Text: Genesis 38: 1-30
In Diana Butler Bass’s book, Grounded, she reminds us that our roots are far deeper than our memories.
We are shaped and influenced by generations that have come and gone, whether or not we remember their stories.
In one of my pastoral care classes in seminary we studied family systems and how the patterns and stories of our ancestors influence us today.
We were asked to map out our family tree and to notice how our actions are influenced by the stories we find.
In fact, I brought my own family system with me today… five generations worth of people who lived and loved and died.
I have discovered through this process the strength of matriarchs, the importance we place on loyalty and fidelity, a deep sense of togetherness, but also why I carry such heavy expectations for myself.
However, the story of my identity is not limited to this family tree.
As a person of faith, my ancestral line and spiritual heritage is found all throughout the pages of scripture.
And so during this season of Advent, as we prepare for Christ to make a home in our lives once again, I find myself remembering his own family tree.
Matthew included in his genealogy of Jesus familiar names like Abraham and Judah and David. But he also breaks with custom to specifically name four women: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba.
Each week during Advent, we will be exploring their stories to discover how they shape our lives.
How do they ground our sense of purpose and identity?
How do they help us navigate the trials and tribulations of our lives?
How might we call upon these ancestors and their faith in God to help us persevere in our own journey?
Too often, we have neglected their stories and their voices, but this Advent, we will remember each one.
After all, there would be no Christmas without them.
So let’s start where Matthew does:
Abraham was the father of Isaac.
Isaac was the father of Jacob.
Jacob was the father of Judah and his brothers.
Judah was the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar.
Her story begins in Genesis, chapter 38:
6 Judah married his oldest son Er to a woman named Tamar.
If we situate her story in its context, there are some interesting family dynamics to explore.
First of all, there is a pattern in this family of God’s promises being passed down not through the eldest son, but through the favored one.
Trickery and deception is part of this family’s DNA. Abraham lied about Sarah being his wife. Jacob stole the blessing from Esau. In the chapter right before we meet Tamar, Jacob’s sons turn on their sibling Joseph, their father’s favorite.
While some wanted to kill him, Judah, the fourth born, proposed they sell him into slavery but they lie and tell their father Joseph is dead.
As this chapter begins, Judah, like ancestors before him, moves off on his own into Canaanite territory, marries, and has three sons. His seeks to establish his own legacy.
His eldest, Er, marries Tamar, but things are not happily ever after.
7 But the Lord considered Judah’s oldest son Er immoral, and the Lord put him to death.
Tamar is left vulnerable.
She has no children.
She is no longer a virgin.
Her only hope for security comes through a custom of the day called levirate marriage.
It provided a way to care for a widow and continue the family line by requiring the brother of the deceased to step in and produce a son.
But Er’s brother, Onan, was just as bad as his brother.
He refused to plant his seed and complete the task because it would diminish his own inheritance and legacy. Yet, he continued to use Tamar as he pleased.
As Tom Fuerst notes, “Onan makes an active choice to deny Tamar justice and leave her in a position of vulnerability, where her safety, identity, and future remain questionable.” (Underdogs and Outsiders, p. 20)
So, God strikes Onan dead, too.
Under the law, Judah had two options.
He could continue to welcome her in his home, betrothed to his youngest, who was still a child.
Or he could release with an unsandaling ceremony, allowing her the freedom to marry again (Deuteronomy 25:7-10).
He does neither.
He sends her away to live as a widow in her father’s home.
Helen Pearson notes in her book Mother Roots that “as long as Judah had a son, he had no right to turn her away and give her back to her father, an act of total rejection on Judah’s part and an even greater humiliation for Tamar.” (p.56)
She was trapped by an unjust application of the law.
All she could do was wait and hope.
Wait for a child to grow up.
Hope that Judah and Shelah would fulfill their promises.
And so, she waited and hope and prayed for justice.
Years passed.
Shelah became a man, but Judah failed to act.
Rather than sit back and wait and continue to be unjustly treated, Tamar made a decision.
She cast off her widows robes, put on the veil of a virgin, and went to confront him.
Maybe the confrontation itself would remind Judah of what was right and he would take her home to his son, Shelah.
Maybe she was going to press for her release and freedom by spitting in his face and taking off his sandal, as the law allowed.
Either way, there was hope and possibility for justice to be done and for her to be restored.
But Judah doesn’t recognize her.
More than that, he thinks she is a prostitute.
And he is lonely.
He’s far from home, his wife is now dead, no one will know…
And so he propositions her.
I think Tamar’s game plan changes in this moment.
A new possibility for fulfilling the law and bringing about justice comes into being.
As Helen Pearson writes, “With sacred intent Tamar acted to preserve the name and inheritance of her dead husbands, Judah’s sons. Trusting her life to the Lord of the Hebrews, Tamar believed that justice and redemption would come to her.” (p. 60)
She makes a deal with him.
And the payment for her services is secured with a deposit: Judah’s seal, cord, and staff.
They were markers of his identity, “symbols of his authority” (Mother Roots, p. 59), and would create a kind of security for Tamar if in fact this plan works as intended.
It does. Tamar conceives.
Word gets back to Judah that his widowed daughter-in-law is pregnant, and NOW he decides to uphold the law.
The law which required the death penalty for someone having sex outside of marriage.
Conveniently ignoring his own transgressions, he was prepared to condemn her.
But then Tamar produces his seal, his cord, and his staff.
26 Judah recognized them and said, “She’s more righteous than I am, because I didn’t allow her to marry my son Shelah.” Judah never knew her intimately again.
The man who was so quick to judge and condemn is now convicted by her righteousness.
When Tamar gives birth, Judah claims the twin sons as his very own.
A future is secured… not only for Tamar, but for the entire family of Judah.
More than that…
Tamar’s actions are instrumental to God’s plans for the birth of a Savior.
On this first Sunday of Advent, we often focus on hope.
But I am reminded that there can be no hope without the promise of justice.
You see, hope is the force that allows us to keep pursuing what is right in the face of everything that is not.
It is holding on to the possibility that things can and will be different.
We hope because we are unwilling to accept things as they are.
We hope because we believe that there is a future in which dignity and righteousness will prevail.
In the story of Tamar, we discover a situation in which the law designed to provide security and protection was being thwarted.
Judah and Onan and Shelah abandoned the law for their own benefit.
And by refusing to live according to the law, the person it was designed to protect became a victim.
She was forgotten.
Overlooked.
Isolated.
Alone.
Yet she clung to hope.
She remembered God’s promises and God’s laws and worked to bring about God’s justice.
As my colleague, Rev. Elizabeth Grasham writes, “Tamar shines a light into unjust, corrupt, and banal violations of the law and how they hurt women like her and she uses every resource at her disposal to get what she deserves.”
Her legacy became a part of the ministry of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
He called out hypocrisy in the leaders of his time, who used or ignored the law in order to benefit themselves and oppress others.
I think of the story of the woman caught in adultery we find in John 8:1-11.
When she is brought to Jesus by the religious leaders, they wanted to stone her… following the same law that would have condemned Tamar.
But where was the man who had also been involved?
Surely if she had been caught in the act, he had been present as well.
Was this really about the woman, or were they simply using her to make a point and advance their own agendas?
Jesus refuses to play their games and instead confronts their own sinful and guilty hearts.
God’s justice, after all, is not just about getting what we deserve when we have done something wrong.
It is about seeking to restore relationships, repair harm, and rejoice in the dignity of all people.
As we prepare our own hearts and lives for the birth of Christ this year, the story of Tamar invites us to seek justice and to persevere in hope.
Perhaps we have been like Judah: quick to act in our own self-interest without examining how our actions have harmed others.
Advent is a time for us to confess and repent and make things right.
Perhaps we have been like Tamar: forgotten or trapped by situations out of our control.
Advent is a time for us to cling with hope to the promise that God does not forget the downtrodden, but brings about justice for the oppressed.
Perhaps we are simply bystanders in this story, and I am challenged by their own inaction and refusal to name the harm.
Advent is a time for us to use our own voices and bodies to act and bring about the future that we long for, not only for ourselves, but for all of God’s people.
Advent is a time for light to shine on all places of injustice, for truth to be revealed, and hope-filled actions that prepare the way for the child of Mary.
May it be so.
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