Ruth as a Foreign Worker and the Politics of Exogamy

Abstract

The book of Ruth can and has been read as an optimistic, idyllic story of integration, of polemic against exogamy and xenophobia (see Ezra and Nehemiah), as a story of love, as a story of duty and hesed, of traditional Jewish conversion. Such readings and others are possible, certainly. What marks such interpretations is the common denominator of viewing the story as a comedy, the birth of a son being interpreted as a happy ending. But a happy ending for whom? Ultimately, so it appears, foreigners may be accepted into the target community: less so if they are of the underprivileged classes and women; and full integration, even in the case of Ruth, is in fact impossible. The variables of class, occupation and femaleness usually override those of foreignness and personal excellence-then and now.