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Bible Women:
Major Events
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Art: Tamar & Judah
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People: Tamar
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Archaeology: Cities
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TAMAR: CLAIMING HER RIGHTS
The story describes the way a widow, Tamar, obtained a child for herself and an heir for her dead husband’s inheritance. It shows a virtuous woman who risked everything, her life and her reputation, to get what was rightfully hers. It is part of the continuing Jewish preoccupations with social justice. The story also shows one of the main themes of the Book of Genesis: God’s promise to continue the Jewish people, through many generations, against all odds. Tamar
is one of the four female ancestors of Jesus, in Matthew's gospel. All
four had irregularities in their marriages/sexual relationships. The story of Tamar contains four
different episodes: 1 Tamar married, but remained childless,
Genesis 38:1-11. Tamar married into the family of Judah, first to
Judah’s son Er and then, after his death, to Onan his brother. Because
of Onan’s actions, she did not become pregnant. For a Jewish woman,
this meant disgrace, because people thought that being childless was a
punishment from God. 2 She claimed her Levirite rights, Genesis 38:12-19. Eventually, Tamar had to trick Judah in order to obtain a child. By ancient Hebrew standards, her actions were legal and morally right.
4 She bore twin sons, Genesis 38:27-30. Her tenacity was rewarded with the birth of sons, one of whom would be the ancestor of King David. Read
the Bible
text of the story of Tamar.
Tamar marries, but remains childless Genesis 38:1-11
As a young woman, Tamar married Er, eldest son of Judah and an unnamed daughter of Shua. It was a good match and things should have gone well, but Er practised some form of birth control, probably by withdrawing before ejaculation, and so Tamar was childless. God punished Er - people at the time saw withdrawal as a crime against Nature and God. Tamar suffered a double tragedy: her husband Er died, and she lost the chance of having a child. But Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in
the sight of the Lord, and the Lord put him to death. Then Judah said to
Onan ‘Go into your brother’s wife and perform the duty of a
brother-in-law to her; raise up offspring for your brother.’ Widowed and without children, Tamar was low in the pecking order of the tribe. But there was a way out: the Levirate Law.
This law was found in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. If a man died, and his wife had not yet had a child by him, she could go to his brother and demand that he marry her and give her a child who would inherit the property of the dead husband. This practical law was about two things:
Under Levirate law, Er’s
younger brother Onan was obliged to give Tamar a child. But he refused
outright to
do so, probably because any child born to Tamar would carry Er’s name,
not Onan’s, and when their father died the child would inherit the dead
brother’s portion of the estate. He practiced the same form of birth
control, and Tamar did not conceive.
Onan thus failed to carry out the Levirate
obligation to Tamar, and disregarded his father's command. He died, and his death at such an early age was seen
as just punishment from God.
Deuteronomy 25:9-10 describes the punishment for a man who refused to obey the Levirate law: the woman went up to him in a public assembly, pulled his sandal from his foot, spat in his face, and said 'This is what is done to the man who does not build up his brother's house'. To us the punishment does not sound very much, but in the context of the time it meant public disgrace. The action in verse 9 had symbolic meaning: the foot symbolized the male genitals, the sandal the female sexual organs, and the spittle, the semen. The woman’s action publicly
humiliated the man, and his family's disgrace was remembered long after he
himself was dead. Public shame was often used to enforce the law in
ancient times. When Onan died without giving
Tamar a child, she looked to the third son of Judah to be her husband. But
he was only a boy, too young to be a father. So Judah sent Tamar back to
her family, promising to send for her when Shelah, the third son, was old
enough. Judah began to look on Tamar as a jinx,
bad luck, responsible for the deaths of his two eldest sons.
Tamar waited patiently, but after a while it became clear that Judah did not mean to give her his third son Shelah as a husband. He refused to keep the Levirate law. When she saw that she was to be left a childless widow, she decided to act. She did not blame ‘the system’, but took the initiative to obtain what was rightfully hers. She would play a trick on Judah, just as he had tricked her. The deceiver now became the deceived. She dressed in the special clothing of a prostitute which
included a veil across her face that disguised her identity, waited for
Judah at the city gates, and persuaded him to have sexual intercourse with her. The city gates described in the story would have been similar to the gates of Dan: massive mudbrick walls with a small gateway that could be easily bared against an enemy, and closed at night for security. Here men congregated to carry on the city's business. Here also the city prostitutes waited for customers. No respectable woman would sit there, or be alone there.
‘She put off her
widow’s
garments, put on a veil, wrapped herself up, and sat down at the entrance
to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah. She saw that Shelah was grown
up, yet she had not been given to him in marriage. When Judah saw her, he
thought she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face.’ It is possible, though unlikely, that Judah perceived Tamar as one of the sacred prostitutes. The Hebrew words for a sacred prostitute (kedeshah, sacred woman) and a normal prostitute (zonah) are both used in this story. In Israel, prostitutes were required to cover their faces at all times.
Tamar may have followed a version of this practice, but she also asked for payment from Judah. He promised to send her a kid from his flock, and in the meantime, as a guarantee, he left his seal, cord and staff, all of which were personal items that could be identified. Judah decided on the fee, Tamar on the pledge. Then she took off the special clothing of
a prostitutes, dressed herself again in her widow’s clothing, and
returned home.
The seal, cord and staff were symbols of a man's identity, items of great personal worth, and it is surprising that Judah gave them up. Judah's seal may have been a cylinder seal similar to clay seals found in a number of archaeological excavations, particularly in the Mesopotamian area. Herodotus gives a description of the staff made specifically for each person, with a personal emblem carved on the top of it. But to Tamar these items meant much more: they symbolised the son she would have, the son who would succeed Judah. This famous incident has been recorded by a number of painters; see Bible Art: Tamar for some of their work.
When Judah’s friend came to make
payment to the unknown prostitute and reclaim Judah’s seal, cord and
staff, the woman was nowhere to be found. Tamar had gone home, without telling
anyone who she was. But through this one act of sexual intercourse with
Judah she had become pregnant, a fact that was
soon evident to the people around her. Judah, who already blamed her for the deaths of
his sons, thought the worst when he heard that she was pregnant. She was
accused of ‘playing the whore’. And Judah said “Bring her out
and let her be burned”. Read Genesis
38:20-26. Now Judah, as head of the tribe,
had the right to pass judgment on her, and to condemn her to death. The Code of
Hammurabi, law 129, reads ‘If the
wife of a man has been caught while lying with another man, they shall
bind them and throw them into the water. If the husband of the woman
wishes to spare his wife, then the king in turn may spare his subject’.
Deuteronomy 22:22, the Hebrew law code, recommends death for both the man
and the woman. Judah pronounced that Tamar should
be burnt to death, a particularly cruel way to die. The birth of Tamar's twin sons
Tamar’s insistence on her rights
was rewarded by the birth of not one but two children! ‘While she was in labor, one put out a hand; and the midwife took and bound on his hand a crimson threat, saying “This one came out first”. But just then he drew back his hand, and out came his brother; and she said “What a breach you have made for yourself!” Therefore he was named Perez.’ These twins were jostling for position even before they were born. The theme of a brother pusing ahead of his elder sibling is a common motif in Genesis. Read Genesis
38:27-30.
Tamar’s actions were unorthodox by modern
standards. But in a way she ‘redeemed’ Judah. She saved him from doing
what was wrong, and was thus a pre-figure of Jesus, who was one of her
descendents. In an odd sort of way, Tamar was
more loyal to the tribe of Judah than he was himself. She knew she had a
duty to produce an heir to her husband, and she was determined to do so,
come what might. Despite her unorthodox methods, she was a woman of
integrity who risked her life to fulfill her duty to herself and her family. She knew she
had the right to a child, and she knew that her first husband Er had the
right to an heir. So she acted to make this happen. 'In the Joseph story, good things happen to bad people, bad things turn out to be good things by misadventure. It is no coincidence that just after the sale of Joseph into slavery, Judah enters into ambiguous sexual relations with a Canaanite daughter-in-law, Tamar. This is a comment on events in Samuel, transposed into the Joseph story, but indirectly. In fact, these very stories may be the springboard for the Shakespearean worldview: scum at the bottom, scum at the top.' (Quoted from David's Secret Demons, Baruch Halpern, William B. Eerdmans Publishing, Michigan, 2001, p.360) Read about other fascinating women of the Bible
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| Bible Study Resource for Women in the Bible: Tamar, the Levirite Law, and Judah | |||||||||||||||||
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