Genesis 38:7-9

Easy-to-Read Version

⁷But Er did many bad things. The Lord was not happy with him, so the Lord killed him. ⁸Then Judah said to Er’s brother Onan, “Go and sleep with your dead brother’s wife.^[a] Become like a husband to her. If children are born, they will belong to your brother Er.”

⁹Onan knew that the children from this union would not belong to him. He had sexual relations with Tamar, but he did not allow himself to stay inside her.

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Footnotes

Genesis 38:8 Go and sleep … wife In Israel if a man died without children, one of his brothers would take the widow. If a child was born, it would be considered the dead man’s child.