Study Desk

Reuben said to them, "Do not shed his blood, but [instead] throw him [alive] into the pit that is here in the wilderness, and do not lay a hand on him [to kill him]"—[he said this so] that he could rescue him from them and return him [safely] to his father.

Now when Joseph reached his brothers, they stripped him of his tunic, the [distinctive] multicolored tunic which he was wearing;

Judah said to his brothers, "What do we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood (murder)?

"Come, let us [instead] sell him to these Ishmaelites [and Midianites] and not lay our hands on him, because he is our brother and our flesh." So his brothers listened to him and agreed.

Now Reuben [unaware of what had happened] returned to the pit, and [to his great alarm found that] Joseph was not in the pit; so he tore his clothes [in deep sorrow].

He rejoined his brothers and said, "The boy is not there; as for me, where shall I go [to hide from my father]?"

So Jacob tore his clothes [in grief], put on sackcloth and mourned many days for his son.

Then all his sons and daughters attempted to console him, but he refused to be comforted and said, "I will go down to Sheol (the place of the dead) in mourning for my son." And his father wept for him.

Now at that time, Judah left his brothers and went down to [stay with] a certain Adullamite named Hirah.

There Judah saw a daughter of Shua, a Canaanite, and he took her [as his wife] and lived with her.

Now Judah took a wife for Er his firstborn; her name was Tamar.

Onan knew that the child (heir) would not be his [but his dead brother's]; so whenever he lay with his brother's widow, he spilled his seed on the ground [to prevent conception], so that he would not give a child to his brother.

Then Judah said to Tamar, his daughter-in-law, "Remain a widow at your father's house until Shelah my [youngest] son is grown"; [but he was deceiving her] for he thought that [if Shelah should marry her] he too might die like his brothers did. So Tamar went and lived in her father's house.

But quite a while later, Judah's wife, the daughter of Shua, died; and when the time of mourning was ended, he went up to his sheepshearers at Timnah with his friend Hirah the Adullamite.

Tamar was told, "Listen, your father-in-law is going up to Timnah to shear his sheep."

He turned to her by the road, and said, "Please come, let me lie with you"; for he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law. And she said, "What will you give me, that you may lie with me?"

When Judah sent the young goat by his friend the Adullamite, to get his pledge [back] from the woman, he was unable to find her.

And when she was in labor, one [baby] put out his hand, and the midwife took his hand and tied a scarlet thread on it, saying, "This one was born first."

But he pulled back his hand, and his brother was born first. And she said, "What a breach you have made for yourself [to be the firstborn]!" So he was named Perez (breach, break forth).

Afterward his brother who had the scarlet [thread] on his hand was born and was named Zerah (brightness).