Alright, not sure how to throw this radical observation out here on the internet, but here's my attempt:
Does Ruth appear mentally disabled to anyone else? I've never heard this theory, nor thought so myself until now. Then again, I've never read Ruth before, only learned that she was a strong woman and a heroine. Reading the story, however, she reminds me of some of the people I work with who have mental retardation and other mental handicaps. I know this is bogus, but her character seems very dependent and innocent to me. Little things gave me this image, like the way the Boaz wants to protect her from the men, and how she follows Naomi's orders to the letter. Even at the end, her baby is given to Naomi to raise.
I'm not sure of the implications of this way of reading it, or if anyone else can even imagine her this way. I just didn't picture the daring woman I'd heard about before. I think Naomi's character is much more admirable, as she leaves everything and everything she knows to follow her husband into a foreign land, where she births two sons, only to have them and their father die. She then journeys back to her home, where I assume any semblance of rights or power she had through her husband are now gone with his death.
Well, there it is... my blasphemous interpretation of one of the most celebrated woman of the Bible. Yeesh.
