Genesis 38

Genesis 38

This story about Judah serves as a transition between Joseph being sold to Egypt and his time in Egypt. In this story, Judah is seen taking a wife from the Canaanites, which seems to initiate the problem. Although it does not explicitly state that Judah was commanded not to take a wife from the Canaanites, his ancestors had been warned of this. She bears him many sons, and his first son becomes an evil man in God’s sight, so much so that the Lord eventually puts him to death. This leaves Er’s (Judah’s son) wife as a widow.

As was customary at that time, if a woman’s husband died, his brother would take her to be his wife. So Judah commanded his second son Onan to take Tamar as his wife. But Onan ends up being much like his brother Er, wicked. Once again we see a bit of jealousy between brothers, a problem that has come all the way from the bitter jealousy of Jacob and Esau, through Jacob’s 12 sons, and now into Judah’s children. Since Onan knew that any children he had with Tamar would not be considered as his but as Er’s, he chose to have no children with Tamar, upsetting Judah and God. As a result, God put him to death as well, which once again left Tamar as a widow.

So Judah once again made a promise to Tamar, this time that his third son, Shelah, would take her as his wife. But after his own wife died, Judah left the place in which he was living and traveled away, leaving Tamar alone with an unfilled promise. Despite the difficulties that had come up in his life, Judah did not even think about how this would affect Tamar. She was still patiently waiting for him to send Shelah to her, but he had completely forgotten about his promises. Tamar then takes matters in her own hands and goes to find him, disguising herself, and making herself a prostitute so that she could be with Judah.

At the moment Judah had no clue who this woman was, and he did not know for several months. At a weak moment in his life, he compromised his morals as he took a prostitute into his home. Granted, he was tricked by Tamar, but at the same time, he was the one who had originally broken his promises to her. The consequences of these actions were seen in his humiliation. When it was revealed that Tamar was pregnant, he was ready to have her killed, chagrining her with not keeping up her end of the deal in waiting for Shelah. But when she brings out his staff and signet, he realizes what had happened. In his moment of weakness, he not only broke his promise with Tamar, but he also fell into her own trap. Now, she was pregnant with his children. Furthermore he had almost had her killed for her immorality, when he was just as guilty as she.

So what can we learn from this side story? Well like many of the stories in Genesis, we must always remember that our actions can have major consequences on our lives as well as the lives of others. Jealousy had extended from Jacob to the sons of Judah. Deception had extended from Jacob to Tamar. For Judah, his choice of marriage revealed some costly consequences as well. But also, Genesis 38 shows us the dangers of judgment. We all tend to rank our mistakes against the mistakes of others to make us feel better about ourselves when in reality we are no better than anyone else. That is what Judah had done to Tamar when he accused her of living an immoral lifestyle. But in reality, he had done the very thing, only he had not yet been caught. We must be careful in pointing out the mistakes of others when we have not yet done a self-check up. Sin is not something that we need to play around with, for as we have seen for 38 chapters now, the consequences can be devastating.

Matt