Ruth 2:17
“So she gleaned in the field until evening; and she beat out that which she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley.”
What does Ruth 2:17 mean?
Ruth spent the entire day gathering leftover grain in Boaz's field, and by evening she had collected enough to thresh (remove the grain from the stalks) a substantial amount, roughly a bushel of barley. This detail shows how hard she worked and how generously Boaz's field provided for her. For a widow with almost nothing, this represented real security, and the narrator wants us to see both Ruth's faithful effort and the beginning of God's provision through her honest labor.