Bible Reading Genesis 38

On this Episode we Read Genisis 38 and talk about Judah and his Relationship with Tamar. Also we talk about the meaning of Righteousness a bit.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:08

Chapter 38. And it came to pass at that time that Judah went down from his brethren and turned in to a certain Adulamite, whose name was Hira. And Judah saw there a daughter of a certain Canaanite whose name was Shua, and he took her and went in unto her. Wow, that's descriptive. And she conceived and bare a son and called his name Ur. And she conceived again and bare a son. And she called his name Onan. And she yet again conceived and bare a son and called his name Shela. And he was at Chazim when she bare him. And Judah took a wife for Ur, his firstborn, whose name was Tamar. And Ur, Judah's firstborn, was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord slew him. Damn. Would that be I see that it's uppercase, but the word Lord can mean many people. Does that mean God?

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Yeah, Lord means God in this context.

SPEAKER_03 1:20

Are we sure?

SPEAKER_01 1:22

Yes, yeah. Go on, read, keep reading, because there's a theme here. So yeah, it's God.

SPEAKER_03 1:29

And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother. 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. And the thing which he did displeased the Lord, wherefore he slew him also. Then said Judah to Tamar, his daughter-in-law, wait, this is between a Canaanite and a and Judah. God wanted Canaan and Judah to breed. Wild.

SPEAKER_01 2:11

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:15

Um said Judah to Tamar, his daughter-in-law, remain a widow at thy father's house. And said Judah to Tamar's daughter-in-law, remain a widow at thy father's house till Shello, my son, be grown. For he said, Lest paradiventure.

SPEAKER_01 2:35

Peradventure, peradventure, he die also.

SPEAKER_03 2:39

He died also that his brother did. And Tamar went and dwelt in her father's house. So okay, I'm gonna keep reading. And in process of time, the daughter of Shua, Judah's wife, died, and Judah was comforted and went up into his sheep shears to Timnath, he and his friend Hera the Adulamite. And it was told Tamar, saying, Behold, thy father-in-law goeth up to Timnath to shear his sheep. And she put her widow's garments off from her and covered her with a veil and wrapped herself and sat in an open place, which is by the way to Timnah, Timnath. For she saw that Shela was grown, and she was not given unto him to wife. When Judah saw her, he thought her to be a harlot because she had covered her face. 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? This is a weird story, man.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

This is one of those stories that I really, really like because it curb stomps our Christian church's Victorian ethic. It gets better. We'll talk about it when you're done. Or maybe by better, I mean a lot of people would find it more confusing. But anyway, go on.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

It's not all about genetics.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

It's not about genetics, but anyway, go on.

SPEAKER_03 4:22

17. 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? 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 to her. And he came in unto her, and she conceived by him. And she arose and went away and laid by her veil from her and put on the garments of her widowhood. And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend at the Adulamite to receive his pledge from the woman's hand, but he found her not. Then he asked the men of that place, saying, Where is the harlot that was openly by the wayside? And they said, There was no harlot in this place. 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. And Judah said, Let her take it to her. And Judah said, Let her take it to her. Lest we be shamed. Behold, I sent this kid, and thou hast not find her.

SPEAKER_01 5:29

It's basically saying let her deal with it. That's what that let her take it to her means. Like let we'll let her grab her own things. That's kind of what I think it's getting at. So sorry. The kid, the goat. Because he was gonna give her a goat.

SPEAKER_03 5:44

Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:45

And uh they were gonna trade the goat for the pledge. And then she couldn't find her. So he's like, Alright, we'll let her deal with it then. I think that's kind of what it's getting at.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

Uh 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 hormon. And Judah said, Bring her forth and let her be burnt, because I hate myself. When she was brought forth, she sent to her father-in-law, saying, By the man whose these are, am I with child. She said, Discern, I pray thee, whose are these? The signet, the bracelets, the staff. 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. And it came to pass in the time of her travail that behold, twins were in her womb. And it came to pass that when she travailed, that the one put out his hand, and the midwife took and bound up upon bound upon his hand a scarlet thread, saying, This came out first. 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 will be called Ferez. And afterward came out his brother that had the scarlet thread upon his hand, and his name was called Zera. This is a very strange story, Gary. Please explain it to me.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

So back in the day when a brother died, it was the Jewish custom for another brother to have children in the dead brother's stead. So that was like a cultural thing. So basically, the older brother died, so he was given to the younger brother. The younger brother said, Oh, sure, I'll do it, and then basically ejaculated out on the ground so she wouldn't get pregnant. And God got mad at that and killed him for that. Now it's important to note a lot of people use this scripture as a um, it's called onanism. They basically say that because he spilled his seed, therefore it's it immoral for men to spill their seed outside of the woman, let's say, or it's it immoral for them to masturbate, like that kind of stuff. But that's not what it's getting at. The point of the story is he broke his vow. He said he was gonna have children in his brother's name, and he didn't.

SPEAKER_03 8:20

Went against God's will.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Yeah, yeah, he broke his word. And he lied to Tamer, you know, he basically slept with her for the entertainment rather than doing what he said he was gonna do. She wanted, she uh I think she loved Ur, and so she was wanting to have kids and to honor her former husband. Yeah. So he lied, is the issue. And uh so that happened. And then Judah, seeing that two of his kids were dead, you know, says he's gonna give uh Tamer to the third kid, doesn't. So Tamar tricks Judah into sleeping with her, and you know the rest. She basically calls him out, and so he can't really kill her because he's the one that slept with her. So uh she got to live and have the kids, and she made her point. And I like this story because Tamar is the good guy in the whole thing, and uh yet she did something immoral to get the good thing, quote unquote, accomplished, i.e., having children in her first husband's name. She's the more honorable one in the story, and I just find that I find that deeply satisfying given the Victorian sentiments of our day.

SPEAKER_03 9:39

So Oh, only the church knows what morality is.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

Well, you know, obviously, like the superficial reading, or like it's not I don't know what the word is. Uh a lot of basically let's put it this way you're not gonna read this in Sunday school because we want to have this clean version of morality. You know what I mean? Yeah. And so it's like this is just as much in the Bible as Joseph and his code of pretty colors.

unknown 10:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

Or mini colors, you know. But this is one of those morally complex complex things. How do you suss out what was right and wrong in that situation? You know, how do you suss out a situation where Esther's basically being forced into this kind of perverted competition and God uses that for a good? And in the same way, Tamar does something that in normal circumstances would be immoral to honor her husband, which is counterintuitive. You know, you stay loyal to your husband to honor him, but then she turns around and sleeps with another guy to have children in his name, which is honoring him. What's the right and wrong thing to do there? Like, how do you how do you mesh this scripture with the rest of it? You know, it's complicated, it's dicey, it's actually worth talking about, and nobody talks about it. So, what makes right and wrong right and wrong? In short, this is an excellent example of there being a distinguishing difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. In this case, honor was more important, or I think what the story is saying is honor is more important, the principle of honor is more important than the letter of the law, which is you know, which is don't have relations outside of marriage. Does that make sense? Yeah. Agree, disagree?

SPEAKER_03 11:29

Uh yeah, I don't I don't like defining morality as like a sore subject. Like, I I don't like if it's if it's outside of God's will, it's not moral.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Do you think there's distinctions between something like uh the letter of the law versus the spirit of the law? Um because I think that's what Christ is saying when he says you know the law but you don't know why it's written.

SPEAKER_03 11:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

I think that's what he's getting at.

SPEAKER_03 12:05

I think it's like the reason we have the law is to keep people's hearts in control.

SPEAKER_01 12:13

What does that mean?

SPEAKER_03 12:14

But if the law is written on our hearts, like I mean, we're we're gonna talk about it more later on, but um like I think when you're when your heart rate gets up, like you can feel an emotion, but when your heart rate gets up, specifically when your heart rate gets up, and that you feel that emotion while your heart rate's up, you can't um that's bad. I don't think Jesus, like when Jesus was flipping tables, I don't think he was like pissed. I don't think he was like screaming and his heart rate was just going crazy. I think he knew exactly what he was doing, and he was doing it calmly.

SPEAKER_01 12:49

You think it was calculated?

SPEAKER_03 12:51

Okay, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

You might be right. I mean, that's a fair interpretation that he wasn't like emotionally, he wasn't reacting like there was a calculation to it.

SPEAKER_03 13:03

Yeah, yeah, I could see that. It was it was a decision, it was a made decision. Like he may have been angry when he first saw it or whatever, but he calmed that. He didn't act out of anger. It's like Yeah. Um, what were we? What was the question? I forgot.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

I are there is there a distinction? Do you believe there's a distinction? I guess it's a two-parter, so I'll add another part to it. A, do you believe there is a distinction between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law? Do you think that's what Christ is getting at whenever he talks about um you know the law but you don't know why it was written? And uh B, do you think that this story is demonstrating that principle in Genesis 38?

SPEAKER_03 13:51

Um there is a difference in the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. Because like the spirit of the law is you're committing murder in your heart when you have evil thoughts. The actual law prevents you, or is there to prevent you from actually doing that? The the further you get on your spiritual journey, the less you act out your internal world.

SPEAKER_00 14:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:21

And these people in the old testament were at the very beginning of their journey.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Yeah, they're they're weaning out of a pagan world, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:33

Yes. So um and but I don't know if Genesis 38 is necessarily painting that picture.

SPEAKER_01 14:44

What do you think Genesis 38's painting then?

SPEAKER_03 14:58

I like what you said, like literally just that God can use even acts of I mean, some people could could conceive what uh Tamar did as like vengeful almost. Like she just, you know, I think um but God can still use that in a positive light. Like I know what you're saying, I'm not sure I agree with it, but like a church, and wouldn't it be like, oh, she's a ho. Like, you know. Yeah. I would never, yeah. But it's like God can use literally anything for good.

SPEAKER_01 15:31

So I I think it's a good, it's a good example to delineate the difference between the spirit of the law and the leather of the law, because the letter of the law is don't be a harlot. But why is somebody not supposed to be a harlot? It's to honor a marriage, right? To honor a covenant, to honor the husband, to honor the spouse. Her whole motivation is to honor the her spouse by providing children for her first husband. So she's motivated by this, she breaks the law, but she's breaking the law in such a way, in the way that she does, because she's motivated by honoring her husband's memory. And so it's like in a way, she's upholding the law. She's upholding the principle of the law, um, even though she's violating the letter of it, I guess, if that makes sense. First of all, does that make sense? Uh then we can discuss whether or not we're agreeing or disagreeing. Okay, so you it makes sense, but you disagree. Why? Um, while you remember it, Trevor, what do you think?

SPEAKER_02 16:51

I think you're right. I guess she made a promise, a covenant with her first husband. And she was just simply trying to do what she thought was right.

SPEAKER_03 17:03

Oh, I remember. Yes, Trevor. Right. Um so like when you are I don't know if it was to honor her husband. Like when you're you like because your main goal in life is God first, not your not your spouse first. It's God first. So like God's will is what prevails. If Tamar was like sorry, go on. If Tamar was given these instructions by God somehow or another, okay. But I mean, as long as I think the whole point is to be true to yourself. When you stand in front of God, he's not gonna be like, why didn't you honor this person? He's gonna be like, why didn't you honor yourself? Like do what you were supposed to do in my name.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

But God's the one who made the rule that says you're supposed to honor your husband. So wouldn't she be honoring God by honoring her husband?

SPEAKER_03 18:10

If that's honor, I guess I don't know. That's like it's weird. It's weird honor.

SPEAKER_01 18:15

It is weird, but that's why I like the story, because it kind of burns our presuppositions. Like, okay, wait a minute, what's this story actually saying? Like, it's not clean, it's not simple.

SPEAKER_03 18:25

If God's will was for those those twins to be born, like then yeah, that's honor, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Well, what if his will was just to honor her husband, though? And he was clearly being disrespected by Judah and his brother and his other brother, like nobody was respecting her for her first husband's memory because they wouldn't let her have a kid in her husband's name. And she was determined to have a child in her husband's name.

SPEAKER_03 18:53

So doesn't Jesus say let the dead bury the dead?

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Sure, but if that's part of the covenant, that you know, or if that's part of the culture and that's the norm and a way of respecting somebody, and part of your covenant, arguably, is to pass on that lineage. You know, in her mind, she's respecting her covenant by making sure she has children in her name. So but yes, but at the same time, she does break the letter of the law. She becomes she plays the harlot.

SPEAKER_03 19:26

So But Jesus did that too. He broke the letter of the law to prove a point to Pharisees that the spirit of the law was better.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

And this is, I think, the point that a lot of uh yeah, Victorian types, because I'm not gonna say Puritans, because I don't think it comes from Puritan America, I think it's Victorian-era attitudes. Uh, they don't seem to want to admit, in my opinion, that the letter of the law is secondary to the principles. Like God, the way I understand theology is that we do not believe in what would be called like divine command theory. That is to say, that God arbitrarily makes up rules. We don't believe that he just makes stuff up, nor do we believe that there is a moral law outside of God and independent of him. Because if there was a moral law outside of God and independent of God, then that moral law, by necessity and definition, becomes God because God is reacting to it, and therefore it's superior to God. So there can't be a moral law outside of God, because then God ceases to be God, but neither can there God, neither can God just be arbitrarily um making up rules because the morality has no foundation. And so the way C.S. Lewis describes it, and what I believe the traditional understanding of God has always been is that the law is a description of God's nature. And so whatever the law at the time is, whatever the letter of the law at the time is, you know, don't be a harlot, don't eat this, don't do that. Whatever the rule is, the rule and all rules in some measure are reflective of God's nature. In other words, there is a principle, there is an aspect of God's being and personality that is being described through that law particular rule. Does that make sense? And so because the letter of the law's purpose is to uphold a principle that is a description of God, the letter is really secondary to the principle.

SPEAKER_03 21:33

I agree. I think you're right.

SPEAKER_01 21:36

Cool. Well, hopefully that didn't come out too pretentious. But uh good.

SPEAKER_03 21:44

Yeah, like when when Jesus told the um let's see. The div uh oh it was it was uh what's his name? The famous Pharisee.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

Uh Nicodemus?

SPEAKER_03 21:58

Nicodemus, yeah. He said Uh Moses told us we could write a certificate of divorce for our wives. And he said that's because your hearts were hard.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:08

Because they've been racing all the time. You gotta slow that heart rate down. So uh yeah, they were just emotional monkeys. Um, but yeah, Jesus he in that story he literally talks about the spirit of the law is more important.

SPEAKER_01 22:26

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:29

So yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

Okay. Well, do we have any other that's kind of my main takeaway from this story. And I like it. I like this story, so yeah. Just me. Um, I I really don't know anything about the very end as far as like the significance of the ribbon, Paras and Zera. I I don't know if that goes. To my memory, that doesn't go anywhere in the future. So I don't know what if it's just a cool story or if there's some something else tied to that, to that story. Those verses at the end, the red ribbon and all that. I I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 23:14

So that is what they used to uh, you know, in Hollywood.

SPEAKER_01 23:19

Scarlet, correct?

SPEAKER_03 23:21

Yeah, the Chris no the Chris Cornell and uh Chester Bennington, they both had red ribbons hanging on their doorknobs after they committed suicide.

SPEAKER_01 23:33

I didn't know that. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 23:34

You didn't know that? No, yeah, yeah. They were both uh about to start writing it, or they were filming, they were in the middle of filming a pedophile documentary about Harvey Weinstein, if I remember correctly.

SPEAKER_01 23:49

That's really interesting. Anna Hesh died right while she was filming a documentary about child trafficking as well. Yeah. That video was terrifying. Did you ever see the well, we're getting off topic. That you'll have to look up Anna Hesh's car wreck. It is really sad. So um, I don't know, Trevor. Do you know anything about the scarlet thread thing? Because I don't.

SPEAKER_02 24:20

No, I I I can try and look something up about it.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

Yeah, can you see if you can Google something really quick and see if there's any interesting details on that?

SPEAKER_02 24:56

After tomorrow had given birth to twins, the first child's hand had already been delivered. And the scarlet thread had been tied to it. It's just part of the like what they did.

SPEAKER_03 25:12

Yeah, I wonder if it was like really important which one came out first.

SPEAKER_02 25:16

Yeah, it was just to it was to tell them which which twin came out first.

SPEAKER_03 25:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:22

It was part of the scarlet thing.

SPEAKER_03 25:24

I wonder if it was like actually like a big deal which twin came out first back then.

SPEAKER_01 25:30

Well, but it's it might tie into like inheritance, like who got yeah, yeah, 100%. Yeah, so maybe that's what it's referring to. Maybe it's maybe it's explaining why this guy got the to continue the family game name over somebody else or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 25:45

So yeah. Have you ever you know when a woman is breach, like during childbirth? Uh the phrase breach here refers to the unusual way the second child was born.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Yeah, it's a breach birth.

SPEAKER_02 26:04

So it broke the normal birth order.

SPEAKER_01 26:08

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 26:11

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 26:13

Okay, so but there's nothing beyond that.

SPEAKER_02 26:17

Like, we don't need to know anything about the significance of the threat or what Perez and Zara did, or uh, I'm trying to read on to see if it says anything. It doesn't really.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 26:32

Just got the rumble notification.

SPEAKER_01 26:34

Yeah, because I forgot to press start because I'm an idiot.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

Oh, okay. Here it is. Here it is. The birth of Perez and his twin brother Zerah is recorded in Genesis 38. And Perez would later become an ancestor of King David.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Ah, okay.

SPEAKER_02 26:56

And through him, Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

Okay, so this is just mainly tied to the genealogies then. Okay. Cool. Alright.

SPEAKER_02 27:06

So this is why it was so important for her to do what she did.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

Yeah. Yeah. Well, there you go. Nice dig it, brother. Very good, sir. Yes. Alright. Well, we're gonna wrap that up. I guess next week we'll move on to Genesis 39. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Faith Fiction and Folklore. If you did, we would love it if you would subscribe to us on YouTube or follow us on Rumble. We can also be found on X, Instagram, and Facebook. And we are available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and iHeartRadio. Thank you again very much for listening, and we'll see you next time.