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Bible Notes - Tabernacle Commentaries
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Genesis 38:20
Comments
Judah wants his pledge back, so he sends Hirah to look for the harlot. Hirah is the junior partner in their bond of friendship, and is sent to go where Judah is ashamed to go himself and to do Judah’s dirt work for him. Enquiries are made about the whereabouts of this harlot, but no one has seen her or even knows of the existence of a prostitute in that place. Judah does not understand what is going on, but decides that to pursue the matter any further is going to bring further embarrassment and shame on him by drawing attention to what he has done. He has already had the shame of having to enquire who is the harlot who operates in that place, making it known to all where his interests lie. Men like to keep their sins quiet, but here he was being drawn much further than he liked. He tells himself that he has done the right thing: he has attempted to pay her as he said he would, and if a prostitute makes herself so hard to find, she does not deserve to receive payment; he is not going to pursue the matter any further. She seems to have tricked him, but he will suffer the loss.
Application
Judah apparently cared about his reputation enough to want to avoid this scandal, but not enough to avoid behaving in this shameful way in the first place. What games we can play with our own consciences! How easy we think it is to pacify conscience with a few trivial acts while whole areas of wickedness go unchecked. We do not understand what it is that God has put within us, a witness that is very hard to corrupt however much we try to silence it.
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