Why Read Ruth on Shavuot? 🌾👑 | Part #1

B"H

Every year on Shavuot, the festival of receiving the Torah, we read the Book of Ruth. At first glance, this seems curious. The story appears simple: a Moabite woman follows her mother-in-law Naomi back to the Land of Israel, gathers grain in the fields, and eventually marries Boaz. From this union comes the lineage of King David.

But the sages teach us that nothing in Torah is arbitrary. The connection between Ruth and Shavuot goes far deeper than commemorating the birth or passing of King David. Ruth, Boaz, Naomi, and the entire narrative are a gateway into understanding what it means to truly receive the Torah — not just the written word, but its inner essence.

The Field as a Spiritual Landscape

On a literal level, Ruth takes place during the harvest season — the same time as Shavuot, also known as the Festival of the Harvest (Chag HaKatzir). But in Kabbalah, the field is more than a plot of land. It's a symbol for our inner landscape — the open, unknown place where we seek G-d. Ruth enters this field as a stranger, gathering leftover grain, unsure of her path, yet guided by a deeper longing. In doing so, she embodies the soul's journey: vulnerable, searching, and willing to be transformed.

Ruth and the Sefirah of Malchut

Ruth, in Kabbalistic language, corresponds to the Sefirah of Malchut — kingship, receptivity, humility. Malchut has no light of its own. It receives from above and gives below. Like the earth, it is fertile because it is empty of ego. Ruth’s essence is this spiritual emptiness — an openness to receive. That’s why her name, rooted in the Hebrew word revaya (satiation), suggests the soul’s ability to be filled — with Torah, with prayer, with divine purpose.

Malchut is also the Sefirah most associated with prayer. King David, Ruth’s great-grandson, says of himself: "Va’ani tefillah" — "I am prayer." Tefillah, true prayer, is not only speaking but listening. It’s aligning ourselves with the divine current flowing through creation. It’s allowing the field of our inner being to be tilled, softened, and ultimately, to grow.

The Dove's Song: Ruth, and the Secret of Prayer

The Zohar makes a connection between Ruth (Rut) and the word Tor, meaning dove — a bird associated with the Jewish people. The dove’s song is not like other birds. It’s soft, almost mournful, carrying two tones at once. So too, the soul’s yearning — its prayer — rises from this paradox of vulnerability and strength, of surrender and intention.

When we say lehitpalel in Hebrew — "to pray" — it literally means “to be prayed.” According to Chassidic teachings, our prayers are not merely requests we offer G-d; they are the voice of the Shechinah itself, the Divine Presence within us, crying out to reunite with its source.

A Lineage That Was Almost Lost

There’s also a halachic tension in the story. Ruth is a Moabite, and the Torah states that a Moabite may not enter the congregation of Israel. This led to a real controversy: was King David even halachically permitted to be part of the Jewish people, let alone become its king?

The Talmud tells us that the prophet Shmuel wrote the Book of Ruth to resolve this very issue. Through deep Torah logic and oral tradition, it was established that only Moabite men — not women — were excluded. Ruth was permitted. From this seemingly small clarification, the lineage of Mashiach becomes possible.

And this is the essence of Shavuot — not only receiving the Torah Shebichtav (the written Torah), but embracing the Torah She’baal Peh (the oral Torah), the living, evolving transmission of divine wisdom. Without it, David could not be king. Without it, Ruth would remain outside the camp. It is the oral Torah that gives Torah its heart, its compassion, its context — and it is precisely that which we celebrate on Shavuot.

Humility, Torah, and Kingship

King David, the "sweet singer of Israel," held no illusions of grandeur. His name — Dalet, Vav, Dalet — begins and ends with dal, the Hebrew word for poor or humble. He saw himself as nothing before G-d. Yet through that very humility, he became everything. That is Malchut. That is prayer. That is Torah lived.

This is why we read Ruth on Shavuot — to remind us that receiving Torah is not about ego or status. It's about humility, devotion, and being open to the field of possibility. Ruth reminds us that holiness is found not just in grand revelations but in quiet acts of loyalty, courage, and faith.

And it is from such acts that kings — and ultimately, redemption — are born.

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