Ruth 4:15

Rth 4:15 And he shall be unto thee a restorer of [thy] life, and a nourisher of thine old age: for thy daughter in law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, hath born him.

Ver. 15. And he shall be unto thee a restorer of thy life.] A joyless life is a lifeless life. Mortis habet vices quae trahitur vita gemitibus. Such had been Naomi’s life for a long while, till now that God had raised her up a restorer. "Now we live," &c. {1Th 3:8}

And a nourisher of thine old age.] Children should nourish their old parents, and supply their wants, αντι πελαργων. Storks and mice feed their dams when old: boughs incline and bend down toward the root; and in summer, receiving from the root leaves, flowers, and fruit, they let them fall again in winter, to the fatting and nourishing of the root. Unkind and unnatural children are like kites, {bird of prey} which, when grown strong, expel their dams, and with their bills and wings beat them out of the nest.

For thy daughter-in-law, which loveth thee … hath born him.] And it is to be hoped that he will not degenerate, or grow out of kind: for partus sequitur ventrem, the birth followeth the belly, as the proverb is.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rth 4:15. A restorer of thy life — Of the comfort of thy life, such a comfort as to make thee, in some sort, young again. For they hoped the child would inherit his mother’s virtues, and particularly her affection to Naomi, which was so surpassing, that it made her a greater blessing to her than a great many children of her own body would have been. Better than seven sons — See how God sometimes makes up the want of those relations from whom we expected most comfort, in those from whom we expected least! The bonds of love prove stronger than those of nature.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

4:15 care for you in your old age (literally cause your old age to be full): With the birth of Obed, Naomi’s life was full again (cp. 1:21).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Meaning, many sons.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

(15) A nourisher.—(See marginal renderings).

Daughter-in-law.—The position of the nominative is emphatic.

Loveth.—The verb is a perfect, which hath ever loved thee.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

15. better to thee than seven sons] Ruth has proved it by her piety towards the dead and the living. Seven is a round number, cf. 1Sa_1:8.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And he shall be unto thee a restorer of thy life,.... Of the joys, pleasures, and comforts of it, which she had been deprived of through the death of her husband and her two sons, ever since which she had lived a sorrowful life; all the comfort she had was from her daughter-in-law, and now a grandchild being born to her of her would be a means of restoring comfort to her mourning sorrowful spirit, and give her pleasure in those years in which she did not expect any:

and a nourisher of thine old age; that would when grown up feed her, support her, and supply her with all necessaries of life, being heir to a large and rich estate:

for thy daughter in law which loveth thee; Ruth the wife of Boaz, who had shown her love, in leaving her own country and kindred, to come along with her into a strange land, and who had laboured for her support in it, and still retained the same affection for her:

which is better to thee than seven sons, hath borne him: either which had been so in the time of her widowhood, as the Targum; or rather which was so now, being the wife of so rich a person, and having now brought forth a son, heir to the estate, who would be more capable of doing for her than if she had seven sons living, having no other than their paternal estate.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Comfort. Hebrew, "to make thy soul revive."

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

A restorer of thy life, i.e. of the comfort of thy life, which was in a great measure dead and gone.

Hath born him, to wit, a son; the pronoun for the noun understood, which is frequent in the Hebrew tongue. Or, hath born to him, i.e. to thy kinsman, to wit, a son, which is easily understood; and so the pronoun affix is put for the separate; of which there are instances; as Jos 15:19; 1Ki 19:21; Job 31:37; Eze 29:3.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

15. He shall be — That is, the child shall be. Boaz was the goel or redeemer of Ruth but the child Obed was the goel of the aged Naomi.

Restorer of thy life — He shall make thee feel the glow of youthful life and joy again.

A nourisher of thine old age — A source of comfort, since the birth of this son would take away the reproach of childlessness from her husband’s family.

Better… than seven sons — Because through Ruth “the loss of her own sons had been supplied in her old age, and the prospect was now presented to her of becoming in her childless old age the tribe-mother of a numerous and flourishing family.” — Keil. “It would seem as if there was already a kind of joyous foretaste of the birth and infancy which, in aftertimes, was to be forever associated with the name of Beth-lehem.” — Stanley.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And may he be to thee a restorer of life, and for the support of thine old age: for thy daughter-in-law, who loved thee, hath borne him, and she is better to thee than seven sons. The number seven suggested an idea of fullness, completeness, perfection. The whole inhabitants of the city knew that Ruth"s love to her mother-in-law had been indeed transcendent, and also that it had been transcendently returned.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thy life - That is, of the comfort of thy life. Born him - Or, hath born to him; that is, to thy kinsman a son. Better than seven sons - See how God sometimes makes up the want of those relations from whom we expected most comfort, in those from whom we expected least! The bonds of love prove stronger than those of nature.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.