Paradoxically, I believe that in Ruth's holding on and clinging to Naomi, she was actually letting go and letting God. No, Ruth, Naomi, and Orpah, as we read the text, are not afraid to lift up their voices and to weep, to genuinely weep. To weep, not to hold on, but to let go, knowing we're not in control. We need a coat with two pockets to remind us who we are. It's not clear when the Book of Ruth was written.
Many scholars believe that perhaps it was written after the exile.
For post-exilic Israel, the community of faith wrestled, not only with their own identity, who they were as a wider community, but also unfortunately wrestled with who was in and who was out. Let's face it. It's much more simple when the lines of race, class, and sexual orientation are clean, clear, and unblurred, everyone fitting in their proper places, their nice, neat, nailed-down boxes. For maybe it is only more simplistic, giving us the illusion that it is more simple. In the Skagit Valley every year, just north of Seattle, hundreds of people come during springtime to experience the annual tulip festival.