Vayeshev

Righteous Restoration

Adapted from Chabad.org

Tamar was the widow of Yehudah's eldest son, Er. Yehudah fulfilled his legal obligation to allow Tamar to marry his next oldest son Onan. When Onan, too, died childless, Yehudah promised Tamar she could eventually marry his next son Shelach. Many years passed, and Tamar realized that Yehudah had no intention of fulfilling his promise.

Tamar veiled herself, and waited by the road for Yehudah, who was then recently widowed. Yehudah mistook her for a prostitute, and lay with her. For her payment, she requested a goat, and took some of Yehudah's personal effects as a pledge. When he tried to pay the prostitute and retrieve his effects, she could not be found. Some months later Yehudah heard that Tamar was pregnant, and angrily ordered her execution. But Tamar produced Yehudah's personal belongings, saying, "The owner of these made me pregnant." Yehudah said, "She is more righteous than I am!"

Tamar married into a family that dealt with one another, often quite hurtfully, through trickery. When she realized this, she devised a trick of her own. The result of her trick, say our sages, was not harm, but a restoration of the just outcome: her right to bear children from her late husband's family. She gave birth to twins. Rabbinic midrash teaches that both grew up into righteous men from whom King David is descended. Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Lyadi adds that Tamar's story shows it is possible, even in negative circumstances, to reach for the original perfection that is our birthright as creatures of God.

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