Heath Dewrell, «How Tamar's Veil Became Joseph's Coat», Vol. 97 (2016) 161-174
The phrase 'ysp(h) tntk' appears in two biblical narratives: the Joseph story (Genesis 37) and the Tamar and Amnon story (2 Samuel 13). While the phrase is usually translated 'coat of many colours' or 'long-sleeved garment', this examination argues that the original significance of the term is to be found in its context in 2 Samuel 13, where it is said to be a garment worn by virgin princesses, an argument supported by comparative material from the Middle Assyrian Laws. The garment's appearance in the Joseph narrative is likely secondary, ultimately deriving from the Tamar and Amnon story.
HoW TAMAR’S VEIL BECAME JoSEPH’S CoAT 173
ment”, worn by virgin nobility, to be sure, but not necessarily by them
alone, and thus he saw no reason not to have Joseph wear one too. In
this way Joseph ends up wearing a “veiling garment” that was origi-
nally intended only for virgin daughters of royalty, but whose meaning
had by that time been lost. of course, once the phrase makes its way
into Gen 37,23, one would naturally wonder where this enigmatic, but
apparently special, garment came from and what happened to it in the
end. For this reason, a notice was added at the beginning of the story
that it was Jacob who gave it to Joseph (Gen 37,3b), and at the end of
the story we learn that the garment which the brothers dipped in blood
to mislead their father was this selfsame ~ysp(h) tntk (Gen 37,32).
The latter likely originally simply read tntk, as in Gen 37,23, and the
entire clause contained in Gen 37,3b may well have been inserted
for the purpose of explaining how Joseph got this special garment,
since in an earlier version of the story, where the brothers stripped
Joseph of an ordinary garment, no such explanation would have been
necessary.
While one may not be entirely convinced by all the details of the
reconstruction above, three points do seem likely: (1) that the ~ysp of
~ysp(h) tntk is cognate to Akkadian pasāmu “to veil”, since in both 2
Samuel 13 and in the Middle Assyrian Laws the so-named garment
served to indicate the sexual status of high-born women; (2) that the
Tamar and Judah story in particular, but also the larger surrounding
narrative, has been heavily influenced by the Tamar and Amnon story,
and that the ~ysp(h) tntk of Genesis 37 is in some way textually de-
pendent upon the identically named garment in 2 Samuel 13; and (3)
once the ~ysp(h) tntk made its way into the Joseph narrative its orig-
inal significance was lost (indeed, it was likely already lost before it
made its way there), leaving interpreters, from at least the time of the
translation of LXX Genesis up to the present day, to puzzle over what
sort of garment this might have been. once one observes these three
points, however, one realizes that in actuality Joseph’s “coat of many
colours” was originally David’s daughter Tamar’s virginal veil.
Princeton Theological Seminary Heath DEWRELL
Princeton, NJ 08540 – uSA