Genesis 38

After Joseph is sold into Egypt in Genesis 37, the narrative briefly turns away from Joseph to the household of his brother Judah. Joseph's story resumes in Genesis 39.

Outline

• Verses 1–5 Judah leaves his brothers and goes to stay with Hirah the Adullamite. He marries the daughter of a Canaanite named Shua and has three sons: Er, Onan, and Shelah.
• Verses 6–11 Judah takes Tamar as a wife for his firstborn, Er. Because Er is wicked, the LORD puts him to death. Judah tells Onan to raise up offspring for his brother, but Onan, knowing that the offspring would not be his, avoids doing so, and he too dies. Fearing that Shelah might also die, Judah sends Tamar back to her father's house to wait until Shelah is grown.
• Verses 12–19 After Judah's wife dies, Judah goes up to Timnah for the sheepshearing. Because Shelah has grown up but has not been given to her as a husband, Tamar takes off her widow's garments, covers her face with a veil, and sits at the entrance to Enaim. Judah takes her for a prostitute, promises her a young goat, and leaves his signet, cord, and staff with her as a pledge. Tamar conceives.
• Verses 20–23 Judah sends Hirah with the young goat to recover the pledge, but the people of the place say there has been no such prostitute there.
• Verses 24–26 About three months later, when it becomes known that Tamar is pregnant, Judah orders that she be burned. Tamar sends him the signet, cord, and staff; Judah recognizes them and acknowledges, "She hath been more righteous than I."
• Verses 27–30 Tamar gives birth to twins. When one child puts out his hand, the midwife ties a scarlet thread on it, but his brother comes out first and is named Perez; the child who comes out afterward is named Zerah.

Key Verses

• Genesis 38:8 "Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother" — The custom whereby a younger brother continues the line of a deceased elder brother (commonly called levirate marriage) forms the background of the chapter's conflict.
• Genesis 38:26 "She hath been more righteous than I" — Judah's acknowledgment of his own wrongdoing is the turning point of the chapter.
• Genesis 38:29 "Therefore his name was called Pharez" — Perez is the ancestor through whom the genealogy later continues to David and to Jesus.

Characters and Places

• Judah: The fourth son of Jacob and the central figure of the chapter.
• Tamar: Judah's eldest daughter-in-law. After losing Er and Onan, she bears sons through her father-in-law, Judah.
• Er, Onan, and Shelah: The three sons born to Judah and the daughter of Shua.
• Hirah: Judah's friend, an Adullamite.
• Perez and Zerah: The twins born to Tamar.
• Adullam, Chezib, Timnah, and Enaim: Places in the land of Canaan where Judah stayed or through which he passed.

Points for Reflection

• The chapter's placement: Because it sits in the middle of the Joseph narrative, the chapter can seem abrupt, but many interpreters read it as a device that contrasts Judah's failure with Joseph's resistance to temptation in chapter 39. Some also see Judah, having admitted his wrongdoing, as a changed man who in Genesis 44 offers himself in place of Benjamin.
• The sin of Onan: Some traditions have read verses 9–10 as grounds for prohibiting contraception or masturbation. Others, however, widely hold that the focus of the text is Onan's refusal of his responsibility to raise up offspring for his brother.
• Assessing Tamar: The text does not commend Tamar for disguising herself as a prostitute. It does, however, have Judah himself declare that she is "more righteous than I." Interpreters differ in how they evaluate Tamar's actions.
• Distinguishing later tradition: Because Tamar did not publicly name Judah but only sent him the items, later Jewish literature preserves accounts that present her as an example of refusing to shame another person publicly. This comes from interpretation, not from what is written in the text.
• Related law and Scripture: The custom of raising up offspring for a deceased brother is set down as law in Deuteronomy 25, and Ruth 4, which features the kinsman-redeemer, also mentions "Pharez, whom Tamar bare unto Judah."
• Connection to the New Testament: The genealogy in Matthew 1 records, "Judas begat Phares and Zara of Thamar." Tamar is one of the women named in this genealogy, along with Rahab, Ruth, and the wife of Uriah (Bathsheba).

In the Korean Church

This chapter is rarely covered in Sunday school curricula. However, when sermons on the genealogy in Matthew 1 are preached during Advent and Christmas, Tamar is often introduced as one of the four women named in the genealogy.