Justice
Read Genesis 38.
What a story! A true soap opera, with sex, drama, more sex, a prostitute, more sex, and God putting people to death. It would make for a blockbuster movie today, I would think. There's a reason you don't hear many (if any) sermons on this story—it's complicated. It's not the kind of thing we expect to find in the Bible, and it's not the kind of story that plays well in children's Sunday School.
Before we rush to judgment on the actions and lifestyle of both Judah and Tamar, we have to keep in mind that this takes place in a different time and a different culture. Were the things Judah did wrong? Yes, certainly by Judeo-Christian standards, but this is not a story about right and wrong. It's a story about justice. Judah was obligated by law and the traditions of his people to provide Tamar a husband after her first husband died, so that she could produce an heir, a son. When he refused to do so out of fear, he was acting unjustly. Get past the modern thoughts of, "Would I really want to marry my husband's brother?" and realize that the traditions and customs here dictated such. Judah was not just toward Tamar.
And so Tamar, like Sarah before her (see Genesis 16), takes matters into her own hands. She knows Judah's weakness. (It seems that part of men's character has not changed in thousands of years!) She puts herself in a place she knows he will be, presents herself in a way she knows he will find alluring, and the rest is history. She becomes pregnant, she is threatened with death, and in a twist worthy of a John Williams score, she dramatically reveals who the father is at the last moment.
And what is the verdict? She has still done everything Judah accused her of. She has, indeed, slept with someone and become pregnant out of wedlock. But Judah recognizes why she did what she did and concludes, "She is more righteous than I" (38:26). What she did has moral problems, but in Judah's estimation, she was more right in her actions than he was in his.
This is hard for us to understand, and yet this story shows up in the genealogy of Jesus. This broken situation is a part of Jesus' heritage. And how beautiful is that, when you consider that this is exactly the sort of situation and these are the people he came to redeem. Brokenness is no threat to the savior. He welcomes it and redeems it...and us, in all of our brokenness as well.
What a story! A true soap opera, with sex, drama, more sex, a prostitute, more sex, and God putting people to death. It would make for a blockbuster movie today, I would think. There's a reason you don't hear many (if any) sermons on this story—it's complicated. It's not the kind of thing we expect to find in the Bible, and it's not the kind of story that plays well in children's Sunday School.
Before we rush to judgment on the actions and lifestyle of both Judah and Tamar, we have to keep in mind that this takes place in a different time and a different culture. Were the things Judah did wrong? Yes, certainly by Judeo-Christian standards, but this is not a story about right and wrong. It's a story about justice. Judah was obligated by law and the traditions of his people to provide Tamar a husband after her first husband died, so that she could produce an heir, a son. When he refused to do so out of fear, he was acting unjustly. Get past the modern thoughts of, "Would I really want to marry my husband's brother?" and realize that the traditions and customs here dictated such. Judah was not just toward Tamar.
And so Tamar, like Sarah before her (see Genesis 16), takes matters into her own hands. She knows Judah's weakness. (It seems that part of men's character has not changed in thousands of years!) She puts herself in a place she knows he will be, presents herself in a way she knows he will find alluring, and the rest is history. She becomes pregnant, she is threatened with death, and in a twist worthy of a John Williams score, she dramatically reveals who the father is at the last moment.
And what is the verdict? She has still done everything Judah accused her of. She has, indeed, slept with someone and become pregnant out of wedlock. But Judah recognizes why she did what she did and concludes, "She is more righteous than I" (38:26). What she did has moral problems, but in Judah's estimation, she was more right in her actions than he was in his.
This is hard for us to understand, and yet this story shows up in the genealogy of Jesus. This broken situation is a part of Jesus' heritage. And how beautiful is that, when you consider that this is exactly the sort of situation and these are the people he came to redeem. Brokenness is no threat to the savior. He welcomes it and redeems it...and us, in all of our brokenness as well.
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