This week’s parsha presents us with two potential acts of illicit behaviour, in the stories of Tamar and the wife of Potifar. Yet, the Torah reveals the same potential behaviour could in fact be viewed in opposing ways; one positive and one negative. Let’s explore how this could be possible.
The Torah tells us that Yehudah had three sons: Er, Onan and Shelah. He married Er off to Tamar, but unfortunately, Er passed away after not living up to Hashem’s expectations. The concept of Yibum (Levirate marriage) led to Yehuda’s next son, Onan marrying his late brother’s wife, Tamar. Soon after, Onan died as well. In accordance with the laws of Yibum, the last son, Shelah should have married Tamar, but he was too young for marriage at the time and Yehudah gets in the way (having lost his first two sons) and sends Tamara away, telling her she could come back when Shelah matures. Tamar returns to her hometown, but eventually realizes Yehudah has no plans for her to marry Shelah, and a while later Yehudah’s wife dies. Hearing this news, Tamar devises a plan to pose as a harlot to seduce Yehudah to sleep with her so she could be the ancestress of malchut David. Her plan works, and she becomes pregnant without Yehudah realizing who she was. Three months pass and her signs of pregnancy become apparent; she was accused of illicit extra-marital relations and sentenced to death. Rather than publically humiliating Yehudah, Tamar accepts her fate, but sends a secret message to Yehudah. He understands what had happened, and that he had errored in not giving Shelah to Tamara as a husband. He saves Tamar, declaring צדקה ממני, “she is more righteous than I,” and
she goes on to have twins, eventually becoming the ancestress of malchut David.
The very next chapter describes the episode where the wife of Potifar tried to seduce Yosef into extra-marital relations. Yosef denies her, leaving his cloak in her hands which allows her to accuse him of harassing her, subsequently leading him to be thrown in jail.
Rashi (39:1) explains the juxtaposition of these two episodes in an interesting way. He says these stories are placed side-by-side. They show that just as Tamar acted לשם שמים, to bear Jewish children who would lead to malchut David, so too, the wife of Potifar saw from her astrologers she would bear righteous children from him (not realizing it would be through her daughter that Yosef eventually marries), and hence acted לשם שמים as well. The strange point is that most commentators leave these episodes with a righteous outlook on Tamar, but a negative outlook on the wife of Potifar. Didn’t she have good intentions too?
In his sefer Otzrot HaTorah, Rav Eliyahu Cohen suggests that the way to measure any deed, good or bad, is only by evaluating it after the fact. When the wife of Potifar was denied by Yosef, even though she started with good intentions, she felt rejected, perhaps nervous her husband and family would learn of her illicit intentions. This led to her putting blame on Yosef, sending him to jail. Despite her initial intentions being לשם שמים, since she chose to falsely lay the blame on Yosef, revealing she was really in it for personal pleasure and gain. Tamar on the other hand, after showing signs of pregnancy and being sentenced to death, did not want to embarrass Yehudah. So not only did she have good intentions at the start, but her actions afterwards confirmed her intentions as purely לשם שמים.
There is a huge lesson here for all of us. Many times we do things, believing that we have the best of intentions, but in actuality the action might not be proper. The way for us to evaluate this is by introspecting on how we dealt with the challenges that came along the way. If we remain positive in our actions, it is likely we were acting properly. However, if we end up blaming others, speaking ill of them, or react in other negative and hurtful ways, that reveals the truth; perhaps our intentions were not so good from the start.
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