הָאֹֽכְלִים֙ לְמַ֣עֲדַנִּ֔ים נָשַׁ֖מּוּ בַּחוּצ֑וֹת הָאֱמֻנִים֙ עֲלֵ֣י תוֹלָ֔ע חִבְּק֖וּ אַשְׁפַּתּֽוֹת׃ (ס)
Mereka yang dahulu menyantap makanan lezat kini merana di jalan-jalan; mereka yang dibesarkan di atas kain kirmizi kini memeluk timbunan sampah.
Bereshit Rabbah
Rabbi Hoshaya the Great began: “I1The speaker is Wisdom (the Torah) personified. was with Him as an amon, a delight day after day…” (Proverbs 8:30) – amon means a child’s caretaker, amon means covered, amon means hidden, and some say amon means greatness. Amon means a child’s caretaker, as it says: “As a caretaker [omen] carries a nursing child” (Numbers 11:12). Amon means covered, as it says: “Those covered [ha’emunim] in scarlet…” (Lamentations 4:5). Amon means hidden, as it says: “He was omen2This is expounded to mean that Mordekhai hid Esther from the emissaries of Aḥashverosh. Hadassa” (Esther 2:7). Amon means great, as it says: “Are you better than No Amon [which sits in the rivers]?” (Nahum 3:8), which we translate in Targum as: Are you better than the great city of Alexandria,3No (or No Amon) is the name of a city in Egypt. Targum identifies this city as Alexandria, and explains Amon to mean great. which is located among the rivers?
Another matter, amon means artisan [uman]. The Torah is saying: ‘I was the tool of craft of the Holy One blessed be He.’ The way of the world is that when a flesh-and-blood king builds a palace he does not build it based on his own knowledge, but rather based on the knowledge of an artisan.4A professional builder. And the artisan does not build it based on his own knowledge, but rather, he has [plans on] sheets and tablets by which to ascertain how he should build its rooms, how he should build its doors. So too, the Holy One blessed be He looked in the Torah and created the world. The Torah says: “Bereshit God created” (Genesis 1:1), and reshit is nothing other than the Torah, as it says: “The Lord made me at the beginning of [reshit] His way” (Proverbs 8:22).5Be-reshit is interpreted as ‘by means of the Torah.’
Another matter, amon means artisan [uman]. The Torah is saying: ‘I was the tool of craft of the Holy One blessed be He.’ The way of the world is that when a flesh-and-blood king builds a palace he does not build it based on his own knowledge, but rather based on the knowledge of an artisan.4A professional builder. And the artisan does not build it based on his own knowledge, but rather, he has [plans on] sheets and tablets by which to ascertain how he should build its rooms, how he should build its doors. So too, the Holy One blessed be He looked in the Torah and created the world. The Torah says: “Bereshit God created” (Genesis 1:1), and reshit is nothing other than the Torah, as it says: “The Lord made me at the beginning of [reshit] His way” (Proverbs 8:22).5Be-reshit is interpreted as ‘by means of the Torah.’
Eikhah Rabbah
“Those who would eat delicacies are desolate in the streets; those reared in scarlet embrace refuse heaps” (Lamentations 4:5).
“Those who would eat delicacies,” Rabbi Ḥanina bar Pappa said: Loaves and aged wine. “Those reared in scarlet” were cast into the rubbish heap.
“Those who would eat delicacies,” Rabbi Ḥanina bar Pappa said: Loaves and aged wine. “Those reared in scarlet” were cast into the rubbish heap.
Midrash Tanchuma Buber
(Exod. 12:29:) AND IT CAME TO PASS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT THAT THE LORD SMOTE ALL THE FIRST-BORN…. This text is related (to Ps. 119:62): AT MIDNIGHT I WILL ARISE TO THANK YOU.61See PRK 7:4; PR 17:3. David said: I am obliged to stand and thank you for what you did with my great grandfather and my great grandmother at midnight. When? When Naomi and Ruth, her Moabite daughter-in-law, returned. What is written (in Ruth 1:19): <AND IT CAME TO PASS THAT, WHEN THEY CAME TO BETHLEHEM,> THE WHOLE CITY WAS EXCITED [OVER THEM, AND THE WOMEN SAID: IS THIS NAOMI?]62Cf. Ruth R. 3:6. This is the woman who went away in a covered wagon!63Gk.: skepaste. The word can also denote a sedan chair. This Naomi is the one who went away and dressed in fine wool!64Gk.: melote (“sheepskin”). (Lam. 4:5:) THOSE WHO WERE REARED IN PURPLE <HAVE EMBRACED REFUSE HEAPS >…. Both of them dwelt in a single house. (Ruth 3:1:) THEN [HER MOTHER-IN-LAW NAOMI SAID TO HER:] {NAOMI SAID UNTO HER DAUGHTER-IN-LAW RUTH:} SHALL I NOT SEEK A RESTING PLACE [FOR YOU]…? Hence they said that a woman has a resting place, not in her father's house, but in her husband's house. (Ruth 3:2:) AND NOW, IS THERE NOT OUR ACQUAINTANCE BOAZ? What is <meant that he is> OUR ACQUAINTANCE (moda'tanu)? He is one of our relatives (qarov). {Is not (according to Ruth 2:21) THE MAN RELATED (qarov) TO US…?} [Thus it is stated (in Ruth 2:21): THE MAN IS RELATED (qarov) TO US…. ] But as a prince of <his> generation, why did he go out and sleep on the threshing floor?65Below, Lev. 9:8. Simply because the generation was extremely lawless. So he went out and slept on the threshing floor. <He did so> in order to ward off the lawless. However (according to Ruth 3:3), YOU (Ruth) ARE TO WASH AND ANOINT YOURSELF. She did not do so. Rather Ruth was extremely pure. She said: Whatever woman saw me thus would say: This is a whore. What did she do (according to vs. 6)? SHE WENT DOWN TO THE THRESHING FLOOR AND DID JUST AS HER MOTHER-IN-LAW HAD COMMANDED HER. <It was only> after she went down, <that> she did everything that her mother-in-law had commanded her.