a Do not press/urge me to leave you, or to turn back from following you. b For wherever you go (halak), I will go (halak); And wherever you stay (lun), I will stay (lun). c Your people (‘am) will be my people (‘am), And your God (’elohim), my God (’elohim).71 b' Where you die (mut), I will die (mut); And there shall I be buried. a' Thus may Yahweh do to me and more so—Nothing but death (mut) will separate me from you! The terms in b, “go” (halak) and “stay” (lun), are opposites, creating a merism, equivalent to saying “all of life.”72 Ruth swears her commitment to Naomi in the name of Israel’s
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