She Happened to Come
1 Naomi had a relative of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech, and his name was Boaz. 2 Ruth the Moabitess said to Naomi, “Let me now go to the field, and glean among the ears of grain after him in whose sight I find favor.” She said to her, “Go, my daughter.” 3 She went, and came and gleaned in the field after the reapers; and she happened to come to the portion of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech.
The narrator introduces Boaz, then reports the most important coincidence in the book in the flattest language he has.
Naomi had a relative of her husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech, and his name was Boaz. The verse is pure exposition, placed before it is needed, and the phrase of the family of Elimelech is doing quiet legal work that chapters 3 and 4 will collect.
Verse 2 has Ruth propose the work herself. Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain after him in whose sight I find favor. Gleaning was a legal right of the poor and the foreigner Leviticus 19:9–10, so she is not asking charity — though her closing phrase concedes that a right on paper still depends on the goodwill of whoever owns the field.
Then verse 3, and its understatement is deliberate: she happened to come to the portion of the field belonging to Boaz. The Hebrew is as casual as the English — her chance chanced upon it.
The narrator has just told the reader who Boaz is and then reports the meeting as an accident. He never says God arranged it. He arranges the sentences so that the reader cannot help thinking it, and leaves the thought unclaimed.
settled What this mark means