The context of the passage should be seen in the light where Naomi and her
family were environmental refugees, forced by famine and crop failure to flee
to Moab, where one of her sons married Ruth, a Moabite. We are not certain why
Naomi’s husband and two sons died there but poverty, starvation and disease are
the lot of the landless poor in most cultures. And so Naomi and Ruth became
economic migrants again, returning to Naomi’s birthplace after hearing that
there was no food in Judah.
The panorama of the selected passage suggests that Naomi and Ruth
arrived with nothing; they were in a deplorable situation. Subsequently, Ruth
set out to find food, gleaning leftovers in the field margins of Boaz a distant
relative of Naomi. Eventually, Boaz showed an optimistic response and welcomes
the migrant refugee. In doing so, he simply followed biblical injunctions:
‘When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your
field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and for
the foreigner residing among you. Ruth and Naomi only survived because of their
redeemer-kinsman, Boaz.
The International Law defines “refugee” as a person who is outside
his or her country and who is unable or unwilling to return to it because of
well-founded fear of being persecuted for reason of race, religion,
nationality, or membership of a particular social group or political opinion.
According to the United Nations High Commission of Refugee official website,
there are 42 million refugees in the world and 80 percent of the world’s
refugees are in developing nations. In India today, there are about 185,656
refugees from Tibet, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Burma (Myanmar), etc. At present the government of India on humanitarian ground allows refugees to
apply for term visas, and work permits are given for government services such
as health care and education. In addition, they have access to the
law-enforcement and justice system. Ironically, these provisions are enjoyed
by a hand-full of refugees. One third or more refugees in India are still in
quest for proper national laws.
In today's scenario, Ruth beyond doubt symbolizes a refugee. But more so, it stands as a symbol of least-empowered
members and minority groups who face the brunt of the immoral and corrupt system of
our society. They might not literally be a refugee but turn out to be the
fatalities of injustices and prejudices in their native soil. For such a time as this, how do Christians witness? Does the
Christian community have an objective view about what should be done to or for
refugees and the suffering community?
Jesus' parables about the Good Samaritan infer
that those who live among us should be treated by us as our neighbors, and
extend the compassion of Christ to their circumstances. It is ironic, but true,
that many people who form the mainstay of our communities are like the priest
and Levi in Jesus’ parable, who wanted
nothing to do with the injured person. I believe one of the points Jesus was
making was that when it comes to other people, irrespective of their identity
or status, the appropriate reaction for a Christian is to go above and beyond
and practice love in action. I am sure Jesus would see a refugee, a suffering
community as an individual, made in the image of God, valuable to God and in
need of emancipation. Today, our response should not just be confined to
leaving the gleanings for the aliens and poor but to approach them with an
empathetic embrace, just as Boaz took Ruth as his wife in times of her agony. Christians
ought to be at the forefront of addressing policies that are hostile to the
poor, the dispossessed, the vulnerable, and those without a voice. May God help
us never to lose sight of the hundreds of millions of people who are in distress and
help us develop a logic of oneness in humanity and love which I believe is the
first step in actually doing something for them.
V. Nikato Sema MTh. I (Missiology)
No comments:
Post a Comment