest I will go:
let the country she was going to be what it would, though unknown to her, and though she should never see her own country any more:

and where thou lodgest I will lodge;
though in ever so mean a cottage, or under the open air:

thy people shall be my people;
whom I shall choose to dwell among, and converse with; whose religion, laws, and customs she should readily comply with, having heard much of them, their wisdom, goodness, and piety, of which she had a specimen and an example in Naomi, and by whom she judged of the rest:

and thy God my God;
not Chemosh, nor Baalpeor, nor other gods of the Moabites, be they what they will, but Jehovah, the God of Naomi, and of the people of Israel. So a soul that is truly brought to Christ affectionately loves him, and heartily cleaves unto him, resolves in the strength of divine grace to follow him, the Lamb, whithersoever he goes or directs; and is desirous to have communion with none but him, and that he also would not be as a wayfaring man, that tarries but a night; his people are the excellent of the earth, whom to converse with is all his delight and pleasure; and Christ's God is his God, and his Father is his Father: and, in a word, he determines to have no other Saviour but him, and to walk in all his commands and ordinances.


FOOTNOTES:

F8 (yb yegpt le) "ne occurras mihi", Vatablus, Rambachius; "ne obstes me", Tigurine version; "ne adverseris mihi", V. L. Drusius; so Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

Ruth 1:16 In-Context

14 Then they wept aloud again. Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.
15 So she said, "See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law."
16 But Ruth said, "Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.
17 Where you die, I will die— there will I be buried. May the Lord do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!"
18 When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.