Ruth (Volume 8) (Wisdom Commentary Series)

This volume, using multiple methods, seeks to bring together the best scholarship and insight—Jewish and Christian, past and present—that has contributed to our understanding and appreciation of the biblical book of Ruth. As a feminist commentary, it is particularly sensitive to issues of relationship and inclusion, power and agency. In addition to the voices of the primary co-authors, Alice Laffey and Mahri Leonard-Fleckman, the volume incorporates and integrates important contributing voices from diverse contemporary social contexts and geographical locations. In sum, the commentary seeks to allow Ruth, Naomi, and Boaz to speak again for the first time.

Alice L. Laffey (1944-2023) taught the Old Testament for thirty-five years at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, before retiring in May 2016. She was the author of many articles as well as Introduction to the Old Testament: A Feminist Perspective (Fortress, 1988), Appreciating God’s Creation through Scripture (Paulist, 1997), The Pentateuch: A Liberation-Critical Reading (Fortress, 1998), and 1–2 Kings in the New Collegeville Bible Commentary series (Liturgical Press, 2012).

Mahri Leonard-Fleckman is associate professor of Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary. She is the author of the award-winning Ponder: Contemplative Bible Study series, co-author of The Book of Ruth in the Wisdom Commentary Series, and a contributor to Give Us This Day: Daily Prayer for Today’s Catholic, published by Liturgical Press.

Barbara E. Reid, general editor of the Wisdom Commentary series, is a Dominican Sister of Grand Rapids, Michigan. She is the Carroll Stuhlmueller, CP Distinguished Professor of New Testament Studies, and president emerita of Catholic Theological Union (the first woman who held the position). She has been a member of the CTU faculty since 1988 and also served as vice president and academic dean from 2009 to 2018. She holds a PhD in biblical studies from The Catholic University of America and was president of the Catholic Biblical Association in 2014–2015. Her most recent publications are Luke 1–9 and Luke 10–24, co-authored with Shelly Matthews (WCS 43A, 43B; Liturgical Press, 2021); and At the Table of Holy Wisdom: Global Hungers and Feminist Biblical Interpretation (Paulist, 2023).