The Hebrew text of verse 7 is rather awkward to render literally, “so she set out from the place where she was, with her two daughters-in-law, and they went on the way to return to the land of Judah.” Even some ancient versions have made adaptations of this Hebrew text in order to obtain a smoother rendering; for example, “she set out” is changed to “they set out,” since obviously all of them went together. So certain editions of the Syriac text. The third person plural is also found in some Septuagint manuscripts; the omission of “on the way” occurs also in the Old Latin. The expression “on the way” is sometimes deleted, and in some instances the second part of verse 7 is omitted as being unnecessary information, since the data has already been implied in verse 6. So the Targum. However, rather than delete the second part of verse 7, it is possible to combine it with verse 8 as New American Bible does: “she and her two daughters-in-law left the place where they had been living. Then as they were on the road back to the land of Judah….” Note how the text is restructured in Good News Translation.

One of the problems involved in rendering verse 7 is that not all of the relevant information is given in the Hebrew text. From what follows later in chapter 1, it seems quite clear that Naomi did not invite her daughters-in-law to follow her. She apparently only informed them of her intentions of going, and they took the initiative to go along with her. In order to point out clearly that the conversation, beginning with verse 8, began only after the journey had started, the latter part of verse 7 can be conveniently rendered as to go back to Judah. Perhaps the actual conversation took place at the border between Moab and Judah in the Jordan valley.

Quoted with permission from de Waard, Jan and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Ruth. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1978, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .