Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
Judah begets Er and Onan, whom God slays for their unnatural vice and withdrawal in the conjugal act. Secondly, verse 16, Tamar deceitfully conceives from Judah and gives birth to Perez and Zerah.
Vulgate Text: Genesis 38:1-30
1. At that time Judah went down from his brothers and turned aside to a man of Adullam named Hiram. 2. And he saw there the daughter of a Canaanite man named Shua, and having taken her as his wife, he went in to her. 3. She conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Er. 4. And conceiving again, she called the son who was born Onan. 5. She bore also a third son, whom she named Shelah. When he was born, she ceased to bear further. 6. And Judah gave a wife to his firstborn Er, named Tamar. 7. And Er, the firstborn of Judah, was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and was slain by Him. 8. Therefore Judah said to Onan his son: Go in to your brother's wife and be joined to her, that you may raise up seed for your brother. 9. He, knowing that the children would not be his own, when he went in to his brother's wife, spilled his seed on the ground, lest children should be born in his brother's name. 10. And therefore the Lord struck him, because he did a detestable thing. 11. Wherefore Judah said to Tamar his daughter-in-law: Remain a widow in your father's house until my son Shelah grows up — for he feared that he too might die, like his brothers. She went away and lived in her father's house. 12. And after many days had passed, the daughter of Shua, Judah's wife, died. After his mourning, having received consolation, he went up to the shearers of his sheep, he and Hirah the shepherd of the flock, the Adullamite, to Timnah. 13. And it was reported to Tamar that her father-in-law was going up to Timnah to shear his sheep. 14. She put off her widow's garments, took a veil, and changing her dress, sat at the crossroads on the way that leads to Timnah, because Shelah had grown up and she had not been given to him as a wife. 15. When Judah saw her, he supposed her to be a harlot, for she had covered her face lest she be recognized. 16. And going to her, he said: Allow me to lie with you — for he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law. She answered: What will you give me to enjoy my company? 17. He said: I will send you a kid from the flocks. And she again said: I will allow what you wish, if you give me a pledge until you send what you promise. 18. Judah said: What do you want to be given as a pledge? She answered: Your ring, your bracelet, and the staff you hold in your hand. From one act of intercourse the woman conceived, 19. and rising, she went away; putting off the garment she had assumed, she put on her widow's clothing. 20. And Judah sent the kid by his shepherd, the Adullamite, to recover the pledge he had given the woman; but when he could not find her, 21. he asked the men of the place: Where is the woman who sat at the crossroads? They all answered: There has been no harlot in this place. 22. He returned to Judah and said: I did not find her; moreover the men of the place told me that no harlot had ever sat there. 23. Judah said: Let her keep what she has; certainly she cannot accuse us of lying. I sent the kid I had promised, and you did not find her. 24. And behold, after three months it was reported to Judah: Tamar your daughter-in-law has committed fornication, and her womb appears to be swelling. Judah said: Bring her out to be burned. 25. When she was being led to punishment, she sent to her father-in-law, saying: I conceived by the man whose these things are. Recognize whose ring, bracelet, and staff these are. 26. He, recognizing the gifts, said: She is more righteous than I, because I did not give her to my son Shelah. Nevertheless, he knew her no more. 27. And when the time of delivery was at hand, twins appeared in her womb; and in the very act of birth, one put forth his hand, on which the midwife tied a scarlet thread, saying: 28. This one will come out first. 29. But when he drew back his hand, the other came out, and the woman said: Why was the wall broken through because of you? And for this reason she called his name Perez. 30. Afterwards his brother came out, on whose hand was the scarlet thread; and she called him Zerah.
Verse 1: At That Time
Moses here describes the genealogy of Judah rather than of the other brothers, because Christ was to be born from Judah through Tamar. Secondly, so that the Jews would not despise the Gentiles, since the tribe of Judah, which was the most noble, descended from Canaanites through the mother Tamar. So says Gennadius.
Namely in Joseph's 16th year, shortly after his sale, Judah took a wife. Judah was therefore then 19 years old, for he was three years older than Joseph, having been born in the 88th year of his father Jacob, and Joseph in the 91st, as I said in chapter 30. From this it follows that Hezron and Hamul, the grandsons of Judah through Tamar and Perez, could not have been born in Canaan before Jacob's descent into Egypt, which occurred 23 years after Joseph's sale, that is, in Joseph's 39th year; rather, they were born after Jacob's descent, while he was living in Egypt. So says Abulensis, although St. Augustine, Question 128, holds the contrary view, on the grounds that he thinks Judah married not in the same year Joseph was sold, but two or three years before.
But the former view is more true. For even granting to St. Augustine that Er was born to Judah three years before the sale of Joseph, nevertheless Er could not have married Tamar before his sixteenth year, after which Tamar married Onan; then she waited some years for the maturity of Shelah; and finally, prostituting herself to Judah, she bore Perez. And Perez was at least sixteen years old when he begot Hezron and Hamul. All of which requires not 23 or 26, but at least 34 years, before the end of which period Jacob had long since — namely nine years earlier — descended from Canaan into Egypt.
For the Jewish assertion that Perez begot Hezron in the ninth year of his age is incredible and impossible.
Verse 2: And He Saw
2. AND HE SAW — that is, he desired.
SHUA. This is not the name of the daughter, but of her father, Judah's father-in-law, as is clear from the Hebrew.
Verse 3: She Called His Name Er
3. SHE CALLED HIS NAME ER. In the Hebrew the verb is masculine, vaiicra, that is, 'and he called' — namely the father, Judah. But for the other two sons the verb is feminine, vatticra, that is, 'and she called' — namely the mother, Judah's wife. From this it is clear that the father gave the name to his firstborn Er, while the mother named the other two born afterwards. So Rachel called her younger son Benoni, but the father changed the name, calling him Benjamin.
Verse 5: She Ceased to Bear Further
5. SHE CEASED TO BEAR FURTHER. In Hebrew it is vehaia biczib, which the Septuagint, the Chaldean, and Vatablus translate as 'he was in Chezib when she bore him,' as if Chezib were the proper name of a city in Palestine. But more correctly, as St. Jerome attests in his Questions on Genesis, our Interpreter [the Vulgate] took Kesib not as a proper noun but as a common noun, in which sense it means falsehood or cessation — as if to say: She was in a cessation of bearing, conception and birth failed her, she ceased to bear. Hence Aquila also translates, 'her childbearing stopped.' The words that follow demand this meaning, as they clearly indicate that this was her last son.
Verse 7: Er Was Also Wicked
7. ER WAS ALSO WICKED. Both Jews and Christians agree that Er as well as Onan sinned by the sin of unnatural vice and withdrawal, which is against the nature of procreation and marriage, for it destroys the offspring and conception in its seed. Hence this sin is compared by the Jews to homicide, and by Scripture, verse 10, it is called detestable. Er therefore did not sin by cruelty, as St. Augustine holds in book 22 Against Faustus, chapter 48, but by lust — namely by withdrawing in the conjugal act so as to spill his seed outside the natural vessel of his wife. He did this from intemperate lust, lest childbearing and the raising of children should detract anything from the beauty of his wife, and consequently from his sexual pleasure. Onan, Er's brother, sinned with the same sin but from a different motive, and by a graver and more criminal motive, namely from envy, lest if he consummated the act of marriage, he would beget sons not for himself but for his brother. Beautifully, 'Er' in Hebrew by metathesis becomes ra, that is, evil, perverse: for he who had been called by his father Er, that is, watchful, was by sin converted into ra, that is, perverse. 'Onan' in Hebrew means the same as iniquity and sorrow; for the latter accompanies and follows the former inseparably, as a son does his mother.
'And he was slain by Him.' — Both Er and Onan were slain by God on account of the sin of onanism, through an evil angel, as it seems, namely through Asmodeus. For he killed the lustful husbands of Sarah, Tobit 3:7. Again, God, says Abulensis, killed them by sending upon them a terrible plague, so that it was clear they had not died naturally, but had been taken away by God, as punishment for their iniquities.
Let confessors take note of this divine vengeance against the dissolute, and against spouses who withdraw from the conjugal act, and impress it upon their penitents. For if in that age so rude, uncultivated, and abandoned, God so punished Er and Onan, how will He punish in this light and law of the Gospel Christians who pollute themselves? St. Christina the Astonishing saw in spirit that the world was full and overwhelmed with this sin of pollution, and that therefore God was threatening the whole world with the gravest plagues; to avert which she tortured herself in wondrous and dreadful ways and punishments. John Benedict in the Summa of Cases, on the sixth precept of the Decalogue, from Conrad Cling transmits something remarkable about this sin (let them bear the credibility), whether received by revelation or experience: namely that those who persevere in this sin of pollution for as many years as Christ lived, that is, thirty-three, are incurable, and of nearly hopeless salvation, unless the wondrous, rare, and extraordinary grace of God comes to their aid and converts them. Let him therefore who has fallen into this sin see to it that he immediately rise from it through penance, lest he contract a habit to which nature is of itself most inclined, which thereafter he cannot put off, and so he binds and weaves for himself the inextricable cords of lust, which drag him into the abyss and bind him inseparably to the fire of hell.
Verse 9: That Sons Should Not Be Born to Him
9. 'That sons should not be born to him.' — Note, before the law of Deuteronomy 25:5, it was the custom among the patriarchs that a brother should marry the wife of his brother who had died without children, and raise up seed, that is, offspring, for him, lest his name and family perish; so namely, that the firstborn whom he would beget from his brother's wife would be reckoned under the name not of himself but of the brother: while the rest born afterwards would be reckoned as his own and called by his own name. Therefore the firstborn to be begotten by Onan was to be called the son of Er: the rest were to be called the sons of Onan. But the envious and impious Onan, lest his brother should shine, extinguished his own lamp, when he poured out his seed upon the ground and wasted it.
Note secondly, the enallage: 'sons,' that is, a son, namely the firstborn, as I have said, and if he should die, the second-born, who would succeed in the place of the firstborn.
Note thirdly, that certain legal customs were in use before Moses: for such is this adoption and arrogation of sons; such also were the observance of the Sabbath, the distinction between clean and unclean animals, circumcision, and certain other things which the patriarchs kept before Moses and the Law, by God's prompting or command.
Verse 11: Remain a Widow
11. 'Remain a widow.' — From this and from verse 8, it is gathered that at that time a woman who had married into a certain family was thenceforth as it were bound to it, so that if her husband died, she would marry another of the same family who would raise up seed for the deceased brother; but if no such man existed, or did not present himself, then she could take a husband from another family. From this custom, therefore, Tamar attached herself to the family of Judah, and did not pass from it to another.
'For he feared.' — In Hebrew it is, 'for he said' (understand: I will not give my third son Shelah to Tamar as a husband), lest he also die, just as his two elder brothers, who had been husbands of Tamar, died in their marriage with her. From this it is clear that Judah, under this pretext and by deception, wished to send away from himself and his family Tamar, who had already been incorporated into it by a twofold marriage, saying that his son Shelah was still too young, and so by weaving delays he eluded Tamar; for he feared that Tamar, either on account of her sins or her ill fortune, was the cause, or at least the occasion, of the death of her husbands: for this same thing was reproached against Sarah, the wife of Tobias, from a similar suspicion, Tobit 3:9.
Tamar perceived this deception of Judah, for she sought offspring from no other source than the stock of Judah and Abraham, blessed by God; and when she saw that Shelah, the husband promised to her, now grown up and mature, was being denied to her, by a remarkable stratagem she outwitted Judah's deception and turned it back upon Judah's own head.
Verse 14: She Took the Veil
14. 'She took the veil,' — she wrapped herself in a mantle, so as not to be recognized. The theristrum was a summer veil, says Suidas, so called from the Greek for summer and heat which it warded off. Hebrew women formerly (as Italian women do now) covered their head and whole body with a silk mantle or veil, as I explained on Ezekiel 16:40; and this partly for modesty, partly for adornment (for the theristrum here is contrasted with the garments of widowhood and mourning), and partly for warding off the heat.
'She sat at the crossroads.' — In Hebrew it is, she sat bepetach enaim, which the Septuagint translate, 'she sat at the gates of Enan.' But note: the Hebrews call a crossroads petach enaim, that is, an opening, and, as the Chaldean translates, a division of two eyes, because at a crossroads we customarily turn our eyes in two directions, namely toward two paths. Thus at crossroads prostitutes sit, to hunt and catch passersby from both directions: hence Tamar sat at the crossroads to catch Judah.
Verse 16: And He Went In to Her
16. 'And he went in to her.' — Judah here sinned by simple fornication, for he did not recognize his own daughter-in-law: and the wife of Judah was already dead, as is clear from verse 12, and therefore Judah was now a widower and free; but Tamar sinned both by fornication and by a kind of adultery (for she was betrothed to Shelah the son of Judah, as is clear from verse 11), and by incest, because she had relations with Judah her father-in-law. Therefore Francis George errs, in section IV, problem 265, where he asserts that Tamar did not sin, because she did this for a mystery. He errs more gravely in problem 267, as also does Rabbi Moses, book III of the Guide, chapter 50, when they excuse the fornication of Judah with Tamar on the grounds that before the law of Moses prostitution was not prohibited, and therefore was lawful. For it is certain that simple fornication is a sin against the law of nature, and therefore at all times, even before the law of Moses, it was forbidden and unlawful, as St. Jerome, St. Augustine (book 22 Against Faustus), St. Thomas, Lyra, Abulensis, and others generally teach.
You will say: St. Chrysostom and Theodoret here excuse Tamar and Judah. I respond: They do not excuse the act, but the intention behind the act in Tamar, because Tamar intended not lust, as Judah did, but offspring. Secondly, they somewhat excuse this act insofar as they refer it to God's disposition, that is, His permission and ordering. For God permitted this sin, and this fornication of Judah, so that from it Perez might be born, and from Perez Christ might be born: He therefore ordered it toward Christ.
Thus St. Ambrose elevates the selling of Joseph as done in a type of the selling of Christ, even though it is certain that in itself it was a grave sin: for God knows how to order and direct all sins and evils of men toward a good end: whence He always draws some good from evils.
Therefore it is frivolous what Rabbi Simeon Jochai says, that Tamar fornicated by God's prompting, so as to conceive the Messiah from Judah: just as Hosea by God's prompting and command married a harlot, and from her begot sons, who are therefore called sons of fornication. But Scripture states this explicitly about Hosea, while it states nothing of the kind about Tamar. Again, this harlot by God's command became the wife of Hosea: but it is established that Tamar did not become the wife of Judah, indeed that Judah thenceforth abstained from her, as is clear from verse 26.
Verse 18: And the Staff
18. 'And the staff,' — a traveling staff, such as Jacob used on the road, chapter 32, verse 10.
Verse 23: Let Her Keep Them
23. 'Let her keep them for herself, certainly she cannot accuse us of falsehood.' — In Hebrew it is, 'let her keep for herself (my ring, bracelet, and staff), lest perhaps we be put to shame: for if we seek her out, and demand back these things of ours from her, she, taking it badly, will publish my fornication, and so will bring great confusion and disgrace upon me; especially if she displays my ring. For men will laugh at my fickleness, wantonness, and shameful conduct, that I gave my signet ring to a prostitute, and that she, by possessing and keeping this ring, so deceived me that she can forge whatever letters she wishes in my name and seal them with my signet. Again, if I demand the ring back, she, in order to keep it, will boast that I did not pay her the agreed price. And so she will publicly accuse me of fraud and falsehood, and will confound me, though falsely: for I did send her the kid that I promised.' For all these things are understood and must be supplied in this concise speech of Judah, in the Hebrew manner. Hence our translator, attending more to Judah's meaning and sense than to his words, clearly translates: 'Certainly she cannot accuse us of falsehood: I sent the kid that I had promised.'
Verse 24: Bring Her Out, That She May Be Burned
24. 'Bring her out, that she may be burned.' — Judah says this, says St. Thomas, as if about to accuse Tamar in a public trial, and to urge that the judge condemn her to fire. Secondly and more probably, Judah here pronounces the sentence of burning against Tamar, acting as judge: whence it was immediately carried out; for it follows: 'And when she was being led to punishment.' For Judah was a paterfamilias, who according to the custom of that ancient age was the judge of his family: or rather, Judah, as the most spirited of the brothers, had been appointed by Jacob his father as a kind of magistrate over the entire family, which was numerous, namely all the Hebrews: for from the time of Abraham they had their own commonwealth distinct from the commonwealth of the Canaanites, in which the patriarch and chief was Jacob. For they were sojourners chosen by God and set apart from other peoples, and they were like a traveling commonwealth, until under Joshua they established their settlements in Canaan. Therefore Judah, as magistrate, demanded that his daughter-in-law Tamar be brought to the pyre, on the charge of certain and public adultery: for she was betrothed to Shelah the son of Judah, and had violated this betrothal by intercourse with Judah; and therefore she was an adulteress.
From this it is clear that the punishment of adultery in that ancient age was death, and indeed death by fire: just as shortly afterwards God through Moses commanded adulterers to be killed by stoning, Leviticus 20:10. Likewise for adulterous women He decreed the waters of cursing, which would cause their womb to rupture, Numbers 5:27. The Egyptians beat adulterers with rods to a thousand blows; they cut off the noses of adulteresses, for perpetual disgrace. The witness is Diodorus, book 1, chapter 6.
Among the Arabs, Parthians, and other nations, the punishment for adulterers was always capital: which most philosophers have handed down, who judged adultery a graver crime than perjury. The witness is Alexander ab Alexandro, book 4, chapter 1.
The people of Cumae exposed an adulteress in the forum for all to ridicule: then they carried her around the whole city on a donkey, so that she would be infamous for her whole life, and thence was called asellaris (donkey-rider), because she had ridden a donkey; the witness is Plutarch in the Problemata. King Tenes of Tenedos enacted a law against adulterers, that the body of each should be cut with an axe, and he set an example of this law in his own son. Plato, book 9 of the Laws, condemns the fornicator to the death penalty; he asserts that an adulterer may be killed with impunity by the husband. Solon permitted the one who caught an adulterer to kill him, as Plutarch attests in his Life of Solon.
Against adulterers Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Domitian, Severus, and Aurelian enacted severe penalties; Aurelian devised this punishment for an adulterer: the tops of two trees were bent down and tied to his feet, and then released, so that he hung torn apart on either side. The witness is Coelius, book 10, chapter 6.
Opilius Macrinus burned adulterers by fire, as Alexander ab Alexandro attests above.
The Saxons, while still pagans, forced an adulteress to hang herself, and above the pyre of her burning and cremation, they hanged the adulterer; the witness is St. Boniface as cited in William of Malmesbury, book 1, chapter 64, On the English.
Moreover, Muhammad decreed that an adulterer be publicly flogged with a hundred blows.
The Brazilians either kill adulteresses or sell them as slaves: the witness is Osorius, book 2 of the Deeds of Emmanuel.
Note: Judah here precipitates judgment out of anger: for he condemns Tamar unheard; again he condemns not only Tamar, but also her innocent offspring. For he ordered Tamar, pregnant, with a three-month-old fetus already ensouled, to be burned; and thus the fetus to be killed in both body and soul, which is against all the law of nature and of nations. So says Cajetan. For what some explain thus: 'Bring her out,' meaning, they say, not immediately to the pyre, but to prison, to be kept there until she has given birth, and then to be burned, does not agree sufficiently with the text, which says: 'Bring her out,' not to be imprisoned, but 'that she may be burned.' Whence Tamar was immediately dragged to the fire. For Moses adds at once, saying: 'And when she was being led to punishment.' For after this Tamar only gives birth in verse 27.
Verse 26: She Is More Righteous Than I
26. 'She is more righteous than I.' — He does not say, 'she is holier than I,' or 'more chaste,' but 'more righteous'; because Tamar sinned more gravely than Judah: for he sinned by fornication alone, while she sinned by fornication, adultery, and incest. Nevertheless she was more righteous, that is, more fairly and justly Tamar dealt with Judah more justly than Judah dealt with Tamar: for Judah did not keep his promises and agreements with her, denying her the promised marriage with Shelah; and so he provoked and drove her to devise this stratagem against Judah, by which the offspring that she hoped for from Shelah, since Judah unjustly prevented it, she would claim from Judah himself. For since Tamar, already bound to the family of Judah and Abraham, earnestly desired offspring from it, and her own Shelah was denied to her, she had no other way to achieve her legitimate desire than to seek offspring cleverly, though through a crime, from Judah himself: Tamar therefore was more sinful before God, but more righteous before Judah.
'Because I did not give her to Shelah.' — Understand: therefore she did this, to strike this blow against me.
'Nevertheless he knew her no more.' — Therefore Tamar remained celibate from then on, content with the offspring received from Judah, says Theodoret; for Shelah could not and would not have her as his wife, polluted as she was by this incest with his father, but married another, as is clear from Numbers 26:19; from whom he begot various sons, and among them one who caused the sun to stand still, as is said in 1 Chronicles 4:22, on which see there.
Verse 27: They Appeared
27. 'They appeared.' — The midwife, placing her hand to the womb, perceived that two were moving inside, and as it were struggling over which would come out first.
Verse 28: This One Will Come Out First
28. 'This one will come out first.' — In Hebrew, 'this one came out first,' as if to say: This one is the firstborn, because he put out his hand first; therefore I will bind and mark him with a scarlet thread or cord, so that if any doubt or uncertainty arises, it may be known from the thread that this one put out his hand first, and is the firstborn.
Verse 29: When He Drew Back His Hand
29. 'When he drew back his hand.' — St. Chrysostom teaches that all these things happened by God's direction and arrangement; namely, God willed that not Zerah but Perez be born first and be the firstborn, because from Perez He willed that Christ the Lord be born.
'And the woman said,' — the midwife, annoyed at being deceived; also fearing that this violent struggle and bursting forth might harm the mother or the twins, said:
'Why was the wall broken through because of you?' — In Hebrew it is, 'why have you broken through a breach upon yourself,' or 'a wall,' that is, why did you break the membrane that covered you, to come forth before your brother? that is, why, having broken the membranes, did you come out first and get ahead of your brother?
For twins have the same afterbirth membranes. Hear Fernelius, book 7 of Physiology, chapter 12: 'Twins who are of one sex are wrapped in the same afterbirth, separated only by a simple membrane (which they call the amnion, that is, the lamb-skin); each however has his own umbilical cord, and his own veins and arteries; but those who are of different sex received different afterbirth membranes as well, and these completely separated.' The same teaches Rodrigo a Castro, book 3 On the Nature of Women, chapter 13, and our physicians profess to have found the same thing through experience.
Note: These are the words of the midwife distressed, as I said, that Zerah's exit from the womb and his birthright had been snatched by Perez. Note: For 'wall' (maceria), the Hebrew has Perez, that is, a breach, also a wall or hedge (as the Septuagint translate) which is broken through; this wall is the membrane by which, as by a wall, the infant in the mother's womb is enclosed and wrapped, and by breaking through which he comes forth. This membrane is called the afterbirth (secundinae), because it follows the infant being born, and is expelled from the womb. Hence the infant was called Perez, that is, division or divider, or breaker, because he first broke and divided the afterbirth membranes, like a wall standing in his way, so as to be born first. 'From Perez,' says St. Jerome, 'from the fact that he divided the little membrane of the afterbirth, he received the name of division: whence also the Pharisees, who had separated themselves from the people as though they were righteous, were called Pharisees, that is, the separated.' Hence also that inscription to Belshazzar, Daniel 5:28: 'Mane, Tekel, Peres,' that is, 'your kingdom has been numbered, weighed, and divided,' and given to the Persians and Medes. So says St. Jerome.
Note secondly, Perez was regarded as the firstborn of Judah, and held the rights of the firstborn; whence the lineage of Judah is traced through Perez: and David and all the kings, and Christ Himself promised to Judah, Genesis 49:10, were descended from him through Perez.
You will say: Shelah, the legitimate son of Judah, was older than Perez, for he was born immediately after Er and Onan; therefore, when they died, the right of the firstborn devolved upon him, especially since Shelah left sons, who are named in 1 Chronicles 4:21. I respond: Er was the firstborn of Judah; and when he died, Onan, and then Shelah, should have married his widow Tamar and raised up seed for Er their brother, and reckoned the firstborn under his name, namely calling him the son of Er, as I said at verse 9. But since Shelah did not do this, but Judah did by begetting Perez from Tamar, hence Perez is reckoned the firstborn, being the son of Tamar, the wife of Er the firstborn, and consequently succeeding to the place of Er the firstborn, by the custom and law of that age. For this reason the generation and birth of Perez, before Zerah, is narrated here at length, because if Zerah had been born before Perez, he would have been the firstborn of Judah: hence in the womb he contended with Perez to be born first.
Here again we see the reason why Tamar so ardently sought offspring from Shelah, and when he was denied, from Judah; because she desired that from her the firstborn heir and prince of the most noble family of Judah be born. For although the law about raising up seed for a deceased brother only named and obligated brothers, not fathers, because the union of a daughter-in-law with a father, that is, with a father-in-law, was forbidden: nevertheless if a father denied his son to a daughter-in-law who was childless and widowed, a son owed to her by law, and she therefore claimed her right, though through a crime, from the father, that is, from the father-in-law, as Tamar did here, then the offspring first born from her was reckoned the firstborn, because by a legal fiction and interpretation, the father was deemed to have done it, and to have rendered the right due to the daughter-in-law and to his deceased firstborn through himself, which he should have done and rendered through his surviving son. For since the rule of law holds: 'What anyone does through another, he is deemed to do through himself'; much more, what he is bound to do through another, if he does it through himself, he must be deemed to have actually done it. Some add that the line of Shelah seems to have died out in his posterity, for no mention of it is made elsewhere: but the line of Perez endured until Christ. Therefore when the line of Shelah had died out, the birthright devolved by every right to the line of Perez, as the nearest. But this is uncertain, and does not satisfy. For from the very beginning, while the line of Shelah still stood, Amminadab, who was second from Perez (for Perez begot Hezron, he begot Ram, he begot Amminadab, and his son Nahshon), were princes in the tribe of Judah, as its firstborn, as is clear from Numbers 1:7.
Verse 30: Zerah
30. 'Zerah.' — 'Zerah' in Hebrew means the same as rising, because this son, since he had first extended his hand, should also naturally have been the first to rise and be born. He was called, says St. Jerome, 'Zerah,' that is, rising, either because he appeared first, or because very many righteous men were born from him, as is clear from 1 Chronicles chapter 2 and following.
Allegorically, Zerah who first put forth his hand represents the Jew, who first received the Law, but drew back his hand bound with the scarlet thread, because he turned his conscience, stained with the blood of Christ, away from God and salvation: whence Perez was preferred to him, that is, the Gentile people, who first came to the light of faith, and was born to God, and broke down the wall of enmity between God and men, through the blood of Christ. So say Rupert and Cyril. But on the contrary, St. Chrysostom, Irenaeus, and Theodoret take Zerah to represent Gentile Christians, and Perez to represent the Jews.
Moral Reflection: On the Origin of Nobility
Morally, see here what the origin of the most noble families is like, and what nobility really is. For behold, from this incest of Judah with Tamar were descended David, Solomon, and all the kings of Judah, and Christ the Lord Himself: for He descended from Judah through Perez and Tamar. For all the legitimate sons of Judah either had no posterity, like Er and Onan, or few and common descendants, like Shelah, as is clear from 1 Chronicles 4:21. In the same way, there is no king or prince who, if he traced back his ancestors two thousand years, would not find among them many bastards, many rustics or cobblers, or even baser men; indeed, very many were raised to kingship from the vilest stock. Thus Saul rose from donkeys, David from sheep to the kingship. Jephthah from a bandit became a prince, Arsaces from a bandit became king of the Parthians, Gyges from a shepherd became king of the Lydians. Darius Hystaspis was Cyrus's quiver-bearer. Valentinian the First, Emperor, had a father who made ropes. Tamerlane from an ox-herd became king of the Tartars. Agathocles, tyrant of Syracuse, had a potter for a father. Tullus Hostilius from a shepherd became king of the Romans. Aurelian and Diocletian were born of humble origin. Maximinus was a shepherd. Maximus Puppienus had a father who was a blacksmith. Justin I, Emperor, was first a swineherd; second, an ox-herd; third, a carpenter; fourth, a soldier, and thence Emperor. Muhammad, the author of Islam and the Quran, was a camel-driver. Othman, the first prince of the Turks, was born of farming parents, whose descendants are still the emperors of the Turks. The Sultans of Egypt, by the institution of the nation and kingdom, first had to be slaves before they could ascend to that honor. In short, all nobility had an ignoble beginning: and those who glory in the nobility of their ancestors glory not in their own but in another's virtue. And this therefore is vanity.
And Iphicrates rightly said to someone reproaching him for ignoble birth: 'My lineage begins with me, yours ends with you.' So says Plutarch in the Apophthegmata. Cicero gave the same reply to his rivals: 'I,' he said, 'have illuminated my ancestors by my virtue.'