Graybill & Guillaume/Ruth, 14. The Story of Ruth According to Peter Comestor

Peter Comestor’s rewriting of Ruth in his Scholastic History (1160s) is original for its historical perspective and its use of Jewish sources like Flavius Josephus and rabbinical texts. Untainted by anti-Judaism and polemics, the History identifies the main questions arising from the story, without losing the immediacy of the narrative and the poetic nature of the tale. Some of these elements also survived in later vernacularizations and versifications of the story of Ruth, inspired by Comestor’s work.