Does This Mean Anything?

Victor Hamilton, in his commentary on Genesis 18-50, points out a number of similarities between Judah and David, in their sin with Tamar and Bathsheba, respectively (p. 448).

1. They both have an illicit sexual relationship followed by a time of quietness in which it is doubtless that the men hope the situation has been forgotten (Judah) or covered up (David).
2. Both relationships produce a child.
3. Both men express moral outrage and righteous indignation when told of the behavior of the women, both not knowing the full story (Judah did not know that he was the father; David did not know that he was the subject of the story).
4. Both are trapped into admitting their own culpability.
5. Both men, when confronted with the truth, acknowledge their sin publicly.

The question is, Does this similarity mean anything in interpreting Scripture? Is it a part of what God intends for us to understand? Did the author of 2 Samuel intend to allude to the great great [etc] grandfather of David? Or is it simply an interesting comparison, indicating that sinners tend to act alike?

We could not say with any reasonable soundness that Moses intended to prefigure David. It would be possible that the author of 1 Samuel was aware of Judah and Tamar through the books of Moses, and was intentionally making an allusion to the event. Yet what purpose would that serve in 1 Samuel? (Feel free to offer a suggestion if you have one.)

My sense is that these are simply interesting coincidences that indicate that sinful people tend to respond the same way in similar situations. It is doubtful that Judah and David are the only two men who ever did this and got caught in such a manner. In fact, chances are that we all know someone who has done something like this, or is in fact, may be doing something like this right now. These are merely the two who God decided to memorialize in the biblical record.

I am always suspicious of commentators and preachers who see all kinds of these allusions in the text, and then lean heavily on them for meaning, simply because I see no textual basis for such an allusion.

We see this type of argument often made about words, such as in Genesis 37 and 38 where Hamilton, for example, uses the Hebrew word for "recognize" (nakar) in 37:32, 33; 38:25, 26 to argue that these two chapters are united. But what if these words were simply common words to connote the idea of seeing something and noting its identity? Again, I am suspicious, though I do not totally discount it. We all frequently use the same word in different contexts without any intent to connect things. We use the word quite simply because it is the word that means what we wish to say. Of course, you can't fill a commentary with that, but it makes more sense, to me anyway.

I would argue we should see fewer of these allusions rather than more, and limit ourselves to what is more obvious from the text.

So let us be cautious. The text is packed full of meaning without our creativity.