A survival of consanguine marriage is found in Deut. xxv., where it is expressly ordered that when a brother's widow is left childless "her husband's brother shall go in unto her and take her to him to wife"; and in the event of his refusing to do so he has to have his shoe loosed and his face spat upon. Of the antiquity of this usage we have evidence in Genesis xxxviii. When Er, Judah's firstborn, died, the father commanded his second son, "Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother." The second son refusing, the thing which he did displeased the Lord, wherefore he slew him. Judah now putting Tamar off from taking his next son, she disguised herself and made her father-in-law do his son's duty, he acknowledging "she hath been more righteous than I." The custom is also referred to in the story of Ruth. Ewald amends Ruth iv. 5: "Thou must buy also Ruth the Moabitess." The Bible reader will remember that the disgusting story of the patriarch Lot and his daughters is related without the slightest token of disapproval. The daughters justified themselves by the plea that they would "preserve seed of our father." To understand these narratives, the reader must remember that in the early history of the family it was desirable, in the struggle for existence, that its numbers should not be diminished. Many instances are found in the Bible of the blessing of a large family. "Happy is the man who has his quiver full." The blessing on the typical servant of Jahveh is that "he shall see his seed," It was the duty of the next of kin to see that the family stock did not diminish. We find at the beginning of Genesis that, when Abel was slain, God gave Seth "instead." In patriarchal life, as exhibited by the Bedouins, the "next of kin," the _goel_, is a most important personage. To him the tribe looks to avenge or redeem a kinsman's death or misfortune. On him the widow and fatherless depend for support. He is, above all, the blood-balancer, who sees that the house is kept in its normal strength, and who seeks to recruit it as far as possible from the same blood--a state of things implying feud with surrounding tribes. Job, in his anguish, can find no stronger consolation this--"I know that my _goel_ liveth." According to the morality of that time, not only Tamar, but the family was grossly wronged by Onan. By refusing to allow Shelah to take the duties of _goel_, on the ground of his youth, Judah himself incurred the responsibilities of that office. It was his duty to see that seed was raised. Tamar resorted to cunning, the weapon of the weak, and Judah's confession is the real moral of what, to a modern, must be considered the very disgusting story in Genesis xxxviii.