A common misinterpretation views this passage as endorsing unrestricted intermarriage between Israelites and Moabites, ignoring Deuteronomy's prohibitions on such unions due to Moab's idolatrous history and the cultural tensions it implied; others might assume the marriages were immediately blessed or that Ruth and Orpah had fully embraced Israelite faith at this point, overlooking the narrative's later portrayal of Orpah's return to Moabite ways and Ruth's eventual conversion, thus missing the story's emphasis on costly faithfulness amid familial tragedy.
Ruth 1:4
King James Version (1769)
4 And they took them wives of the women of Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth: and they dwelled there about ten years.
This verse narrates the marriages of Naomi's sons, Mahlon and Chilion, to Moabite women named Orpah and Ruth during their family's ten-year sojourn in Moab amid famine in Judah, establishing key relationships central to the book's themes of loss, loyalty, and divine providence, while highlighting God's work through unlikely circumstances and outsiders to preserve the lineage leading to King David.