The book of Ruth itself doesn't identify an author, so we need to look elsewhere.
There are several proposals as to who may have written the book of Ruth:
1. The Talmud attributed the authorship of both Judges and Ruth to Samuel (b. B. Bat. 14b - 15a), like the rest of the books in the Hebrew Bible and most literary texts from the ancient Near East.
2. Some contend that the book was composed as an apology for David’s kingship during David’s lifetime. Murray Gow speculates that Nathan may have been the author, noting the narrator’s rare literary talent, sensitive disposition toward women, access to the family traditions, devout Yahwistic faith, and the literary integrity of the book.
3. Others who find in this book a pro-Davidic polemic date its composition to the reign of Solomon. The long and relatively peaceful reign of Solomon provided an ideal context for the flourishing of culture, which finds here one of its fullest blooms.
4. Literarily, Ruth bears a closer resemblance to the so-called Yahwist narratives of Genesis and the stories in Samuel than the accounts in Chronicles and the book of Esther. Citing a series of clichés and phrases that resemble expressions found in Israelite literature but before the time of Elisha, and interpreting the alleged Aramaisms as evidences of a Northern Hebrew dialect, Moshe Weinfeld suggests the book may have been composed in Northern Israel in the ninth century BCE. However, he does not explain why this idyllic account of David’s origins would have been so important for a Northern author.
5. In part because the book tells a woman’s story, Adrien Bledstein argues that the book is the work of a female author, perhaps another Tamar, the daughter of David, and great-great-granddaughter of Ruth, who had herself experienced the tragedies that befell even royal women in a patriarchal world. However, the narrator’s sympathy toward women does not mean that a man could not have authored the book. Although it incorporates stories told from a woman’s perspective, the opening paragraph (Ruth 1:1-5), most of the final chapter (Ruth 4:1-13), and especially the concluding genealogy (Ruth 4:17b-22) represent traditional male perspectives. While we should not rule out the possibility that a woman might have authored the book, given the paucity of evidence for female literary activity in Israel and in the world around, the theory seems strained. In any case, it is better to focus on the gender perspective of the book than on the gender of its author.
To learn more about the book of Ruth, watch Daniel I. Block's lecture series on MasterLectures:
masterlectures.zondervanacade...
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