Boaz
The kinsman-redeemer whose gentleness of power makes him a type of Christ
A Man of Substance
Boaz is introduced in Ruth 2:1 as “a mighty man of wealth” — but the Hebrew word translated “wealth” is chayil, which equally means valor, strength, and virtue. He is not simply rich; he is a man of substance in every sense. When Ruth comes to glean in his fields, the first thing we see him do is notice her, inquire about her, and ensure she is protected and fed beyond what duty required.
That pattern — power used gently, in excess of obligation — defines him throughout the story. He tells his servants to deliberately leave stalks for her. He invites her to eat with his household. He says, “The Lord recompense thy work, and a full reward be given thee of the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust” (Ruth 2:12). He blesses her before she asks him to.
The Kinsman-Redeemer
In ancient Israel, the go’el — the kinsman-redeemer — was a near relative who had both the right and the responsibility to redeem a family member from debt, slavery, or the loss of ancestral land. When Naomi returned to Bethlehem destitute, and when Ruth came with her in loyalty, Boaz was a man with the legal right to act as their redeemer.
There was a nearer kinsman with a prior claim. At the city gate — the ancient place of legal transaction — Boaz laid out the situation for this man: would he redeem Naomi’s land and marry Ruth? The man declined when he understood what it would cost him (Ruth 4:6). Boaz, without hesitation, declared: “I will redeem it.”
Ruth 4:9–10
“And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech’s, and all that was Chilion’s and Mahlon’s, of the hand of Naomi. Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance.”
A Type of Christ
Boaz is one of the most transparent Old Testament types of the Savior. The parallel structure is exact: humanity is in a condition of destitution and covenant loss. There is a nearer kinsman — the law — that might seem to have the prior claim. But the law “declined” in the sense that it cannot save by itself; it cannot pay the price that redemption requires. Christ, the willing redeemer with both the right and the power, stepped forward and said “I will redeem it.”
The price of that redemption was his own life. What Boaz gave was wealth and status. What Christ gave was everything. But the pattern — the nearer kinsman who cannot do it, the willing redeemer who can — is the same structure.
Boaz and Ruth become the great-grandparents of David, and therefore ancestors of Christ himself (Matthew 1:5). The kinsman-redeemer is literally in the bloodline of the One who redeems all mankind. The typology does not stay in the field at Bethlehem; it runs all the way to Calvary.