Judah and Tamar - Genesis 38:1-38:30

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On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom.

One of my mottos in life is that every blessing comes with a curse. The— there is a great deal of beauty in taking care of one another and those kind of bonds. The ugliness is that it becomes higher than morality. It's like my country right or wrong, my family right or wrong, my blood right or wrong. And I think that the ultimate message in the Torah is right or wrong is higher than blood.

That's coming up on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

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Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to dennisprager.com.

All right, about that time Judah left his brothers and camped near a certain, uh, Dulemite whose name was Kherah. That's an area. It's a man of Adullam, which is in the northern sector of the, of the Judean lowlands. And Judah is one of the brothers, of course, and a very important one since it is from Judah that we get Jews. So Judah is a rather important figure. He left his brothers. Why did he leave his brothers? Apparently feeling the responsibility for the sale of Joseph, or the death of Joseph, they think he's died, for the responsibility that he might have had in it. That's the apparent implication of it. At any rate, he left his brothers and camped near this Adullamite named Sheerah. There Judah saw the daughter of a certain Canaanite whose name was Shua. And he married her. That is the name of the father, Yeshua, not hers. The Canaanite. And he married her and cohabited with her. All right, Judah married the daughter of the Canaanite. There's an express prohibition in Genesis on marrying Canaanite daughters. Esau, if you remember, brought great aggravation to his parents for marrying into Canaanites. That Judah would have done this is very dramatic. This is quite far away. What is more dramatic is that a Canaanite woman becomes the ancestor of the Jewish Messiah. That's what's unbelievably dramatic about this particular verse, which otherwise would have put most of you to sleep.

Mm-hmm.

But when you realize who she is the ancestor of, this becomes a very, very significant little thing. So significant that it bothered the medieval rabbis a great deal, and they translated "Canaanite" here as "merchant." Ha, ha, ha. The thought that he would have done this and that King David and the line of David would come from a Canaanite, was too painful. And they had some basis, because once in the Bible, in Zechariah, "kna'ani" does in fact mean merchant. So there is a possibility, I just want it for the record, that it was in fact a merchant. My suspicion is it's a Canaanite. Because that's— who cares that he was a merchant? That's not relevant to a story. So what, right?

Right.

What makes the story dramatic is that he was a Canaanite, not a merchant. He married her and he cohabited with her. She conceived and bore a son, and he named him Er. There's no question that, again, we have plays on words here. If any of you know Hebrew, Er backwards— Er is ayin resh. Ayin resh. And does anyone know what—

Dad.

Right.

His name is Bad backwards. It's as if his name was Dad. All right? It's a play. It's as though— to me, it seems that there's a play on words here, though there may not be. But in light of what happens to good old Er, there's a good chance that that's exactly what the Torah is saying. She conceived again and bore a son. She conceived again and bore a son and named him Onan, who has entered our dictionary, our language, and as I will emphatically note, incorrectly. It's a very, very important thing here that I'm going to get into. Once again she bore a son, so let's see, so again, Judah marries this woman, the daughter of Shua, right? First son is Er, second son is Onan. Once again she bore a son and named him Shelah. And he was at Kezib when she bore him. All right, so she has 3 sons, the daughter of, the daughter of Shua. All right, verse number 6. Judah got a wife for Er, his firstborn. That— fathers ran everything in those days. They took the women they wanted, they took the women for their sons they wanted. It was, uh, it was— this is good old patriarchy. I mean, when, you know, when women's groups talk about American patriarchy, they don't know what the real thing is at all. Are you kidding? This is nothing. This is patriarchy. Judah got a wife for Er, his firstborn. Her name was Tamar. But Er, Judah's firstborn, was displeasing to the Lord, and the Lord took his life. See, it says here that he was ra. It's, "Er was ra." It's actually in the verse. Er was bad, or Dab was bad in God's eyes, and God killed him. We don't know what he did, all right? Uh, but it's interesting. One Jewish, uh, traditional commentator writes, the Bachor Shor, that he refused to consummate the marriage because he wanted to avoid having children. According to a rabbinic tradition, you'll find this very interesting, in the Talmud, he didn't want her to have children because he didn't want Tamar's beauty to be marred by pregnancy. Isn't that interesting? Now, they made this all up. That's what's so interesting about it. [LAUGHTER] You have to— it really is. I don't mean that tongue-in-cheek. It is a very interesting thing. If I gave you a sentence and so-and-so was a bad man, and then you had to develop why was he bad, it would tell a great deal about you, what you said he was bad about. It says a great deal about the rabbis, and I don't mean this at all negatively, that this is what they— what is a bad man? A man who won't have kids because he doesn't want to mar his wife's beauty with pregnancy. That's very interesting that that's what— they could have made up anything, you know. He left home for weeks at a time to go gambling. I mean, right? I mean, anything could have been possible, right? He cheated people. But this is what they developed as the source of his evil. And it's— which probably, if nothing else, leads you to understand what pregnancy did to women in those days, and how it was in their minds. Well, you know, if I were a really bad guy, This is what I would do. I would prevent my wife from having children so that she could stay as beautiful as she was, as she has always been. It's a fascinating insight. Please hold it, I'm sorry, unless— because otherwise— all right, I'll take it one.

Yeah. Isn't it a commandment to have— for men to have to bear children?

Yes.

Well, so that would—

That's right, it is bad.

—make up something that God would smite him for.

That's absolutely right. Oh no, oh no, this is a serious offense to For a man to opt not to have children is a serious offense. All I'm saying is the rabbis made it up, because there's nothing in the text at all to suggest that that was the problem. Except for the fact that they don't list any children from them. So at least that, they have some basis to come up with that particular notion. But I do, it is, I think, very fascinating that that's what they came up with. Okay. So God, God kills him. It's interesting, the Hebrew is vayimitehu. It's not God killed him, that would be vayehargehu. It's God made him dead. I don't know why it's that important, but I just thought I'd note it to you. It doesn't say he killed him, it's, it's he made him dead. And it's not a common, uh, form of the verb in Hebrew. Who knows, there must be a reason, but I just don't know it. Verse 8. Then Judah said to Onan— that's the second son, correct?— join with your brother's wife and do your duty by her as a brother-in-law and provide offspring for your brother. This is a critically important sentence here. Uh, I made a big boo-boo. Anybody have an entire Bible or entire Torah here?

Yeah.

Okay, can I borrow it please? I need to— that's fine. I need to read to you from Deuteronomy 25:5. This is called levirate marriage. It comes from the Latin lever, which means brother-in-law. And let me read to you from the Torah, and believe it's 25:5 in Deuteronomy, what the law was. This apparently was universal in the ancient Near East. Or at least a, uh— yes, here we go. Or, or— If brethren dwell together and one of them dies and has no child, the wife of the dead shall not be married abroad, meaning to a stranger outside the family, unto one not of his kin. Her husband's brother shall go in unto her and take her to him to wife. Who, who wrote this? Somebody, somebody with a speech impediment? And take her to him to wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother unto her. In Hebrew, yibum is what it is called. I'll finish and then explain it to you. And it shall be that the firstborn that she bears shall succeed in the name of his brother that is dead, that his name not be blotted out of Israel. And if the man like not to take his brother's wife, then his brother's wife shall go up to the gate unto the elders, and say, my husband's brother refuses to raise up unto his brother a name in Israel. He will not perform the duty of a husband's brother unto me. Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him. And if he stands and says, I will not take her, then his brother's wife shall draw near unto him in the presence of the elders and loose his shoe from off his foot and spit in his face. And she shall answer and say, so shall it be done unto the man that does not build up his brother's house. And his name shall be called in Israel the house of him that had his shoe loosed. Okay, now all you ethnocentric, time-centered bigots, Let me, let me please note it down because I have to take the questions later. Let me explain that. I mean, unless there's a clarification issue here. Let me explain.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Among other things that this law of ye'bum makes clear is that the woman's role in, in that world was really solely for the edification of men. Well, not solely, but primarily. That she was there to make babies. Her name was not the critical name, it was his name that was the critical name. And if it wasn't this brother, okay, so this brother. Her— she had no choice. Right. The brother had a choice, but he was disgraced if he exercised the option not to do yibum with the, with the widow of his, of his older brother. Are you with me? Because that would— that means it's as if, so to speak, the brother hadn't lived. There was no one to carry on his name. If he had a child, the first child that he, or son, that he would have with the, with the widow was counted as if it was the brother's child. For all intents and purposes, inheritance, rights, and name, this was the brother, the dead brother's child. That is called levirate marriage, again from the Latin lever, L-E-V-I-R, or levir, I don't know how it's pronounced in, in Latin, which means brother-in-law. That is the law, and the rabbis later still insisted on chalitzah, the second part of the ceremony. They more or less abolished the whole idea that you had to go to your brother's widow, that you had to have relations with her. But they didn't abolish chalitzah. That was maintained in Jewish law later on. Ceremony of the spitting in the face and the taking off the shoe and so on. Now, this goes back to your question, did God write this? The, uh, you have to— I don't have a direct answer to you whether God wrote about whether you loosen your brother-in-law's shoe and spit in his face. What I can say to you is We need to understand the achievement of this Torah in elevating people who believe this stuff. This is what the Torah inherited. This is the civilization of Jews, or Hebrews, at that time. You cannot change people by saying, "I wipe away all of your ceremonies. I wipe away all of your practices." so that I can elevate you to live on a 20th century level in the 20th century— in the 12th century BCE. It, it, it, you have to understand how absurd it was. God doesn't work in heaven. God works on earth. With real people, you have to do real things. Now, it was a patriarchal world, but you'll see from this story that there are very interesting moral elements that came into play here. At any rate, that is what Judah told Onan to do. Your brother died, you're the next brother, you go now and you have relations with Tamar. Okay, my daughter-in-law Tamar, your— more importantly, your sister-in-law, to carry on your brother's name in Israel. All right. Uh, Sarna writes, it is widely interpreted that the levirate institution had its origin in the notion that the widow had initially been purchased through marriage by the head of the family and so became part of the dead husband's estate. That's what you have to understand. It's not even only that it's patriarchal. It's, it's more, it's deeper than that. It's not that men said, "Oh, look, we're so lucky, we get to own these women." It's not that. It's that that's the way in which society could function with order. And not have children wandering around the place. Because, my friends, that is the issue. Every society has to figure out what do you do with the product of sexual intercourse called humans, little humans called children. I must tell you that if we think we're all that advanced and laugh at their answer to it, we haven't done a very good job given the illegitimacy rates of our own country in the late 20th century.

Dennis Prager.

As I have broadcast now a few times, I agree with Charles Murray that illegitimacy is the single greatest source of problems, of the serious crime problems in our society. 7 out of 10 men who are in prison for violent crime did not grow up with a father. That's the issue here. What the issue— see, marriage in those days was not, "Oh, I'm in love with you," you know, across a crowded room, I saw her face. They didn't even see many of their faces since many of them were veiled. The, uh, it wasn't a matter, it wasn't like that. This is brand new stuff, romantic love. Marriage was done in order to have an orderly way to make new people in your own civilization. Now, remember too, that in a certain sense, this was somewhat for her sake too. While I grant all the patriarchy. Otherwise, where is this widow? All societies have terrible problems with, with the widow. It's a sad state to be in this, in the, in the world. It's not, it's not that easy in the modern world. It was impossible in the ancient world. And here is the law saying, wait a minute, we're not going to abandon that widow. She's part of our family. And there is an unmarried brother, he'll go to her. It's not romantic, but please don't regard it as barbaric. Okay? Does that make more sense now? That's what it's saying. This takes care of the widow, it takes care of the brother, it has order, and God knows order is pretty critical. That's what civilization is founded on— order. This is what we— how we procreate. So that is the way in which it was done, by marrying into the family She's not abandoned, as indeed many women are after divorce, after widowhood. I get calls, I get calls and letters about this all the time. And here was a society that said, "Wait a minute, you're a widow? You're just as much part of our family." And intercourse was not something regarded as, "Oh, the bonding of two souls." This is brand new, the bonding of two souls. Then it was, uh, two organs. Two organs. Of two people who were to be attached in order to keep the, the society functioning. Now you will understand much better why it's so serious the way in which Onan didn't fulfill his duty.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

We live in a time where the moment you question the narrative, you're told to stop thinking and start complying. That's why what Angel is doing matters. Matters. With eye-opening documentaries like "Thank You, Dr. Fauci" and "RFK: Legacy," Angel is willing to explore the issues others avoid. In a culture shaped by gatekeepers, Angel offers something rare: a platform for truth-seeking storytelling that isn't constrained by fear or conformity. Go to angel.com/prager, join the Angel Guild, and watch these films today.

Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

The next the next, uh, verse 9. I'll just read 8 again. Then Judah said to Onan, join with your brother's wife and do your duty by her as a brother-in-law and provide offspring for your bro— for your brother. But Onan, knowing that the seed would not count as his, let it go to waste whenever he joined with his brother's wife. So as not to provide offspring for his brother. This is a selfish guy. Gets to sleep with Tamar and doesn't do anything about it. Now, if you sleep with your sister-in-law outside of yibum, outside of levirate, you know what that is? That's a form of incest. This is a very serious sin. Yes. He slept with her, but he would not ejaculate in her. This is coitus interruptus, since we're really into Latin tonight. That is what he did. He did not perpetuate his brother's name, and for all intents and purposes, he used Tamar. So he had the best of both worlds. Got to sleep with Tamar and didn't want— and was selfish in that he didn't want to give his brother a child. That's what it says. Because he does not want to provide offspring for his brother. Is that clear what he did?

Yes. Okay.

He faked going through yibum. There would be no way that Judah could know this. Right? Judah is not present when his son is having relations with, with Tamar. So he's faking out the father, so he's cheating the father, he's cheating the wife— she wants children— he's cheating everybody. He's cheating God, cheating the father. And the only one who can know that he's cheating outside of his, uh, outside of Tamar, uh, although theoretically not necessarily that— he could have faked it, right? I mean, it is possible that a woman does not know if ejaculation occurs. It is very possible he even faked her out. The only one that he didn't fake is God. And there is a very important part in the Torah in this regard, wherein the— wherever you have, nearly wherever you have later on in the Torah, "And you shall fear your God," it's after a sin that only God could know you did. Mm-hmm. For example, don't put an obstacle before a blind person. That's a law in the Torah. And then it says, "And you shall fear God." Wherever people can't catch you and punish you, you have the addition, "Fear God." That's, that's the moral necessity of God. Who's to catch you? Who's to stop you when man, when humanity can't? Yes. Obviously, the police can stop certain things, but there's a lot that they can't. That's where God comes in, morally speaking. That is why it— that now you'll understand God's intense reaction against what Onan did. He, he did something in total secrecy that was utterly wrong. He, he completely upset the family balance. He undid the whole institution. She would remain childless 'cause he faked her out. And how do you know she didn't walk around depressed that she's childless again? He could have stopped. He could have said to Judah, "I don't want to do this." He would not have been killed for it. He could have said, "I'm sorry, I don't want to do my duty." And then she would have had to wait for the youngest son. But he didn't. He did. Instead, he just had, uh, he just had Tamar when he wanted her, and in the meantime, uh, never consummated what he was supposed to do. Now you understand the severity of his particular thing. Now I'm going to go to the next verse and then go back because I need to talk about the spilling of seed. What he did, verse 10, was displeasing to the Lord, and God took his life also. And, uh, now you know better why he would have deserved it. What else is God going to do, as it were, right? Put him in jail? Do you understand? I mean, the choices here are pretty, pretty limited. Okay, unfortunately, very unfortunately in my opinion, The rabbis of the Talmud and later saw what Onan did, saw the vile act that he did as masturbation, spilling seed. With all respect, and God knows I have great respect for the rabbis, that is 100% wrong. Not 90, but 100. The sin is as clear as a bell. He didn't perform yibum. He didn't sleep— well, he slept, but he didn't ejaculate into his sister-in-law to procreate the seed of his dead brother. To read from this that the sin is masturbation is to engage in a wrong reading, a desire to put in something you don't like into the Torah's words. Yes. They didn't like masturbation, so they stuck it into this particular verse. So much so that that's how you get the word onanism. Onanism, which means autoeroticism or masturbation, comes from Onan. That is how deeply entrenched this interpretation is. But that wasn't his sin. It's his sin in later Jewish life that caused masturbation to sin. Mm-hmm. But it's not his sin in this verse. His sin is clear. This is a, this is a real problem. Because I am convinced of something larger here, and that is that the rabbis of the Talmud and later Jewish life had a somewhat, indeed seriously, different view of sexual matters than the Torah did. The Torah's view on sexual matters was utterly and totally practical. It did not regard sex as the inherently almost sinful— because it's not inherently, by the rabbis too, relations between husband and wife are the holiest thing people can engage in. I want to make that clear. The rabbis never had the New Testament view that, as Paul put it, "Better to marry than burn with desire." Ideally, you don't do either, but if you're burning, then you should get married. There is a clear element of the New Testament that sees chastity as an ideal. That is not true even among the rabbis. Chastity was a sin. If you took a vow of chastity, In Judaism, it was considered a sin. You were to have sex with your spouse. And indeed, it's obligatory, and a woman could sue for divorce if her husband denied her sex. It's one of the few grounds that, in fact, she could initiate divorce proceedings, even under ancient Jewish law. So I need to make it clear that the rabbis did not hold sex wrong. But any non-marital sex, from, from auto-sex, to premarital sex, to obviously extramarital, but that's already in the Ten Commandments, but premarital, or, or onanism as it is called, this was seriously wrong. The Torah, I do not believe, if you read it as it is, without the eyes of the rabbis, has the same view. Sex is sex, it's part of life, it's a part of life that needs to be controlled, not because it's inherently so problematic or sinful a thing outside of marriage, as it is a thing that can cause chaos in society. If everybody sleeps with everybody, then society will fall apart because of the product. But it's the product that is the bigger worry. The proof of that is that even the original ban on adultery was only with regard to married women. Mm-hmm. Because women have children. So ironically, a single woman could not, under the original interpretation of "Thou shalt not commit adultery," she could not commit adultery. She could sleep with 400 married men and not commit adultery because she had— she is not part of a family yet, which is an outside unit, uh, and she does not belong to a man. There's also the patriarchal issue. She does not belong to anybody. Don't, don't— the point is not that the Torah didn't frown upon it. It did frown upon it, but it allowed it for another reason, because it allowed polygamy. If a married man slept with a single woman, then, who was not his wife, but that's definitional, wouldn't be a single woman if she were his wife, then he was in effect marrying her. One of the ways in which you married was by, by having intercourse. This is complex stuff, but it is very important stuff because this masturbation issue is a good example. In the, in the Orthodox world, and the more Orthodox you get, the truer it is, masturbation is an extremely serious sin. The Shulchan Aruch, the medieval guide to Jewish law, uh, holding that it was akin to murder, which from our perspective is preposterous. How do you murder sperm, which would die anyway? Because, I mean, you know what, but there must have been a belief that there was a limited amount of sperm in a man's life, perhaps. I don't know why. To the point, in fact, where my dear friend Rabbi Joseph Telushkin reminds me that the rabbis took a verse from the prophets "Yidechem melei dam," or something to that effect. "Your hands are filled with blood," which the prophet was saying to the Jews is because you oppress the weak and the poor. And they said, "Oh, it's because you masturbate." But it's not, but it's clearly not the case. What developed clearly was an antipathy to sex, became an ultra-sensitive matter, which in the Torah it's not. The proof is very simple. In Jewish Torah law, in Torah law later, if a man sleeps with a woman, an unmarried man with an unmarried woman, do you know what the, you know what the quote-unquote punishment is? There is no punishment. All that happens is this: he must marry her, and he can never divorce her. Wow. If he took a virgin. If he took a virgin and slept with her. If he took a non-virgin, nothing happens. But if he took a virgin and slept with her, he has to marry her. But if she doesn't want to marry him, that's okay. All he does is pay the father of the, of the girl how much virginity was worth. Do you understand? That's why I said the Torah's concerns were practical. Sex was not the biggest deal. It became a very sensitive and big deal to the rabbis, and certainly to Christianity, and I don't know why. I mean, one would need to be a scholar of the ancient world and know a great deal about why this developed. I don't know. I can only tell you that, as a Jew who has studied this his whole life, there is, to me, a clear bifurcation between the Torah's view of sexual matters and the rabbinic view of sexual matters. To an Orthodox Jew, of course, there is no difference because the rabbinic view is as divine as the Torah view. And so this would be dismissed a priori. But— so I respect that. I don't share that. It is clear to me that there is a difference. And it is clear to me that Onan didn't didn't get killed by God because he masturbated. Because if God killed masturbators, there would be nobody left. The world would be emptied. It would be devoid of people. Uh, so how could it possibly be— besides the context, why would God kill a masturbator? I mean, that's the other question that would have to be asked. And I want to tell you, it's the sort of thing that wreaks havoc on a lot of, especially boys' mentalities. I was a counselor in Orthodox Jewish camps for years, and I remember I'd have what we call bull sessions with the campers. I always had 13, 14-year-olds because I was the biggest Jew in camp, so I could handle these monsters.

Yeah.

And it was, it was really something to me when I would talk to them the first night of camp. I remember this vividly. I'd walk in the dark, back and forth in the bunk, and they'd all be on their cots lying there listening to me avidly. And I would, I would talk to them about the birds and the bees, because a lot of them could not talk to their fathers, and certainly not their rabbis at yeshiva. And when I told them my view of masturbation, they were shocked. They would confide that they were told that it's like murder, it's a terrible, terrible sin, and they were going out of their minds. And it's, uh, and for what? I mean, if I truly would have to ask, of any act that's called a sin, who the hell does that hurt? I mean, of all the acts I could think of to induce guilt in humanity, that's the last one I would bother doing it about. Well, you might say, but what if you're addicted? Well, if you're addicted to anything, if you're addicted to baseball cards, it's not good. But if you're not addicted, What's the difference? And it is sad that religion in the Western world has become so associated with sex, with suppression of sex outside of very confined arenas. It's very unfortunate. It has done— it has done religion a disservice, and it's done sex a disservice, because we do need religious guidelines for sexuality. Dennis Prager. But when— but what has happened is so many people became so uptight that they said, "I'm rejecting all of religion because it was so depressing in this one area of life." And so what you end up with, which is what we have very much in America, for example, and in the Western world, is you have on the one hand religious Jews and Christians, often with a very dark view of sexuality, outside of the very, very specific arena of husband-wife intercourse, and on the other hand, massive license, where anything goes anywhere. And what we really need today, more than anything, is religious guidelines that take— that take the world seriously and do not have a dark view of all sexual matters outside outside of husband-wife intercourse. And that's, uh, which would include obvious, most obviously, onanism. And so this is why this is a very important, it's had real ramifications in Jewish history, and I needed to get into this topic. There's one other thing too, while talking about sexual matters.

Yes?

The— I've made this point frequently, and I remember when I realized it in my own life, it was a massive help. There is a difference— I draw a difference between the moral and the holy. Take premarital sex. If two adults engage in sex totally consensually, neither of them is married, it is impossible for me to call the act immoral. Immoral is if I coerce you, or you coerce me, or you trick a person. If you, if you coerce or trick, then it's immoral. What I would call it from a Jewish perspective is it falls fall short of the holiness ideal that Judaism has for sexual behavior, which is in marriage. But falling short of the holiness ideal is not the same as immoral. And I therefore have long drawn a distinction between the moral and the holy. When by religion labeling every unholy act Immoral? I think that it has done a great disservice to religion and caused a lot of people to reject it, because in their hearts, the vast majority of people who have engaged in premarital sex in a, in a consensual manner do not believe that they engaged in an immoral act. And when you tell people that they have done something and in their gut they know they didn't, you're going to get a reaction. What the reaction is, you will lose your credibility. I believe that religion in the West has lost a lot of credibility because of the sex issue, and it has been the whipping boy religion of all those who advocate the opposite— do whatever you want with whomever you want. Dennis Prager. Whenever you want. The moment you say, "Wait a minute, there have to be some guidelines," oh, you're a Puritan, right? You're puritanical. It's become part of the language. Puritanical comes from Christian Puritans. But they could have said, "Oh, you're Orthodox Jewish." And I don't mean that as an insult or a derogatory term. I mean it as an honest description of the attitude toward any non-marital sex, sexual act. Now, I do think lines have to be drawn, and I get a great deal of flak for it from the secular left. I think lines do. I think that heterosexuality must be called the ideal, without condemning the homosexual to hell. I think that incest needs to be stated, that is out of bounds. There have to be religious guidelines. And I think the Torah, frankly, in this regard, is quite progressive in that it said the things that are forbidden, but otherwise didn't have a major preoccupation with it. Otherwise, you will have to explain how the prostitute prostitutes of the Hebrew Bible are almost always nice people, depicted as very nice. How in this chapter Tamar is a heroine, though she seduces, acting like a whore, her own father-in-law, which is coming up now. Not only is the— I mean, religious Jews named their daughters after this woman. That's quite a thing. Boy, if their daughters did it, they would not be pleased. So it's a very sensitive and important issue, and I'm very— I'm happy that you can see what the origins of the ban on masturbation are and how it's not correct. It is absolutely fair for me to state to you categorically The Hebrew Bible is silent, or the Torah is silent on this issue. What he did was to cheat his, his family, cheat Tamar, cheat Judah, cheat God. That's why God got angry, not because he spilled seed. Number 11. Let me just read to you what Sarna writes about Onan. The callous refusal of Onan to perpetuate the line of his brother may have been due to a lack of a sense of duty to the dead. An even more powerful motivation would have been the fact that with the death of the firstborn, Onan inherits one half of his father's estate. However, should he provide an heir to his brother, his portion would be diminished. So he had financial considerations, uh, which is probably true that that was a factor.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

All right. Remember I said to you this, this is disagreed by Sarna. I said to you that he could have stood up and said to his father, said to his father, "I don't want to sleep with her." He writes, "Clearly society at this time had made no provision for voluntary renunciation of the levirate duty." as is found in Deuteronomy 25. You get it? I don't, I don't know if he's right. He says clearly only because, uh, Onan didn't do it, but I'm not sure that that's necessarily the case. Why would God then punish him if he had no choice? It makes his sin a little less. I, uh, I don't know, you see, I don't know that Sarna is right on this, but I just want you to hear a different interpretation. He says that Onan had no choice, he couldn't get out of it because the Deuteronomy law comes later. I just want you to know that because I had said he could have gotten out of it. Yes? This, uh, and you've stated several times, refers to the older brother dies, the next brother takes on this task. What if it weren't in that order? What if this— the younger brother died? Yes, yes, probably the older brother would have to do that. Yes, it's right. Yes, but you generally married your children off in chronological order. Remember that? What's— that's what Laban said about his daughters. It's by us, we don't do that where the younger goes first. Okay, let's, uh, we're up to verse, uh, verse what? 11. Then Judah said— so God— so now wait, now poor Judah. Judah in the meantime has two dead, two dead sons, and in neither case knows why. So needless to say, what is his first reaction? That this is not a lucky wife. Wouldn't you think that? Your daughter-in-law's— your son marries a daughter-in-law. He drops dead for reasons you don't know. Your next son marries her, drops dead for reasons you don't know. You start getting concerned. This is not my daughter-in-law, my type of daughter-in-law. So sure enough, Judah said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, stay as a widow in your father's house. Thanks, but no thanks. Until my son Shelah grows up. For he thought, Judah thought, he too might die like his brothers. I mean, he's a poor father. He's mourning. He doesn't have a clue as to, as to why they died. So Tamar went to live in her father's house. Remember, he still, under those ancient rules, rules over her. She is still married, as it were, to Judah's family. Okay, but he orders her, go back to your father's house. You know, and I'll give you sheilah, you know, like maybe when he's 110, uh, which is probably what he had in mind. Verse 12: A long time afterward, Shua's daughter, the wife of Judah, died. Now the reason that that is noted is because it's important to know that Judah's behavior that you are about to witness takes place after his wife died. Okay. Clearly, it's not to tell you about her. You don't even know her name. We just know she's the daughter of Shua. You get the point here? Clearly, it's not to tell you about her. We don't care about her. We don't know a thing about her. It's to tell you that the behavior that you will now encounter takes place after he became single again. When his period of mourning was over, Judah went up to Timnah to his sheep shearers together with his friend Chira the Adullamite. From the first verse. And Tamar was told, your father-in-law is coming up to Timnah for the sheep shearing. Okay, I wanted to make a point here. The, uh, in 11, Judah regarded Tamar as a killer wife, as a wife who has a fatal attraction. Okay, it is important— is another reason therefore for the Torah mentioning that. It is in order— the Torah is defending both Judah and Tamar with a lot of explanations here. It's defending Judah for what he's about— for, excuse me, for not giving Shelah to Tamar. You, you get it? Because he was afraid he'll die, that another son will die. And, uh, okay, and he is defending him, and the Torah is defending, like, defending Tamar. For her actions that we will now witness. Tamar was told, "Your father-in-law is coming." So she took off her widow's garb. Verse 14, covered her face with a veil, and wrapping herself up, sat down at the entrance to Einayim. Which is an interesting thing because it, it's all grown up, yet she had not been given to him as a wife. She realized, uh-oh, he's not going to give me this sheilah, this is nonsense. I'm going to die without children, and this is just terrible. So now you understand what the Torah is doing. It's going to tell you of a horrible episode on the face of it, a daughter-in-law acting like a prostitute to go, to go to bed with her father-in-law, and it defends both. It explains, look, he was a single man. Mm-hmm. And he had a nightstand with a prostitute. In effect, again, the Torah is saying, big deal. It is not an issue. It is not an issue to the Torah that Judah would sleep one night with a prostitute. You have to understand, it's not even that big a deal that she did it. Although it's a bigger deal. But at any rate, they are both defended. He is single, and she wants children from his family, which she has a perfect right to. She got stuck. Er was a bad man, and Onan was a bad man. She got stuck. Maybe that's Canaanite blood. Who knows? Maybe that's what the Torah is telling you, but I don't think so since she's also Canaanite, right? Right. Well, actually, no, they're not Canaanite blood. They're Judah's— excuse me, they're Judah's, uh, they're Judah's kids. I take that back. It's not Canaanite blood. This is good Jewish blood, bad kids. That's right, bad Jewish boys. Uh, when Judah saw her, he took her for a harlot. Oh, excuse me, for she saw— yes, when Judah saw her, remember now, she wrapped herself up so that he couldn't see the face, and she made herself like a, like a "kideisha." And I'll explain that in a moment because the word is critical. But here it says "zona." There are two words in the Torah for prostitute: "zona" and "kideisha." Both are used here, and they both mean slightly different things. When Judas saw her, he took her for a prostitute, for she had covered her face. So he turned aside to her by the road and said, "Here, let me sleep with you." For he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law. What, she asked, will you pay for sleeping with me? He replied, "I will send a kid from my flock." We've had a lot of kids with a lot of deceptions using kid, using goats. This is another one. It's a very interesting theme, and I'm going to read to you afterwards all the themes that this story shares with other stories in, in Genesis, including people fooling people. The number of disguises in it and the number of clothing issues is remarkable. Remember who with, uh, with kid skin, with, uh, faked who, and it's coming back again? Uh, he replied, I will send a kid from my flock. But she said, you must leave a pledge until you have sent it. And he said, what pledge shall I give you? She replied, your seal and cord and the staff which you carry. Now you have to understand, the seal and cord is as individual as a signature. It's as if I would have written out to a prostitute, I owe you and sign my name with a notary public present. Okay, that's how official it was. It could not be anybody else's cord and seal, which of course is what she wanted, not a goat. So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she conceived by him. One of the, one of the points that I, that I made that when I read this, or that I inferred, is that it's remarkable that Judah did not know whom he was sleeping with, which just once again reveals the impersonality possible to sex, and specifically sex with a prostitute.

Mm-hmm.

It's, uh, it's not something that women naturally are inclined to appreciating, how utterly anonymous sex could be for a male. But here you have it. I mean, it's his daughter-in-law. He ob— he never looked at her face. That's the only possible understanding of this. He slept with a woman and never saw her face. Um, she conceived by him at 19, then she went on her way. She took off her veil and again put on her widow's garb. Judah sent the kid by his friend the Adullamite to redeem the pledge from the woman, but the Adullamite could not find her. He inquired of the people of the town, where is— now you see it's changed to kadeshah— where is the cult prostitute? The one at Einayim by the road. I'll explain that in a minute. But they said there has not been a cult prostitute here. They use kiddushah in Hebrew. They should have translated again as cult prostitute. Let me explain why he says this. It's not that embarrassing to be known to have slept with a cult prostitute. After all, you're engaged in a religious act. But a simple prostitute— can you imagine a guy walking around town Hey, where's the prostitute I slept with? She has my corn and staff and I owe her money. But it's still remarkable that he could go around town saying, where's the cult prostitute that I slept with? Or at least the Adullamite, asking the name, that Judas slept with. Where is she? Gives you an idea of the, again, of an openness here to to sexual behavior that we would never tolerate in our, in our time. Cult prostitute. A cult prostitute in, in almost all religion, which is something very big in the Torah because it describes this a great deal. There were male and female cult prostitutes, men and women who would be— Prostitutes. Like clergy in pagan cults and who would sleep with the parishioners. So it was certainly one way to increase church attendance. You know the old thing about, you know, the wife dragging the husband to synagogue or church? In those days it was not an issue. So, yeah, but that was a very big part of all over the world. In my essay on homosexuality, I show, I have a chapter, not a chapter, but a fair amount on this particular subject. It was quite widespread all over the world, and it was something that Judaism wanted to wipe out. By the way, She is described originally as a prostitute, not a cult prostitute, by the Torah. It's the Torah's little hint of saying, "We see no difference between cult prostitution and regular prostitution." The little hint that the reader would have picked up, because you use the word "zona" originally, but now he goes around asking for the "kiddusha." By the way, many of you know this word. The word for cult prostitute in the Torah, "kiddushah," comes from what Hebrew word?

Kadosh. Which means?

Right, which means holy. The difference between the holy and the unholy is literally a matter of dots in Hebrew. Kiddushah means holy woman. Kiddushah means cult prostitute. And it is a beautiful idea that the difference in all of our life, that it's a very fine line often between beauty and ugly, between love and hate, between the holy and unholy, as I said. Context is everything. After all, both a kiddusha and a kiddusha A holy woman and a cult prostitute sleep with a man, so the act itself is neutral. Context determines everything in sex. Everything. Number, uh, so where— oh yeah, where is the cult prostitute? They said there's been no cult prostitute here. So he returned to Jude and said, I couldn't find her. Moreover, the townspeople said, "There has been no cult prostitute here." So Judah said, "Let her keep them, lest we become a laughingstock." In other words, he's, you know, he'd be embarrassed to spend the rest of his life looking for a cult prostitute he claims that he slept with. There's just so much he's going to go around town asking where she is. So let her keep my staff and my cord. 'lest we become a laughingstock.' To which he said, 'What do you mean we, kemosabe?' It's an alternate reading that is not found in your particular Pentateuch. Isn't that cute? I love the way he goes, 'Lest we.' Hey, excuse me, Judah, old pal, old friend, what do you mean we? You slept with her. I'm just looking for her. I got a kick out of that one. Lest we become— well, all right. So you become a laughingstock. That's 23. I did send her his— this kid, but you didn't find her. In other words, he tried. He was an honorable man. Everybody's been honorable. The only dishonorable thing was the sex. That's what I'm trying to say to you. Honorable people can do less than honorable sexual things. I think that that's a very important part of what this chapter is talking about. About 3 months later, Judah was told, "Your daughter-in-law Tamar has played the harlot. In fact, she is with child by harlotry." Hmm. He was told 3 months later that she acted like a prostitute. It says here in Hebrew, prostitute, not cult, because it would have been impossible. She's not part of the Canaanite cult, so it would have been absurd. She acted like a— she acted like a zonah. Zantah Tamar. Tamar prostituted herself, your daughter-in-law. "Vegam hinei haralis nunim." And she is now pregnant with the product of prostitution. So Judah said, "Bring her out and let her be burned." He has the complete dictation here. And remember, she committed adultery. She is still married to her— his family. To Shelah, at least in theory. So she, as an adulterer, she is to be executed as an adulteress. As she was being brought out, she sent this message to her father-in-law: "I am with child by the man to whom these belong." Is this a great story or a great story. Make a movie. Yes, it could. You could truly make a movie out of it. That's right. I am with child by the man to whom these belong. And she added, examine these. Whose seal and cord and staff are these? I think it's a noble thing she didn't cry it out to the town. She sent a message to Judah. We have two quite honorable people here, because you will see how honorable he is in the next verse. I was very touched by the fact that she sent the message quietly. Just tell him— she had faith that when he saw this, she would not be executed, although he could have— to protect his own name, he could have executed her, right? Said, I'll bury that staff, and this is ridiculous, she's just making up a story. But he didn't do that. She was honorable and he was honorable. 26, Judah recognized them and said, she is more in the right than I. How often do people say that in life? Twice, three times in a long life. It's quite remarkable. Inasmuch as I did not give her to my son Shelah. That— he immediately understood what went on here. It's so powerful. Oh God, she doesn't want to play prostitute and sleep with me. She wants a child from this family, and I denied it to her. Of course she's right. Isn't that something? A very powerful reaction. The second he— he put two and two together immediately. Not she's more in the right than I. Oh, it's I who slept with her and she's showing the staff. No, she's more than right. She did the right thing. She wants children from this family. Again, the sex issue is just dropped. It's, it's family issue. It's, it's culture. It's society, not sex. And he was not intimate with her again. Though he could have been. Which is a statement again about him and about them. When the time came for her to give birth, there were twins in her womb. Remember this? Oh, there are so many parallels to the Genesis stories. While she was in labor, but of course the difference here was that they didn't know it until the time to give birth. Whereas in the case of Jacob and Esau, it was known from the beginning. It was a prediction from God that there were two nations in you and they'll fight with each other and so on. While she was in labor, one of them put out his hand and the midwife tied a crimson thread on that hand to signify this one came out first. That's how they did it in those days, I guess. But just then he drew back his hand and out came his brother. And she said, "What a breach you have made for yourself!" So his name was Breach. Which is what it would be if they did the actual translation like that. Peretz. Peretz, actually. Afterward his brother came out, on whose hand was the crimson thread. He was named Zerah. Those names appear later, but it's, it's not The Zerahites were a clan of Judah, and, uh, that's the end of this incredible story. I'd like to read to you a few things now that summarize what went on here. First, from the Oxford Companion to the Bible, or the Oxford Bible Dictionary, which is very good. This is by Carl S. Ehrlich, who is a professor at an institute for advanced Jewish studies in Germany, talking about Onan and masturbation under Onan in the Oxford Bible Dictionary. Onan's effort to avoid impregnating his sister-in-law has given rise to the term onanism, a synonym for masturbation. This passage is then employed by some to indicate divine condemnation of autoeroticism. This interpretation, however, completely misses the point of the passage. Onan's sin was not sexual. Rather, it was his refusal to fulfill the obligation of levirate marriage and according to which a man was obligated to impregnate the wife of his brother if his brother would die without an heir, and so on. Thus Onan's sexual act, most probably coitus interruptus, was the means whereby he avoided his fraternal duty in spite of the fact that he seemed to be fulfilling it, seemed to be, by cohabiting with Tamar. For this deception he was punished. Lest you think it's only I Who said that the point is entirely missed there. Let me read to you now some of the parallels. This is from the Harper, uh, dictionary, Bible dictionary. As Numbers 26:19-22 and 1 Chronicles 2 indicate, Judah's 3 surviving sons, Shelah from his wife, right, and Zerach and Pharez from Tamar, become the progenitors of the most important clans of the tribe of Judah. Isn't that interesting? And look at their origins. Daughter-in-law sleeping with her father-in-law. The descent of David, of King David, from Tamar's younger son Paretz is recorded in the genealogy in Ruth chapter 4. Isn't that something? That's what I told you. And the Messiah comes from Beit David. So in Jewish tradition, the Messiah will come from a Canaanite woman, ultimately Canaanite woman, and through sleeping, acting like a prostitute, a prostitute sleeping with her father-in-law. That's what you call auspicious beginnings, which is very important. I have told you my own deepest belief that values are everything and blood is nothing, and this is a Jewish support for it. This is what, this is what matters. It's what values you hold, not who your grandparents are. By the way, in later Jewish life that did not come to be the case. Blood and yichus, you know the term yichus, where, ah, what yichus she has or he has, meaning, oh, look at the parents and grandparents, and that's how you married them. Child from less auspicious or humble origins would not be for your child. And I don't think that's in keeping with the essence of the Jewish message. Yes.

I thought you said that the daughter-in-law was actually Jewish? I mean, she was not a Canaanite?

You mean because of the word Canaanite?

Right, but you mentioned before that she was not a Canaanite, she was a Jew.

No, no, not her. I've said that Judah, Judah's kids were. I had made a mistake about Judah's children. Right, okay. Yes.

What strikes me about the whole passage is sort of this importance of family. And when you brought out the notion of we, lest we be shamed, jokingly, the fact of the matter is there was that we that he stood for the family. It's Judah's shame, the family's shame. I mean, everyone is connected to everyone, therefore you're responsible within that.

Oh, I see. I see. So you think the we it may very well be that Judah was not him and the Adullamite, but was his family. That's a good point.

I mean, because the whole thing—

May very well be. I just couldn't resist the line. I, you know, they're just—

But that's what's so striking to me about the notion of, I mean, from the greater standpoint of Jews as a tribe sticking together and being responsible for one another. If this man is starving, he's my brother.

Yeah, the problem, yeah. Listen, one of my mottos in life is that every blessing comes with a curse. There is a great deal of beauty in taking care of one another and those kind of bonds. The ugliness is that it becomes higher than morality. It's like my country right or wrong, my family right or wrong, my blood right or wrong. And I think that the ultimate message in the Torah is right or wrong is higher than blood. That is the reason the Torah is so critical often of Jews and so positive often with regard to non-Jews, as in the case of Moses. Moses— the one who snitches on Moses is a Jew. The one who saves Moses is the daughter of Pharaoh, the persecutor of the Jews.

But it is still familial in the sense that people who act in the familial way are holding immoral high ground. They're treating one another with that sense.

Yeah, but the problem— well, the problem, the problem though, yes, I, I, I'm certainly pro-family. I'm just— the problem lies in, and this is something that I won't be covering in Genesis, but it's to me the greatest law in the Torah. If I had, you know, if I— the That proverbial pagan came to me after Shammai and Hillel and said, "Mr. Prager, while standing on one leg, could you summarize the Torah?" I would say, "Yes, love the stranger." The ability to love the different is the greatest challenge to the human being. Animals can't do that. The only species capable of loving the stranger is us. And that's where family is critical to start with, but never to end with. That's how I would put it. Yes?

Why is there such an obvious correlation between Esau, Nephilim, and the Greymen of Babylon?

Why is there such an obvious correlation? I think it's purely stylistic. I don't know. It's an— because I don't know. I have a feeling that you— while I never teach the Torah's literature, there's no question that there is a desire to show linkages between stories. For example, in this case, it is constantly asked by biblical critics who say this shows that you have a lot of different tradition sources here, that, that this story doesn't belong there. Remember the last chapter Joseph was sold into slavery. What on God's earth is this chapter? Everything from the last chapter, 37, till the end is with regard to Joseph, except when Jacob dies, except for this chapter. But the beauty is it ties it in with— organically— with the use of the same exact symbols. In music, it's called a leitmotif, where you will have the same theme in different ways coming across all the movements or all the operas in a series. That's what you have here, this leitmotif. In fact, I'll give you one that just on my car phone on the way here, Joseph Telushkin gave me from the late Rabbi Wolf Kelman. He said, "What ties this story in with the Joseph and his brothers story? Brothers hating each other." Mm-hmm. Look at the way Onan treated Er.

It's not like me either.

Well, because— no, because it's not the— it's not the people who did the original sin who are getting punished. That's why it's not me that can— I can meet on that way. But it is— it is— there are— but there is symmetry. It's like a mirror. Here are twins, there are twins. That's why I want to read— let me just read. I'm going to come right back to you. Let me just read other— by the way, you might find this interesting. In the New Testament, Old Testament, Paretz makes an appearance in both genealogies of Jesus. Uh, Tamar is one of the many women in the Hebrew Bible who show initiative within a patriarchal world. That is one thing that we have noticed. The power of women and the initiative of women has been constant in Genesis. Okay, with all the patriarchy, these were not exactly slouches, these women who were making, who were determining. And, and he took his hat off to her. She said, this is crazy. I'm not going to sit by and wait for you to just give me your son. I'm going to act on my own. And it was pretty sharp the way she did it, wasn't it? I mean, that was pretty classy. Give me your cord and your staff and act like a, like a cult prostitute out there and so on. She really had it done and worked perfectly. Um, it's amazing how they all get pregnant in one shot. That I must admit, I always find that the more remarkable part of these stories. But, you know, maybe she timed it and, you know, knew the rhythm method, pre-Catholicism. The connections of the Judah-Tamar story with its context are multiple. First, there are several noteworthy contacts with the Jacob cycle. The birth of twins who struggle during delivery for the status of being the firstborn. The choice of the younger twin to play an important part in the divine plan. Jacob in his case, uh, and in this case, uh, Paretz. Is that right? Paretz is the younger one. Let's take a look. Yes, right. Okay, had to have been, otherwise this thing would have been wrong. To, uh, a deception by disguise that, and that involves a kid, as I pointed out. You see All of a sudden, you know what, you know why I love this? To me, this almost says to all these biblical critics who go, "Oh, this thing is clearly placed by a different tradition," that thousands of years ago, whoever wrote this, from God to Moses to a redactor, knew that there would be people 2,000 years later at Yale who would be saying these things, and they leave all these clues, "Hey, fellas, this is what I mean." Yeah. One strand of document. Give me a break. And we're going to drop all these clues to let you know that this is part of one larger whole, and it's not a piece that just fell in. Isaac's non-recognition of Jacob, using the same verb in 27:23 that occurs in 37:32. Let's see, what would that have been? I have to, I have to look into that. With the Joseph narrative, the Judah-Tamar Tamar story— this is now with the Joseph narrative, that showed the connection to the Jacob narrative— with the Joseph narrative, the Judah-Tamar story shares such elements as the failure to recognize a family member, a deception involving a kid and a means of identification, the words of Jacob's sons, "Recognize this garment," paralleled by Tamar's, "Recognize to whom these belong." Mm-hmm. And Judah's recognition of his seal and staff recalls Jacob's recognition of Joseph's garment. In view of, of such links, one can conclude that while chapter 38 does interrupt the Joseph narrative, its multiple contextual connections nicely explain its placement. This is not written by believers. It's from the Harper Bible dictionary. This is from the writer Donald Redford. One may note the similarity between Judah in 38 and Jacob in 37. Both are patriarchs. Both are deceived. Both are obliged to give legal recognition to a piece of evidence. Between Tamar— that comes later— between Tamar and Potiphar's wife, on the other hand, there is a marked contrast. Tamar is an honorable woman faithful to the interests of her husband, while Potiphar's wife is adulterous, malevolent, and contemptuous of her husband. The Chief Rabbinate— this is another point for you— the Chief Rabbinate of the State of Israel issued a decree in 1950 prohibiting ibum and making chalitzah obligatory. Mm-hmm. Isn't that interesting? Till how late this was an issue in Jewish life. And one final one. This is from Plaut. King David stemmed from a strange and non-indigenous line. For the lady who asked over there. Tamar and Ruth. Were not Israelites. Both were widows, and both claimed a son by dint of the levirate tradition. And from this King David and the Messiah come, from these two women, non-indigenous, not Jews by blood, and widows, and both getting a son through this brother-in-law law. David thus arises out of the most unlikely configurations. After tragedy had marred their lives, it appeared that Tamar and Ruth would remain childless, but God in his wisdom turned fate to his own design. The Judah-Tamar interlude is therefore not merely an old tribal tale, but an important link in the main theme to show the steady, though not always readily visible, guiding hand of God who never forgets his people and their destiny. In this story, Tamar is his unlikely tool. She is a Canaanite, a daughter of the very people against whom Abraham had warned and whom the children of Israel would later displace. Tamar is treated with respect. Her desperate deed draws no condemnation from the Torah. By the way, think about that too in light of what I said. God kills the guy for masturbating but rewards her with the Messiah will come from her for acting like a prostitute. You see, I mean, think about it for a minute. It just, again, it becomes so, uh, untenable. What she did fulfilled the requirement of Hebrew law and in addition appeared to serve the higher purposes of God. One lesson from this is, while in some way God acts through us, or some of us, we still have to take the initiative. Tamar had to take the initiative for this to happen. The tale of Judah is artfully interwoven into the Joseph story. In God's plan, primogeniture is clearly inapplicable. Firstborn does not mean much to God.

Mm-hmm.

In fact, it means very little, according to all the stories in Genesis. And the very language employed emphasizes that Judah's ultimate choice by God took place only after he, like Jacob, had passed through the cycle of the deceiver being deceived himself. He deceived his father with Joseph, and now he got deceived. Mm-hmm. Robert Alter has pointed to the key— well, it's, it's the Hebrew stuff. Finally, when we return, chapter 39, from Judah to the Joseph story— that's the next chapter— we move in pointed contrast from a tale of exposure through sexual incontinence to a tale of seeming defeat and ultimate triumph through sexual continence. Joseph and Potiphar's wife. Sometimes you have to act like a prostitute, and sometimes you have to be chaste. Context determines it. I think that Judaism, in its deepest form, is, is so overwhelmingly preoccupied with values that these are the hints, and they're big ones, they're important ones, that all All the things that everybody else values, God doesn't. Not blood and not primogeniture. God plays with all of these things. You think blood is so important? I'm going to give your— your king is going to come from your biggest enemy, the most pagan corrupted nation in the entire world, the Canaanites. You think you're the big ones on firstborn, secondborn? The youngest is going to be the hero in case after case after case. It is God's way of saying, "I have much higher values than the stuff that you place all this emphasis on." And I obviously resonate to that. Take a couple of questions and then let me tell you, there's the next session. Do you want to know when it is?

Yes.

Badly, or?

Badly.

OK. This term is over. You'll get the 100. You'll be getting your final exam in the mail, and you are invited to cheat. It's an open-book test. Test. You can open your Torahs. Uh, let me— here, I, I do have them, but I got to find them. Let's see. No, it's— oh, I don't have it in here. I don't believe it. Mark, do you have it? Mark, are you here? Okay. Oh, I guess you'll just find out by mail. I'm sorry, I can't believe I didn't put it in. January 24th. I is that what I told you?

That's about right.

Sounds right, but it'll be Monday nights again starting the end of January. Okay, yes. Let me just close by saying that God said that he doesn't have the same values that the people have.

Yeah. But isn't it really the other way around?

I mean, didn't God come first? So isn't it us people that are saying we don't have the same values that God has? Yes, that's right. We are supposed to have God's values, and that's the purpose of the religion. Absolutely. To use the Christian phrase, imitate Dei, to imitate God. We'll just take 2 more minutes, folks. Yes.

In regards to the law that if the husband dies, his brother takes over the wife, what if the husband didn't have any brothers? What would happen then? To the wife or to the widower?

If the husband didn't have any brothers and he died? It's a good question. I don't know. She became a widow.

Well, in the case of Ruth, it went on to relatives of her husband.

Well, maybe so. That's right. Yes. That could be. I don't know if that was the general rule, but certainly in that case it worked. Yes.

Also, Ruth— another question. Ruth went with Naomi and then Eventually married to Boaz?

Yes. Yes, that's what she was just saying, right. It could be that it continued beyond, but I don't think that that was demanded. I think this is demanded of the brothers. I think she could then go on in that family, but this was the demand. This was the law. If there weren't brothers, she was a widow, and if it worked out, I guess it worked out. But there were widows, yeah.

Also, does that—

Sorry?

It's the 24th.

It's the 24th? Thank you. January 24th.

Also, does that rule, uh, is the same for the wife? If the wife dies, then the sister has to marry the other husband?

No. No, because it's the, uh, a girl, a woman married into, she became a member of that family. The sister became a member of another family. That's the way it worked. Sisters left their homes, as it were. It was the males whose families were the key families.

Yes? Wouldn't Judah have thought that perhaps his sons were killed because the oldest married a Canaanite, and that's why he didn't want the third also to marry her?

That's an interesting theory. I mean, there's no evidence to it, but he could have thought that.

He didn't marry out?

Yes.

Well, right.

I think he probably just would have thought this was not a propitious bride, right? Yes?

I have 3 questions, but you keep mentioning the Messiah. Are you referring to Jesus or David?

No, no. According to Jewish tradition, Beit— the Messiah, the Jewish Messiah will come from Beit David, the House of David. I'm sorry?

We don't have a Messiah.

We don't have a Messiah.

Messiah.

No. Anybody here born on Tisha B'Av? Yes.

And I thought maybe you could tell about it with the third son. And she yet again bore a son and called his name Bilhah, and he was at Kedesh when she bore him. Yes, he was there when she bore him. That's kind of cute.

What does that mean? Yes, I don't know what it meant. I, I looked it up also. I'll tell you this— this line that she was at Keziv when she bore him, right? He was there. Yes, right. I don't know. I'm sure it means something because they don't throw in these things for no— all I could tell you was I know that there was some play on word because kosev means liar in, in Hebrew. You'll find it in the Psalms, kol adam kosev, that, uh, So anyway, I don't know though. One final one. Yes.

What is the yibum that they don't allow anymore?

Yes, don't allow yibum anymore. Yibum is the levirate marriage. It's the Hebrew word for it.

Yes.

You talked about Ruth again.

Well, my name is Ruth. I'm very involved in it.

Her name is Tamara, so she feels very, very involved in this. Yes.

The story of Ruth, we read here She is Moabian, and her coming to be Moab is a very interesting intercourse of father and daughter. This is the beginning of Moab, which is again very strange.

Yes, that's right. Very good point about the origins of, of Ruth and Moab, and also atypical to say the least. And also, by the way, a traditional enemy.

On tomorrow's Sunday Fireside Chat.

What to me, the idea that God is in heaven And it's sort of like an air conditioner. Air conditioners are amoral, right? They condition the room if a Hitler walks in, and they condition the room if a Mother Teresa walks in.

Correct?

Right.

So that is how people who speak of God's unconditional love, to me, are speaking about God. He just blows his love onto everybody equally. It is irrelevant how people treat other people. I don't know where that's from. By the way, if you check it, it's very interesting. Google has a fascinating graph on the use of terms in books and magazines and newspapers in the course of the last 100 years, from the beginning of the 20th century, under 20 years. And I looked up unconditional love, and the graph goes like, like this. Oh, wow. So, virtually nothing, 1900, virtually nothing, then a little climb, then a little climb, and after the 1950s, it's like a mountain.

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