HoW TAMAR’S VEIL BECAME JoSEPH’S CoAT 169 While such a solution may appear somewhat speculative at first, I believe that close consideration will reveal that it does fit well with other evidence one can glean concerning the textual transmission of the Joseph stories. Taking a step back, one should note the close literary connections between the two Tamar stories of the Hebrew Bible — that is, between the story of Tamar and Amnon in 2 Samuel 13 and the story of Tamar and Judah in Genesis 38. G. Rendsburg goes so far as to propose that the various characters of the Tamar and Judah story are actually stand- ins for characters in the Tamar and Amnon story (e.g., Tamar = Tamar; Judah = David; onan = Amnon, etc.) 17. Building upon Rendsburg’s observations, C.y.S. Ho has observed a large number of parallels, both thematic and linguistic, between the David tales of Samuel and the story of Tamar and Judah in Genesis. on the basis of these paral- lels, Ho likewise concludes that the latter was likely derived from the former 18. Similarly, G. Auld points to examples of terminology shared by the Tamar and Judah story of Genesis 38 and the Tamar and Amnon story of 2 Samuel 13 19. Also significant is the fact that, despite its apparent intrusion into the present Joseph narrative, and somewhat contrary to the scholarly opinion of previous generations, which treated the Tamar and Judah story as an unconnected tale that interrupts the Joseph saga 20, the Tamar and Judah story has been integrally woven into the larger ma- terial that it “interrupts” 21 in ways that seem to have affected the sur- rounding material. For instance, as u. Cassuto observes, there are strong lexical connections between Gen 38,25-26 (within the Tamar and Judah story) and Gen 37,32-33 (in the Joseph narrative outside the Tamar and Judah story). In the former, Tamar sends (hxlX) to her fa- ther-in-law and says (rmatw): “Discern (an rkh) whose seal and signet 17 G. RENDSBuRG, “David and His Circle in Genesis XXXVIII”, VT 36 (1986) 438-446. 18 C.y.S. Ho, “The Stories of the Family Troubles of Judah and David: A Study of Their Literary Links”, VT 49 (1999) 514-531. 19 G. AuLD, “Tamar between David, Judah, and Joseph”, Samuel at the Threshold. Selected Works of Graeme Auld (SoTSMS; Aldershot 2004) 213-224, here 214; first published in Svensk Exegetik Årsbok 65 (2000) 93-106. 20 See, e.g., H. HoLzINGER, Genesis (KHC; Freiburg 1898) 227; SKINNER, Genesis, 449-450; SPEISER, Genesis, 299; WESTERMANN, Genesis 37–50, 49. 21 So N.M. SARNA, Genesis (JPS Torah Commentary; Philadelphia, PA 1989) 263-264; D. CARR, Reading the Fractures of Genesis. Historical and Literary Approaches (Louisville, Ky 1996) 249-253.