Was Tamar Judah's Wife?

 

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

Tamar is usually presented as a Canaanite woman with no Hebrew ancestry. This is clearly not the case because the Hebrew took only Hebrew marriage partners (caste endogamy). It is more likely that Tamar was a daughter of a Hebrew priest who maintained a water shrine along the road between Adullam and Timnah and that she was a shrine-dedicated virgin before her marriage. She was qedeshah, that is a holy woman. Judah’s friend Hirah went to find Tamar, asking for the qedeshah (Gen. 38:21).

Concerning such women, Bible scholar Edward Lipinski noted, “Contrary to the claims of some 20th-century scholarship, the Hebrew Bible never refers directly to cult prostitutes. Many modern Bible translations are simply misleading in this respect. Much of the confusion results from a misunderstanding of a few Biblical texts that mention qedeshot, the plural of qedeshah, which is related to qodesh, “holy place.”

In his “Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew” Hayim Tawil notes that qedeshah or kedeshah is derived from the root K-D-Sh which can mean “separation” or “elevation” of a holy woman. It can refer to a woman dedicated to the service of a temple or a water shrine.

If we remove the narrative about Judah’s sons Er and Onan we are left with a coherent picture of Judah as a Hebrew clan chief with two wives. One wife was the daughter of a Hebrew man named Shua and the other, mentioned in rabbinic writings, was either the daughter of Asuel (or Bat-Asuel) or, if one credits the Book of Jubilees (34:20), a woman named Aliyah. High-ranking Hebrew chiefs typically had two wives living in separate settlements.

It is strange that the Bible provides so little information about someone as prominent as Judah. Afterall, the words Jew and Judea are derived from his name. Judah was a Hebrew chief who, by the time of the events described in Genesis 38, would have been an older man with two wives. Tamar was probably one of them. The detail about God killing Judah’s sons seems to come from the Deuteronomistic Historian, a source from about 1000 years after the time of Judah and Tamar. The narrative reflects the legal and theological frameworks of the Deuteronomistic history, the taboo of onanism, and the practice of levirate marriage as codified in Deuteronomy 25:5–10. The theology of the Deuteronomist entails a God who directly punishes and sometimes ends the lives of those who violate the Law.

When we extract this source from the picture Judah emerges as the father of three living sons: Shelah, Perez, and Zerah by two different wives. These Hebrew sons form a typical three-clan confederation. It was common for the descendants of two of the sons of a confederation to intermarry. The intermarriage between the descendants of Zerah and Perez explains why they are linked in the Book of Ruth and counted among the ancestors of King David and Jesus.

Typically, the Bible traces descent from two half-brothers and their wives. Consider these sibling sets in which a common father is acknowledged, but there are at least two different mothers.

Jubal, Jabal, Tubal-Cain – Lamech’s sons by two wives (Gen. 4).

Ham, Shem, Japheth – Noah’s sons by different women.

Nahor, Abraham, Haran – Terah’s sons by two wives.

Isaac, Joktan, Ishmael - Abraham’s sons by two wives and a concubine.

Moses, Aaron, Korah – Amram’s sons by two wives.

Numbers 26:20 explicitly identifies the three-clan confederation of Judah. “The descendants of Judah by their clans were: through Shelah, the Shelanite clan; through Perez, the Perezite clan; through Zerah, the Zerahite clan.”

Typically, only two of the three sons of a Hebrew confederation are ascendant, meaning that their roles as firstborn sons are prescribed. The firstborn of the first wife is his father’s heir and when the father dies, he rules over the father’s territory. The firstborn of the second wife serves the household of his maternal grandfather or becomes an official in that territory. The third is a son of a concubine and he is sent away with sufficient resources to become established in an area away from the two other sons. This custom drove the dispersion of the early Hebrew into far reaches on the ancient world.

Evidence that Judah married Tamar

Around the time that Joseph was serving his uncle Potiphar in Egypt, Judah left Hebron and went to Timnah for a sheep shearing with his Hebrew kinsmen Hirah of Abdullum. On the way, Judah stopped at Enaim where he married Tamar. The priest overseer of the Enaim water shrine was Tamar’s father.

Enaim means “Two Wells” and it was common for marriages to be formalized at such places. Abraham married Keturah who lived at the Well of Sheba (Beersheba). Moses married Zipporah who he met at the well of her father Jethro. Caesarius Archbishop of Arles explained that Isaac, Jacob, and Moses are types of Jesus Christ, "for this reason they found their wives at wells, because Christ was to find His church at the waters of baptism."

Note that when Judah arrived with a gift for his bride, she was veiled. This was a common practice. In Genesis 24:65 we read that Rebekah covered her face with a veil when she learned that the man walking toward them in the field was her future husband, Isaac.

Note also that Judah gave Tamar a kid from his flock and promised her a goat. This sounds very much like a bride price.

Related reading: The Hebrew were a Caste; The Hebrew Selection of Marriage Partners; Hebrew Rulers with Two Wives; Keturah was Abraham's Second Wife; Cousin Brides Among the Hebrew; The Hebrew Hierarchy of Sons; Fertility and Water Shrines

Mother's House and Father's House

East African village seen through the cattle kraal.

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

Some scholars have wondered why Rebecca ran to her mother's house to announce the marriage proposal from Isaac (Gen. 24:28). One explanation is that the mother's house was responsible for the necessary arrangements to set up a new household for the bride-to-be. The father's house was responsible for the legalities involving dowry, inheritance, and property. Running to her mother's house expressed Rebecca's willingness and eagerness to be married.

In the Bible the "mother's house" and the "father's house" represent distinct right and responsibilities. The mother's house is where women gather to plan weddings and ceremonies for the girls. coming of age. The father's house is where the elders of the village gather to deliberate on matters such as hunting, defense of territory, marriage alliances and dowries. However, the women take care of the practical arrangements for weddings and the necessities to set up a new household.

A woman who was forbidden to marry or remarry was told to return to her father's house. This is what Judah told Tamar when he refused to provide her with another son. On the other hand, Naomi hoped that her two daughters-in-law would remarry, and she sent them back to their mothers (Ruth 1).

The Bible is pointing us to a village arrangement in which the women gathered in the house of the chief's principal wife and the men gathered in the house of the chief. The custom is found even today among Africans and in some Eurasian villages.

Among African peoples, rites of passage included circumcision, scarification, naak, and the building of small huts. Before girls come of marriage age (13-15 years) they build their own huts next to the huts of their mothers. They mimic female adulthood until they marry, at which point they take down their small hut and move into a larger hut built by their husband and located with his kinsmen (patrilocal residence).

Similarly, young men celebrate their approaching manhood by building a small hut next to their father's hut until they take a wife, at which time they build a larger hut in the kraal.

South African women preparing the bride

Credit: Monica Dart

This Xhosa bride wears a sheet to cover her secrets.

A blanket or sheet covering is an ancient practice associated with marriage.

Ruth sought marriage to Boaz by covering herself with his blanket.

This practice of building up a house is more than building a place to live. It is about building a lineage. The book of Ruth alludes to this. Naomi tells her widowed daughters-in-law to return to their "mother's house" so that they can prepare to remarry and have families.

Contrast this to the story of Judah and Tamar (Gen. 38). Judah's sons who were married to Tamar die one after the other. He refuses to fulfill the law of levirate marriage, fearing that he might lose another son. Judah tells Tamar to return to her "father's house" which is to say, "You will remain a widow and childless."

Related reading: Marriage Partner Selection Among the Hebrew; Tamar and the Theme of Two Sons; African Weddings; Igbo Village Life; Denying Marriage to Royal Woman

Was Polygyny Among Abraham's People Immoral?

Alice C. Linsley

Before reading this post, I recommend reading Abraham's Complaint.



Question number 7 of the Nine Meaty Questions is: "If marriage is between one man and one woman, as Gen. 2 seems to be saying....what is all this about men having two wives one North and one South? Is this disobedience or part of God's design, and if so, why doesn't Christianity accept polygamy now?"

Answer: Marriage, as we know it in the West, is not instituted in Genesis 2. Or, to express this a different way, Genesis 2 is about the order of creation, not about the institution of marriage.

It is also important to note that the practice of having 2 wives pertained only to ruler-priests. The context is more African than Asian. In traditional African societies, rulers are expected to have more than one wife. Were Henry VIII to have followed this practice, he would have had his male heir and spared the lives of his wives (we can hope). So we see the practicality of the custom.

The actual term for the kinship pattern of these ruler-priests is "polygyny," that is, multiple wives. Noble women did not take multiple husbands, at least not legally. In fact, were a priest's daughter found in a sexual relationship outside of marriage, the law required that she be burned alive. This is why Judah ordered that Tamar should be burned. Tamar was the daughter of a priest.

The placement of wives on a north-south axis is both practical and religious. It is practical because the wives' settlements marked the northern and southern boundaries of the ruler's territory. These households were guarded by trained soldiers who intercepted all who crossed through the ruler's territory. Between the 2 settlements were the grazing lands for the ruler's herds. The herds drank at major water systems that were about halfway between the wives.

This arrangement is found in the cases of Cain, Seth, and Na'hor the Elder, and characterized the the Horites of living between Mt. Hor (northeast of Kadesh-barnea) and Mt. Harun (in Jordan).

We recognize the religious significance of the placement of the wives when we remember that the Sun was a symbol of the Creator for Abraham's Horite people. The Sun appears to make a circuit from east to west. They perceived of this as the Creator making a daily inspection of His territory. So the Creator's territory stretched from east to west. Out of reverance for the Creator, the ruler-priests placed their wives on a north-south axis. Only the braggert Lamech, who set himself up as God, placed his wives on an east-west axis. (Adah means dawn and Zillah means dusk.)

I believe that this was part of God's plan as it speaks to us about the Kingdom of God. Ruler-priests had two wives who lived in separate households yet belonged to and shared jointly in the same Kingdom. Likewise, the Kingdom of God consists of the Bride of Christ (New Covenant) and the Beloved of God (Old Covenant). Together these bear witness to the Truth: Jesus Christ, the only Begotten Son of the Father, came into the world to save sinners (such as me).

Christianity stresses the humility, simplicity and servanthood of Christ. Multiple wives are a status symbol, as only rulers had more than wife. Christian men don't pattern themselves after such worldly pursuits. They are content to be the husband of one wife or to be celibate.

From the beginning of Christianity none who came to faith in Christ Jesus was required to follow any custom other than to "abstain from food offered to idols, from blood and from sexual immorality" (Acts 15:29). As priests during the time of Jesus had multiple wives, that clearly was not regarded as immoral.


Related reading: The Marriage and Ascendancy Pattern of Abraham's People; Sent-Away Sons

The Biblical Motif of Two Sons

Alice C. Linsley

The best way to appreciate the Biblical narrative is to honor the story as a meaningful whole while investigating the smaller anthropologically significant details.

Some commentaries on Genesis cut the whole into pieces to get at what is inside. This seems an impatient mode of operating. I'm reminded of a problem I occasionally encounter when trying to open the large dog food bags with white stitching across the top. To open the bag properly one must find the right end of the string, jiggle it a bit, and pull in a straight line. If you try to rip from the wrong end or yank at an odd angle, the bag won't open. If at this point you become frustrated and take scissors to the bag you will get at what's inside, but you will have destroyed the integrity of the whole.

Cutting the whole into pieces leads to skepticism about the text because the pieces no longer possess a natural arrangement. We are unable then to see the relationship of the pieces. This is like trying to make sense of a person's dream while insisting that parts of the dream belong to someone else. Biblical narratives have a complexity similar to dreams. They have their own logic involving symbol and structure. Many of the same cognitive approaches used in interpreting dreams can be used to interpret biblical narratives. Attention must be given to symbolic details in the dream, but the greater narrative always must be kept in sight and kept intact.

The biblical theme of 2 sons requires just this approach of preserving the integrity of the whole while exploring the genealogical details.

In the New Testament the motif of two sons appears in the case of James and John, and Andrew and Peter, and at least 2 parables involving 2 sons. The Old Testament motif of 2 sons often involves murder, jealousy and conflict between brothers and/or the first born sons of the Horite ruler-priest's two wives. The following list provides something of the scope of this motif. Two sons comprise an essential element in the following narratives:

Cain and Abel

Cain and Seth

Ham and Shem

Eber's sons, Peleg and Joktan

Terah's sons, Abraham and Nahor

Joseph’s son, Manassah and Ephraim

Judah’s sons, Perez and Zerah

Moses’s sons, Eleazar and Gershom

Naomi’s 2 sons who died in Moab

Eli’s sons, Hophni and Phinehas

Moab and Ammon

Ishmael and Isaac (two of Abraham's 9 sons)

Jacob and Esau (two of Isaac's sons, but likely not his only sons)

Simeon and Levi

Judah and Joseph

Reuben and Judah

Moses and Aaron

This list, while not comprehensive, is adequate to illustrate the scope and recurrence of the theme of 2 sons. Clearly, the biblical narrative derives structure from this theme. However, it would be erroneous to conclude that these were the only sons born at a time before birth control and when fecundity was highly valued. We must remember that Nahor had 8 sons (Gen. 22:20-24) and Abraham had 8, if we add them all together. We remember also that Jesse had 8 sons, the youngest being David.

Let us return to the analogy of the dog food bag. Analysis and proper interpretation require finding the right end of the string: key words, recurring images, or genealogical patterns that allow us to get inside to what Carl Jung called the “ah hah moment.” In other words, understanding what the Bible means requires investigation. Such is the case in examination of the 2-sons motif. Let us now turn to a specific case.

Speiser could not see the natural relationship of the Judah-Tamar-Joseph narrative because he wasn’t looking at the bigger picture. Instead he was focusing on documentary threads, following the Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis. Thus he wrote concerning Genesis 38, “The narrative is a completely independent unit. It has no connection with the drama of Joseph which it interrupts…” (E.A. Speiser, The Anchor Bible Commentary on Genesis, p. 299).

By looking at the whole, we see that the placement of the story of Judah and Tamar is not an interruption of the Joseph narrative, but rather a key to understanding that story. Both narratives are about the loss of 2 sons and the gain of 2 sons. Jacob lost Joseph and then Benjamin to Egypt, but gained Perez and Zerah in Canaan. Both stories are about the loss of sons and God’s action to restore. The loss of Joseph and Benjamin in Egypt was temporary and foreshadows the Egyptian captivity of Israel. The gain of Perez and Zerah in Canaan foreshadows the dynasty of David and the coming of Messiah. Chapter 38 constitutes a bridge between two settings of divine action: Egypt and Canaan. It reminds us to seek God's working out of salvation in more than one place.

Joseph would have been about 26 at the time that Judah’s first born son married Tamar. This son died and the next oldest was enlisted to marry Tamar according to the law of levirate marriage. The second son also died and Judah was reluctant to have another son involved with Tamar so he sent her home to her “father’s house” in Edom. Judah, like his father Jacob, lost two sons. The key here is the term “father’s house” – the opposite of Naomi’s words to her daughters-in-law. Naomi told them to return to their “mother’s house” which was a way of urging them to remarry. Judah, on the other hand, by sending Tamar to her “father’s house” condemned her to widowhood and broke the law. He knew what he was doing because later he admits that Tamar is more righteous then he.

So after losing 2 sons, Judah gained 2 sons and his rule was amplified through Perez from whom would come Israel's greatest king and the promised Messiah.

The theme of loss, restoration and amplification is lifted up when Joseph presents his sons to his father. Then Israel said to Joseph, "I did not think I should ever see you again, and now God has let me see your children as well." (Gen. 48:11)

The theme of 2 sons also involves reversals. Consider the repetition of the blessing of the younger son over the older.

When Israel saw Joseph’s two sons, he asked ‘Who are these?’ ‘They are my sons whom God has given me here,’ Joseph told his father. ‘Then bring them to me,’ he said, ‘so that I may bless them.’ (Gen. 48: 8). Joseph presents his older son to Jacob’s right hand and is surprised when old Jacob lays his right hand on the younger and his left hand on the older. Just as Jacob received the first born's blessing, now he bestows it upon his youngest. This theme is found in extra biblical sources also.

Consider the Falasha account of the death of Moses. Moses wife “went weeping and said to the children: ‘Go to your father before he dies, for you shall see him no more.’ She awakened them from their sleep and brought them, holding their hands in her right and left hands and said to them: ‘Weep over your father, for you and he must part… Look well at your father until you be satisfied, for soon you will be parted.’ When they saw their father they fell on their faces and wept with a great weeping. Moses wept with them… [and] he put his younger son Eleazar on his right knee and his older son Gershom on his left and he blessed them.” (Falasha Anthology. Yale University Press. p. 110).

Such reversals in the Scriptures must be taken seriously as clues to meaning. Reversals indicate that God is acting both here and now and also in another place and time. The Judah-Tamar story is an example. It points out that God is working in two places: Egypt and Canaan. The Judah drama in Canaan parallels the Joseph drama in Egypt. We see this alluded to in the mention of the women’s association with sacred shrines. Joseph’s wife, Anath, was the daughter of the priest of the shrine at On (Heliopolis) and Tamar dressed herself as a shrine prostitute.

Tamar is the most famous female ancestor of David. She is mentioned in Genesis and in Ruth. Her name means date nut palm, a symbol of fertility, prosperity and strength. Honoring this ancestor, Solomon made her hometown in Edom one of his 7 fortified cities. Tamar is to Edom what Anath is to Egypt. Both women had 2 sons and in both cases, the younger son was elevated above the older.

What lesson are we to take away from this exploration of the theme of two sons? God is not restricted by customs of primogeniture. He blesses whom He chooses and his blessings extend in all directions. So it is with the youngest of Terah's sons, Abraham, that God forms an everlasting covenant through which all the peoples of the earth will be blessed, and it is to the youngest of Jesse's sons that the throne of Israel is given that the scepter might pass to the eternal Messiah.

Related reading:  Genesis in Anthropological Perspective; Sent-Away Sons; Archaic Rulers, Ascendancy, and the Foreshadowing of Christ; Pepinakht-Heqaib: Upholding the Rights of Two Sons; Hidden Sons in the Bible

The Scarlet Cord Woven Through the Bible

Alice C. Linsley


The Apostle Paul reminds the Hebrew Christians that they may enter with boldness into the Most Holy Place "by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is His body..." (Hebrew 10:19, 20)  In this we follow Christ, our great High Priest, who "did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but He entered the Most Holy Place once for all by His own blood..." (Hebrew 9:12)

The Blood of Jesus Christ is the source and substance of the Christian's life. Scripture teaches that life is in the blood. For Christians this has radical and profound implications. When one is born, there is water and blood. When our Lord died, there was water and blood. In Baptism and Communion there is water and blood. We humans are attracted to the water, but wary of the blood.

For years I didn't grasp the distinct yet interwoven nature of Baptism and Communion. I think this is because I thought of Baptism apart from His blood, even though the Apostle Paul makes it clear that we are baptized into Christ's Sacrifice and raised to new life with Him. Does this mean that we are free of passions that drive a wedge into our fellowship with Him? Certainly not. That is why we also need the Priesthood, confession and spiritual disciplines such as prayer, fasting, alms-giving and Scripture study.

I have never spoken of the vision I had inside the little church of St. Paul in West Whiteland, Pennsylvania.  I saw an angel pouring His blood from a golden pitcher into the baptismal font. Over the years I have pondered this and delved more into the mystery of the blood of Jesus by which we sinners are forgiven and cleansed. I was an Episcopal priest at the time and I associated the blood of Christ with Holy Communion, but somehow I had neglected the significance of His blood in reference to Baptism. I knew that the Scriptures hold forth this truth: "Life in in the blood."  Hebrews explains that no cleansing comes by the blood of beasts, but only by the blood of Christ, the true Priest.

That set me thinking.  If Christ is the Mediator of a new Covenant in His blood and I enter that covenant by baptism, then my life depends entirely on His once and for all sacrifice. Somehow in that vision beyond the mundane, I sensed a timeless dimension to His Sacrifice and I began to ponder the pleromic nature of His blood. The Apostle Paul explains that Jesus Christ is the fullness (pleroma in Greek) of all things in heaven and on earth, both invisible and visible. The term “pleroma” was used among the Gnostics to describe the metaphysical unity of all things, but Paul uses the term to speak about how all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ in bodily form (Col. 2:9).


Pondering the Pleromic Blood

There is a significant difference between the Gnostic application of “pleroma” and Paul’s application. For the Gnostics, the pleroma is vague and undifferentiated, but for Paul the pleroma is the manifestation of the benefits of the “blood of Jesus.” Paul never allows the churches he planted to wander far from the blood of Jesus that brings forgiveness, cleansing and eternal life.

Paul articulated his understanding of the pleroma as early as his second missionary journey when he preached to the Athenians that, “in Him [Jesus Christ] we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28) His thoughts developed further as he continued to reflect on the Hebrew Scriptures, and as he prayed, fasted, and received greater illumination. We find the fullest expression of the pleroma in his latter writings, especially in Romans and in Ephesians.

In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times, He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth. (Ephesians 1:7-10)

While not yet fully developed in the Church, the Trinity underlies Paul’s understanding of the pleroma. He speaks of the distinct Persons of the Trinity and of the oneness of the Body of Christ in the language of Shema: “There is one Body, one Spirit, ...one hope ...one Lord, one Faith, one baptism, and one God and father of all, over all, through all and within all” (Eph. 4:4-5).

These words follow Paul’s explanation of the saving work of Jesus Christ. He explained to the Ephesians:

But now in Christ Jesus, you that used to be so far apart from us have been brought very close, by the blood of Christ. For He is peace between us, and has made the two into one and broken down the barrier which used to keep them apart, actually destroying in His own person the hostility caused by the rules and decrees of the Law. This was to create one single man in Himself out of the two of them and by restoring peace through the Cross, to unite them both in a single body and reconcile them with God. In His own person He killed the hostility… Through Him, both of us have in one Spirit our way to come to the Father. (Eph. 2:13-14)

Paul moves the Christian faith toward a Trinitarian comprehensiveness that forever distinguishes it from polytheistic dynamism (Hinduism), henotheistic animism (tribal religions) and the mushiness of post-Christian theologians.


All Things through Him and in Him

Since God is not bound by the constraints of time and space, perhaps the blood of the Son of God is that substance by which the world was made. The Creed and the Apostle John affirm that "through Him all things were made."  All things were made by Him before the Incarnation and now all things are gathered in Him, the Incarnate One.

If life is in the blood and only His blood gives life, we might trace the scarlet cord from before time, were that possible. Then we pick it up in Genesis. The promise that the woman's Seed shall overcome death and restore Paradise came to be fulfilled through Jesus' sacrifice and His resurrection. Jesus claimed to be the fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 when he told his disciples about his death.  He said that unless a seed fall into the ground and dies it cannot give life. (John 12:24)

In tracing the scarlet thread, we discover the "deeper magic" (to use C.S. Lewis' words from The Magician Nephew). The sacrifice of God's Lamb is alluded to in many biblical images and the scarlet cord image weaves throughout the Bible.

We continue to trace the scarlet cord where we read of the birth of twin boys to Tamar (Gen. 38:28-20). The story is told that when it came time for Tamar to give birth, Zerah stuck out his hand and the midwife tied a scarlet cord around the infant's hand. As soon as she had done this, the baby withdrew his hand and his brother Perez was born first. St Jerome wrote, "What is one to say of Tamar, who brought to birth the twins Zerah and Perez? Their separation at the moment of birth was like a wall that divides two peoples, and the hand tied with the scarlet ribbon already then speckled the conscience of the Jews with the passion of Christ." (Letter 123.12)

Perez is the younger son, but he is remembered in Ruth as one of David's honored ancestors. We remember that David too was the youngest of many sons, yet chosen to rule in Israel. And from Perez and David would come the Promised Messiah.

What is the significance of this story? It speaks of the redemption of the one who is not chosen to rule. It speaks of God's grace shown to the other, just as God promised Abraham that He would bless Ishmael and Abraham's sons by Keturah. The chosen one, Isaac, is not the only one blessed. The chosen people of Israel are not the only people blessed. The Blood which gives life, symbolized by the scarlet cord, is for all people. And that we be looking in the right direction, the scarlet cord leads from Tamar to David and from David to Messiah.

The scarlet cord is found in Leviticus. Here it is used in a priestly ritual to cleanse lepers and to retore them to the community (Lev. 14:4-6; 49-52). This too points us to the Blood of Jesus, for we who were afar and rotting in our sins, have been cleansed by His Blood and brought home.

The cord is found in Egypt on the doorposts of the Hebrews preparing to depart. This is the first Passover.

The cord appears again at Rahab's house in Jericho.  This forebearer of David and of Jesus tied a scarlet cord outside her window so that she and all her family would be saved from destruction. This is a second Passover and it too speaks of the salvation for those who are obedient to God's call.

St. Ambrose wrote concerning Rahab that she "uplifted a sign of her faith and the banner of the Lord's Passion; so that the likeness of the mystic blood, which should redeem the world, might be in memory. So, outside, the name of Joshua [Jesus] was a sign of victory to those who fought; and inside, the likeness of the Lord's passion was a sign of salvation to those in danger." (On the Christian Faith, Book V, no. 127)

And finally, the cord is traced to a temporal end and perfection in Hebrews 9:11-26, which tells us:

(11-14) But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

(15-22) And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For where there is a testament, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is in force after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives. Therefore not even the first covenant was dedicated without blood. For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, saying, "This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you." Then likewise he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry. And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.

(23-26) Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us: not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another - He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

Christ suffered the sacrifice of Himself only once.  Its "innumerable benefits" are such that Thomas Cranmer wrote in the first Exhortation before Communion, "And above all things ye must give most humble and hearty thanks to God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, for the redemption of the world by the death and passion of our Saviour Christ, both God and man; who did humble himself, even to death upon the Cross, for us, miserable sinners, who lay in darkness and the shadow of death; that he might make us the children of God, and exalt us to everlasting life."

What is our response to such great love shown to us while we were yet sinners? Cranmer continues, "And to the end that we should always remember the exceeding great love of our Master, and only Saviour, Jesus Christ, thus dying for us, and the innumerable benefits which by his precious blood-shedding he hath obtained for us; he hath instituted and ordained holy mysteries, as pledges of his love, and for a continual remembrance of his death, to our great and endless comfort. To him therefore, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, let us give, as we are most bounden, continual thanks; submitting ourselves wholly to his will and pleasure, and studying to serve him in true holiness and righteousness all the days of our life. Amen. ((First Exhortation before Communion, Book of Common Prayer, 1928)



Related reading:  Two Passovers and Two Drunken Fathers; The Messianic Priesthood of Jesus; The Pleromic Blood and Gnosticism; The Pleromic Blood and Gender Distinctions; Life is in the Blood; Blood and Crosses