Dear Yaakov,



It is the way of the religious to overturn the text to satisfy their desire for faith They will invest a great deal of work and effort in a search for the “wonders” of the text, without noticing that they turn themselves into laughing stocks.

This was well known to one of the greatest of Jewish commentators, Abraham Ibn Ezra (1089-1164). In his commentary on the Book of Ruth he cites a man who craved “codes and secret depths” whom he allowed to make his speech to gladden his heart, even though his words were nothing more than sarcasm. These are the words of Ibn Ezra:

And [Ruth] gleaned in the field until night and she beat out what she had gleaned, about an ephah of barley [In the Scriptures, an ephah is a measure of volume of about 25 litres.]

About an ephah of barley — I was once asked by a man what the purpose of the words “about an ephah of barley” were.

I said that this was an irrelevant question, for the Scripture related what had happened. I was belittled in his eyes and he told me he knew the reason behind the words. I did not ask him his reason, and he came to me one day and said that he had many reasons:

One was that Ruth saw, through prophecy, that one of her descendants, King Solomon, would in the future erect a pillar in his house — the House of the Lebanese Woods — in name of her husband, Boaz (I Kings 7:21). Ephah in gematria is 96, for the 96 bells on the pillar (Jeremiah 52:23) Shiurim is not to be read “barley,” but “guesses” or prophecy.



Another reason is a double meaning, in Hebrew and Aramaic. She prophesized Avshalom, another of her descendants, would be hung. The kaf and aleph of hint at the 21 years of Avshalom’s life, and then the words ephah se’orim, in the plural, come because he was too heavy.

Another reason is that the start of the word k’ephah, taken together with the start of the word seorim spells Yishai, who was a completely righteous man.

Then the man’s heart was glad and settled within him.

(Ibn Ezra on Ruth 2:17)

Sincerely,



Daat Emet