Ruth 2:14
And Boaz said unto her, At mealtime come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar. And she sat beside the reapers: and he reached her parched corn, and she did eat, and was sufficed, and left. And Boaz said unto her, At mealtime come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar. And she sat beside the reapers: and he reached her parched corn, and she did eat, and was sufficed, and left.
Ruth 2:14 stands in the beautiful, brief four-chapter pastoral tale of Ruth, set in the time of the judges, into which a Moabite woman is brought and whose close shows the ancestry of the Lord Jesus. At mealtime Boaz welcomes Ruth to come, eat of the bread, dip her morsel in vinegar, and sit beside the reapers, and he reaches her parched corn so that she eats, is satisfied, and has some left. That welcome to eat with the reapers reflects the simple home and community life of Israel.
The sitting beside the reapers means alongside them, not inside them or as part of them, for the Hebrew word mitzad means beside or at the side and does not mean in the side. In the same sense the Hebrew word rendered in the side in Deuteronomy 31:26 can mean by the side of, so the book of the law was placed beside the ark in the place appointed for it rather than inside the ark, distinct from the Ten Commandments placed inside it. The Hebrew word for dipping the morsel in vinegar is rendered in the Septuagint by a form of bapto meaning to dip or immerse, so the verse illustrates dipping, not sprinkling.
The verse belongs to the harvest in Boaz's field, where grain that has been cut down must also be gathered into sheaves. Ruth's gleaning in the field is an example of joining faithfully in humble work, eating until satisfied from what Boaz gives. Her gleaning in Boaz's field illustrates the work of seeking people who have been overlooked and gathering them into the church, even through small acts of service.