Verses 1–5: After selling Joseph into slavery, Judah decided to leave his brothers and head to Adullam, where he lived with a man named Hirah. There, he met and married a Canaanite woman with whom he had three sons: Er, Onan, and Shelah.
When Judah married into the Canaanite culture (which had clearly rejected God and his ways), it showed how spiritually depraved he had become. He hadn't just left home physically, but spiritually as well. Judah had persuaded his brothers not to murder Joseph, but to sell him into slavery, and he was still covering it up. The conscience that was sensitive enough to rescue his brother from death likely also drove him, in guilt, to leave his father's home (full of Jacob's grief and despair) as well as his commitment to living faithfully for God.
Like Father, Like Sons
Verses 6–7: In time, Judah found Tamar as a wife for his eldest son Er. Sadly, like his father, Er rejected all the good that comes from walking in God's ways, and instead became wicked. To end his corruption, God put him to death.
Verses 8–10: Judah tries to do right by Tamar by asking his son Onan to fulfill his responsibility as her kinsman-redeemer. It was basically Onan’s duty to marry Tamar, have children with her, and perpetuate his brother’s family line (and property). Instead, Onan enjoyed all the benefits of marriage and property while denying Tamartinued her widowhood. God’s serious unhappiness with the depth of Onan's self-centeredness and injustice toward Tamar resulted in his death as well.
From Bad to Worse
Verse 11: Instead of rectifying the situation for Tamar, who lived through two arranged marriages that no one would likely want, Judah added to her harm. He deceptively asked her to live as a widow in his home until his son, Shelah, grew old enough to become her next kinsman-redeemer. But he had no intention of offering his son to her, as he superstitiously believed that Shelah might die, just like his brothers.
Tamar’s options were few at this point. Without the ability to provide for herself in a male-dominated culture that offered women little to no career opportunity, it's likely that her only means of support was her father-in-law. So, she agreed and went to live with Judah and his family.
Verses 12–14: After a long time passed, Judah's wife died. Once he moved beyond his grief, he went with Hirah to visit Timnah, where Judah’s sheep were being sheared. When someone let Tamar know, she hatched a plan to have a child despite Judah’s scheming. She would throw off her widow's clothes and exchange them for that of a prostitute. With a veiled face, she sat at the entrance to Enaim, a town en route to Timnah. She could see the writing on the wall. Shelah had grown up, but Judah never bothered to arrange a marriage for them.
Verses 15–19: As Judah approached Tamar, his ongoing distance from God became evident again. He solicited sex from her, offering a goat in payment and leaving his staff and family seal as a pledge for it. Tamar achieved her goal of becoming pregnant. She continued weaving the thread of dishonesty running through the family by once again donning her widow's clothes and covering it up.
20–23: Once at home, Judah tried to send his promised payment back to Enaim with Hirah. But Hirah can't find the prostitute, and men in the area claim that no prostitute has been there. He reports this to Judah, who tells him to forget it— she can keep his staff and seal. If they looked around too much for her, Judah's one night stand with a prostitute would become known to everyone, making them a laughingstock.
The Reckoning and Redemption
24–26: After three months passed, Tamar’s secret was out. In all Judah's self-righteousness and ill-placed pride, he demanded that Tamar be burned to death. As she's brought from his house, she sent word to him, asking if he knew whose seal and staff she had; they belonged to the man who slept with her. We finally see some good resurface in Judah, who’s convicted to the core. He admitted his guilt and recognized what he'd stolen from Tamar by refusing his son while maintaining her status as a widow. He never slept with her again.
27–30: Tamar finally experienced the joy of children and family as she gave birth to twins, Perez and Zerah. Judah, too, experienced a turning in his own heart which lasted through the years, as we’ll see in the next chapter of Genesis.
