Genesis 38:13-28

Contemporary English Version

¹³ Tamar found out that her father-in-law Judah was going to Timnah to shear his sheep. ¹⁴ She also realized that Shelah was now a grown man, but she had not been allowed to marry him. So she decided to dress in something other than her widow's clothes and to cover her face with a veil. After this, she sat outside the town of Enaim on the road to Timnah.

¹⁵ When Judah came along, he did not recognize her because of the veil. He thought she was a prostitute ¹⁶ and asked her to sleep with him. She asked, “What will you give me if I do?”

¹⁷ “One of my young goats,” he answered.

“What will you give me to keep until you send the goat?” she asked.

¹⁸ “What do you want?” he asked in return.

“The ring on that cord around your neck,” was her reply. “I also want the special walking stick^[a] you have with you.” He gave them to her, they slept together, and she became pregnant.

¹⁹ After returning home, Tamar took off the veil and dressed in her widow's clothes again.

²⁰ Judah asked his friend Hirah take a goat to the woman, so he could get back the ring and walking stick, but she wasn't there. ²¹ Hirah asked the people of Enaim, “Where is the prostitute who sat along the road outside your town?”

“There's never been one here,” they answered.

²² Hirah went back and told Judah, “I couldn't find the woman, and the people of Enaim said no prostitute had ever been there.”

²³ “If you couldn't find her, we'll just let her keep the things I gave her,” Judah answered. “And we'd better forget about the goat, or else we'll look like fools.”

²⁴ About three months later someone told Judah, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar has behaved like a prostitute, and now she's pregnant!”

“Drag her out of town and burn her to death!” Judah shouted.

²⁵ As Tamar was being dragged off, she sent someone to tell her father-in-law, “The man who gave me this ring, this cord, and this walking stick is the one who got me pregnant.”

²⁶ “Those are mine!” Judah admitted. “She's a better person than I am, because I broke my promise to let her marry my son Shelah.” After this, Judah never slept with her again.

^27-28 Tamar later gave birth to twins. But before either of them was born, one of them stuck a hand out of her womb. The woman who was helping tied a red thread around the baby's hand and explained, “This one came out first.”