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112 send that which thou doest promise; Iudas said: What wilt thou to be giuen thee for a pledge? She answered: Thy ring, and bracelet, and staffe which thou holdest in thy hand. The woman therfore by once companying conceaued, and rising she went her way: and putting off the apparel which she had taken, put on the garments of her widowhood. And Iudas sent a kid by his shepheard the Odolamite, that he might receiue the pledge againe, which he had giuen to the woman: who when he had not found her, he asked the men of that place: Where is the woman that sate in the crosse way? Al making answer: There was no harlot in this place, he returned to Iudas, and said to him: I haue not found her: yea the men also of that place said vnto me, that there neuer sate harlot there. Iudas said: Let her take it to her, surely she can not charge vs with a lye, I sent the kid which I promised: and thou didest not find her. And behold after three months they told Iudas, saying: Thamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot, and her bellie seemeth to swel. And Iudas said: Bring her forth that she may be burnt. Who when she was led to execution, she sent to her father in law, saying: By that man, whose these things are, haue I conceaued: looke whose the ring is, and the bracelet, and the staffe. Who acknowledging the guifts, said: She is iuster then I: because I did not giue her to Sela my sonne. But he knew her no more. And when she was readie to be brought to bed, there appeared twinnes in her bellie: and in the verie deliuerie of the infants, one put forth the hand, wherin the midwife tyed a skarlet string, saying: This shal come forth the former. But he drawing backe his hand, the other came forth: and the woman said: Why is the partition diuided for thee? and for this cause called his name Phares. Afterward his brother came forth, in whose hand was the skarlet string: whom she called Zara.

ANNOTATIONS. CHAP. XXXVIII.

8. Raise seed to thy brother.) By this it appeareth, that in the law of nature, when a maried man died without issue, his brother might lawfully marie the widow; whose first sonne should be counted and called the sonne and heyre of his vncle dead before. The same was established by the law of Moyses (Deut. 25). Which being now abrogated, it remaineth in the Churches power to constitute a law in this behalf, and consequently to dispence in the same, so farre as is agreable with the law of nature. Wherof see more Leuit. 18. Rh