Genesis: 1a 1b 1c 1d 2a 2b 2c 2d 3 4a 4b 4c/5 6a 6b 7 8 9 10 11a 11b 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25a 25b 26a 26b 27 28a 28b 29 30a 30b 31a 31b/32a 32b 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44a 44b 45 46 47a 47b 48 49 50
The Story of Yehudah and Tamar
This story was probably not about Yehudah at all, but rather a Kena'anite rite of the date-goddess as Astarte, and possibly an account of the take-over of her shrine by the Beney Yisra-Elim. It bears many similarities with the story of Amnon's rape of his half-sister Tamar in 2 Samuel 13; she is the daughter of King David there, but the name Tamar was simply a hereditary and traditional title of the priestess, as David, or Yedid-Yah, "the beloved of the moon-goddess", was likewise a title. It really does not belong at this point in Genesis. Was it perhaps David, or the Redactor then or later, trying to find a way of dealing with the Amnon-Tamar story: after all, pseudo-naming him Yehudah would make sense? Or is it the other way round: that the Amnon story was in fact a rite, repeating this one, and either Av-Shalom misunderstood, or Amnon exceeded his role, or Av-Shalom's part too is ritualistic as well, having to do with the "Golden Bough" champion attempting to seing the priest-kingship from the incumbent - and in this case, being defeated?
The connection to King David is also present in the latter part of the tale, with the births of Parets and Zerach. The genealogical table in the Book of Ruth (4:18-22) tells us that "Parets begat Chetsron, who begat Ram (רָם), who begat Ami-Nadav (עַמִּינָדָב), who begat Nachshon (נַחְשׁוֹן), who begat Salmah (שַׂלְמָה) who begat Bo'az (בֹּעַז), who begat Oved (עוֹבֵד), who begat Yishai (יִשָׁי), who begat David". This makes Yehudah the ancestor of King David.
The Book of Chronicles 1 4:1, on the other hand, names Perets (rather than Parets), Chetsron, Karmi, Chur (חוּר), and Shoval as Yehudah's sons, with no mention of Zerach; this despite having told us in 1 2:3/4 that his sons were Er, Onan, and Shelah, and that "Tamar his daughter-in-law bore him Perets and Zerach. All the sons of Yehudah were five". This latter reflects the version we are about to read here.
At one level, it is simply a variation of the same fertility myths we have seen elsewhere; she needs to have a child, to fulfil her female destiny, and cannot; not because of barrenness this time, but for lack of a male.
But it is also significant that it should be placed here, so close to the rape of Dinah, and yet far enough away that a connection is not automatically made. It has no place in the Yoseph story after all.
And lastly, it is one of the more intriguing features of Judaism that every significant figure in the Biblical history, from Adam and Chavah being disobedient in the Garden of Eden, via Kayin (Cain) killing his brother, Av-Ram and Yitschak both selling their wives, Ya'akov (Jacob) stealing his brother's birthright and blessing and then his father-in-law's sheep and household gods, to the eponymous priest Levi carrying out a massacre at Shechem with his brither Shim'on, to Yehudah here, and Mosheh at Merivah, and on through the many sins of King David... not one is a pure hero, a god-like role-model for future generations, like the heroes of every other national epic and saga in the world; all are flawed, failed, merely human, worthy of respect for their good deeds, yes, but also, like every other human being...
✡
38:1 VA YEHI BA ET HA HI VA YERED YEHUDAH MEY ET ECHAV VA YET AD ISH ADUL-AMI U SHEMO CHIRAH
וַיְהִי בָּעֵת הַהִוא וַיֵּרֶד יְהוּדָה מֵאֵת אֶחָיו וַיֵּט עַד אִישׁ עֲדֻלָּמִי וּשְׁמוֹ חִירָה
KJ (King James translation): And it came to pass at that time, that Judah went down from his brethren, and turned in to a certain Adullamite, whose name was Hirah.
BN (BibleNet translation): And it happened, around the time of the festival, that Yehudah left his brotheres and went to stay with an Adul-Ami, whose name was Chirah.
ET: Not the "ET" that denotes a nominal accusative, but the accusative of the word "OT", which does not simply mean a "time", but a very specific time: feast, fast or festival. We are not told which festival.
YERED (ירד): to say he "went down from his brothers" may not simply mean that he wandered off for a while. After all, the total length of the following story must be at the very least fifteen years, in order for the boys to be old enough to do what they did - and probably twenty or twenty-five is nearer the mark. Yet it is presented as though it all happened within the space of a single week. Nor is the "going down" here likely to be intended geographically, in the way that we heard, in the previous chapter, about "going down" into Egypt; because the town of Adul-Am was built on the top of a hill.
ADUL-AM: 11 miles north-west of Chevron, 17 miles south-west of Yeru-Shala'im, or just south of Beit Shemesh if you prefer to map it that way, it was the seat of a Kena'anite king dispossessed by Yehoshu'a (Joshua 12:15), today called Khirbet Id-al-Ma, or Eîd el Mieh in the Arabic - and interesting to note the retention of the "festival" in the name. Continuing our Davidic connections, it was a key location in the David story, his hiding-cave during the long years of Sha'ul's persecution of him, and the base for his bandit-army (1 Samuel 22 ff).
CHIRAH (חירה): the word means "noble", and may therefore indicate a social position rather than a name. Why is he mentioned anyway, since he has no place in the story?
38:2 VA YAR SHAM YEHUDAH BAT ISH KENA'ANI U SHEMO SHU'A VA YIKACH'EHA VA YAVO ELEYHA
וַיַּרְא יְהוּדָה בַּת אִישׁ כְּנַעֲנִי וּשְׁמוֹ שׁוּעַ וַיִּקָּחֶהָ וַיָּבֹא אֵלֶיהָ
KJ: And Judah saw there a daughter of a certain Canaanite, whose name was Shuah; and he took her, and went in unto her.
BN: And Yehudah saw there a daughter of a Kena'ani, and his name was Shu'a; and he took her, and went in to her.
SHEMO (שמו): "his name", rather than SHEMAH (שמה), "her name". Why is the father's name given, not his daughter's? Or is her name actually Bat Shu'ah, in the way that David's fourth wife was named Bat Sheva?
SHU'A: the name means "wealth" or "riches". Is there a link between Shu'a and Chirah, both being epithets of the classic "Pilgrim's Progress" sort, in the way that the Ya'akov-in-Charan story was about Sheep and Cow and Uncle White; and thus the two are actually the same man?
Is there also, perhaps even more importantly, a distant, a purely literary, even a slightly ironic, link to both Be'er Sheva and, more significantly given that we are in the realms of King David and of improper relationships with women, of Bat Sheva, the woman with whom he parented Shelomoh. Bat Shu'a and Bat Sheva are however spelled differently - the latter being בַּת-שֶׁבַע with a Bet not a Vav.
YIKACHEYHA (יקחה): No sense of marriage here; did he really just "take her? A pick-up in a bar for a one-night-stand? A visit to a brothel? A sacred marriage on the occasion of the festival, he the wealthy Yisra-Elite chosen as "May King", she the daughter of SHU'A and/or CHIRAH, the local rich-man, as May Queen? Or are we hearing echoes of Shechem and Dinah, and thence the Amnon-Tamar story, perhaps only in foreshadowing? There is certainly an echo of ritual prostitution when Yehudah takes Tamar later.
I wonder how Yehudah's father would have felt about him taking a Kena'ani woman, and fathering children on her, given the ancestral taboo, given Yishma-El, given Esav? I guess it only mattered if he married her - and verse 12 will confirm that he did.
38:3 VA TAHAR VA TELED BEN VA YIKRA ET SHEMO ER
וַתַּהַר וַתֵּלֶד בֵּן וַיִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמוֹ עֵר
KJ: And she conceived, and bare a son; and he called his name Er.
BN: And she fell pregnant, and bore a son; and he named him Er.
ER (ער): The root is the same that gives IR (עיר) = "city", a most unlikely name for a child, but not in fact connected here, despite sound, spelling and appearances. Gesenius reckons it means "watcher", but as so often without evidence. Its root, AVER (עור), means precisely the opposite, "to blind", from which UR (עור) means "to be hot/ardent" or in another use "to awaken", both transitively and intransitively; also "to rejoice". In another usage, possibly of foreign origin, UR (עור) = "chaff" and OR (עור) = "skin".
If it was ritual prostitution, then the children would have been sacred and dedicated to the temple. Is this the case here? If "took her" does indeed mean rape, and he raped a sacred priestess and left her pregnant, she would have been personally exonerated but lost her office. The children would still have been dedicated to the Temple, but would have been obvious candidates for sacrifice. This may explain their early demise.
Surf The Site
Genesis: 1a 1b 1c 1d 2a 2b 2c 2d 3 4a 4b 4c/5 6a 6b 7 8 9 10 11a 11b 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25a 25b 26a 26b 27 28a 28b 29 30a 30b 31a 31b/32a 32b 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44a 44b 45 46 47a 47b 48 49 50
1 Chronicles 4:21 has Er as a sub-clan of Shelah (שלה), while Onan is there only as a son of Yerachme-El (ירחמאל - Jerahmeel in English), son of Chetsron (חצרון), son of Parets in 1 Chronicles 2; whereby Perets (or Pharats or Parats) had taken precedence over Shelah; while Zerach isn't mentioned at all in 4:21 but only in 2:26.
But if it is his physical seed, why does he believe that the child will not be his, but his brother's, even though his brother is dead. The answer to that lies in Deuteronomy 25:6: " And it shall be, that the first-born that she bears shall succeed in the name of his brother that is dead, so that his name is not blotted out of Yisra-El." Which means that the elder brother's blessing and birthright pass to this son, and not to the man who has fathered him.
Note that it is he and not the mother who gives the child its name. Compare this to previous birth-tales where it was the mother (Sarah, Le'ah, Rachel, etc).
38:4 VA TAHAR OD VA TELED BEN VA TIKRA ET SHEMO ONAN
וַתַּהַר עוֹד וַתֵּלֶד בֵּן וַתִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמוֹ אוֹנָן
KJ: And she conceived again, and bare a son; and she called his name Onan.
BN: And she fell pregnant again, and bore a son; and she named him Onan.
This allows us to discount much of the speculation above (but the method remains valid: take it verse by verse, establish hypotheses based on the given text, then re-evaluate as the text provides more information). After all, you can rape a woman once and get her pregnant, but you are unlikely to return; and prostitutes are usually more careful about conception; and the ritual hierodules don't generally copulate with the same May King twice, unless the "marriage" is like Queen Esther's, the formal marriage to the King in the name of the Mother Goddess. And yet the text clearly told us that "he took her". Was it simply a way of putting off the implications of Yehudah "marrying out", one of which - and Bo'az marrying Ruth, who can barely be said to have converted, adds another layer to this - is: was King David, the primal ancestor of the Messiah, actually Jewish? Because this does now sound like marriage- ad his "going down" from his brothers a way of saying that he left the tribe, doing as Kayin and Yishma-El and Esav had done before him, which was to join his wife's tribe. Which hypothesis is reinforced by the tribal area inherited by Yehudah later on - precisely here.
So what is meant by "took her"? Married her against her father's will? No evidence of that anywhere in the text? Or as Eli-Ezer "took" Rivkah, by placing a nose-ring and a wrist-bracelet on her when she was patently available for marrying. See verse 6 below, where Yehudah "took" a wife for his son: it clearly does mean marriage. And verse 12 will confirm it with Yehudah and Bat Shu'ah as well.
ONAN (אונן): probably a variation of (אונם) = "strong".
Why does she name the second son but he named the first one? If this was indeed another matrilocal marriage, she would have named the first son as well (but the Redactor is doing his best to hide as much as he can of this exogamy, because, well, Yehudah, the one surviving tribe, the remnant of the Jewish people - and he married out! Oi ve voi!)
38:5 VA TOSEPH OD VA TELED BEN VA TIKRA ET SHEMO SHELAH VE HAYAH VICHZIV BE LIDETAH OTO
וַתֹּסֶף עוֹד וַתֵּלֶד בֵּן וַתִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמוֹ שֵׁלָה וְהָיָה בִכְזִיב בְּלִדְתָּהּ אֹתוֹ
KJ: And she yet again conceived, and bare a son; and called his name Shelah: and he was at Chezib, when she bare him.
BN: And yet again she bore a son, and named him Shelah; and he was at Cheziv when she bore him.
SHELAH (שלה): as with Er, the meaning is uncertain. SHALAH (שלה), may be a variant of SHALAV (שלו) = "to be safe/secure"; or it may come from SHALAH (שלה) = "to wander/deceive"; or from SHALAH (שלה) = "to draw out", and as such would be the Yehudit equivalent of the Egyptian MASHAH (משה), whence Mosheh (Moses). Daniel 3:29 has SHALAH (שלה) = "an error"; though this may itself be an error, as most texts offer SHALU (שָׁלוּ) in brackets as an alternative. SHILO'AH (שלוה), from the same root, is the town generally mis-named Shiloh in English translations; the two are really different places. SHEL-LAH (שלה) is the feminine genitive "belonging to her". Given the nature of the story, and given the laws of ultimogeniture, it may very well be that this latter is actually correct: Yehudah sacrificing each of his first two sons, but dedicating the third to the priestess at the Temple; this would also give added weight to Tamar's complaint, and her public ritual prostitution.
SELAH is also a possible reading, in theory anyway. Selah is the technical term for an end-bar in a stave of music, the notification of a pause before beginning the next section. When it appears in the Psalms, as it often does, it is a technical direction to the musicians and is not meant to be said.
CHEZIV (כזיב): aka Achziv, or Chozeva (כֹזֵבָא) in 1 Chronicles 4:22 is today En al-Kazbah in the wadi al-Sant. Not to be confused with Achziv just south of Ras-El-Naqura (Rosh Ha Nikra) on the Israel-Lebanese border.
This, we can now conclude, was no rape, no hierodule-hierophant encounter, but a genuine marriage, and with a wealthy tribal heiress to boot, and three children as a result; so the father of the Jews was married to an Adul-Amite, a Kena'anite! Av-Raham and Yitschak would turn in their graves! But why are modern Jews not equally concerned? After all, exogamy is the sin! And here they are, the remnant of the tribe of Yehudah, whose wife was "taken", two of whose sons died in wickedness, who slept with his daughter-in-law and fathered twins on her, and whose most important descendant, King David, was a Beney Mo-Av on his mother's side.
And this really matters, because David is a descendant, and from David's root will come the Mashiyach (you can see the full genealogy all the way to Jesus by clicking here; or alternately, since Matthew and Luke offer such very different versions, and do so because the Tanach has so many different versions from which to construe it, you can see the full genealogy all the way to Jesus by clicking here) And Yoseph too will marry out, and his sons too will become tribes fully accepted in the Israelite confederacy.
38:6 VA YIKACH YEHUDAH ISHAH LE ER BECHORO U SHEMAH TAMAR
וַיִּקַּח יְהוּדָה אִשָּׁה לְעֵר בְּכוֹרוֹ וּשְׁמָהּ תָּמָר
KJ: And Judah took a wife for Er his firstborn, whose name was Tamar.
BN: And Yehudah took a wife for Er his first-born, and her name was Tamar.
How old must Er have been? Not that it matters to the tale, but it does allow us to see the full time-lapse of this tale. They married them off young in those days, but we must have jumped at least ten years between the last verse and this one, and - if the Tanach is history and accurate chronology, as those of faith insist - then the following events will be taking place while Yoseph is in Egypt.
TAMAR (תמר): meaning "palm-tree", which was sacred to the Love-and Birth goddess Eshet (Isis), known elsewhere as Io, Yah, Ishtar, Lat or Il-Lat/al-Lat (see my notes to the Lot story). The Arabs worshipped the palm-tree of Nejran, which they draped annually with women's clothes. Lat's son was Apollo of Delos. Probably the original Tamar was a ritual prostitute (Kedeshah/קדשה, not Zonah/זונה) – there is a world of difference between a fertility priestess and a street-whore; and see verse 21, where Chirah clearly believes she was a Kedeshah. The scarlet thread links her with the twins Parets and Zerach (for which see also the connection to Shelah above), and to Rachav (Rahab) - cf Joshua 2:18.
Note that Er is BECHORO, the first-born; take this use of the term back to the Kayin and Esav stories, in both of which it was problematic.
38:7 VA YEHI ER BECHOR YEHUDAH RA BE EYNEY YHVH VA YEMIT'EHU YHVH
וַיְהִי עֵר בְּכוֹר יְהוּדָה רַע בְּעֵינֵי יְהוָה וַיְמִתֵהוּ יְהוָה
KJ: And Er, Judah's firstborn, was wicked in the sight of the LORD; and the LORD slew him.
BN: And Er, Yehudah's first-born, was wicked in the sight of YHVH; and YHVH killed him.
We remember Onan as the sinner in this tale, but apparently Er was wicked too. What actually was his sin: or is the sin simply attributed because his name backwards means "wicked" (ער-רע) and the authors just can't resist those word-games? Or is this simply a way of expressing the popular belief that death was a punishment for sin, so if you died young you must have been wicked? Probably he had a heart-attack, or contracted Brucellosis from his goats; these are the methods that YHVH employs, alongside hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes and avalanches. Either way, as we shall see, his wickedness cannot have been the same as Onan's, because he was the formal husband.
YHVH (יהוה): We had almost forgotten that he was still in the story; it must be several chapters since he last got a mention!
38:8 VA YOMER YEHUDAH LE ONAN BO EL ESHET ACHIYCHA VE YABEM OTAH VE HAKEM ZERA LE ACHIYCHA
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוּדָה לְאוֹנָן בֹּא אֶל אֵשֶׁת אָחִיךָ וְיַבֵּם אֹתָהּ וְהָקֵם זֶרַע לְאָחִיךָ
KJ: And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother.
BN: And Yehudah said to Onan, "Go in to your brother's wife, and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her, and raise up a descendant for your brother."
But probably this is why the story is here: the need to explain the ancient Levirate Law (Deuteronomy 25:5-10, Ruth 4:5) by example; as with everything else in Beney Yisra-El history, one of the ancestors has to be the originator, and Yehudah was chosen to carry the tale. And again the David connection - because it was under the Levirate law that Bo'az married Rut.
VE YABEM: the custom of a brother marrying his late brother's childless widow, the Levirate marriage as it is called (and which caused Henry VIII such troubles!), in order that there be an heir (assuming that the child is a boy), or at the very least a posterity (assuming that the child is a girl) - which takes us back to the issues raised between Sarah and Hagar and between Le'ah/Rachel and Zilpah/Bilhah, as to who names the child, and who it really "belongs to", tribally speaking. This Yehudah tale may in fact be a Biblical responsa to those issues; and if so it is hugely significant. This tale tells us that the child always belongs to the father, in which case it is the father's tribe, and not that of the mother which counts - affecting our questions about Ephrayim and Menasheh being sons of the Egyptian Asnat, and Rut's (Ruth's) non-conversion. Yet today, and since mediaeval if not Roman times, it has been the mother's affiliation which counts.
(But in Onan's case it is more complex than that, because... wait for the next verse and I will explain it there.)
HOWEVER; and there is always a however in TheBibleNet, the existence here of a Mosaic Law, and the insistence by Yehudah, and by the Redactor later, that the law already applied even though YHVH had not yet given it to Mosheh on Mount Sinai, throws into question why all the other, or even some of the other Mosaic Laws did not also apply, such as Av-Ram feeding the angels non-kosher food (Genesis 18:6-8), and several other occasions that have been noted in these commentaries. Was it simply that the Levir was already in place, long before Mosheh?
The laws are given in Deuteronomy 25, the specifics in 25:5 and 6; the repercussions of the brother-in-law refusing are given in the verses that follow, and it is interesting that those repercussions are not enforced here.
A somewhat mocking debate over the Levirate laws can be found in Matthew 22:23–30, which leaves me wondering if a similar mockery was not intended with this story of Yehudah and Tamar.
HAKEM: "To raise up", because this applies to the father, not the mother. Previously the text has used LIVNOT = "to build", the word which gives BEN = "son", and which was so crucial to the Sarah and Le'ah and Rachel tales: a woman without children is nothing in this world; having children gives her status because it guarantees her a kind of immortality. It is significant that a lot of Jewish laws deal with women's sexual and generative needs, far more than they do with men's; to the point that men are actually regarded as little more than tupping rams. But then fertility was the realm of the goddess (death appears to be the realm of the god!). But this is not the case here; this is about the man's posterity, not the woman's; this is HAKEM , not IBANEH (אִבָּנֶה), as in Genesis 16:2.
38:9 VA YEDA ONAN KI LO LO YIHEYEH HA ZARA VE HAYAH IM BA EL ESHET ACHIV VE SHICHET ARTSAH LE VILTI NETAN ZERA LE ACHIV
וַיֵּדַע אוֹנָן כִּי לֹּא לוֹ יִהְיֶה הַזָּרַע וְהָיָה אִם בָּא אֶל אֵשֶׁת אָחִיו וְשִׁחֵת אַרְצָה לְבִלְתִּי נְתָן זֶרַע לְאָחִיו
KJ: And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother.
BN: But Onan knew that the child would not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in to his brother's wife, that he spilled his seed on the ground, rather than create a descendant for his brother.
The infamous Sin of Onan! However, this needs more explanation than the traditional fobbing off with sniggers about masturbation being sinful, evil and bound to cause blindness or even death! First of all, it was not masturbation, it was coitus interruptus - and as such it was a flagrant breach of the Levirate Law, because he has absolutely no right to sleep with his sister-in-law, married or unmarried, is indeed guilty of incest if he does so (Leviticus 18:6 ff), unless it is sanctioned by the Levirate law, for its very specific purpose. So, effectively, he has raped her, even if he only made the decision at the last moment, rather than consciously seizing the legal opportunity, and then abusing it.
This takes us back yet again to the discussion that has run through this commentary, and even in the verses that related the naming of these three sons. To whom does the child belong, the mother or the father; and does it vary between tribes, depending on whether you are parenting with someone who, like yourself, is either patrilocal/patriarchal or matrilocal/matriarchal? This must be seen alongside Sarah's giving Hagar to Av-Raham, and Rachel Bilhah to Ya'akov, that they might bear a child for her "on her knees". It seems that, in this Biblical world, the child "belongs" to the mother and not the father in a matrilocal/matriarchal tribe, but to the father not the mother in a patrilocal/patriarchal tribe, though even then this can change with the slaves and servants who become concubines; in which case it is this phrase, not the Rashi-line about Kena'anite and Habiru slaves, that determines whether or not Jewish identity comes from the mother.
In many traditional fertility rites, by the way, the seed is deliberately spilled on the ground, because it was believed that this was a means of fostering fertility in the soil and providing a good harvest. But not in this tale.
38:10 VA YERA BE EYNEY YHVH ASHER ASAH VA YAMET GAM OTO
וַיֵּרַע בְּעֵינֵי יְהוָה אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה וַיָּמֶת גַּם אֹתוֹ
KJ: And the thing which he did displeased the LORD: wherefore he slew him also.
BN: But what he did was a wickedness in the eyes of YHVH; and he killed him too.
Not having much luck old Yehudah, is he - or are the Ezraics carefully getting rid of his off-spring retrospectively?
As to the punishment, it does seem a bit severe to kill a man for coitus interruptus; unless, yet again, we are in the realm of the fertility rites and sacred ceremonies etc, in which case it would make total sense. Corpses found in various parts of Europe from the ancient rites there have turned up the bodies of men and women, buried in pairs because still locked in coitus at the moment that their throats were ritually and ceremonially cut.
Question: we don't know what Er did that was so wrong, is it possible that he did the same thing as Onan? The phrasing hints that it might be the case. Having raised the question, I reject the answer; the phrasing is sufficiently clear to indicate that Er died either of natural causes, or through "an act of god" as the insurance companies call these things, while Onan was punished for breach of the Levirate Law (though death, according to Deuteronomy 25, is not the prescribed punishment for this, but only being forced to give up one of your shoes). The sin of Onan lies in the breach of the Levirate law.
38:11 VA YOMER YEHUDAH LE TAMAR KALATO SHEVI ALMANAH VEIT AVIYCH AD YIGDAL SHELAH VENI KI AMAR PEN YAMUT GAM HU KE ECHAV VA TELECH TAMAR VA TESHEV BEIT AVIYHA
KJ: Then said Judah to Tamar his daughter in law, Remain a widow at thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown: for he said, Lest peradventure he die also, as his brethren did. And Tamar went and dwelt in her father's house.
BN: Then said Yehudah to Tamar his daughter-in-law, "Stay as a widow at your father's house, until Shelah my son is grown up." For he said, "Lest he die too, like his brothers." And Tamar went and stayed in her father's house.
"Went and stayed" at her father's house tells us that, when she married Er, she joined the father's tribe, at Migdal Eder, but she is now to "return" to Adul-Am. Why will Yehudah not take responsibility for her?
The age of Shelah adds still more years to this story. Did it all happen before Yoseph came along, or at the same time. Where were all these people when Yehudah went down to Egypt? And there also appears to have been a considerable age-gap between Er and Shelah.
38:12 VA YIRBU HA YAMIM VA TAMAT BAT SHU'A ESHET YEHUDAH VA YINACHEM YEHUDAH VA YA'AL AL GOZAZEY TSONO HU VE CHIRAH RE'EHU HA ADUL-AMI TIMNATAH
KJ: And in process of time the daughter of Shuah Judah's wife died; and Judah was comforted, and went up unto his sheepshearers to Timnath, he and his friend Hirah the Adullamite.
BN: And in process of time Shu'a's daughter, who was Yehudah's wife, died; and Yehudah completed the period of mourning, and went up to his sheep-shearers in Timnah, he and his friend Chirah the Adul-Ami.
BAT SHU'A (בת-שוע): is this in fact her name, like David's "wife" - also "taken" in a manner not entirely kosher: Bat Sheva. Given the Tamar connections, the fact that Bat Shu'a (בת-שוע) is so much like Bat Sheva (בת-שבע) is not without significance. The Vav (ו) in Shu'a is pronounced U on this occasion, but why not as a Vav, as it is in so many other circumstances, which would then lead to an aural pun on Bat Sheva?
TIMNAT (תמנת): between Beit Lechem (Bethlehem) and Beit Natif, now called Khirbet Tibna. Not to be confused with the Timnah that is just north of Eilat.
VA YINACHEM YEHUDAH: Hertz suggests that he went to Timnah for the Kena'anite festivities connected to the sheep-shearing; and quite probably he did. At the same time, seeing this simply as story, Yehudah and Chirah going back to Timnah for the festival does sound like he is looking for a wife, or at the very least a temporary bed-companion, which of course was how this particular story got started.
38:13 VA YUGAD LE TAMAR LEMOR HINEH CHAMICH OLEH TIMNATAH LAGOZ TSONO
38:11 VA YOMER YEHUDAH LE TAMAR KALATO SHEVI ALMANAH VEIT AVIYCH AD YIGDAL SHELAH VENI KI AMAR PEN YAMUT GAM HU KE ECHAV VA TELECH TAMAR VA TESHEV BEIT AVIYHA
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוּדָה לְתָמָר כַּלָּתוֹ שְׁבִי אַלְמָנָה בֵית אָבִיךְ עַד יִגְדַּל שֵׁלָה בְנִי כִּי אָמַר פֶּן יָמוּת גַּם הוּא כְּאֶחָיו וַתֵּלֶךְ תָּמָר וַתֵּשֶׁב בֵּית אָבִיהָ
KJ: Then said Judah to Tamar his daughter in law, Remain a widow at thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown: for he said, Lest peradventure he die also, as his brethren did. And Tamar went and dwelt in her father's house.
BN: Then said Yehudah to Tamar his daughter-in-law, "Stay as a widow at your father's house, until Shelah my son is grown up." For he said, "Lest he die too, like his brothers." And Tamar went and stayed in her father's house.
"Went and stayed" at her father's house tells us that, when she married Er, she joined the father's tribe, at Migdal Eder, but she is now to "return" to Adul-Am. Why will Yehudah not take responsibility for her?
The age of Shelah adds still more years to this story. Did it all happen before Yoseph came along, or at the same time. Where were all these people when Yehudah went down to Egypt? And there also appears to have been a considerable age-gap between Er and Shelah.
38:12 VA YIRBU HA YAMIM VA TAMAT BAT SHU'A ESHET YEHUDAH VA YINACHEM YEHUDAH VA YA'AL AL GOZAZEY TSONO HU VE CHIRAH RE'EHU HA ADUL-AMI TIMNATAH
וַיִּרְבּוּ הַיָּמִים וַתָּמָת בַּת שׁוּעַ אֵשֶׁת יְהוּדָה וַיִּנָּחֶם יְהוּדָה וַיַּעַל עַל גֹּזֲזֵי צֹאנוֹ הוּא וְחִירָה רֵעֵהוּ הָעֲדֻלָּמִי תִּמְנָתָה
KJ: And in process of time the daughter of Shuah Judah's wife died; and Judah was comforted, and went up unto his sheepshearers to Timnath, he and his friend Hirah the Adullamite.
BN: And in process of time Shu'a's daughter, who was Yehudah's wife, died; and Yehudah completed the period of mourning, and went up to his sheep-shearers in Timnah, he and his friend Chirah the Adul-Ami.
BAT SHU'A (בת-שוע): is this in fact her name, like David's "wife" - also "taken" in a manner not entirely kosher: Bat Sheva. Given the Tamar connections, the fact that Bat Shu'a (בת-שוע) is so much like Bat Sheva (בת-שבע) is not without significance. The Vav (ו) in Shu'a is pronounced U on this occasion, but why not as a Vav, as it is in so many other circumstances, which would then lead to an aural pun on Bat Sheva?
TIMNAT (תמנת): between Beit Lechem (Bethlehem) and Beit Natif, now called Khirbet Tibna. Not to be confused with the Timnah that is just north of Eilat.
VA YINACHEM YEHUDAH: Hertz suggests that he went to Timnah for the Kena'anite festivities connected to the sheep-shearing; and quite probably he did. At the same time, seeing this simply as story, Yehudah and Chirah going back to Timnah for the festival does sound like he is looking for a wife, or at the very least a temporary bed-companion, which of course was how this particular story got started.
38:13 VA YUGAD LE TAMAR LEMOR HINEH CHAMICH OLEH TIMNATAH LAGOZ TSONO
וַיֻּגַּד לְתָמָר לֵאמֹר הִנֵּה חָמִיךְ עֹלֶה תִמְנָתָה לָגֹז צֹאנוֹ
KJ: And it was told Tamar, saying, Behold thy father in law goeth up to Timnath to shear his sheep.
BN: And it was told to Tamar saying, "Behold, your father-in-law has gone up to Timnah to shear his sheep.”
Sheep-shearing was an early summer activity, and the fleeces would have been valuable. Used for tents, clothing etc, but at least some (one-tenth) dedicated to the temple.
CHAMICH: From CHAM, who of course was one of the three sons of No'ach, but which is also understood to mean "father-in-law", as it clearly does here; however, when the several "fathers-in-law" of Mosheh are referred to, on innumerable occasions in Exodus and afterwards (see Exodus 3:1 as an example), the noun there is always CHATAN (in Exodus 3:1 CHOTNO - חֹתְנוֹ, with the possessive suffix, "his father-in-law"). It is very hard to see a difference between the two states that requires two words; the only seeming suggestion is that a woman's father-in-law was her CHAM and a man's his CHATAN.
38:14 VA TASAR BIGDEY ALMENUTAH ME ALEYHA VA TECHAS BA TSA'IPH VA TITALAPH VA TESHEV BE PETACH EYNAYIM ASHER AL DERECH TIMNATAH KI RA'ATAH KI GADAL SHELAH VE HI LO NITNAH LO LE ISHAH
וַתָּסַר בִּגְדֵי אַלְמְנוּתָהּ מֵעָלֶיהָ וַתְּכַס בַּצָּעִיף וַתִּתְעַלָּף וַתֵּשֶׁב בְּפֶתַח עֵינַיִם אֲשֶׁר עַל דֶּרֶךְ תִּמְנָתָה כִּי רָאֲתָה כִּי גָדַל שֵׁלָה וְהִוא לֹא נִתְּנָה לוֹ לְאִשָּׁה
KJ: And she put her widow's garments off from her, and covered her with a vail, and wrapped herself, and sat in an open place, which is by the way to Timnath; for she saw that Shelah was grown, and she was not given unto him to wife.
BN: And she took off her widow's weeds, and put on the burqa, and wrapped herself inside the burqa, and sat at the entrance of Eynayim, which is on the way to Timnah; for she saw that Shelah had grown up, but she had not been given to him as his wife.
BIGDEY ALMENUTAH: Why is she still wearing her widow's weeds all these years and probably years later? Poor editing, or simply that in that culture a widow wore widow's weeds for ever, and not just for the year of mourning and then dress up and find another husband.
EYNAYIM (עינים): The name of a town, or "water fountains"? Given the likely liturgical-mythological origins of this tale, we can assume the latter.
This is the point at which an absurd story becomes completely ridiculous - if we take it as "soap-opera" rather than mythology or liturgy. Hearing that Yehudah is coming to town definitely offers a good opportunity to remind him that Shelah has a Levirate commitment; but she chooses not to do that; she cons Yehudah into sleeping with her himself. Having a child with Yehudah does not fulfill the Levirate law anyway; it simply makes both of them guilty of incest, by the terms of the Mosaic laws at least - if the Levirate applies, even though it hasn't been given yet, then we have to assume that the other laws relating to sexual behaviour apply too. So what does she gain from this? If she falls pregnant, she gains a child who is a mamzer (a "bastard" by normal translation, but the link makes clear that it is more complex than that), plus the reputation of a whore and an accusation of incest, for any two of which stoning to death can be anticipated. What possible motivation can she have for this, unless... and yes I am riding my hobby-horse once again, but I am convinced that most of these tales were originally either parts of the liturgy of the fertility cults, or the anthropomorphic tales of the gods and goddesses of those cults... unless this is about the ritual marriage of the May King and the May Queen, in order to achieve the birth of the annual vegetation god; and as we shall see, there will be twins again - there are always twins in these myths - and the twins will strive in the womb again, and one will become connected to the heel again, and the two will squabble in the conventional manner of all Tanist cults.
Note that it all happens in the gate of the city again. At one level this makes sense: having been sent home to her father's, she has no pretext for approaching Yehudah about the boy; knowing he is passing her way creates such a pretext. It also tells us where she came from.
The clothing, according to Hertz, is that of a votary of Astarte, which puts a Rabbinic saddle on my hobby-horse.
38:15 VA YIR'EHA YEHUDAH VA YACHSHEV'EHA LE ZONAH KI KISTAH PANEYHA
וַיִּרְאֶהָ יְהוּדָה וַיַּחְשְׁבֶהָ לְזוֹנָה כִּי כִסְּתָה פָּנֶיהָ
KJ: When Judah saw her, he thought her to be an harlot; because she had covered her face.
BN: When Yehudah saw her, he thought she was a harlot; for she had covered her face.
Which suggests that Yehudah thought he was picking up a street prostitute; another example of the radical humanisation of the Jewish patriarchs. Like the wedding night of Ya'akov and Le'ah, can we not reasonably assume that the veil would have come off at some point of intercourse, and that Yehudah would thus have known who he was with? And anyway, street-whores don't usually hide their faces, because that reduces their chances of finding a punter.
Though it would be interesting sociologically if it were the case that whores in the ancient Midle East did cover their faces, if that is what this means. Probably it doesn't mean that at all however; it really connects to the modesty laws that are still prevalent in Islam. What she is wearing is not a whore's veil but a burqa.
In v21 Chirah will speak of her, not as a ZONAH but as a KEDESHAH (קדשה), which means a "ritual prostitute" in the positive fertility-goddess sense, the hierodule sense of Hindu, Babylonian and Phoenician Ishtar rites: a holy act of union between the priestess and a male lover, each surrogating their divine counterparts – the May King and May Queen; in which sense we demean it by calling it prostitution. Deuteronomy 23:18 specifically prohibits Kedashut (though most translations render KEDESHAH as "prostitute" and thereby miss half the point). This makes much more sense than the prostitution version which is commonly believed.
38:16 VA YET ELEYHA EL HA DERECH VA YOMER HAVAH NA AVO ELAYICH KI LO YADA KI CHALATO HI VA TOMER MAH TITEN LI KI TAVO ELAY
וַיֵּט אֵלֶיהָ אֶל הַדֶּרֶךְ וַיֹּאמֶר הָבָה נָּא אָבוֹא אֵלַיִךְ כִּי לֹא יָדַע כִּי כַלָּתוֹ הִוא וַתֹּאמֶר מַה תִּתֶּן לִּי כִּי תָבוֹא אֵלָי
KJ: And he turned unto her by the way, and said, Go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto thee; (for he knew not that she was his daughter in law.) And she said, What wilt thou give me, that thou mayest come in unto me?
BN: And he turned to her by the way, and said, "Come I pray you, let me come in to you". For he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law. And she said, "What will you give me, that you may come in to me?"
This is a dialogue between a punter and a streetwalker, probably created in the Ezraic editorial office in order to demean the hierodule-hierophant relationship. The only redeeming feature is an aural pun between TOMER and TAMAR, the former with an Aleph (א), the latter without one.
38:17 VA YOMER ANOCHI ASHALACH GEDI IZIM MIN HA TSON VA TOMER IM TITEN ERAVON AD SHALCHEYCHA
וַיֹּאמֶר אָנֹכִי אֲשַׁלַּח גְּדִי עִזִּים מִן הַצֹּאן וַתֹּאמֶר אִם תִּתֵּן עֵרָבוֹן עַד שָׁלְחֶךָ
KJ: And he said, I will send thee a kid from the flock. And she said, Wilt thou give me a pledge, till thou send it?
BN: And he said, "I will send you a kid of the goats from the flock." And she said, "Will you give me a pledge, till you send it?"
GEDI IZIM: As with the Ya'akov stories, there seems to be little to distinguish a sheep from a goat - he is down here, after all, shearing his sheep.
A kid of the goats sounds like an offering to a priestess, not payment to a whore; and anyone who has ever worked in Jewish fund-raising will know that a pledge is a pledge is a pledge - is Yehudah any more likely to fulfill a goat-pledge than he did his promise to send Shelah? It is hard to imagine this dialogue, or its equivalent, in 1970's Times Square, or 1980s Soho in London, or on the Place Pigalle, or in some lap-dancing club along Miami Beach: we have to assume that the writer was inexperienced in the matter of illegally-purchased sex and did not know that cash, paid beforehand, is the only viable currency in these contracts - no credit cards, no bitcoins, no goat-pledges. And anyway, what use is the goat to her? If she were really a hooker, she would want cash; and no hooker ever agreed to go with a punter on the basis of a pledge? This isn't the Jewish Federation's Annual Campaign or the synagogue's Yom Kippur Appeal; this is a back-alley brothel at Eynayim. So again we must draw the conclusion that the prostitute story is a late calumny, and the truth is an authentic and entirely legitimate fertility rite.
ERAVON is a pun too of course, aurally, which any Yehudit-speaking audience would immediately pick up if this were an acted drama or a told story rather than written for the page. "Give me an ERAVON" - the first syllable ER being the name of her first husband, the one whose death started all this; the second syllable being AVON, meaning "punishment", which was claimed as the reason for the deaths of the two un-Levirated brothers - so the word becomes a neat demand for reparations, and this is why she is here.
38:18 VA YOMER MAH HA ERAVON ASHER ETEN LACH VA TOMER CHOTAMCHA U PHETIYLECHA U MAT'CHA ASHER BE YADECHA VA YITEN LAH VA YAVO ELEYHA VA TAHAR LO
וַיֹּאמֶר מָה הָעֵרָבוֹן אֲשֶׁר אֶתֶּן לָּךְ וַתֹּאמֶר חֹתָמְךָ וּפְתִילֶךָ וּמַטְּךָ אֲשֶׁר בְּיָדֶךָ וַיִּתֶּן לָּהּ וַיָּבֹא אֵלֶיהָ וַתַּהַר לוֹ
KJ: And he said, What pledge shall I give thee? And she said, Thy signet, and thy bracelets, and thy staff that is in thine hand. And he gave it her, and came in unto her, and she conceived by him.
BN: And he said, "What pledge shall I give you?" And she said, "Your signet and your cord, and your staff that is in your hand?" And he gave them to her, and came in to her, and she conceived by him.
The cord and staff were the insignia of a sheikh in Kena'an, Babylon and Egypt. Thus giving them to her is the equivalent of giving her his ID card or his driver's licence, because his fingerprints, metaphorically speaking, are all over them. She does not want them as ransom against the pledge however, but so that she can prove afterwards who was the father of the child. And that too mitigates against this being the prostitute-punter relationship that is claimed, because prostitutes are famous for taking precautions against venereal diseases and pregnancy, neither of which are very good for business. Her becoming pregnant, as part of the Levir, or part of the Asherah, is entirely plausible; indeed, there is little point to the story if she does not fall pregnant.
CHOTEMET is anachronistic; they didn't have writing yet, except hieroglyphs and cuneiform, so why he would have had a signet ring?
38:19 VA TAKAM VA TELECH VA TASAR TSE'IPHAH ME ALEYHA VA TILBASH BIGDEY ALMENUTAH
וַתָּקָם וַתֵּלֶךְ וַתָּסַר צְעִיפָהּ מֵעָלֶיהָ וַתִּלְבַּשׁ בִּגְדֵי אַלְמְנוּתָהּ
KJ: And she arose, and went away, and laid by her vail from her, and put on the garments of her widowhood.
BN: And she arose, and went away, and took off her veil, and put her widow's weeds back on.
Seeming to confirm that, like Greek women to this day, a widow remains in black for ever.
38:20 VA YISHLACH YEHUDAH ET GEDI HA IZIM BE YAD RE'EHU HA ADUL-AMI LAKACHAT HA ERAVON MI YAD HA ISHAH VE LO METSA’AH
וַיִּשְׁלַח יְהוּדָה אֶת גְּדִי הָעִזִּים בְּיַד רֵעֵהוּ הָעֲדֻלָּמִי לָקַחַת הָעֵרָבוֹן מִיַּד הָאִשָּׁה וְלֹא מְצָאָהּ
KJ: And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, to receive his pledge from the woman's hand: but he found her not.
BN: And Yehudah sent goat-kid by the hand of his friend the Adul-Ami, to redeem the pledge from the woman's hand; but he couldn't find her.
Yehudah at least proves honest on this occasion. But the sending of the goat also confirms that he has performed the duties of the May King with the May Queen, and the goat is not for Tamar to keep as a pet and a source of milk, but as a sacrifice.
38:21 VA YISH'AL ET ANSHEY MEKOMAH LEMOR AYEH HA KEDESHAH HI VA EYNAYIM AL HA DARECH VA YOMRU LO HAYETAH VA ZEH KEDESHAH
וַיִּשְׁאַל אֶת אַנְשֵׁי מְקֹמָהּ לֵאמֹר אַיֵּה הַקְּדֵשָׁה הִוא בָעֵינַיִם עַל הַדָּרֶךְ וַיֹּאמְרוּ לֹא הָיְתָה בָזֶה קְדֵשָׁה
KJ: Then he asked the men of that place, saying, Where is the harlot, that was openly by the way side? And they said, There was no harlot in this place.
BN: Than he asked the men of her place, saying, "Where is the Kedeshah, who was at Eynayim by the wayside?" And they said, "There has been no Kedeshah here."
Did Yehudah tell his friend he had been with a Kedeshah or with a Zonah? In verse 15 we were told that Yehudah believed she was a Zonah; yet that is not, clearly, what he has told his Adul-Ami friend. Interesting moment of psychology! And of course, they are right, there has not been a Kedeshah hereabouts, nor is there ever likely to have been because Zonot may work the "wayside", but a Kedeshah will be found exclusively, and very publicly visibly, at the shrine or temple or the city gate.
But this is the verse in which the entire story falls apart, or reveals itself, as you prefer. Not once but twice it describes her as a KEDESHAH; and that makes this whole tale very different.
38:22 VA YASHAV EL YEHUDAH VA YOMER LO METSA'TIYHA VE GAM ANSHEY HA MAKOM AMRU LO HAYETAH VA ZEH KEDESHAH
וַיָּשָׁב אֶל יְהוּדָה וַיֹּאמֶר לֹא מְצָאתִיהָ וְגַם אַנְשֵׁי הַמָּקוֹם אָמְרוּ לֹא הָיְתָה בָזֶה קְדֵשָׁה
KJ: And he returned to Judah, and said, I cannot find her; and also the men of the place said, that there was no harlot in this place.
BN: And he returned to Yehudah, and said, "I couldn't find her, and also the men of the place said that there had been no Kedeshah there."
Why has Tamar gone into hiding? Presumably because she doesn't yet know if she is pregnant, and being pregnant is her objective in this. But also because she wants to shame Yehudah publicly for what he has done - or rather, for what he has not done, which is to fulfil his part of the Levir by sending Shelah.
38:23 VA YOMER YEHUDAH TIKACH LAH PEN NIHEYEH LAVUZ HINEH SHALACHTI HA GEDI HA ZEH VE ATAH LO METSA'TAH
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוּדָה תִּקַּח לָהּ פֶּן נִהְיֶה לָבוּז הִנֵּה שָׁלַחְתִּי הַגְּדִי הַזֶּה וְאַתָּה לֹא מְצָאתָהּ
KJ: And Judah said, Let her take it to her, lest we be shamed: behold, I sent this kid, and thou hast not found her.
BN: And Yehudah said, "Let her take it, lest we be put to shame. Behold, I sent this kid, and you have not found her."
Very odd wording, which sounds less like daily speech than formal ceremony. Presumably meaning that he sacrifices the kid anyway; another give-away that we are in the realm of the goddess, who would be angry if he did not honour his promise to send the goat; if he can't get it to Tamar, he can still give it directly before witnesses to the goddess; any other explanation, and the scale of his honesty is simply beyond belief. And of course, Tamar is the goddess whose ritual priestess he went with - or perhaps we should say "took".
38:24 VA YEHI KE MI SHELOSH CHADASHIM VA YUGAD LI YEHUDAH LEMOR ZANTA TAMAR KALAT'ECHA VE GAM HINEH HARAH LIZNUNIM VA YOMER YEHUDAH HOTSIY'UHA VE TISAREPH
וַיְהִי כְּמִשְׁלֹשׁ חֳדָשִׁים וַיֻּגַּד לִיהוּדָה לֵאמֹר זָנְתָה תָּמָר כַּלָּתֶךָ וְגַם הִנֵּה הָרָה לִזְנוּנִים וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוּדָה הוֹצִיאוּהָ וְתִשָּׂרֵף
KJ: And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot; and also, behold, she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let her be burnt.
BN: And it came to pass, about three months lafer, that Yehudah was told, saying, "Tamar your daughter-in-law has played the harlot; and what's more, now she's pregnant from the harlotry." And Yehudah said, "Bring her here, and let her be burnt."
SHELOSH (שלש): grammatical error, it should read Sheloshah (שלשה). Chodesh is masculine.
ZANTA... LIZNUNIM (לזנונים...זנתה): what does this really mean; the translations are not trustworthy. The important thing once again is the use of the word ZONAH (זונה) = "whore", in place of KEDESHAH (קדשה) = "ritual prostitute"; indeed, it confirms what has been said throughout about the story. These people only know that she is pregnant, and as a widow she should not be; their disparaging remark of her "whorings" demonstrate this. In fact we know otherwise.
TISAREPH (תשרף): Harsh punishment, no? Hypocrisy besides; if Yehudah did go with her as a street-prostitute, even if he didn't know that it was Tamar, then surely his sin is as great as hers, so burn him too. Did they actually burn people in those days, for this or any other "sin" or "crime"? Or did they only burn animals; and only then as sacrifice for the purpose of eating and propitiating the gods? The answer is, alas, that yes they did. Leviticus 20:14 tells us: "If there is a man who marries a woman and her mother, it is immorality; both he and they shall be burned with fire, so that there will be no immorality in your midst"; while Leviticus 21:9 has: "Also the daughter of any priest, if she profanes herself by harlotry, she profanes her father; she shall be burned with fire." But neither of these applies to Tamar. Deuteronomy 23:17 tells us that "No man or woman of the Beney Yisra-El is to serve as a Kedeshah", but no punishment for doing so is stated.
Adultery was punished with the deaths of both parties by drowning; but if the husband was willing to pardon his wife, the king might intervene to pardon the paramour. For incest with his own mother, both were burned to death; with a stepmother, the man was disinherited; with a daughter, the man was exiled; with a daughter-in-law, he was drowned (this should have applied to Yehudah once he had discovered what he had done, but perhaps her deceit-by-burqa provided mitigating circumstances); with a son's fiancée, he was fined. A wife who for her lover's sake procured her husband's death was gibbeted. A betrothed girl, seduced by her prospective father-in-law, took her dowry and returned to her family, and was free to marry as she chose. But none of these apply to Tamar.
And of course, all these are Mosaic laws, not yet in existence at the time of the Yehudah-Tamar incident, and so of course they do not apply; however, as noted already, if that is the case, then it is also the case with the Levirate Law, and so we have to go back and re-read this story rather differently.
One last question, if a wooden statue of a goddess proved false, in the pre-Mosaic world obviously, would it have been burned? To which the answer is also: yes.
38:25 HI MUTS'ET VE HI SHALCHAH EL CHAMIYHA LEMOR LE ISH ASHER ELEH LO ANOCHI HARAH VA TOMER HAKER NA LE MI HA CHOTEMET VE HA PETIYLIM VE HA MATEH HA ELEH
הִוא מוּצֵאת וְהִיא שָׁלְחָה אֶל חָמִיהָ לֵאמֹר לְאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר אֵלֶּה לּוֹ אָנֹכִי הָרָה וַתֹּאמֶר הַכֶּר נָא לְמִי הַחֹתֶמֶת וְהַפְּתִילִים וְהַמַּטֶּה הָאֵלֶּה
KJ: When she was brought forth, she sent to her father in law, saying, By the man, whose these are, am I with child: and she said, Discern, I pray thee, whose are these, the signet, and bracelets, and staff.
BN: And when they went to fetch her, she sent to her father-in-law saying, "By the man whose these are, am I with child." And she said, "Recognise, I beseech you, whose these are, the signet, and the cords, and the staff."
8:26 VA YAKER YEHUDAH VA YOMER TSEDAKAH MIMENI KI AL KEN LO NETATIHA LE SHELAH VENI." VE LO YASAPH OD LEDATAH
וַיַּכֵּר יְהוּדָה וַיֹּאמֶר צָדְקָה מִמֶּנִּי כִּי עַל כֵּן לֹא נְתַתִּיהָ לְשֵׁלָה בְנִי וְלֹא יָסַף עוֹד לְדַעְתָּהּ
KJ: And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She hath been more righteous than I; because that I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he knew her again no more.
BN: And Yehudah acknowledged them, and said, "She is more righteous than me; this is because I did not give her to Shelah my son." And he knew her again no more.
The goddess avenged through her priestess; but the last phrase is odd: he did not go with her again. Why would he anyway, if it was a one-off kerb-crawl?
But wait a minute, has he not just confirmed, in front of witnesses, that he had sex with his daughter-in-law, and has left her pregnant? Is there not a legal consequence? Even if not the Mosaic burning, is there not a requirement of marriage - I can't imagine Shelah now wants to marry her, and bring up a child fathered on his wife by his own father? Can Yehudah legally marry her? There are ramifications to this tale which the text simply side-steps.
And whose child is it, hers or his or Er's? Does the Levir still apply,and he is therefore exonerated from incest? And does he now send Shelah - presumably there is no longer any need, if Yehudah is indeed regarded as having fulfilled the Levir, albeit unintentionaly, and without formally marrying her.
Which leaves me wondering if the whole story was in fact dialectical and didactic - let's think up as many "what-ifs" as possible, to see if this Levirate law we are proposing is really viable... Because, in the end, it appears to be nothing more than that: a good moral parable to reinforce the Levirate laws that weren't even in existence yet, which is rather a shame. Aeschylus would have made a magnificent tragedy out of it, rather than this (oh, he did? The Oedipus Trilogy?).
38:27 VA YEHI BE ET LIDETAH VE HINEH TE'OMIM BE VITNAH
וַיְהִי בְּעֵת לִדְתָּהּ וְהִנֵּה תְאוֹמִים בְּבִטְנָהּ
KJ: And it came to pass in the time of her travail, that, behold, twins were in her womb.
BN: And it came to pass, at the time of parturition, that behold there were twins in her womb.
What, another set of twins! Are we still in the epoch of Gemini? I thought that was replaced by Taurus, and we are now in Aries - click here. Residual tales - the Bible, like Homer et al, is full of them.
Is this next part a completely different story, unconnected to the above? A means of bringing in the key links to David's ancestry and also another, perhaps the tribe of Yehudah's, version of the Tanist twins.
38:28 VA YEHI VE LIDETAH VA YITEN YAD VA TIKACH HA MEYALEDET VA TIKSHOR AL YADO SHANI LEMOR ZEH YATSA RI'SHONAH
וַיְהִי בְלִדְתָּהּ וַיִּתֶּן יָד וַתִּקַּח הַמְיַלֶּדֶת וַתִּקְשֹׁר עַל יָדוֹ שָׁנִי לֵאמֹר זֶה יָצָא רִאשֹׁנָה
KJ: And it came to pass, when she travailed, that the one put out his hand: and the midwife took and bound upon his hand a scarlet thread, saying, This came out first.
BN: And it happened that, while she was in labour, that one of them put out a hand; and the widwife took it, and bound upon his hand a scarlet thread, saying, "This one came out first."
Very important this, for ritual regicides and birthrights etc, which one is BECHOR and which one GEDOL. It echoes the tale of Ya'akov grabbing his brother's heel (Genesis 25:24 ff) - as though fighting for first egress. It does lead to the rather ridiculous idea that infants in the womb are already conversant in the laws of primo and ultimogeniture and are playing strategy games in full consciousness.
And why a scarlet thread? See my previous notes on Rachel's Tomb (Genesis 35:20), but best of all under Tol'a, Yisaschar's eldest son. A fertility symbol. Yet one more honouring of the goddess. Yet one more confirmation that this was originally a May King-May Queen tale.
And because I have no medical expertise, and am not female, how in the era before ultrasound did they know she was carrying twins? Is it obvious?
38:29 VA YEHI KE MESHIV YADO VE HINEH YATSA ACHIV VA TOMER MAH PARATSTA ALEYCHA PARETS VA YIKRA SHEMO PARETS
וַיְהִי כְּמֵשִׁיב יָדוֹ וְהִנֵּה יָצָא אָחִיו וַתֹּאמֶר מַה פָּרַצְתָּ עָלֶיךָ פָּרֶץ וַיִּקְרָא שְׁמוֹ פָּרֶץ
KJ: And it came to pass, as he drew back his hand, that, behold, his brother came out: and she said, How hast thou broken forth? this breach be upon thee: therefore his name was called Pharez.
BN: And it came to pass, as he drew back his hand, that behold his brother came out. And she said, "Why have you made a breach for yourself?" And for this reason he was named Parets.
PARETS (פרץ): does indeed mean "breach", though it is usually used for sieges and not for babies. It could imply a breech-birth, except that the description is very clearly not of a breech-birth. A fine legal point here by the sound of it; but also another absurd explanation.
English versions tend to call him Perez, rather than Parets, or indeed Perets as he is on most other occasions, which confuses him with the Perizim (פרזים), one of the aboriginal tribes of Kena'an; and risks confusion with Peres (פֶּרֶס), one of the prohibited birds of Leviticus 11.
38:30 VA ACHAR YATSA ACHIV ASHER AL YADO HA SHANI VA YIKRA SHEMO ZARACH
וְאַחַר יָצָא אָחִיו אֲשֶׁר עַל יָדוֹ הַשָּׁנִי וַיִּקְרָא שְׁמוֹ זָרַח
KJ: And afterward came out his brother, that had the scarlet thread upon his hand: and his name was called Zarah.
BN: And afterwards his brother came out, with the scarlet thread upon his hand; and he was named Zarach.
ZARACH (זרח): = "to rise" and used specifically of the sun, though it is also used for things "breaking out", e.g. leprosy on the skin, plants from the ground, and foetuses from the womb. Given the tale, this is not uninteresting.
But he is never actually called ZARACH. He is called ZERACH, from the same root, but with that same variation that we have seen thoughout the text.
Is the birthright stolen even before birth in this tale? As with the "what-ifs" to test the Levirate law, this seems to be a what-if to test the birthright and inheritance laws.
Samech break; end of fourth fragment; end of chapter 38
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