# 351 The Levirate Law

The Book of Genesis

Day 351

Ge 38:8 And Judah said to Onan, "Go in to your brother's wife and marry her, and raise up an heir to your brother."  9 But Onan knew that the heir would not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in to his brother's wife, that he emitted on the ground, lest he should give an heir to his brother.  10 And the thing which he did displeased the LORD; therefore He killed him also.

What is going on here? It’s like we are given much more information about the sex life of Onan and Tamar than we really care to know! Well let’s start with the insistence of Judah that Onan marry Tamar, (the widow of his elder brother Er)  What is that all about?

It’s about a practice that would later become codified in Law in the Book of Deuteronomy.  It is called the Law of the Levirate. We read about it in De 25:5-10, "If brothers dwell together, and one of them dies and has no son, the widow of the dead man shall not be married to a stranger outside the family; her husband's brother shall go in to her, take her as his wife, and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her.  6 "And it shall be that the firstborn son which she bears will succeed to the name of his dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out of Israel.  7 "But if the man does not want to take his brother's wife, then let his brother's wife go up to the gate to the elders, and say, 'My husband's brother refuses to raise up a name to his brother in Israel; he will not perform the duty of my husband's brother.'  8 "Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him. But if he stands firm and says, 'I do not want to take her,'  9 "then his brother's wife shall come to him in the presence of the elders, remove his sandal from his foot, spit in his face, and answer and say, 'So shall it be done to the man who will not build up his brother's house.' 10 "And his name shall be called in Israel, 'The house of him who had his sandal removed.'

Definitely foreign to our culture but not to the Israelites. The purpose of the Law was to ensure a widow of the possibility of raising up a male heir. This “heir” would then inherit all things that a male first born was entitled to. The problem here is Onan resisted this “duty” because he wanted all the inheritance for himself, rather than provide it for Tamar.

This may seem silly to us, but it’s not so silly when you remember God’s promise to Eve and Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob! It was from their seed that the Messiah would come, and in hindsight, we see that the womb of Tamar had a role to play in the line of Christ.

In the enforcement of the Levirate law, there was an unusual courtroom scenario played out in the gate of the city involving the removal of a sandal and “spitting” in the offender’s face. This was the God-ordained way to properly deal with the brother who would not carry out his conjugal duties. (By the way, it didn’t have to turn  ugly, and you can  read about this method again in the Book of Ruth, when Boaz was given the right to marry Ruth)

The removal of the offender’s sandal was symbolic and it was as if to say, “You have no right to walk on the land of my inheritance.” It signified a removal of any material rights and claims of the offending brother.

Obviously Tamar did not carry the Levirate Law that far, because God took care of the situation on His own.  Any previous offenders of this Law, just lost some property and got some spit on their face, Onan  wasn’t so fortunate. God killed him because the thing that he had done “displeased God.”

Much has been made of the sin of Onan by biblical commentators, and we will continue to look at his wrongdoing next time.

In the meantime, just remember that in spite of man’s efforts to thwart God’s plan, God stepped in and brought it to fruition anyway. It is far better to work WITH God than against Him, and we can learn, even today, about working with Him as we read and seek to obey His Word.