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Genesis · Literal Standard Version

Genesis 38 Literal Standard Version

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About LSV
  • Protestant
  • OT: Masoretic Hebrew
  • NT: Majority (Byzantine) text
  • Protestant (66 books)
  • Very literal
  • 2020
  • CC BY-SA 4.0

Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings

1 And it comes to pass, at that time, that Judah goes down from his brothers, and turns aside to a man, an Adullamite, whose name [is] Hirah; 2 and Judah sees there the daughter of a man, a Canaanite, whose name [is] Shuah, and takes her, and goes in to her. 3 And she conceives, and bears a son, and he calls his name Er; 4 and she conceives again, and bears a son, and calls his name Onan; 5 and she adds again, and bears a son, and calls his name Shelah; and he was in Chezib in her bearing him. 6 And Judah takes a wife for Er, his firstborn, and her name [is] Tamar; 7 and Er, Judah’s firstborn, is evil in the eyes of YHWH, and YHWH puts him to death. 8 And Judah says to Onan, “Go in to the wife of your brother, and marry her, and raise up seed to your brother”; 9 and Onan knows that the seed is not [reckoned] his; and it has come to pass, if he has gone in to his brother’s wife, that he has destroyed [it] to the earth, so as not to give seed to his brother; 10 and that which he has done is evil in the eyes of YHWH, and He puts him also to death. 11 And Judah says to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Abide [as] a widow at your father’s house, until my son Shelah grows up”; for he said, “Lest he die—even he—like his brothers”; and Tamar goes and dwells at her father’s house. 12 And the days are multiplied, and the daughter of Shuah, Judah’s wife, dies; and Judah is comforted, and goes up to his sheep-shearers, he and Hirah his friend the Adullamite, to Timnath. 13 And it is declared to Tamar, saying, “Behold, your husband’s father is going up to Timnath to shear his flock”; 14 and she turns aside the garments of her widowhood from off her, and covers herself with a veil, and wraps herself up, and sits in the opening of Enayim, which [is] by the way to Timnath, for she has seen that Shelah has grown up, and she has not been given to him for a wife. 15 And Judah sees her, and reckons her for a harlot, for she has covered her face, 16 and he turns aside to her by the way and says, “Please come, let me come in to you,” for he has not known that she [is] his daughter-in-law; and she says, “What do you give to me, that you may come in to me?” 17 And he says, “I send a kid of the goats from the flock.” And she says, “Do you give a pledge until you send [it]?” 18 And he says, “What [is] the pledge that I give to you?” And she says, “Your seal, and your ribbon, and your staff which [is] in your hand”; and he gives to her, and goes in to her, and she conceives to him; 19 and she rises, and goes, and turns aside her veil from off her, and puts on the garments of her widowhood. 20 And Judah sends the kid of the goats by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, to receive the pledge from the hand of the woman, and he has not found her. 21 And he asks the men of her place, saying, “Where [is] the separated one—she in Enayim, by the way?” And they say, “There has not been in this [place] a separated one.” 22 And he turns back to Judah and says, “I have not found her; and the men of the place also have said, There has not been in this [place] a separated one,” 23 and Judah says, “Let her take to herself, lest we become despised; behold, I sent this kid, and you have not found her.” 24 And it comes to pass about three months [after], that it is declared to Judah, saying, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar has committed fornication; and also, behold, she has conceived by fornication”: and Judah says, “Bring her out—and she is burned.” 25 She is brought out, and she has sent to her husband’s father, saying, “To a man whose these [are], I [am] pregnant”; and she says, “Please discern whose these [are]—the seal, and the ribbons, and the staff.” 26 And Judah discerns and says, “She has been more righteous than I, because that I did not give her to my son Shelah”; and he has not added to know her again. 27 And it comes to pass in the time of her bearing, that behold, twins [are] in her womb; 28 and it comes to pass in her bearing, that [one] gives out a hand, and the midwife takes and binds on his hand a scarlet thread, saying, “This has come out first.” 29 And it comes to pass as he draws back his hand, that behold, his brother has come out, and she says, “What! You have broken forth—the breach [is] on you”; and he calls his name Perez; 30 and afterward his brother has come out, on whose hand [is] the scarlet thread, and he calls his name Zerah.

People & places in this chapter

From this site's family tree and Bible maps, only where those guides cite this chapter.

People

  • Er

    Judah's firstborn

    Judah's firstborn, who was wicked in the LORD's sight and died young; first husband of Tamar.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38:3-7

  • Hirah

    Judah's Adullamite friend

    Judah's friend, an Adullamite near whom Judah settled, who went with Judah to the sheepshearing at Timnah and later took the young goat to Enaim but could not find the woman.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38:1; Genesis 38:12; Genesis 38:20

  • Judah

    The royal tribe

    The lion of the tribes, from whom kings and the Messiah would come.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 29:35; 38; 49:8–12

  • Onan

    Judah's second son

    Judah's second son, who died for refusing to raise up offspring for his late brother.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38:4-10

  • Perez

    Son of Judah

    Born of Judah and Tamar, he became the head of the leading clan of Judah.

    Cited in the guide: Gen. 38; Ruth 4:18; 1 Chron. 2:4-5; Matt. 1:3

  • Shelah

    Judah's third son

    Judah's third son, withheld from Tamar until she took matters into her own hands.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38:5, 11; Numbers 26:20

  • Tamar

    Mother of Perez

    Judah's daughter-in-law who, denied justice, became the mother of Perez.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38; Matthew 1:3

  • Zerah

    Twin of Perez

    The twin brother of Perez, born to Judah and Tamar, whose hand first reached out at birth.

    Cited in the guide: Genesis 38:29-30; 1 Chronicles 2:4

Cross references (25)

Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.

  1. 1 2 Kings 4:8; 1 Samuel 22:1; Proverbs 13:20; Micah 1:15; Genesis 19:2–3
  2. 2 1 Chronicles 2:3; Genesis 24:3; 2 Corinthians 6:14; Judges 16:1; Genesis 3:6
  3. 3 Numbers 26:19; Genesis 46:12
  4. 4 Genesis 46:12; Numbers 26:19
  5. 5 Numbers 26:20; Genesis 46:12; Genesis 38:26; Genesis 38:11; 1 Chronicles 4:21
  6. 6 Genesis 21:21; Genesis 24:3; Matthew 1:3
  7. 7 1 Chronicles 2:3; Genesis 46:12; Numbers 26:19; Genesis 13:13; Genesis 19:13
  8. 8 Deuteronomy 25:5–10; Matthew 22:23–27; Ruth 4:5–11; Ruth 1:11; Leviticus 18:16
  9. 9 James 4:5; Deuteronomy 25:6; James 3:16; Titus 3:3; Job 5:2
  10. 10 Numbers 11:1; Genesis 46:12; Proverbs 14:32; 1 Chronicles 21:7; Numbers 26:19
  11. 11 Leviticus 22:13; Ruth 1:11–13
  12. 12 Joshua 15:10; 2 Samuel 13:39; Judges 14:1; Genesis 24:67; Genesis 31:19
  13. 14 Genesis 38:26; Genesis 38:11–13; Proverbs 7:12; Jeremiah 3:2; Genesis 24:65
  14. 16 1 Timothy 6:10; Matthew 26:15; 2 Samuel 13:11; Ezekiel 16:33; Deuteronomy 23:18
  15. 17 Genesis 38:20; Ezekiel 16:33; Luke 16:8; Proverbs 20:16; Genesis 38:24–25
  16. 18 Genesis 38:25–26; Luke 15:22; Jeremiah 22:24; Hosea 4:11
  17. 19 Genesis 38:14; 2 Samuel 14:2; 2 Samuel 14:5
  18. 20 Genesis 20:9; 2 Samuel 13:3; Luke 23:12; Leviticus 19:17; Judges 14:20
  19. 23 Ephesians 5:12; 2 Samuel 12:9; Proverbs 6:33; Romans 6:21; 2 Corinthians 4:2
  20. 24 Leviticus 21:9; Judges 19:2; Ezekiel 23:44; Hosea 2:5; Ezekiel 23:19
  21. 25 Genesis 37:32; Genesis 38:18; Psalm 50:21; Jeremiah 2:26; Revelation 20:12
  22. 26 1 Samuel 24:17; 1 Peter 4:2–3; John 8:9; Titus 2:11–12; 2 Samuel 24:17
  23. 27 Genesis 25:24
  24. 29 Genesis 46:12; Matthew 1:3; 1 Chronicles 2:4; Numbers 26:20; Nehemiah 11:6
  25. 30 1 Chronicles 9:6; 1 Chronicles 2:4; Matthew 1:3

Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences

What the Fathers said

Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).

How these were chosen

“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).

  1. Quotes verse 38:28 Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies (Book IV, Chapters XXV–XXVI)

    This fact is indeed set forth by many other [occurrences], but typically by [the history of] Thamar, Judah's daughter-in-law. For when she had conceived twins, one of them put forth his hand first; and as the midwife supposed that he was the first-born, she bound a scarlet token on his hand.

    Read in context · Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1 (1885)