Now these [are] the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.
1. Now these are the generations ] The title of a new section in P; see note on Gen 2:4.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
– Section VIII – The Nations
– Japheth
2. gomer, Gomer, completion; related: complete; Kimmerioi. magog, Magog, Caucasian, Skyth. maday, Madai, middle: Mede. yavan, Javan; Iaon; Sanskrit, Javana; Old Persian, Juna. tubal, Tubal; Tibareenoi. meshek, Meshek, drawing possession, valor; Moschoi, tyras, Tiras; Thrax.
3. ‘ashkenaz, Ashkenaz, Askanios. rypat, Riphath, oree Ripaia, togarmah Togarmah, Thorgom, ancestor of the Armenians.
4. ‘elyshah, Elishah; Eelis, Hellas, Aioleis. tarshysh, Tarshish, breaking, fastness: Tartessus, Tarsus, Tyrseni. ktym, Kittim, smiters; Citienses; Kares; dodanym, Dodanim, Dodona, Dardani.
5. ‘y, meadow, land reached by water, island; related: be marked off or bounded (by a water line). goy, nation; related: be born; gegaasi.
The fifth document relates to the generations of the sons of Noah. It presents first a genealogy of the nations, and then an account of the distribution of mankind into nations, and their dispersion over the earth. This is the last section which treats historically of the whole human race. Only in incidental, didactic, or prophetic passages do we again meet with mankind as a whole in the Old Testament.
The present chapter signalizes a new step in the development of the human race. They pass from the one family to the seventy nations. This great process covers the space of time from Noah to Abraham. During this period the race was rapidly increasing under the covenant made with Noah. From Shem to Abraham were ten generations inclusive; and, therefore, if we suppose the same rate of increase after as we have supposed before, there would be about fifteen million inhabitants when Abraham was thirty years of age. If, however, we take eight as the average of a family, and suppose eleven generations after Shem at the one hundredth year of Abrahams life, we have about thirty million people on the earth. The average of the three sons of Noah is higher than this; for they had sixteen sons, and we may suppose as many daughters, making in all thirty-two, and, therefore, giving ten children to each household. The present chapter does not touch on the religious aspect of human affairs: it merely presents a table of the primary nations, from which all subsequent nationalities have been derived.
Gen 10:1-2
The sons of Japheth. – Japheth is placed first, because he was, most probably, the oldest brother Gen 9:24; Gen 10:21, and his descendants were the most numerous and most widely spread from the birthplace of mankind. The general description of their territory is the isles of the nations. These were evidently maritime countries, or such as were reached by sea. These coastlands were pre-eminently, but not exclusively, the countries bordering on the north side of the Mediterranean and its connected waters. They are said to belong to the nations, because the national form of association was more early and fully developed among them than among the other branches of the race. There is, probably, a relic of Japheth in the, Iapetos, Japetus of the Greeks, said to be the son of Uranus (heaven), and Gaea (earth), and father of Prometheus, and thus in some way connected with the origin or preservation of the human race.
Fourteen of the primitive nations spring from Japheth. Seven of these are of immediate descent.
(1) Gomer is mentioned again, in Ezekiel Eze 38:6, as the ally of Gog, by which the known existence of the nation at that period is indicated. Traces of this name are perhaps found in the Kimmerioi, (Homer, Odyssey Eze 11:14; Herodotus Eze 1:15; Eze 4:12), who lay in the dark north, in the Krimea, the Kimbri who dwelt in north Germany, the Kymry, Cambri, and Cumbri who occupied Britain. These all belong to the race now called Keltic, the first wave of population that reached the Atlantic. Thus, the Gomareis, of Josephus (Ant. 1:6.1) may even be identified with the Galatae. This nation seems to have lain to the north of the Euxine, and to have spread out along the southern coasts of the Baltic into France, Spain, and the British Isles.
(2) Magog is mentioned, by Ezekiel Eze 38:6, as the people of which Gog was the prince. It is introduced in the Apocalypse Rev 20:8, as a designation of the remote nations who had penetrated to the ends or corners of the earth. This indicates a continually progressing people, occupying the north of Europe and Asia, and crossing, it may be, over into America. They seem to have been settled north of the Caspian, and to have wandered north and east from that point. They are accordingly identified by Josephus (Ant. 1:6.1) with the Skyths, and include the Mongols among other Skythic tribes.
(3) Madai has given name to the Medes, who occupied the southern shore of the Caspian. From this region they penetrated southward to Hindostan.
(4) Javan is traced in the Iaones, Iones, who settled in the coasts of the Aegean, in Peloponnesus, Attica, and subsequently on the coast of Asia Minor, and accordingly denotes the Greeks in the language of the Old Testament Isa 66:19; Eze 27:13; Dan 8:21. The name Yunau is found in the cuneiform inscriptions of the times of Sargon, referring to a western people.
(5) Tubal and (6) Meshek are generally associated. (Eze 27:13; 38; 39) connects them, on the one hand, with Magog, and on the other, with Javan. Josephus (Ant. 1:6.1) finds Tubal in Iberia, and Meshek in Cappadocia, tracing the name in Mazaca. Their names are seemingly detected in the Tibareni and Moschi, and their seat was probably between the Euxine and the Caspian, whence they spread themselves northward and westward. The names of the rivers Tobal and Mosqua bear a strong resemblance to these patriarchal names.
(7) Tiras is referred by Josephus to Thrace. The name is perhaps discernible in the Tyras or Dniester. The seat of the nation was east of the Euxine, whence it spread to the north. Thus, we have the original starting-points of these seven nations about the Caspian, the Euxine, and the Aegean Seas.
Gen 10:3
Gomer has three sons, who are the founders of as many nations.
(8) Ashkenaz is supposed to have lain south of the Euxine, and to be traceable in its original name axenos, and in the Ascanius and Ascania of Bithynia, perhaps in Scandinavia. Part of the nation may have migrated to Germany, which is called Ashkenaz by the Jews, and where the word Sachsen (Saxon) occurs. It perhaps contains the root of the name Asia.
(9) Riphath seems to have travelled north, and left his name in the Rhipaean mountains. Josephus, however, places him in Paphlagonia, where the name Tobata occurs (Diphath) 1Ch 1:6.
(10) Togarmah is said to have been settled in Armenia. By a tradition in Moses Chorenensis, Haik, the ancestor of the Armenians, is the son of Thorgom, the son of Gomer. At all events, the Black Sea might convey colonies from Gomer to Asia Minor and Armenia.
Gen 10:4
Javan has four sons, who are the heads of nations.
(11) Elishah is noted by Ezekiel Eze 27:7 as a nation whose maritime country produced purple, which agrees with the coast of Laconia or the Corinthian Gulf. The name has been variously sought in Elis, Hellas, and Aeolis. The last is due to Josephus. It is possible that Elea or Velia, in the south of Italy, may contain some reference to the name.
(12) Tarshish is conjectured by Josephus to be the people of Cilicia; which, he affirms, was anciently called Tharsus, and the capital of which was Tarsus. But whether this be the primitive seat of Tarshish or not, it is almost certain that Spain retains the name, if not in Tarraco, at least in Tartessus.
(13) Kittim is discovered, by Josephus, in Cyprus, where we meet with the town of Citium Kition. He adds, however, that all the islands and the greater part of the seacoasts are called Chedim by the Hebrews. We may therefore presume that the Kittim spread into northern Greece, where we have a Kition in Macedonia, and ultimately into Italy, which is designated as the isles of Kittim Num 24:24; Isa 23:1; Jer 2:10; Eze 27:6; Dan 11:30.
(14) Dodanim leaves a trace, perhaps, in Dodona, an ancient site of the Hellenes in Epirus, and perhaps in Dardania, a district of Illyricum.
Gen 10:5
Thus, we have discovered the ancient seats of Japheth, Iapetos – , around the Caspian, the Euxine, the Aegean, and the north of the Mediterranean. From these coastlands they seem to have spread over Europe, northern, western, and southern Asia, and, both by Behrings Straits and the Atlantic, they at length poured into America. So true is it that Japheth was enlarged, and that by them were the isles of the nations divided.
In their nations. – We here note the characteristics of a nation. First. It is descended from one head. Others may be occasionally grafted on the original stock by intermarriage. But there is a vital union subsisting between all the members and the head, in consequence of which the name of the head is applied to the whole body of the nation. In the case of Kittim and Dodanim we seem to have the national name thrown back upon the patriarchs, who may have themselves been called Keth and Dodan. Similar instances occur in the subsequent parts of the genealogy. Second. A nation has a country or land which it calls its own. In the necessary migrations of ancient tribes, the new territories appropriated by the tribe, or any part of it, were naturally called by the old name, or some name belonging to the old country. This is well illustrated by the name of Gomer, which seems to reappear in the Cimmerii, the Cimbri, the Cymri, the Cambri, and the Cumbri. Third. A nation has its own tongue. This constitutes at once its unity in itself and its separation from others. Many of the nations in the table may have spoken cognate tongues, or even originally the same tongue. Thus, the Kenaanite, Phoenician, and Punic nations had the same stock of languages with the Shemites. But it is a uniform law, that one nation has only one speech within itself. Fourth. A nation is composed of many families, clans, or tribes. These branch off from the nation in the same manner as it did from the parent stock of the race.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Gen 10:1-32
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah
A chapter of genealogies
Many readers might be disposed to undervalue a chapter like this, since it is but a collection of names–some of which are quite unknown–and is made up of barren details promising little material for profitable reflection.
Yet a thoughtful reader will be interested here, and discover the germs and suggestions of great truths; for the subject is man, and man, too, considered in reference to Gods great purpose in the government of the world. This chapter is as essential to an understanding of the Bible, and of history in general, as is Homers catalogue, in the second book of the Iliad, to a true knowledge of the Homeric poems and the Homeric times. The Biblical student can no more undervalue the one than the classical student the other.
I. IT IS MARKED BY THE FEATURES OF A TRUTHFUL RECORD.
1. It is not vague and general, but descends to particulars. The forgers of fictitious documents seldom run the risk of scattering the names of persons and places freely over their page. Hence those who write with fraudulent design deal in what is vague and general.
2. Heathen literature when dealing with the origin of nations employs extravagant language. The early annals of all nations, except the Jews, run at length into fable, or else pretend to a most incredible antiquity. National vanity would account for such devices and for the willingness to receive them. The Jews had the same temptations to indulge in this kind of vanity as the other nations around them. It is therefore a remarkable circumstance that they pretend to no fabulous antiquity. We are shut up to the conclusion that their sacred records grew up under the special care of Providence, and were preserved from the common infirmities of merely human authorship.
3. Here we have the ground plan of all history.
II. THAT HISTORY HAS ITS BASIS IN THAT OF INDIVIDUAL MEN. The general lesson of this chapter is plain, namely, that no man can go to the bottom of history who does not study the lives of those men who have made that history what it is.
III. THAT MAN IS THE CENTRAL FIGURE OF SCRIPTURE. Infidels have made this characteristic of revelation a matter of reproach; but all who know how rich Gods purpose towards mankind is, glory in it, and believe that great things must be in store for a race which bus occupied so much of the Divine regard.
IV. THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT OF HISTORY TOWARDS AN END. All the interest centres successively in one people, tribe, and family; then in One who was to come out of that family, bringing redemption for mankind. Salvation is of the Jews. The noblest idea of history is only realized in the Bible. Those of the world had no living Word of God to inspire that idea. That book can scarcely be regarded as of human origin which passes by the great things of the world, and lingers with the man who believed in God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. (T. H. Leale.)
Circumstances attendant on man
Instead of saying that man is the creature of circumstances, it would be nearer the mark to say that man is the architect of circumstances. It is character that builds an existence out of circumstance. Our strength is measured by our plastic power. From the same materials one man builds palaces, another hovels; one warehouses, another villas; bricks and mortar are mortar and bricks until the architect can make them something else. Thus it is that, in the same family, in the same circumstances, one man rears a stately edifice, while his brother, vacillating and incompetent, lives forever amid ruins; the block of granite which was an obstacle in the pathway of the weakly becomes a stepping stone in the pathway of the strong. (T. Carlyle.)
Oneness of humanity
A clear conception of the import of this marvellous chapter should enlarge and correct our notions in so far as they have been narrowed and perverted by our insular position. We should recognize in all the nations of the earth one common human nature. God hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on the face of the earth. This reflection is both humbling and elevating. It is humbling to think that the cannibal is a relative of ours; that the slave crouching in an African wood is bone of our bone; and that the meanest scum of all the earth started from the same foundation as ourselves! On the other hand, it is elevating to think that all kings and mighty men, all soldiers renowned in song, all heroes canonized in history, the wise, the strong, the good, are our elder brothers and immortal friends. If we limit our life to families, clans, and sects, we shall miss the genius of human history, and all its ennobling influences. Better join the common lot. Take it just as it is. Our ancestors have been robbers and oppressors, deliverers and saviours, mean and noble, cowardly and heroic; some hanged, some crowned, some beggars, some kings; take it so, for the earth is one, and humanity is one, and there is only one God over all blessed for evermore! If we take this idea aright we shall get a clear notion of what are called home and foreign missions. What are foreign missions? Where are they? I do not find the word in the Bible. Where does home end; where does foreign begin? It is possible for a man to immure himself so completely as practically to forget that there is anybody beyond his own front gate; we soon grow narrow, we soon become mean; it is easy for us to return to the dust from whence we come. It is here that Christianity redeems us; not from sin only, but from all narrowness, meanness, and littleness of conception; it puts great thoughts into our hearts and bold words into our mouths, and leads us out from our village prisons to behold and to care for all nations of mankind. On this ground alone Christianity is the best educator in the world. It will not allow the soul to be mean. It forces the heart to be noble and hopeful. It says, Go and teach all nations; Go ye into all the world; Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others; Give and it shall be given unto you, good measure, pressed down, heaped up, and running over. It is something for a nation to have a voice so Divine ever stirring its will and mingling with its counsels. It is like a sea breeze blowing over a sickly land; like sunlight piercing the fogs of a long dark night. Truly we have here a standard by which we may judge ourselves. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. If we have narrow sympathies, mean ideas, paltry conceptions, we are not scholars in the school of Christ. Let us bring no reproach upon Christ by our exclusiveness. Let us beware of the bigotry of patriotism, as well as of the bigotry of religion. We are citizens of the world: we are more than the taxpayers of a parish. A right view of this procession of the nations will show us something of the richness and graciousness of Christs nature. What a man must he have been either in madness or in Divinity who supposed that there was something in himself which all these people needed! (J. Parker, D. D.)
The planting of nations great responsibility
The one point to which I would draw your attention is that which lies upon the very surface of this history, and to which, as a great law imprinted by God upon our race, I wish to call your special notice. It is the degree in which the original features of the founders of a race reproduce themselves in their descendants, so as to become the distinct and manifest types of national life. This is so plain here that it has rarely escaped some observation. The few words wherein, according to the wont of patriarchal times, Noah, as the firstborn priest of his own family, pronounces on his sons his blessing and his curse, sketch in outline the leading characteristics of all their after progeny. Thus, the Blessed be the Lord God of Shem, can hardly fail to convey to the heaters mind the impression that devotion to, and a trust in God, as his portion, marked the character of the firstborn of Noah. And so it proved in fact, for it was the line of Abraham and the Semitic race, in the tribes of Israel and Judah, which filled this office of the priests of mankind for two thousand years. So also with regard to the second son of Noah. Sensuality and filial irreverence manifestly stained his character. In the future of such a man lay naturally cruelty–the inseparable companion–and degradation–the unfailing consequence–of lust. A servant of servants should he be. He who disregarded the duties of a son should lose the place of a brother: he who sacrificed to sensual appetite every highest duty, should in the end barter for it his own liberty; and his character, too, has through unnumbered generations reproduced itself in his descendants. Without entering upon the difficult task of tracing in some of its details the outline of the Hamitic race, it is clear beyond all contradiction, that through past ages, and even to the present day, the nations which manifestly sprung from his loins are marked by these characteristics–lust, cruelty, and servitude. The character of Japhet is perhaps, at first sight, less plainly to be traced in his fathers benediction. His words would seem, however, to point to a character marked less strongly than that of his firstborn by piety towards God, but possessed of those family virtues with which, in the course of things, an increasing posterity is commonly connected and endued with the practical activity and vigour, which, as opposed to the more contemplative character of Shem, were essential to that subduing of the earth, which must accompany its replenishment by the enlarging seed. Beyond this lay the unexplained and mysterious blessing of his future dwelling in the tents of Shem, pointing probably, in the personal life of the patriarch, to the pious rest into which the later years of a virtuous activity would so probably subside. And all this has plainly marked the Japhetic races: their increase has furnished the nations of the Gentiles; whilst family virtue, and that practical activity which to this day has so wonderfully subjected the material earth to its obedience, are the distinction of their blood. In all these cases, then, we may trace on the broadest scale the action of that of which I have spoken, as a law impressed upon our common nature, that nations, in their after generations, bear, repeat and expand the character of their progenitor. And then, further, we may observe adumbrations of a mode of dealing with men which seems to imply that in His bestowal of spiritual gifts, God deals with them after some similar law, Hence, then, we may conclude further, that, by the laws of grace as well as of nature, there is a reproduction in the after seed of the character of the progenitor. Now, it is to the application of this principle to our past history and our present duty, that I would specially invite your notice. And first, FOR THE FACT. Since the opening of the historical period, there has been scarcely any national planting of the earth through emigration, until within the last three centuries. Even those events of far distant times, which most resembled it, were widely different. For they were rather irruptions than emigration; and the great wave of life which they brought into some new land, first cast out races in possession, often as numerous as, and commonly more civilized than, their invaders, and who not unfrequently tinged their subduers with their religion, their manners, and their language. The direct replenishment of the earth for the last three hundred years by the Japhetic family, is altogether different. These emigrations have set forth exclusively from Christian lands. They have been directed to vast tracts of thinly peopled countries; and they have borne to them men who have been, in the fullest sense of the words, founders of nations. In this work, we have borne a larger share than any other people. Now, with what an awful character of responsibility does the truth which we have before considered invest such acts! A sensual seed will produce a degraded people; a godless seed will grow into an atheistic empire; nay, even the lesser evils of a worldly, or a sectarian origin, will mark and renew themselves in successive generations. How plainly, then, must it be one of the very highest duties of a Christian people to provide all that is needful to bless and hallow such a national infancy:–to plant a chosen seed, and not a refuse; to send forth with them that faith, which alone can exalt and renew the race of man in its purest form, and with every advantage for its reproduction! How far, then, has England, which has been the chiefest of the nations in this sacred work, acted up to her responsibilities? Let North America,–let Australasia answer. How scanty in its measure–how imperfect in its form–how divided in its character–was the Christianity we mingled with the abundant seed of man which we scattered broadcast over North America; how fearful a paternity of crime did we assume, when we conceived and almost executed the enormity of planting the antipodes with every embodiment of reckless wickedness, and giving it no healing influence of our holy faith! What then must be herein our guilt and shame! But our chief concern is not with the past: it is with that present in which the future lies enfolded. Never has the tide of emigration risen so high as now; never were we so freely planting the earth with our energetic, increasing race as the seed of future empires; never, then, did the duty of planting it aright press so heavily upon us: and what is the prime essential for its adequate discharge? Surely, far beyond all other, that with the seed of fallen man we plant that Church of Christ, through which God the Holy Ghost is pleased to work for his recovery. This, and no less than this, can fulfil our obligations. (Bishop Samuel Wilberforce.)
In their nations
The characteristics of a nation
1. It is descended from one head. Others may be occasionally grafted on the original stock by intermarriage. But there is a vital union subsisting between all the members and the head, in consequence of which the name of the head is applied to the whole body of the nation. In the case of Kittim and Dodanim we seem to have the national name thrown back upon the patriarchs who may have themselves been called Keth and Dodan. Similar instances occur in the subsequent parts of the genealogy.
2. A nation has a country or land which it calls its own. In the necessary migrations of ancient tribes, the new territories appropriated by the tribe, or any part of it, were naturally called by the old name, or some name belonging to the old country. This is well illustrated by the name of Gomer, which seems to reappear in the Cimmerii, the Cimbri, the Cymry, the Cambri, and the Cumbri.
3. A nation has its own tongue. This constitutes at once its unity in itself and its separation from others. Many of the nations in the table may have spoken cognate tongues, or even originally the same tongue. Thus the Kenaanite, Phoenician and Punic nations had the same stock of languages with the Shemites. But it is a uniform law, that one nation has only one speech within itself.
4. A nation is composed of many families, clans, or tribes. These branch off from the nation in the same manner as it did from the parent stock of the race. (Prof. J. G. Murphy.)
Hams posterity
1. The most cursed man may have a numerous seed: it enlargeth the curse.
2. Cursed ones bring out sometimes an eminent rebellious seed to hasten vengeance (Gen 10:8).
3. The greatest judgments will not keep wicked ones from sin though being but a little escaped from them.
4. Under a wise providence, power and violence is suffered to rise and spring in the earth (Gen 10:8).
5. It is the property of giants in sin and earthly power to hunt to death Gods saints to His face.
6. God makes in vengeance the names of such wicked ones a proverb (Gen 10:9).
7. The beginning and chief of all the power of wicked ones is but confusion, and the place of wickedness. Babel and Shinar (Gen 10:10).
8. Wicked potentates are still invading others to enlarge themselves (Gen 10:11).
9. Edifying cities, and places of strength, is the wickeds security.
10. Great cities they may have, but such as are under the eye and judgment of God (Gen 10:12). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Nimrod
Nimrod
Nimrod was not merely a giant or mighty one in hunting, but also a cruel oppressor and bloody warrior. He is represented by some ancient historians as having renewed the practice of war, which had for some time been abandoned for agriculture, and hence the well-known couplet–
Proud Nimrod first the bloody chase began, A mighty hunter, and his prey was man.
Obscurity rests, and ever shall rest, on his particular achievements, although his figure and name have been found of late in Nineveh. What animals he slew, what weapons he employed, what battles he fought, with the blood of what enemies he cemented the cities which he built, how long he lived and where, how and where he died, are not recorded either in profane history or in the Book of God. Imagination figures him as another Hercules, clad in the skins of lions, and pursuing his prey with sounding bow and fiery eye over the vast plains of Asia, and when wild beasts are not to be found, turning his fury against his neighbours. Such men are the ragged and menacing shadows which the sun of civilization casts before it; their strong heart is fit to be the first strong heart of a people; their crimes, for which they must answer to God, are yet made useful to Gods purpose, and from the blood they shed springs up many a glorious harvest of arts and sciences, of culture and progress. Without questioning their guilt or the evil they do, or seeking to solve the mystery why they exist at all, we see many important ends which their permission answers; and acknowledge that the page of history were comparatively tame, did it want the red letters which record the names of a Nimrod, a Nebuchadnezzar, a Charlemagne, a Henry the Eighth, a Rienzi, and a Napoleon. (G. Gilfillan.)
Gospel archery
My text sets forth Nimrod as a hero when it presents him with broad shoulders and shaggy apparel and sun-browned face, and arm bunched with muscle–a mighty hunter before the Lord. I think he used the bow and the arrows with great success practising archery. I have thought if it is such a grand thing and such a brave thing to clear wild beasts out of a country, if it is not a better and braver thing to hunt down and destroy those great evils of society that are stalking the land with fierce eye and bloody paw, and sharp tusk and quick spring. I have wondered if there is not such a thing as Gospel archery, by which these who have been flying from the truth may be captured for God and heaven. The archers of olden times studied their art. They were very precise in the matter. The old books gave special directions as to how an archer should go, and as to what an archer should do. But how clumsy we are about religious work. How little skill and care we exercise. How often our arrows miss the mark.
1. In the first place, if you want to be effectual in doing good, you must be very sure of your weapon. There was something very fascinating about the archery of olden times. Perhaps you do not know what they could do with the bow and arrow. Why, the chief battles fought by the English Plantagenets were with the long-bow. They would take the arrow of polished wood, and feather it with the plume of a bird, and then it would fly from the bowstring of plaited silk. The broad fields of Agincourt, and Solway Moss, and Nevilles Cross heard the loud thrum of the archers bowstring. Now, my Christian friends, we have a mightier weapon than that. It is the arrow of the Gospel; it is a sharp arrow; it is a straight arrow; it is feathered from the wing of the dove of Gods Spirit; it flies from a bow made out of the wood of the cross. Paul knew how to bring the notch of that arrow on to that bowstring, and its whirr was heard through the Corinthian theatres, and through the courtroom, until the knees of Felix knocked together. It was that arrow that stuck in Luthers heart when he cried out: Oh, my sins! Oh, my sins! In the armoury of the Earl of Pembroke, there are old corslets which show that the arrow of the English used to go through the breastplate, through the body of the warrior, and out through the backplate. What a symbol of that Gospel which is sharper than a two-edged sword, piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and body, and of the joints and marrow! Would to God we had more faith in that Gospel!
2. Again, if you want to be skilful in spiritual archery, you must hunt in unfrequented and secluded places. The good game is hidden and secluded. Every hunter knows that. So, many of the souls that will be of most worth for Christ and of most value to the Church are secluded. They do not come in your way. You will have to go where they are.
3. I remark, further, if you want to succeed in spiritual archery, you must have courage. If the hunter stand with trembling hand or shoulder that flinches with fear, instead of his taking the catamount, the catamount takes him. What would become of the Greenlander if, when out hunting for the bear, he should stand shivering with terror on an iceberg? What would have become of Du Chaillu and Livingstone in the African thicket, with a faint heart and a weak knee? When a panther comes within twenty paces of you, and it has its eye on you, and it has squatted for the fearful spring, Steady there. Courage, O ye spiritual archers! There are great monsters of iniquity prowling all around about the community. Shall we not in the strength of God go forth and combat them? We not only need more heart, but more backbone. What is the Church of God that it should fear to look in the eye any transgression?
4. I remark again, if you want to be successful in spiritual archery, you need not only to bring down the game, but bring it in. I think one of the most beautiful pictures of Thorwaldsen is his Autumn. It represents a sportsman coming home and standing under a grapevine. He has a staff over his shoulder, and on the other end of that staff are hung a rabbit and a brace of birds. Every hunter brings home the game. No one would think of bringing down a reindeer or whipping up a stream for trout, and letting them lie in the woods. At eventide the camp is adorned with the treasures of the forest–beak, and fin, and antler. If you go out to hunt for immortal souls, not only bring them down under the arrow of the Gospel, but bring them into the Church of God, the grand home and encampment we have pitched this side the skies. Fetch them in; do not let them lie out in the open field. They need our prayers and sympathies and help. That is the meaning of the Church of God–help. O ye hunters for the Lord! not only bring down the game, but bring it in. (Dr. Talmage.)
Lessons
1. The last mention of the Churchs line is not the least in Gods account.
2. Fruitfulness is given to the Church of God, for its continuance on earth.
3. Visible distinction hath God made between the lines of the world and of the Church.
4. Hebers children are the true Church of God.
5. The name and blessing of Shem is on that Church.
6. Sharers in the promise are especially brethren.
7. The first in birth may be last in grace (Gen 10:21).
8. Out of the same holy stock may arise enemies to the Church as well as the right seed (Gen 10:22). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Lessons
1. Syrians may arise from the Father of the Church according to the flesh, very enemies to it.
2. Gods mind is to keep the line of His Church distinct; from all who turn aside (Gen 10:23).
3. The line of the Church is but short in respect of the world (Gen 10:24).
4. Memorable as well as terrible is that division of people and tongues which God hath made (Gen 10:25).
5. Saints have been careful to keep in memory such judgments of division; the naming of the child (Gen 10:25).
6. Numerous is the seed departed from the Church (Gen 10:26; Gen 10:29).
7. God has given a dwelling place to degenerate seed (Gen 10:30).
8. The Church hath its family, tongue, place, and people, distinct from all (verse 37). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
CHAPTER X
The generations of the sons of Noah, 1.
JAPHETH and his descendants, 2-4.
The isles of the Gentiles, or Europe, peopled by the
Japhethites, 5.
HAM and his posterity, 6-20.
Nimrod, one of his descendants, a mighty hunter, 8, 9,
founds the first kingdom, 10.
Nineveh and other cities founded, 11, 12.
The Canaanites in their nine grand branches or families, 15-18.
Their territories, 19.
SHEM and his posterity, 21-31.
The earth divided in the days of Peleg, 25.
The territories of the Shemites, 30.
The whole earth peopled by the descendants of Noah’s three
sons, 32.
NOTES ON CHAP. X
Verse 1. Now these are the generations] It is extremely difficult to say what particular nations and people sprang from the three grand divisions of the family of Noah, because the names of many of those ancient people have become changed in the vast lapse of time from the deluge to the Christian era; yet some are so very distinctly marked that they can be easily ascertained, while a few still retain their original names.
Moses does not always give the name of the first settler in a country, but rather that of the people from whom the country afterwards derived its name. Thus Mizraim is the dual of Mezer, and could never be the name of an individual. The like may be said of Kittim, Dodanim, Ludim, Ananim, Lehabim, Naphtuhim, Pathrusim, Casluhim, Philistim, and Caphtorim, which are all plurals, and evidently not the names of individuals, but of families or tribes. See Ge 10:4; Ge 10:6; Ge 10:13; Ge 10:14.
In the posterity of Canaan we find whole nations reckoned in the genealogy, instead of the individuals from whom they sprang; thus the Jebusite, Amorite, Girgasite, Hivite, Arkite, Sinite, Arvadite, Zemarite, and Hamathite, Ge 10:16-18, were evidently whole nations or tribes which inhabited the promised land, and were called Canaanites from Canaan, the son of Ham, who settled there.
Moses also, in this genealogy, seems to have introduced even the name of some places that were remarkable in the sacred history, instead of the original settlers. Such as Hazarmaveth, Ge 10:26; and probably Ophir and Havilah, Ge 10:29. But this is not infrequent in the sacred writings, as may be seen 1Ch 2:51, where Salma is called the father of Bethlehem, which certainly never was the name of a man, but of a place sufficiently celebrated in the sacred history; and in 1Ch 4:14, where Joab is called the father of the valley of Charashim, which no person could ever suppose was intended to designate an individual, but the society of craftsmen or artificers who lived there.
Eusebius and others state (from what authority we know not) that Noah was commanded of God to make a will and bequeath the whole of the earth to his three sons and their descendants in the following manner: – To Shem, all the East; to Ham, all Africa; to Japheth, the Continent of Europe with its isles, and the northern parts of Asia. See the notes at the end of the preceding chapter. See Clarke on Gen 9:29.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
1. In the search of these genealogies we must avoid both carelessness, for the reasons now mentioned, and excessive curiosity about every particular person here named, and the people sprung from him; which is neither necessary nor profitable, nor indeed possible now to find out, by reason of the great changes of names, through length of time, loss of ancient records, differences of languages, extinction of families, conquest and destruction of nations, and other causes. It may suffice that divers of them, and those the most eminent, are evident and discernible at this day, as will appear in the progress, by which we may and ought to presume the truth of the rest, whose names are lost in the public confusions of the world in former ages, of whom I shall therefore be silent, and only speak of the principal persons, and that briefly.
2. The same people which were originally seated in one place did ofttimes shift their places, or at least sent forth colonies; and that sometimes into places far distant from their brethren, as appears from the ancient and famous expeditions mentioned in sacred and profane story. So you must not wonder if you meet with the same people in divers countries.
3. In general, the world was divided into three parts, whereof the more eastern parts were allotted to Shem and his issue, the more southern parts to Ham, and the more northern parts of it to Japheth.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
1. sons of NoahThe historianhas not arranged this catalogue according to seniority of birth; forthe account begins with the descendants of Japheth, and the line ofHam is given before that of Shem though he is expressly said to bethe youngest or younger son of Noah; and Shem was the elder brotherof Japheth (Ge 10:21), the truerendering of that passage.
generations, c.thenarrative of the settlement of nations existing in the time of Moses,perhaps only the principal ones for though the list comprises thesons of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, all their descendants are notenumerated. Those descendants, with one or two exceptions, aredescribed by names indicative of tribes and nations and ending in theHebrew im, or the English “-ite.”
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah,…. The genealogy of them, and which is of great use to show the original of the several nations of the world, from whence they sprung, and by whom they were founded; and to confute the pretended antiquity of some nations, as the Egyptians, Chaldeans, Chinese, and others; and to point out the particular people, which were to be the seat of the church of God for many ages, and from whom the Messiah was to spring; which seems to be the principal view of the history of Moses, and of this genealogy, with which should be compared 1Ch 1:1 Shem, Ham, and Japheth; see Ge 5:32
and unto them were sons born after the flood; for they had none born to them either before the flood or in it; they were married before the flood, for their wives went into the ark with them; but it does not appear they had any children before, though they then were near an hundred years old; and if they had, they were not in the ark, and therefore must perish with the rest, which is not likely: Shem’s son Arphaxad was born two years after the flood, Ge 11:10 when the rest were born, either his or his brethren’s, is not said; however they were all born after the flood; though some pretend that Canaan was born in the ark y, during the flood, for which there is no authority; yea, it is confuted in this chapter, where Canaan stands among the sons of Ham, born to him after the flood.
y See Bayle’s Dictionary, vol. 10. art. “Ham”, p. 587.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Descendants of Japhet. – In Gen 10:1 the names of the three sons are introduced according to their relative ages, to give completeness and finish to the Tholedoth ; but in the genealogy itself Japhet is mentioned first and Shem last, according to the plan of the book of Genesis as already explained in the introduction. In Gen 10:2 seven sons of Japhet are given. The names, indeed, afterwards occur as those of tribes; but here undoubtedly they are intended to denote the tribe-fathers, and may without hesitation be so regarded. For even if in later times many nations received their names from the lands of which they took possession, this cannot be regarded as a universal rule, since unquestionably the natural rule in the derivation of the names would be for the tribe to be called after its ancestor, and for the countries to receive their names from their earliest inhabitants. Gomer is most probably the tribe of the Cimmerians, who dwelt, according to Herodotus, on the Maeotis, in the Taurian Chersonesus, and from whom are descended the Cumri or Cymry in Wales and Brittany, whose relation to the Germanic Cimbri is still in obscurity. Magog is connected by Josephus with the Scythians on the Sea of Asof and in the Caucasus; but Kiepert associates the name with Macija or Maka, and applies it to Scythian nomad tribes which forced themselves in between the Arian or Arianized Medes, Kurds, and Armenians. Madai are the Medes, called Mada on the arrow-headed inscriptions. Javan corresponds to the Greek , from whom the Ionians ( ) are derived, the parent tribe of the Greeks (in Sanskrit Javana, old Persian Juna ). Tubal and Meshech are undoubtedly the Tibareni and Moschi, the former of whom are placed by Herodotus upon the east of the Thermodon, the latter between the sources of the Phasis and Cyrus. Tiras: according to Josephus, the Thracians, whom Herodotus calls the most numerous tribe next to the Indian. As they are here placed by the side of Meshech, so we also find on the old Egyptian monuments Mashuash and Tuirash, and upon the Assyrian Tubal and Misek ( Rawlinson).
Gen 10:3 Descendants of Gomer. Ashkenaz: according to the old Jewish explanation, the Germani; according to Knobel, the family of Asi, which is favoured by the German legend of Mannus, and his three sons, Iscus ( Ask, ), Ingus, and Hermino. Kiepert, however, and Bochart decide, on geographical grounds, in favour of the Ascanians in Northern Phrygia. Riphath: in Knobel’s opinion the Celts, part of whom, according to Plutarch, crossed the , Montes Rhipaei, towards the Northern Ocean to the furthest limits of Europe; but Josephus, whom Kiepert follows, supposed to be Paphlagonia. Both of these are very uncertain. Togarmah is the name of the Armenians, who are still called the house of Thorgom or Torkomatsi.
Gen 10:4 Descendants of Javan. Elishah suggests Elis, and is said by Josephus to denote the Aeolians, the oldest of the Thessalian tribes, whose culture was Ionian in its origin; Kiepert, however, thinks of Sicily. Tarshish (in the Old Testament the name of the colony of Tartessus in Spain) is referred by Knobel to the Etruscans or Tyrsenians, a Pelasgic tribe of Greek derivation; but Delitzsch objects, that the Etruscans were most probably of Lydian descent, and, like the Lydians of Asia Minor, who were related to the Assyrians, belonged to the Shemites. Others connect the name with Tarsus in Cilicia. But the connection with the Spanish Tartessus must be retained, although, so long as the origin of this colony remains in obscurity, nothing further can be determined with regard to the name. Kittim embraces not only the Citiaei, Citienses in Cyprus, with the town Cition, but, according to Knobel and Delitzsch, probably “the Carians, who settled in the lands at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea; for which reason Ezekiel (Gen 27:6) speaks of the “isles of Chittim.” Dodanim ( Dardani): according to Delitzsch, “the tribe related to the Ionians and dwelling with them from the very first, which the legend has associated with them in the two brothers Jasion and Dardanos;” according to Knobel, “the whole of the Illyrian or north Grecian tribe.”
Gen 10:5 “ From these have the islands of the nations divided themselves in their lands; ” i.e., from the Japhetites already named, the tribes on the Mediterranean descended and separated from one another as they dwell in their lands, “ every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.” The islands in the Old Testament are the islands and coastlands of the Mediterranean, on the European shore, from Asia Minor to Spain.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Generations of Noah. | B. C. 2347. |
1 Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood. 2 The sons of Japheth; Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras. 3 And the sons of Gomer; Ashkenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah. 4 And the sons of Javan; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim. 5 By these were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.
Moses begins with Japheth’s family, either because he was the eldest, or because his family lay remotest from Israel and had least concern with them at the time when Moses wrote, and therefore he mentions that race very briefly, hastening to give an account of the posterity of Ham, who were Israel’s enemies and of Shem, who were Israel’s ancestors; for it is the church that the scripture is designed to be the history of, and of the nations of the world only as they were some way or other related to Israel and interested in the affairs of Israel. Observe, 1. Notice is taken that the sons of Noah had sons born to them after the flood, to repair and rebuild the world of mankind which the flood had ruined. He that had killed now makes alive. 2. The posterity of Japheth were allotted to the isles of the Gentiles (v. 5), which were solemnly, by lot, after a survey, divided among them, and probably this island of ours among the rest; all places beyond the sea from Judea are called isles (Jer. xxv. 22), and this directs us to understand that promise (Isa. xlii. 4), the isles shall wait for his law, of the conversion of the Gentiles to the faith of Christ.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
GENESIS – CHAPTER TEN
Verses 1-5:
This listing includes seven sons of Japheth, and seven grandsons. Each of these became the progenitor of a nation. These nations populated the regions to the north and east, including Europe, Wales, the Balkan areas of Eastern Europe, the areas around the Black Sea, the Euxine Sea, and the Caspian Sea. Ethnologists trace the lineage of Japheth’s descendants generally as:
Gomer: peoples dwelling in “the sides of the north” (Eze 38:6); the Galatae of the Greeks and the Cimmerians, who apparently spread from the Caspian and Euxine over Europe to the Atlantic and the British Isles.
Magog: a warlike people who settled in the Caucasus, in what is known today as Russia. Ezekiel prophesied their destruction, in chapters 38 and 39. In Re 20:8, Gog and Magog are arrayed against God and His people.
Madai: the Medes or Medians, settling on the southwest region of the Caspian.
Javan: the Greeks, see Isa 66:19; Eze 27:13; Da 8:21; 10:20; Joe 3:6.
Tubal and Meshech: tributaries of Magog (Eze 38:2, 3; 39:1). Peoples in the north of Armenia.
Tiras: Thracians.
The Sons of Gomer…and Javan: nations dwelling in Armenia, the Balkans, southern Europe, and some of the Mediterranean islands. The language describing these indicate maritime countries.
The descendants of Japheth appear to have been expansionists, pushing the boundaries of their territories into the remote regions. They were warlike peoples, but they also engaged in extensive commercial enterprises. Highly intelligent, many of these peoples excelled in the arts and sciences and philosophy. Some of the world’s most beautiful art and sculpture and architecture come from the Japhetic peoples. However, their pursuit of esthetic beauty and human intellect led them to glorify man and his accomplishments rather than God.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
1. These are the generations. If any one pleases more accurately to examine the genealogies related by Moses in this and the following chapter, I do not condemn his industry. (306) And some interpreters have not unsuccessfully applied their diligence and study to this point. Let them enjoy, as far as I am concerned the reward of their labors. It shall, however, suffice for me briefly to allude to those things which I deem more useful to be noticed, and for the sake of which I suppose these genealogies to have been written by Moses. First, in these bare names we have still some fragment of the history of the world; and the next chapter will show how many years intervened between the date of the deluge and the time when God made his covenant with Abraham. This second commencement of mankind is especially worthy to be known; and detestable is the ingratitude of those, who, when they had heard, from their fathers and grandfathers of the wonderful restoration of the world in so short a time, yet voluntarily became forgetful of the grace and the salvation of God. Even the memory of the deluge was by the greater part entirely lost. Very few cared by what means or for what end they had been preserved. Many ages afterwards, seeing that the wicked forgetfulness of men had rendered them callous to the judgment and mercy of God, the door was opened to the lies of Satan by whose artifice it came to pass, that heathen poets scattered abroad futile and even noxious fables, by which the truth respecting God’s works was adulterated. The goodness of God, therefore, wonderfully triumphed over the wickedness of men, in having granted a prolongation of life to beings so ungrateful, brutal, and barbarous. Now, to captious men, (who yet do not think it absurd to refuse to acknowledge a Creator of the world,) such a sudden increase of mankind seems incredible, and therefore they ridicule it as fabulous. I grant, indeed, that if we choose to estimate what Moses relates by our own reason, it may be regarded as a fable; but they act very perversely who do not attend to the design of the Holy Spirit. For what else, I ask, did the Spirit intend, than that the offspring of three men should be increased, not by natural means, or in a common manner, but by the unwonted exercise of the power of God, for the purpose of replenishing the earth far and wide? They who regard this miracle of God as fabulous on account of its magnitude, should much less believe that Noah and his sons, with their wives, breathed in the waters, and that animals lived nearly a whole year without sun and air. This then, is a gigantic madness, (307) to hold up to ridicule what is said respecting the restoration of the human race: for there the admirable power of God is displayed. How much better would it be, in the history of these events, — which Noah saw with his own eyes, and not without great admiration, — to behold God, to admire his power, to celebrate his goodness, and to acknowledge his hand, not less filled with mysteries in restoring, than in creating the world? We must, however, observe, that in the three catalogues which Moses furnishes, (308) all the heads of the families are not enumerated; but those only, among the grandsons of Noah, are recorded, who were the princes of nations. For as any one excelled among his brethren, in talent, valor, industry, or other endowments, he obtained for himself a name and power, so that others, resting under his shadow, freely conceded to him the priority. Therefore, among the sons of Japheth, of Ham, and of Shem, Moses enumerates those only who had been celebrated, and by whose names the people were called. Moreover, although no certain cause appears why Moses begins at Japheth, and descends in the second place to Ham, yet it is probable that the first place is given to the sons of Japheth, because they, having wandered over many regions, and having even crossed the sea, had receded farther from their country: and since these nations were less known to the Jews, therefore he alludes to them briefly. He assigns the second place to the sons of Ham, the knowledge of whom, on account of their vicinity, was more familiar to the Jews. But since he had determined to weave the history of the Church in one continuous narrative, he postpones the progeny of Shem, from which the church flowed, to the last place. Wherefore, the order in which they are mentioned is not that of dignity; since Moses puts those first, whom he wished slightly to pass over, as obscure. Besides, we must observe, that the children of this world are exalted for a time, so that the whole earth seems as if it were made for their benefit, but their glory being transient vanishes away; while the Church, in an ignoble and despised condition, as if creeping on the ground, is yet divinely preserved, until at length, in his own time, God shall lift up her head. I have already declared that I leave to others the scrupulous investigation of the names here mentioned. The reason of certain of them is manifest from the Scripture, such as Cush, Mizraim, Madai, Canaan, and the like: in respect to some others there are probable conjectures; in others, the obscurity is too great to allow of any certain conclusion; and those figments which interpreters adduce are, in part, very much distorted and forced; in part, vapid, and without any fair pretext. Undoubtedly it seems to be the part of a frivolous curiosity to seek for certain and distinct nations in each of these names. (309) When Moses says, that the islands of the Gentiles were divided by the sons of Japheth, we understand that the regions beyond the sea were parted among them. For Greece and Italy, and other continental lands, — as well as Rhodes and Cyprus, — are called islands by the Hebrews, because the sea interposed. Whence we infer that we are sprung from those nations.
(306) For ample information on this interesting subject, which the general plan of Calvin’s Commentary scarcely allowed him fully to investigate, the reader cannot do better than consult Dr. Wells’ Geography of the Old Testament, chap. 3 From certain expressiones contained in the Mosaic account here given, of the first settlement of nations after the flood, it is clear that the records of the chapter now before us, have reference to the state of things after the confusion of tongues at the building of the Tower of Babel, though the narration of this event occurs in the chapter following; for the settlements are said to be made “according to their languages.” But we know that before the attempt to build the tower, the whole earth was of “one language and of one speech;” and therefore the events here placed first, in the order of narration, were subsequent in the order of time. It may be proper here to observe, that according to the division of the earth into three great portions, Europe, Asia, and Africa, speaking generally, Japheth was the progenitor of the Europeans, Shem of the Asiatics, and Ham of the Africans. Yet this line of demarcation is not intended to be accurately drawn. The whole of Lesser Asia, for instance, falls within the province of the sons of Japheth; and Arabia within that of the sons of Ham. — Ed.
(307) “ Hic ergo Cyclopicus est furor.”
(308) The first relating to the sons of Japheth the elder brother, from verse 2 to verse 6; the second, to the sons of Ham, from verse 6 to verse 21; the third, to the sons of Shem, from 21 to the end. Shem, though generally named first as a mark of Divine favor, is here placed last, because the subsequent history of Moses principally concerns this race; as Calvin properly argues. — Ed.
(309) Doubtless there is truth in these remarks of Calvin. Yet he seems to carry his objection too far. For it is one of the strongest possible confirmations of the truth of the Mosaic history, that (notwithstanding some inevitable obscurity) there should be such a mass of undeniable evidence still existing, that the world was really divided in the manner here described. Far more nations than Calvin supposed may, with the highest degree of probability, be traced upward to the progenitors whose names are here recorded. See Wells’ Geography, Mede’s Works, and Bishop Patrick’s Commentary. A list of the names, with the supposed corresponding nations, is also given in the Commentary of Professor Bush on this chapter. The following extract from Hengstenberg’s ‘Egypt, and the Books of Moses,’ also bears upon this point: — “It has often been asserted that the genealogical table in Gen 10:0. cannot be from Moses: since so extended a knowledge of nations lies far beyond the geographical horizon of the Mosaic age. This hypothesis must now be considered as exploded. The new discoveries and investigations in Egypt have shown that they maintained, even from the most ancient times, a vigorous commerce with other nations, and sometimes with very distant nations…. But not merely, in general, do the investigations in Egyptian antiquities favor the belief that Moses was the author of the account in this tenth chapter of Genesis. On the Egyptian monuments, those especially which represent the conquests of the ancient Pharaohs over foreign nations,… not a few names have been found which correspond with those contained in the chapter before us.” The learned author then proceeds to adduce instances in proof of his position, which the reader may consult with advantage. — See Hengstenberg’s Egypt, and the Books of Moses, chap. v2 p. 195 — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
THE DAWN OF HISTORY
Gen 1:1 to Gen 11:9.
IN beginning this Bible of the Expositor and Evangelist, I am keenly sensible of the seriousness of my task. The book to be treated is the Book of Books, the one and only volume that has both survived and increasingly conquered the centuries, and that now, in a hoary old age, shows no sign of weakness, holds no hint of decay or even decrepitude; in fact, the Book is more robust at this moment than at any time since it came to completion, and it gives promise of dominating the future in a measure far surpassing its influence upon the past.
The method of studying the Bible, to be illustrated in these pages, is, we are convinced, a sane and safe one, if not the most efficient one. Years since, certain statements from the pen of Dr. James M. Gray, superintendent of the Moody Bible Institute, fell under our eyes, and those statements have profoundly influenced our methods of study.
Five simple rules he suggested for mastering the English Bible:
First, Read the Book.
Second: Read it consecutively.
Third: Read it repeatedly.
Fourth: Read it independently.
Fifth: Read it prayerfully.
Applying these suggestions to each volume in turn, if ones life be long continued, he may not hope to master his English Bible, but he will certainly discover its riches increasingly, and possess himself more and more of its marvelous treasures,
It was on the first Sunday of July, 1922, that I placed before myself and my people the program of study that produced these volumes. To be sure, much of the work had been done back of that date, but the determination to utilize it in this exact manner was fully adopted there and then. It was and is my thought that the greatest single weakness of the present-day pulpit exists in the circumstance that we have departed from the custom of our best fathers in the ministry, namely, Scriptural exposition. If, therefore, these volumes shall lead a large number of my brethren in the ministry, particularly the young men among them, to become expository preachers, and yet to combine exposition with evangelism, my reward will be my eternal riches.
Stimulated by that high hope, I turn your attention to the study itself, and begin where the Book begins and where all true students should begin, with Gen 1:1, but in thought, an eternity beyond the hour of its phrasing, for by the opening sentence we are pushed back to God. In the beginning
GOD.
That is the starting point of all true studies. The scientist is compelled to start there, or else he never understands where he is, nor yet with what he deals. God, the One of infinite wisdom, infinite power, infinite justice and of infinite goodnessIn the beginning God.
Having heard that name and having understood the One to whom it is applied, we are prepared for what follows,created the heavens and the earth marvelous first verse of the Bible!
All in this first chapter is wrapped up in that first sentence; that is the explanation of all things; what follows is simply the setting forth of details.
I agree with Joseph Parker that the explanation is simple. No attempt at learned analysis; that the explanation is sublime because it sweeps in all of time, all of material suggestions, all of power and illustrates all of wisdomthe heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament showeth His handiwork; day unto day uttereth speech and night unto night showeth knowledge, and it is a sufficient explanation, the only one that satisfies the mind of man.
Infidel evolutionists cannot account for the beginnings. The geologist who does not believe, digs down to a point where he says, Who started all of this? and waits in sadness while the dumb rocks are silent; but for the Christian student no such mystery makes his work an enigma.
Everywhere he sees the touch of God; in the plants, the animals, the birds and in man,God. Where the unbeliever wonders and questions to get no reply, the believer admires, saying, This is my Fathers hand, the work of my Fathers word. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear (Heb 11:3), and he joins with the Psalmist, Let all nations praise the name of the Lord for He commanded and they were created (Psa 108:5).
Competent scholars have called attention to the careful use of words in the Bible, a use so painstaking and perfect as to give a scientific demonstration of the verbal inspiration theory. When it is said that God created the heavens and the earth, the Hebrew verb bara is employed, and it means to create something from nothing, so that God gave the death blow to the evolution theory some thousands of years before that unprovable hypothesis was born! The same word bara is also used in the 21st verse (Gen 1:21) concerning the creation of mammals, and three times in the 27th verse (Gen 1:27) concerning the creation of man, while a kindred word asah (neither of which convey any such thought as growth or evolution) is employed concerning His making man in His own image in Gen 1:26.
God, then, is not a mechanic; He is a Creator. He did not come upon the scenes of the universe to fashion what existed independent and apart from Him, but to create and complete according to His own pleasure.
In later chapters we shall show how these creative acts are confirmed by science itself, and argue the utter folly of trying to find incompatibility between Gods Work and Gods Word.
So for the present we may pass from God the Creator, as revealed in the first chapter, to
ADAM THE MAN
of the second chapter. An infinite decline, somebody says. But let us be reminded that it is not so great as appears at this present hour. The only man God ever made outright was not what you and I see now. The man He made was in His own image, after His own likeness, only as far below
Him as the finite is below the infinite; as the best creation is below the best Creator.
The man God made was good. The man God made was great. The man God made was wise. The man God made was holy. The men we see now are not His children, but the children of the fallen Adam instead, for Eve, fallen, brought forth after her kind; and what a fall was that!
When man disobeyed, he brought on himself and all succeeding ages sin, and its wretched results. There are those who blame God for the fall of man and say, He had no business to make him so he could fall. But everything that is upright can fall, and the difference between a man who could not fall and a man who could fall is simply the difference between a machine and a sentient, intelligent, upright, capable being.
There was but a single point at which this man could oppose Providence. Situated and environed as Adam was, the great social sins that have crushed the race could make no appeal to him. It is commonly conceded that the Decalogue sweeps the gamut of social, ethical and even religious conduct. Adam had no occasion to bow down before another God, for Jehovah, his Creator, was his counsellor and friend, and of other gods he knew nothing nor had he need of such. There was no provocation that could tempt him to take the name of that God in vain. There was no Sabbath day, for all days were holy, and the condemnation to labor was not yet passed. There was no father and mother to be honored. To have committed murder was unthinkable; first because there was no provocation, and second, such an act would have left him in the world alone, his heart craving, unsatisfied, and his very kind to perish. The seventh commandment meant nothing to the man whose wife was in the image of God, and the only woman known. Theft was impossible, since all things belonged to him. False witness and covetousness against a neighborhe had no neighbor.
But when God selected for Himself a single tree, leaving the rest of the earth to Adam, and he proved himself unwilling to let the least of earthly possessions be wholly the Lords, he gave an illustration to the unborn millenniums that man, in his almost infinite greatness, would not abide content that God Himself should be over and above him; and from that moment until this, that very thing has been the crux of every contention between the Divine and the human. If we may believe the Prophets, it was that very temptation that caused Lucifers fall and gave us the devil and hell!
All talk of shallow minds that God condemned the race because one man happened to bite into an apple, is utterly wide of the mark. Condemnation rests upon the race because every man born of the flesh has revealed the same spirit of rebellion shown by our first parentswe will not have God rule over us even to the extent of keeping anything from us. The wealth of His gifts should shame and restrain against His few prohibitions.
But, alas for mans guilt and godlessness! Equally wide of the mark is that other superficial reasoning that it is unjust of God to condemn me because some one of my forefathers misbehaved! Why charge God with injustice concerning something He has never done and will never do? Why not let
Him speak for Himself in such matters, and listen when he declares, The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him (Eze 18:20).
If, therefore, Adam with a body, mind and spirit unsullied, never having been weakened by an evil act or habit, did not stand, what hope for any man in his own merit. Are we better than they? No, in no wise, for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles that we are all under sin. As it is written, There is none righteous, no not one. There is none that understandeth. There is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way. They are altogether become unprofitable (Rom 3:9-12).
You say that the temptation was a subtle one. I answer, Yes, that is Satans way to this hour. You say, The desire was for wisdom. I answer, Yes, that is still Satans appeal; you need to see and to know more than you do, hence you had better try this sin.
Over one of the most palatial but wicked doorways of all Paris there used to be an inscription, Come in; nothing to pay, and so far as mere entrance to that place was concerned, that was true. But those who entered found when they had come out that they had visited the place at the cost of character, not to speak of that meaner thing money.
In passing, we call your attention to the justice of Gods judgment upon this sin. Its heaviest sentence fell upon the serpent, Satans direct agent; that wisest of all beasts of the field. He was accursed above all cattle, and brought down from his upright, manly-appearing position to go upon his belly and to eat dust all his days, and to be hated and killed by the seed of the woman with whom he had had such influence.
The second sentence in weight fell upon the woman who listened to this deception and led the way in disobedience. The man did not escape. The associate in sin never does. His love for the principal may in some measure mitigate Gods judgment, but the justice of God would be called in question, and even His goodness, if He permitted any sin to be unpunished.
EVE, THE PRINCIPAL PERSON
in this third chapter must have been in her unfallen state Adams equal, mentally and morally. We have had great women, beautiful women, women worthy the admiration of the world, but I have an idea that the worlds greatest woman was not Cleopatra, the beautiful but selfish; nor Paula, that firmest of all friends; nor Heloise, the very embodiment of affection; nor Joan or Arc, heroism incarnate; nor Elizabeth, the wonderful queen; nor Madam De Stael of letters; nor Hannah Moore of education; but Eve, our first mother.
When I think on her and look at the frail, feeble, sickly, sinful sister of the streets, I feel like weeping over the fact that our first mother fell; and today among her daughters are those so far removed from Gods ideal.
THE FAMILY
of the fourth chapter had its beginning in sin, and it is a dreadfully dark picture that is here presented. Envy, murder and lust appear at once. Abel is murdered, Cain made a criminal, polygamy introduced and all social vices which curse the sons of God. The picture would incite despair, but for the circumstance that in the third chapter God had made a promise which put Grace instead of Law.
There was need, for unless the womans seed should bruise the serpents head, that serpents venom will not only strike the heel of every son, but send its poison coursing to his heart and head; without God, without hopedead indeed!
Truly, as one writer has said, We lose our life when we lose our innocence; we are dead when we are guilty; we are in hell when we are in shame.
Death does not take a long time to come upon us; it comes on the very day of our sin. In the day when thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. Before that sentence there is no hope, except in these words spoken of the seed of woman against that old serpent, Satan; It shall bruise thy head the first prophecy of the wonderful gift of Gods Son.
Of
CAIN AND ABEL
we appreciate the contrast! The self-righteousness on the part of one; self-abasement on the part of the other. Cains saying, The fruit of mine own hands shall suffice for my justification before God; Abel saying, Without the shedding of blood there is no remission, and that spirit of Cain dominates the early society, as we have already seen; for while the population grew rapidly, sin kept pace, and even seemed swifter still. From self-righteousness they rushed to envy, to murder, and to lust.
The Pharisee may thank God that he is not as other men are, but history is likely to demonstrate the want of occasion for his boasting, for pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.
The most dangerous man is the man who recognizes no dependence upon another than himself; and the man most likely to be an extortioner, to be unjust, the man most apt to be an adulterer, yea, even a murderer, is this same Cain who says, See the fruit of my hands. The youthful Chicago murderers thought their fine family connections and their university educations would save them from suspicion and condemnation! I tell you, it is the humble man who is justified in Gods sight!
The man who cries, God be merciful to me a sinnerrather than the man who wipes his lips and says, I am clean, and is offended when you talk to him of the necessity of purifying Blood in which to baptize his soulhe is the man who is justified in Gods sight.
THE FIFTH CHAPTER
covers a period of about 1,500 years, and contains but one great name, not introduced in the other chapters, and this is the name of Enoch. Note that his greatness consisted in the single fact that he walked with God.
Dr. Dixon said, He did not try to induce God to walk with him. He simply fell in with Gods ways and work.
Some one asked Abraham Lincoln to appoint a day of fasting and prayer that God might be on the side of the Northern Army. To this that noble President replied, Dont bother about what side God is on. He is on the right side. You simply get with Him.
Enoch was an every-day hero! Walking patiently, persistently, continuously is harder than flying. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. Like Enoch of old, they shall not see death, for God shall take them, and before their translation they shall have this testimony that they please God.
We have said that this fifth chapter covers 1,500 years. I call you to note the fact that it contains a multitude of names; names that even the best of Bible students do not, and cannot call. Nobody has ever committed them to memory; nobody cares to. They are not worth it. They were given to no noble deeds; they lived and died. The only wonder we have about them is that God let some of them live so long, unless it be that we also wonder how they managed to live so long and accomplish so little. Yet these nonentities have a part in Gods plan. They were bringing forth children; grandchildren came, and great grandchildren, and the children of great-grandchildren until Enoch was born, and by and by Noah; then the whole line was noble from Seth, Adams better of the living sons, down to these great names. It is worth while for a family to be continued for a thousand years, if, at the end of that time, one son can be born into the house who shall bring things to pass; one Enoch who shall walk with God; one Noah who shall save the race! There are people who are greatly distressed because their parents were neither lords, dukes nor even millionaires. They seem to think that the child who is to come to much must descend from a father of superior reputation at least. History testifies to the contrary, and shows us that the noblest are often born into unknown houses. The most gifted sons, the most wonderful daughters have been bred by parents of whom the great world never heard until these children, by their fame, called attention to their humble fathers.
The multiplied concessions that advocates of the evolution theory are obliged to make by facts they face at every turn, excite almost tender pity for them. Professor Conklin, in his volume The Direction of Human Evolution puts forth an endeavor in splendid defense of this hypothesis worthy of a better cause, and yet again and again he is compelled to say the things that disprove his main proposition. Consider these words. Think of the great men of unknown lineage, and the unknown men of great lineage; think of the close relationship of all persons of the same race; of the wide distribution of good and bad traits in the whole population; of incompetence and even feeble-mindedness in great families, and of genius and greatness in unknown families, and say whether natural inheritance supports the claims of aristocracy or of democracy.
When we remember that most of the great leaders of mankind came of humble parents; that many of the greatest geniuses had the most lowly origin; that Shakespeare was the son of a bankrupt butcher and an ignorant woman who could not write her name, that as a youth he is said to have been known more for poaching than for scholarship, and that his acquaintance with the London theatres began by his holding horses for their patrons; that Beethovens mother was a consumptive, the daughter of a cook, and his father a confirmed drunkard; that Schuberts father was a peasant by birth and his mother a domestic servant; that Faraday, perhaps the greatest scientific discoverer of any age, was born over a stable, his father a poor sick black-smither, his mother an ignorant drudge, and his only education obtained in selling newspapers on the streets of London and later in working as apprentice to a book-binder; that the great Pasteur was the son of a tanner; that Lincolns parents were accounted poor white trash and his early surroundings and education most unpromising; and so on through the long list of names in which democracy glories when we remember these we may well ask whether aristocracy can show a better record. The law of entail is aristocratic, but the law of Mendel is democratic.
Quaint old Thomas Fuller wrote many years ago in his Scripture Observations,
I find, Lord, the genealogy of my Saviour strangely checkered with four remarkable changes in four immediate generations:
1. Roboam begat Abia, that is a bad father and a bad son.
2. Abia begat Asa, that is a bad father a good son.
3. Asa begat Josaphat, that is a good father a good son.
4. Josaphat begat Joram, that is a good father a bad son.
I can see, Lord, from hence that my fathers piety cannot be entailed; that is bad news for me. But I see also that actual impiety is not always hereditary; that is good news for my son.
It is not so much a question as to your birth, or to the line in which you are, as to the nobleness of the family tree, as it is what sort of a branch you are; what sort of a branch you may become.
The Duke of Modena flung a taunt at a Cardinal in a controversy, reminding him that his father was only a swineherd of the Dukes father. The Cardinal calmly replied, If your father had been my fathers swineherd, you would have been a swineherd still.
In the race of life it does not make so much difference where we start as how we end.
I do not mean to despise the laws of heredity. They are somewhat fixed, wise and wonderful. The child of a good father has the better chance in this world, beyond doubt. But our plea is that no matter who the fathers are, we may so live that our offspring shall be named by all succeeding generations. I call attention to Enoch in illustration.
About
NOAH
four chapters or more enwrap themselves. Gods man has a large place in history. It is hard enough for Him to find one who is faithful, but when found He always has an important commission for him.
The most important commission ever given to any man was given to this man; namely, that of saving the race. Noah did his best, but when he saw that he was not succeeding with the outside world, he turned his hope to himself as the last resort; to his family as his possible associates. That is always the last resort. Man must save himself, or he can save no one else. The man who saves himself by letting God save him, stands a good chance of being accepted by his own family, and his faith will doubtless find its answer in their salvation as well. Even if it fail with the outside world, that world will be compelled to remember, when Gods judgment comes, that this commissioned one did what he could for them.
In Hebrews we read, By faith Noah moved with fear prepared an ark to the saving of his house. The fear of man bringeth a snare. The fear of God effects salvation. The fear of man makes a coward; the fear of God incites courage. The fear of man means defeat; the fear of God accomplishes success. Be careful whom you fear! I like the man who can tremble before the Father of all. I pity the man who trembles before the face of every earthly foe.
The story is told that two men were commissioned by Wellington to go on a dangerous errand. As they galloped along, one looked at the other, saying, You are scared. Yes, replied his comrade, I am, but I am still more afraid not to do what the commander said. The first turned his horse and galloped back to the Generals tent and said, Sir, you have sent me with a coward. When I looked at him last his face was livid with fear and his form trembled like a leaf. Well, said Wellington, you had better hurry back to him, or he will have the mission performed before you get there to aid. As the man started back he met his comrade, who said, You need not go. I have performed the mission already.
It was through Noah that the Lord gave to humanity a fresh start. God is always doing that. It is the meaning of every revolutionGod overrules it for a fresh start. That is the meaning of wars they may be Satanic in origin, but God steps in often and uses for a fresh start. That is the meaning of the wiping out of nationsa fresh start, and man is always doing what he did at the firstfalling again.
Noah was a righteous man; with his family he made up the whole company of those who had been loyal to God, and one might vainly imagine that from such a family only deeds of honor, of valor, acts of righteousness would be known to earth. Alas for our hope in the best of men!
He has scarcely set foot upon dry ground when we read, (Gen 9:20-21), Noah began to be a husbandman and he planted a vineyard, and he drank of the wine, and was drunken, and he was uncovered in his tent, and down the race went again! Man has fallen, and his nakedness is uncovered before God, and the shame of it is seen by his own blood and bone. Truly, by the deeds of the law no flesh shall be justified in His sight, because our deeds are not worthy of it. Faith becomes the only foundation of righteousness. That is what the eleventh chapter of Hebrews was written to teach us. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he, and when once a man has fixed his faith in the living God, and keeps it there, the God in whom he trusts keeps him, and that is his only hope. For by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast (Eph 2:8-9).
NIMROD
the principal personage in the tenth chapter has his offices given. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord, and he was a king. The beginning of his kingdom by Babel and Erich, and Accad and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.
Our attention has been called to the fact that before this chapter, nations are unknown, but now established government appears. Chapter 9:6 is the basis of it, and in Rom 13:2-4 we see that God set the seal of His approval upon it. Nimrod comes forth as the first autocrat and conqueror. One can almost hear the marches to and fro of the people in this chapter; cities are going up and civilization doubtless thought it was making advance, but how far it advances we shall speedily see.
The things in its favor were dexterously employed. Some wise men suddenly remembered that they all had one speech and said, We ought to make the most of it. True, as Joseph Parker says, Wise men are always getting up schemes that God has to bring to naught. Worldly wise men have been responsible for the most of the confusion our civilization has seen. Men who get together in the places of Shinar and embark in real estate, and lay out great projects and pull in unsuspecting associates, and start up tremendous enterprises, and say, under their breath, in their secret meetings, We will get unto ourselves a great name. We will exalt ourselves to heaven, and after the world has done obeisance to us, we will walk among the angels and witness them bow down; but God still lives and reigns. The men who count themselves greatest are, in His judgment, the least; and those that reckon themselves most farseeing, He reckons the most foolish; and those who propose to get into Heaven by ways of their own appointment, He shuts out altogether and drives them from His presence, and they become wandering stars, reserved for the blackness of darkness; for we must learn that self-exaltation brings Gods abasement. He that exalteth himself shall be humbled, and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. God is willing that man shall come to Heaven but, as some one has said, If we ever get to Heaven at all, it will not be by the dark and rickety staircases of our own invention, but on the ladder of Gods love in Christ Jesus.
God is willing that we should have a mansion, but the mansion of His desire is not the wooden or brick structure that would totter and fall, but the building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. God is willing that we should dwell in towers, but not the towers of pride and pomp, but those of righteousness wrought out for us in Christ Jesus.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
CRITICAL NOTES.
Gen. 10:1. Generations] The origins, genesis, or developments; a characteristic note of this book. The whole chapter is a table of the nations which descended from the sons of Noah.
Gen. 10:2. Japheth] The order of the generations of the sons of Noah here followed is Japheth, Ham, Shem. The reason why this arrangement begins with Japheth is that he was the eldest of the three. Ham follows next, in order that the main subject, the line of Shem, may be free for treatment; the object of secondary interest having been first disposed of, according to the practice of the sacred writer (Alford). There is a striking similarity between the name Japheth and the Iapetus, which the Greeks and Romans regarded as the progenitor of the human race.Gomer] This name has been traced to the Cimmerians of Homer, and also to the Cymry, the national name of the Welsh. The name occurs in the Cimmerian Bosphorusthe Crimea. This people inhabited the N.W. portion of Japheths territory; they are mentioned in Eze. 38:6.Magog] Identified with the Scythiansgenerally the north-eastern nations. The chief people in the army of Gog (Eze. 38:2-3; Eze. 39:1) is Rosh, that is, the Rossi, or Russians (Knobel).Madai] The Medes, inhabiting the S. and S.W. They became incorporated in the Persian Empire, hence the two nations are spoken of together.Javan] The Ionians, or Greeks.Tubal and Meshech] These names frequently occur together in the Old Testament. They are supposed to be identical with the Tiberians, inhabiting Pontus and the districts of Asia Minor generally.Tiras] Probably the Thracians, dwellers on the River Tiras, or Dniester.
Gen. 10:3. Ashkenaz] Some suppose this name to designate the Asen race, which is said to be the origin of the Germans. It is somewhat remarkable that the Jews, to this day, call Germany Askenaz (Alford).Riphath] Probably the Celts, who dwelt originally on the Riphan, or Carpathian mountains.Togarmah] The Arminians, whose first king was named Thorgom, and who still call themselves the House of Thorgom.
Gen. 10:4. Elishah] Josephus and Knobel suppose that the olians are represented; others have traced the name to Hellas.Tarshish] The Tyrseni, or Etruscans, colonised the east and south of Spain, and north of Italy.Kittim] The original inhabitants of Cyprus, whose ancient capital was Citium, an old Greek town. Alexander the Great is said to have come out of the land of Chittim (1Ma. 1:1; 1Ma. 8:5).Dodanim] The Dardanians, who in historic times inhabited Illyrium and Troy.
Gen. 10:5. The isles of the Gentiles] would appear to include the coast of the Mediterranean. The word signifies not only island, but also any maritime tracts. The notice in this verse must evidently be regarded as anticipatory of chapter Gen. 11:1 (Alford), The Jews applied the word, besides its strict sense, also to describe those countries which could only be conveniently reached by water.Every one after his tongue] Thus clearly evincing that this dispersion took place after the confusion of tongues, though related before it (Bush).
Gen. 10:6. Cush] This name designates the Ethiopians, also including the Southern Asiatics. Cush is generally rendered Ethiopia in the A. V.Mizraim] The O.T. name for Egypt or the Egyptians.
Gen. 10:7. Saba] Meroe-Ethiopians living from Elephantine to Meroe. The prophets represent the accession of Seba to the Church of God as one of the glories of the latter-day triumphs (Psa. 72:10).Candace seems to have been the queen of this region (Act. 8:27.Jacobus.)Sheba] The Sabeans, dwelling on shores of the Persian Gulf. They are referred to as men of stature and of commercial importance, in Isa. 45:14-18. And Cush begat Nimrod] The historian here turns aside from the list of nations to notice the origin of the first great empires that were established on the earth. Of the sons of Cush, one is here noted as the first potentate in history (Jacobus). The occurrence of the name Jehovah marks the insertion as due to the Jehovist supplementer (Alford).A mighty one in the earth] A heroa conquerorthe first founder of an empire.
Gen. 10:9. He was a mighty hunter] Taken in its primary sense, that this great conqueror was also a great follower of the chase, a pursuit which, as Delitzch remarks, has remained to this day, true to its origin, the favourite pleasure of tyrants (Alford).Before the Lord] An expression denoting his eminent greatness. Some suppose that it refers to his defiance of Jehovah, and this interpretation is favoured by the meaning of his namelet us rebel.
Gen. 10:10. The beginning of his kingdom] The first theatre of his sovereignty.Babel] Babylon.
Gen. 10:11. Out of the land went forth Asshur] A more probable rendering is, He came forth to Asshur, i.e., he extended his conquests from Shinar.
Gen. 10:12. The same is a great city] Knobel refers this to the whole four just mentioned, Nineveh, Rehoboth, Calah, and Resen; these four places are the site which is named the great city, viz., Nineveh in the wider sense. See Jon. 4:11; Jon. 3:3 (Alford).
Gen. 10:13-20. A continuation of the sons of Ham]
Gen. 10:21. The father of all the children of Eber] This declaration calls attention beforehand to the fact, that in the sons of Eber the Shemetic line of the descendants of Abraham separates again in Peleg, namely, from Joktan, or his Arabian descendants (Lange).
Gen. 10:25. In his days was the earth divided] These words have given rise to much speculation, but the more probable opinion is that they refer to the incident described in ch. 11.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPHSGen. 10:1-32
THE FIRST ETHNOLOGICAL TABLE
Many readers might be disposed to undervalue a chapter like this, since it is but a collection of namessome of which are quite unknownand is made up of barren details promising little material for profitable reflection. Yet a thoughtful reader will be interested here, and discover the germs and suggestions of great truths; for the subject is man, and man, too, considered in reference to Gods great purpose in the government of the world. This chapter is as essential to an understanding of the Bible, and of history in general, as is Homers catalogue, in the second book of the Iliad, to a true knowledge of the Homeric poems and the Homeric times. The Biblical student can no more undervalue the one than the classical student the other. (Dr. T. Lewis, in Langes Genesis.) Let us consider what are the chief characteristics and lessons of this, the oldest ethnological table in all literature.
I. It is marked by the features of a truthful record.
1. It is not vague and general, but descends to particulars. The forgers offictitious documents seldom run the risk of scattering the names of persons and places freely over their page. That would expose them to detection. Hence those who write with fraudulent design deal in what is vague and general. This chapter mentions particulars of names and places, and, in this regard, has the marks of a genuine record. Heathen literature does not furnish so wide and universal a register. One cause why that literature is so deficient in documents of this nature lies in the fact that each heathen nation was shut up within itself, having little relations with others except those of trade and war. But this chapter is framed on a wider basis, is concerned with all races of men, however diversified, and contemplates the human family as having an essential unity under all possible varieties of character and external conditions.
2. Heathen literature when dealing with the origin of nations employs extravagant language. The early annals of all nations, except the Jews, run at length intofable, or else pretend to a most incredible antiquity. National vanity would account for such devices and for the willingness to receive them. The Jews had the same temptations to indulge in this kind of vanity as the other nations around them. It is therefore a remarkable circumstance that they pretend to no fabulous antiquity. We are shut up to the conclusion that their sacred records grew up under the special care of Providence, and were preserved from the common infirmities of merely human authorship. The sober statements of this chapter regarding the origin of nations is a presumption of their truth.
3. Here we have the ground-plan of all history. The physical, intellectual, moral, social, and religious forces represented here sufficiently account for all subsequent history. We have, in this sacred portion of history, a light to guide and inform us over those tracts of time where the records of other nations leave us in darkness. We learn further
II. That history has its basis in that of individual men. We speak of Gods relations to humanity, of the history of the world; but it will be found that this ultimately resolves itself into the history of individual men, who represent social and moral forces which have determined the currents of events. We find that Gods successive revelations were made to depend upon the characters of individual men. The revelation of salvation itself ever tends to take this form. God did not reveal His plans of mercy, in their ever-expanding outline and detail, to large bodies of men, but to individuals whom He deemed worthy of such sacred communications. It is not therefore strange that single human lives occupy so large a portion of Scripture. All history was to issue in One who would be the flower of humanity; and in whom alone the race could be contemplated with any joy of hope. The general lesson of this chapter is plain, namely, that no man can go to the bottom of history who does not study the lives of those men who have made that history what it is.
III. That man is the central figure in Scripture. The Bible differs, in one important feature, from the sacred books of other nations. They lose themselves in endless theories and speculations concerning the origin of the material universe. They have minute and elaborately detailed systems of cosmogony, geography, and astronomy. Hence the advance of the human mind in natural knowledge must be fatal to their authority. But the Bible commits itself to no detailed description of the laws and phenomena of nature. One short chapter in it is deemed sufficient to tell us that God made the heavens and the earth. The world is only considered as it is a habitation for man, and the platform on which the Supreme works out His great designs. Man is regarded in Scripture not merely as part of the furniture of this planet, but as lord of all. Everything is put under his feet. Hence the sacred records describe a God of men rather than a God of nature. They give a history of man as distinct from nature. Infidels have made this characteristic of revelation a matter of reproach; but all who know how rich Gods purpose towards mankind is, glory in it, and believe that great things must be in store for a race which has occupied so much of the Divine regard.
IV. The progressive movement of history towards an end. No history is marked by signs of living power that does not advance towards some great and noble end. In the highest things, how aimless have been the histories of the chief nations of mankind! Some particulars of Bible history may be regarded as unimportant, and even contemptible, when compared with the more stately and dignified records of the nations around; yet they show the onward march of humanity towards an end. They show how that humanity was gravitating towards its centre in Shem, Abraham, and Christ. How soon does the sacred history leave many of the great names recorded heresome of them founders of great empires; and important forces, as the world accountsand proceeds to the delineation of individual lives which in the grey dawn and morning of the world reflect the light of the Sun of Righteousness! The great nations of the earth are afterwards little noticed, except when for a moment they are brought into some relation with the chosen people. The reason of this peculiarity is, that the Bible is not a world-history, but a history of the kingdom of God. All the interest centres successively in one people, tribe, and family; then in one who was to come out of that family, bringing redemption for mankind. Salvation is of the Jews. The noblest idea of history is only realised in the Bible. Those of the world had no living Word of God to inspire that idea. That book can scarcely be regarded as of human origin which passes by the great things of the world, and lingers with the man who believed in God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE CHAPTER
In this chapter we see the origin of many nations in all parts of the world, and therefore the power of the blessing which God, after the flood, had renewed to men in respect to their multiplying and propagation; and so, finally, we learn the fathers from whom Christ was born according to the flesh. Neither Noah nor his sons begat any offspring during the time of the flood. The same may be conjectured to be true of the animals which were shut up with him in a dark dungeon, and as it were in the midst of death.(Starke.)
In this outline of the history of all nations, we have a suggestion of the universality of Gods gracious purposes towards mankind. Heaven will draw inhabitants from every kingdom, people, nation, and tongue.
The relation between the history of Gods kingdom and the world-history:
1. The contrast;
2. the connection;
3. the unity (in its wider sense is the whole worlds history a history of the kingdom of God).(Lange.)
The fifth document relates to the generations of the sons of Noah. It presents first a genealogy of the nations, and then an account of the distribution of mankind into nations, and their dispersion over the earth. This is the last section which treats historically of the whole human race. Only in incidental, didactic, or prophetic passages do we again meet with mankind as a whole in the Old Testament.(Murphy.)
This chapter illustrates one stage of advance in the development of the human race. The family grows into the nation. The history reaches from Noah to Abraham, who is the representative of all the children of faith. Hence arises the Church, the highest form of life, the home for all mankind, however diversified in country, race, or tongue.
Though the race of man, as a whole, now disappears from the sacred page, yet in the progress of Gods revelation to man we are led on to Christ, in whom all things and men that have been sundered and scattered shall be gathered together.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON SPECIAL PORTIONS
Gen. 10:1. Note the connection of this with the former history. Noah had prophesied before concerning all his sons, and then was added his expiration, the Spirit meaning to speak no more of him: but now, that being done, He proceeds to show the persons and posterity upon whom all these words were to be fulfilled. Gods word must not fall to the ground. Gods prophecies and performances are joined together in His word, so they should be in our faith and observation.(Hughes.)
Gen. 10:5. The Scripture, foreseeing that Europe would, from the first, embrace the Gospel, and for many ages be the principal seat of its operations, the Messiah Himself is introduced by Isaiah as addressing Himself to its inhabitantsListen, O isles, unto Me; and hearken ye people from afar. Jehovah hath called Me from the womb, and hath said unto Me, It is a light thing that Thou shouldest be My servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob. I will also give Thee for a light to the Gentiles, that Thou shouldest be My salvation to the end of the earth (Is. 49:1-6). Here we see not only the first peopling of our native country, but the kind remembrance of us in the way of mercy, and this, though far removed the means of salvation. What a call is this to us who occupy what is denominated the end of the earth, to be thankful for the Gospel, and to listen to the sweet accents of the Saviours voice.(Fuller.)
It was Gods plan that men should be divided and dispersed all over the earth, and He has Himself determined the bounds of their habitation.
In their nations. We note here the characteristics of a nation
1. It is descended from one head. Others may be occasionally grafted on the original stock by inter-marriage. But there is a vital union subsisting between all the members and the head, in consequence of which the name of the head is applied to the whole body of the nation.
2. A nation has a country or land which it calls its own. In the necessary migrations of ancient tribes, the new territories appropriated by the tribe, or any part of it, were naturally called by the old name, or some other name belonging to the old country.
3. A nation has its own tongue. This constitutes at once its unity in itself, and its separation from others. Many of the nations in the table may have spoken cognate tongues, or even originally the same tongue. But it is a uniform law that one nation has only one speech within itself.
4. A nation is composed of many families, clans, or tribes. These branch off from the nation in the same manner as it did from the parent stock of the race.(Murphy.)
Gen. 10:9. The original term for hunting occurs elsewhere, not so much in reference to the pursuit of game in the forest, as to a violent invasion of the persons and rights of men. Thus 1Sa. 24:11, Thou huntest my soul (i.e. my life) to take it. This usage undoubtedly affords us a key to Nimrods true character; though probably, like most of the heroes of remote classical antiquity, addicted to the hunting of wild beasts; yet his bold, aspiring, arrogant spirit rested not content with this mode of displaying his prowess. With the band of adventurous and lawless spirits which his predatory skill had gathered around him, he proceeded gradually from hunting beasts to assaulting, oppressing, and subjugating his fellow-men. That the inhuman practice of war, at least in the ages after the flood, originated with this daring usurper, is in the highest degree probable.
Proud Nimrod first the bloody chase began,
A mighty hunterand his prey was man.
(Bush).
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY THE
REV. WM. ADAMSON
Scripture Strata! Gen. 10:1-31.
(1) Geologists have found great truths embedded in the earths strata. Enduring traces left behind by the eruption of the volcano and the tranquil lapse of the waves on the beachfaint but indelible footprints of creatures which crawled over the soft mudripple marks of primeval seas whose murmurs passed into silence countless ages agocircular and oval hollows produced by showers of rain which no eye witnessed, and which fell on no waving cornfield or flowery meadowimpressions caused by viewless winds indicating the strength of their currents and the direction in which they moved; all these have taught great scientific truths.
(2) Is the Book of Revelationwith its strata pregnant of the annals of the human racedifferent, in this respect, from the Book of Nature? Both are by the same author, and just as the student of the geological strata reasons, as well as infers from his records, so may the student of the Scripture strata reason and infer from his annals. The names here are full of significance. They are the ripple marks telling of tides of human thought and actionimpressions caused by the currents of human conception and purpose under the great wonder-working God!
O strange mosaic! wondrously inlaid
Are all its depths of shade,
With beauteous stones of promise, marbles fair.
Toldoth Beni Noah! Gen. 10:1-32. (l) Rawlinson says that this genealogy of the sons of Noah is the most authentic record that we possess for the affiliation of nations. Kalisch says that it is an unparalleled listthe combined result of reflection and deep research, and no less valuable as a historical document than as a lasting proof of the brilliant capacity of the Hebrew mind.
(2) It is indisputable that the majority of scientific ethnologists regard this record as of the very highest value. Ethnological science has established a triple division of mankind, and speaks of all races as either Semitic, Aryan, or Turanian. And certainly Genesis 10 may be regarded as a document furnishing an ethnological arrangement of mankind under three heads.
(3) The particular allotment, or portion of each, after their families, &c., is distinctly specified. And although the different nations descended from any one of the sons of Noah have intermingled with each other, and undergone many revolutionseven as the various strata of the earth have been dislocated, and undergone convulsionsyet the three great divisions of the world remain intact and distinct, as separately peopled and possessed of the posterity of each of the sons of Noah, by the holy will and wisdom of Him whose purpose is fixed, and whose counsel shall stand, to make all things new.
Is blessing built upon such dark foundation!
And can a temple rising from such woe,
Rising upon such mournful crypts below,
Be filled with light and joy and sounding adoration?
Human Unity! Gen. 10:1.
(1) Humboldt funishes an interesting suggestion as to the unity of the human race. In a letter to Dr. Ahrendt at Guatemala, he asks whether the idols Bhudda in India, Woden in Western Europe, and Votan in Central Americaall of which gave name to the Wednesday of the weekare not the same, evidencing most distinctly a unity of origin.
(2) Forbes and Pickering have apparently established the fact that, in regard to the animal and vegetable families, these have not been created in particular centres, and that Nature has not reproduced any species in different quarters of the globe. It may, therefore, be reasonably inferred that different human races have not been created in different centres.
(3) The unity of the human race, as detailed in Genesis 10, may further be inferred from the scientific discovery that there is a marked similarity between the blood corpuscles of all races of men, and that, as Ragg remarks, while blood has been transfused from human veins without failure, a transfusion from different species to man has invariably proved fatal. And
Now this truth is feltbelieved and felt
That men are really of one common stock;
That no man ever hath been more than man.Pollock.
Human Diversity! Gen. 10:1.
(1) It has been argued that when God, who from the beginning determined the bounds of mans habitation, parcelled out the earth among the sons of Noah, it is reasonable to conceive that He gave them an adaptation to the portions He allotted them, or endued them with an unusually plastic power, by which the race of Ham became indigenous in Africa, the race of Shem in Asia, and that of Japhet in Europes colder clime.
(2) One fact in support of this argument may be drawn from the adaptation of all animal and vegetable matter to their respective peculiar spheres and purposes. Geology has discovered to us that each new and successive creation formed a harmonious part of the great whole. Yet how diversified they each and all area diversity explicable to students of Nature by law of preadaptation.
(3) It has been remarked over and over again that there is no exception to this range of adaptation; so that we may fairly include the Shem, Ham, and Japhet diversities. And when we remember that there is no indication in any quarter of separate creations, we realise the grand Scripture assertion of human originas of all creation
Shade unperceived, so softening into shade,
And all so forming one harmonious whole.Ragg.
Human Origin! Gen. 10:1. Shem, Ham, and Japhet were brethren, yet how different the races of the three originals. Is the Scripture record wrong? or has climate produced the remarkable diversity of hue, etc.? Most careful investigation has established the fact that the differences arise from differences in climate.
(1) Ragg says that it has been found that, in a very few generations, the fair European of Shemetic or Japetan race became dark within the tropics. Bishop Heber says that the descendants of Europeans in India have totally changed their colour, though they have not lived as exposed to the influences of the sun as uncivilised or barbarian races. Dr. Wiseman shows that the Portuguese who have been naturalised in the African colonies of their nation have become entirely black.
(2) This is observable in the Jews. In the plains of the Ganges the Jew puts on the jet black skin and crisped hair of the native Hindoo. In milder climates he wears the natural dusky hue and dark hair of the inhabitant of Syria. Under the cooler sky of Poland and Germany he assumes the light hair and fair, ruddy complexion of the Anglo-Saxon. Smythe says that on the Malabar coast of Hindostan are two colonies of Jewsthe elder colony black, and the younger comparatively fair, in exact proportion to the length of their sojourn there.
Amazing race! deprived of land and laws,
A general language, and a public cause;
With a religion none can now obey,
With a reproach that none can take away.Crabbe.
Heathen History! Gen. 10:2-30.
(1) The history of almost all ancient peoples show, at their commencement, a number of mythological stories, as in Greece, Rome, and Britain, which are of great interest in regard to any inquiries into their origin and early history. There are traces of a large and singularly rich collection of these legends, both in Assyria and in Babylonia. A good example of such documents is the cuneiform account of the descent of the goddess Ishtar into Hadesshe who conceived an ardent passion for Nimrod. The whole account is most curious, as showing the religious opinions of that age; and the story has some striking parallels in the poems and legendary stories of other and later countries.
(2) Contrast all these heathen histories with the unique Sacred History. Legends and portents there are none. The history of the origin of nations is unrivalled for its stern simplicityits freedom from all wonderful details. Free and natural as the plan of a river, it begins at the source in Noah, and flows on in quiet, easy course, with an entire absence of all portents and prodigies, such as make heathen history ridiculous even to children.
They, and they only, amongst all mankind,
Received the transcript of the Eternal Mind;
Were trusted with His own engraven laws,
And constituted guardians of His cause.Cowper.
Bible Annals! Gen. 10:2-31.
(1) An eminent professor says that there are glories in the Bible on which the eye of man has not gazed sufficiently long to admire them. There are notes struck in places which, like some discoveries of science, have sounded before their time, and only after many days been caught up, and found a response on the earth. There are germs of truth which, after thousands of years, have never yet taken root in the world.
(2) Jukes remarks on the names here that in them we have the true theory of development, given by One who cannot lie, and given for our learning and instruction in righteousness. It would be full of deepest interest to trace the course of these different families through their successive generations. For in them (he thinks) is prefigured the parentage and birth of every sect and heresy which has sprung up, and troubled the bosom of the regenerate Church; and which
As prowls a pack of lean and hungry wolves,
Driven by fierce winter from Siberian steppes,
Around a camps bright flashing fires, have fixd
Their ravenous glances on the Bride of Christ.
Life Architecture! Gen. 10:2-14.
(1) Carlyle remarks that, instead of saying that man is the creature of circumstance, it would be nearer the mark to say that man is the architect of circumstance. It is character that builds an existence out of circumstance. Thus it is that in the same family, in the same circumstances, one man rears a stately edifice, while his brother, vacillating and incompetent, lives in a hovel. The block of granite, which was an obstacle in the pathway of the weak, becomes a stepping-stone in the pathway of the strong.
(2) The Hamertons were brothers; both were nearly of an age, and both were brought up in the same home. In due time both attended the same seminary, and both entered upon the theatre of life under parallel advantages and disadvantages. The elder was of ordinary mind, liked by the world for his frank, openhanded spirit, but entirely void of energy, fixedness of purpose and forethought. The younger resolutely set himself to establish a name and a fame, and he succeeded. The difficulties which seemed to the elder colossal and insurmountable became steps of a staircase up which the younger climbed.
(3) Nimrod, a man of immense ambition, and endured with a resolute mind firm as iron, soon began to tower above his fellows. In Carlyles sense, he became the architect of circumstancebuilding upon the foundation of pride a huge fabric of power, which held in awe his foes, and secured the admiration of his friends. Yet of him and others we may ask
Where are the heroes of the ages past?
Where the brave chieftains, where the mighty ones
Who flourished in the infancy of days?
All to the grave gone down.White.
Church and World! Gen. 10:2-31. From the very first we seem to have two divisions of men. These the Judge is marking off, as the shepherd divideth the sheep from the goats. Before the Deluge, we had the distinct divisions of men in the persons of Cain and SethLamech and Enoch. We may call these the Church and the World. The Church is that body which is chosen and separated by God
(1) to testify to things unseen, to the existence of GodHis lovepowerjudgment; and
(2) to teach men that the world which is passeth away. The World is that spirit which loves nothing, and looks for nothing save that which is now. It cares not for God, neither has God in all its thoughts. It recognises only things which are visible, and esteems the invisible as empty shadow and dreamland. Under its deadly prince, it is ever against the Church,
Weaving its snares, and plying arts to draw
From Gods allegiance all the sons of men,
And so to reign without a rival there
The whole round earth its theme for ever.
Gomer! Gen. 10:2. Japhets eldest son seems to have gone to the shores around the Sea of Azof, especially the peninsula. His children were called Cimmerians, and the name of the Crimea is a relic. That place was thought then to be next door to the infernal regions. It was supposed that the people could not see much of the sun because of the clouds and mists of their savage country. Here Gomers children dwelt until the Scythians drove them west. They took possession of Denmark, and the northern coast of Germany and Belgium, until, in the time of the Romans, they were known as the Cimbri. They crossed over into Britain, but were driven to the north and west, i.e., Wales and Scotland. Here came the truth of Christ to them.
And then, oer all the trouble of their day,
A downy veil of tranquil stillness stole,
And with TRUTHS arm beneath their head they feel
It is GODS heart on which they rest so safe.Williams.
Magog! Gen. 10:2.
(1) The children of Magog were the wild hordes of men who inhabited Northern Asia; beginning at the east of the Caspian Sea, and spreading north and north-east into the cold and savage regions of those parts. They were the Scythians, a terrible and fierce people. They were said to be the inventors of the bow and arrow, and they were great at the use of them on horseback. Just prior to the time of Ezekiel, the Scythiansor children of Magogwere driven out by another tribe. Going southward, they spread terror everywhere.
(2) Ezekiel took them as a type of the foes of the church. In his awful predictions of Gog and Magog he foretells with what an overthrow the Lord would destroy them. In the latter days the Church should suffer terribly from their cruel, fierce incursions. Magog thus typifies the great adversaries of the Church at the dawn and dusk of the Millennial eventide. Two woeful invasions is that Church to know; but the authors of each of them are to experience a corresponding woeful overthrow, when nearer and nearer still
The rush of flaming millions, and the tramp
Like as of fiery chivalry. But, hark!
A voice; it is the shout of God. Behold!
A light; it is the glory of the Lord.Bickersteth.
Madai! Gen. 10:2. The father of the Medesamong the bitterest enemies of Assyria. They lived on the other side of the Zagros range, which separated them from the Assyrians. A hardy race of tribes, governed by sheikhs. They were united by Cyaxares the Great into one kingdom. He then conquered Assyria; so that the children of Madai became the third great Eastern empire. The northern part was, and still is, a fine fertile country, with a temperate climate. It grows all kinds of corn, wine, silk, and delicious fruits. Tabreez is a beautiful placea forest of orchards. Farther south there is a lovely mountainous country, where everything growscotton, Indian corn, tobacco, wheat, wine, and every variety of fruit. These sweet glimpses of Natures beauty and fruitfulness send us
(1) back to the time when all the earth was fair, and
(2) forward to the time when the earth shall be again an Eden.
And Nature haste her earliest wreaths to bring,
With all the incense of the breathing spring!
When vines a shadow to our race shall yield,
When the same hand that sowed shall reap the field,
When leafless shrubs the flowery palms succeed,
And odorous myrtle to the noisome weed.Pope.
Hamites! Gen. 10:6-14. The Cushites were in Ethiopiathe children of Mizraim in Egyptthe descendants of Phut also in Egypt and Ethiopiaand the offspring of Canaan in Syria. All these became great nations. They established themselves in great power. They had arts and accomplishments superior to other peoples at that day. Homes of civilisation grew up from a Hamite stock in many a place. They were merchants and builders, and people of great ability in forming and establishing empire. Wherever they were they left traces of themselves. Very massive pieces of architecture, which once must have belonged to a magnificent nation; a peculiar mixture of language; and a native religion in part, at least, of low creature-worshipall these are before us. On our Thames Embankment rises a monument of the race of Ham, in the shape of Cleopatras Needle; while towering amid natures desolation in Egypt are the pyramidsthose silent records
Those deathless monuments which alone do show
What, and how great, the Mizraite empire was.
Human Helplessness! Gen. 10:8-14.
(1) Kingsley says, that men in the mass are the tools of circumstance. They are thistle-down on the breezestraw on the river. Their course is shaped for them by the currents and eddies of the stream of life. This was not what man was meant to be; and in proportion as he approaches the Divine ideal does he cease to be the mere tool of circumstance. In proportion as he recovers his humanityboth physically and psychicallyin proportion does he rise above circumstance, moulding and fashioning circumstance to suit his purpose.
(2) This explains the rise of such men from among the mass as Nimrod, Csar, and Napoleon, in the sphere of ambition and conquest. And the same key unlocks many a cabinet in the halls of science and artlearning and commerce. This power Divine grace lays hold uponrefines and sanctifies it, so that the Christian becomes a marked man among his fellowseminent not for conquest over others so much as over himself, and distinguished by the loftiest of all ambitions to become conformed to the image of God. With such, ambition becomes a virtue: and at last around his brow shall shine
In heaven from glorys source the purest beam,
Whose aspect here, with beauty most divine,
Reflects the image of the Good Supreme.Mant.
Nimrod-Myths! Gen. 10:9.
(1) By the Greek mythologists Orion was supposed to be a celebrated hunter, superior to the rest of mankind in strength and stature, whose mighty deeds entitled him after death to the honours of an apotheosis. The Orientals imagined him to be a huge giant who, Titan-like, had warred against God, and was therefore bound in chains to the firmament of heaven. Some authors have conjectured that this notion is the origin of the history of Nimrod, who, according to Jewish tradition, instigated the descendants of Noah to build the Tower of Babel.
(2) In the cuneiform tablets or Chaldean legends, deciphered by Smith, there are some curious details about him. These details are loaded with miraculous and impossible stories, from which it is impossible to separate the historical matter. He is reported to have been a Babylonian chief, celebrated for his prowess. He was also a mighty hunter and ruler of men, who delivered the city of Erech, when the chief of a neighbouring race came down with a force of men and ships against it. He afterwards ruled over it.
Here Nimrod, his empire raised supreme,
And empire out of ruined empire built;
His greater than the last, and worse by far.
Supremacy! Gen. 10:9.
1. Nimrod exalts himself to lord it over brethren; for of those over whom he ruled all had sprungand within a few generationsfrom one common father. Little is told us of the second form of apostasy; but that little is enough, and indeed, the steps by which lordship over brethren is reached are not many. Jukes asserts that his very name (Rebel) points out the character of those actings, by which the family and patriarchial government instituted by God was changed into a kingdom ruled by violence. There appears to be two steps here:
(1) Nimrod becomes a mighty one, then
(2) he becomes a mighty hunter of beasts and men.
2. It was so in Israel, when that people desired a king. Saul became a mighty one; then followed the natural sequence in the descent of evil, and he became a mighty hunter. Nimrod again appeared after the resurrection of Christ. Rome began to be mightylike Nimrod and Saul to grow up tall and towering trunks above its fellow-churches. Then as the trunk spreads forth its branches over smaller surrounding trees, Rome became a mighty hunter. Spiritual dominion became a spirit of dominationhunting soulsimposing a grievous yoke upon them. See Revelation 13 : where the arch-adversary is represented as building for his harlot bride a mystical metropolis
The haunt of devils, Babylon the Great,
Whence in her pride and pomp she might allure
The nations, as the peerless queen of heaven,
Mother and mistress of all lands.Bickersteth.
Erech! Gen. 10:10.
(1) Wurka is a vast mound, now called Assagah, or the place of pebbles. It was probably a city consecrated to the moon, i.e., a kind of necropolis. Great numbers of tombs and coffins have been found here. The arrow-headed account of the Flood, recently discovered and translated by Smith, was a copy of an original inscription at this place. Thus the existence of this city thousands of years ago is established by the discovery of tiles or slabs in its neighbourhood at this date, recording the fact of the Flood in Genesis 9.
(2) As of Nineveh, so may we not Say of Erech, that it remained quiet in its sepulchre, till an age like the present, when the reality of its evidence to the truth of revelation could be properly attested. He who is natures Creator and Preserver has kept Erech and other ruins hermetically sealed to give evidence to the truth of His Word in an age when that evidence cannot be lost, and when that Word in its truth is called in question. So great is His power, wisdom, and goodness!
Some are filled with fairy pictures,
Half imagined and half seen;
Radiant faces, fretted towers,
Sunset colours, starry flowers,
Wondrous arabesques between.Havergal.
Nimrod Memorials! Gen. 10:10. Nimrods name still lives in the mouths of the Arabs. A traveller says, I shall not soon forget when I first heard his name from one of them. We were going down the Tigris on a raft. Towards eveningone pleasant evening in springwe came near an immense heap of ruins on the eastern bank of the river. It was all green then, as the Assyrian ruins are after the great rains. The mound and meadows around this ruin were all fresh and green, and full of flowers of every colour. The ruins looked very like a natural hill, but for the pieces of pottery, and brick, and alabaster half hid among the grass. The river was swollen from the rain, and rushed along rather furiously. A sort of dama large piece of mason workstretched across it. Over this, and around, the waters whirled and eddied, and made a tolerably large cataract. We went over safely with a dash. My Arab boatman then went through his religious exclamations, which the danger had called up; after which he told me that the dam had been built by Nimrod, and that it was the remains of a causeway which he had to enable him to pass from his city to a palace on the opposite bank.
Ah! who that walks where men of ancient days
Have wrought, with godlike arm, the deeds of praise,
Feels not the spirit of the place control,
Or rouse and agitate his labouring soul?Wordsworth.
World-Powers! Gen. 10:10.
(1) As the Apostle stands on the sands of Patmosthe waves of the gean sea rolling at his feethe sees emerging from the bosom of the deep a hideous monstersomewhat akin to, yet differing from the great red dragon. This new fiendish incarnation, Macduff notes, has seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. These heads and horns are the well known symbols of world powerindicating a mighty hunter, a Nimrod.
(2) Presently, another beast rises from the eartha giant deceiver, and exacting homage from them which dwell on the earth. The previous monster of the sea was the representative of brute force; this monster of the land is that of moral despotism. Its weapons are moral and spiritual. Its subject and crouching victims are the depraved intellectthe enslaved consciencethe fettered will of nations and men. Material and moral, physical and psychichal antitypes of Nimrod.
Couching its fell designs in lamblike guise,
It sent through earth its legionary spirits,
And led the shepherds of the silly sheep
Blindfold, and blinding others, to adore
The beast, whose deadly wound was healed.
Asshur! Gen. 10:11-12, etc. Heeren in his Handbook of the History of States remarks that history properi.e., the history of States first dawns upon us in the Genesis 10. In Gen. 10:11, etc., we are told that Asshur, having previously dwelt in Babylon, went out before the Cushites, and founded the great Assyrian cities. This leads us to infer that the Assyrians, having been originally inhabitants of the low country, emigrated northwards, leaving their previous seats to a people of a different origin. And thus we are drawn to conclude
(1) that Babylon was built before Nineveh;
(2) that Babylon did not, as Diodorus asserts, owe its origin to the conquest of the country by an Assyrian princess; but that
(3) the early Babylonians were an entirely distinct race from the Assyrians; and that
(4) a Babylonian kingdom flourished before there was any independent Assyria. It is interesting to notice, as Loftus points out, that the spread of Asshurs raceafter leaving Babyloniais northwards stage by stage, Asshur, Calah, Nineveh. The Book of Nahum is assuredly prophetic of the destruction of Nineveh. According to him, Nineveh was not only to be destroyed by an overflowing flood, but the fire also was to devour it. Heathen historyignorant of holy prophecydeclares such was the case. Lately, the buried arts of the Assyrian have been recovered from beneath the dust; as may be learned from Layards Nineveh. It discloses that God is the Lord of Hosts, and that all the vain glories of the proudest mortals perish at His word.
Cities have been, and vanished, fanes have sunk,
Heaped into shapeless ruin, sands oerspread
Fields that were Eden.Percival.
Divine Methods! Gen. 10:21.
(1) In Cana, the governor of the feast addressing the bridegroom admits that it is mans ordinary course to bring forth the best wine, and afterwards that which is of inferior quality. That admission is true, if we are to accept the records of universal history down to our own days. Man invariably puts the best fruit uppermostbrings the best robe forth at the beginning.
(2) God acts otherwise. It is His ordinary way to keep the best to the last. Hence in Genesis, chaps 4 and 5, we have first Cains line, then that of Seth. Again in Genesis, Genesis 25, we have the descendants of Ishmael, and then those of Isaac. Yet again in Genesis, chaps. 36 and 37, we have the detail first of Esaus family, and afterwards that of Jacobs. And so here, the Holy Spirit gives us first the families of Japhet and of Ham, then that of Shem. This is explained in Deuteronomy 32, 8, The Lords portion is His people.
Holy, Father, we poor lambkins
Out of bitter woe do bleat;
Strong men drive us oer the mountains,
Sharpest stones do pierce our feet.Sadie.
Study of Humanity! Gen. 10:32.
(1) It has been noticed that the more extensive our acquaintance becomes with other countries, the more numerous do we find the features which they possess in common with our own. We find the representative forms of life and dead matter which they possess to be in common with each other. In foreign countries what strikes the traveller most at first sight isnot the strange, butthe familiar look of the general landscape. And when the naturalist begins to investigate he finds that the longer and deeper his researches, the more and more numerous and striking are the resemblances of those forms of life to those in his own country.
(2) This similarity is not confined to the different regions of our earth alone. Science is showing to us, more and more every day, that the substances of the stars are identical with those of our globe. Pritchard, in reference to spectrum analysis, says that it has not yet discovered in the remotest stellar ray a single new or unknown element. The meteors which fall are of the same constituents as our earth. Tis distance only that makes them stars.
(3) It is precisely the same with the study of man. The more the different human races are studied the more numerous and striking are the similarities of each and all, one to the other. So far from careful investigation and prolonged study contributing to widen the narrow spaces between the different races, they only reveal more connecting links than were supposed to exist between the offspring of Shem, Ham, and Japhet, and show us
How God wrought with the wholewrought most with what
To man seemed weakest means, and brought result
Of good from good and evil both.Pollok.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
PART TWENTY-THREE:
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE NATIONS
(Gen. 10:1-32)
1. The Families of Noah (Gen. 10:1).
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, namely, of Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.
It seems that Noah gave to Shem and Japheth, by prophetic insight of course, the names that would be descriptive of their respective destinies: Shem (name, renown, because Yahweh would be his God in a special sense), Japheth wide-spreading, enlargement, with widespread occupancy of the earth and accompanying civil power, and by sharing ultimately the spiritual blessings of the Line of Shem. As for Ham, his name is usually rendered dark-colored; however, the etymology is said to be uncertain. As a matter of fact, it is difficult to identify the various ethnic groups that were, or are, associated with this progenitor and his name. Anthropological classifications in our day do not recognize a specific Hamitic Line. It is noteworthy, however, that a surprising number of the names listed in Chapter x. have been reliably identified, as we shall see below.
2. The Table of Nations
This is the name usually given to the content of this chapter. The word nation is best defined as a specific ethnic group or people. Hence, we are correct in speaking of the United States as the melting-pot of nations.
Note well (JB, 25): In the form of a genealogical tree this chapter draws up a Table of Peoples; the principle behind the classification is not so much racial affinity as historical and geographical relationship. The sons of Japheth inhabit Asia Minor and the Mediterranean islands, the sons of Ham people the lands of the south, Egypt, Ethiopia, Arabia, to which is added Canaan in memory of the time when she was Egypts satellite. In the regions between these two groups live the sons of Shem: Elamites, Assyrians, Aramaeans, and the ancestors of the Hebrews. . . . This table sums up such knowledge of the inhabited world as Israel would possess in Solomons time and asserts the unity of the human race which, from a common stock, has split up into various groups, Pfeiffer (BBA, 37): The Table is arranged in climactic form. The first reference is to the Japhetic peoples who occupied Europe and parts of Asia. These were the people most remote from Biblical Israel. The Hamitic peoples of Asia and Africa were given second place. Many of these had close contacts with the Israelites. Semitic history, of which the family of Abraham is a conspicuous part, is presented last.
3. The Trend of the Narrative
It is evident that the writer of Genesis (Moses), in setting forth the account of mans original temptation and fall, and his degeneracy into universal wickedness as a result of the intermingling of the pious Sethites with the irreligious Cainites, was not only leading up to the narrative of the Flood, but also was pointing the finger of inspiration to another pivotal event in the unfolding of the Scheme of Redemption, namely, the giving of the Law. This purpose becomes more apparent in the ninth and tenth chapters of the book. The ninth chapter gives us the story of the beginning of the new world-order, and specific mention of the laws against the eating of blood, and against murder. The tenth deals with the dispersion and settlement of the descendants of Shem, Ham and Japheth, which followed of course the confusion of tongues at Babel the account of which appears in the eleventh chapter. Then every event, from the call of Abram to the Exodus, points forward clearly to Sinai. The Apostle Paul states the case tersely in these lines: What then is the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise hath been made (Gal. 3:19). In the same chapter (Gal. 3:16) the Apostle writes: Now to Abraham were the promises spoken, and to his seed. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. Thus the true Seed. Messiah, became the fulfillment of the Genesis oracle (Gen. 3:15) and of the Abrahamic Promise (Gen. 12:3; Gen. 22:18; Gen. 26:4; Gen. 28:14; Act. 3:25; Luk. 1:44; Rom. 4:13-16; Rom. 9:1-5). Thus the internal unity of the Biblical revelation as a whole is again demonstrated beyond all possibility of reasonable doubt.
4. Problems of the Table of Nations
This Table presents some difficulties for which no solution has been found, up to the present time at least. Note the following facts, in this connection: (1) The account is that of the peopling of the earth after the Flood (Gen. 10:32), and the area in which this began to take place must have been relatively small; therefore we must depend on subsequent history to trace the continued diffusion. (2) Some of the names which might be known to us in their native forms may seem unfamiliar because of having been vocalized incorrectly in the Hebrew tradition, by which the purely consonantal text has been supplied with vowel signs. Kraeling (BA, 47): Thus Gomer should have been Gemer, Meshech should have been Moshech, and Togarma should have been Tegarma according to the evidence of the Assyrian inscriptions. (3) Apparently, the same, or very similar, names occur in separate Lines of descent. (Of course this may be accounted for on the ground that a particular people may have occupiedby conquest or by infiltrationan area already held by another and taken over the established geographical name of the prior ethnic group (as, for example, the English became known as Britons, and the Germanic peoples as Teutons, etc.). (4) The greatest difficulty, however, is that of the intermingling of individual with national (tribal) names. Smith and Fields et al (ITH, 46): Now this is really of little consequence, since, with a few exceptions, as that of Nim-rod (Gen. 10:8-9), the purpose is clearly to exhibit the affinities of nations. The record is ethnographical rather than genealogical. This is clear from the plural forms of some of the names (for example, all the descendants of Mizraim), and from the ethnic form of others, as those of the children of Canaan, nearly all of which are simply geographical. The genealogical form is preserved in the first generation after the sons of Noah, and is then virtually abandoned for a mere list of the nations descended from each of these progenitors. But in the line of the patriarchs from Shem to Abraham the genealogical form is strictly preserved, since the object is to trace a personal descent, Here it becomes Messianically oriented.
On the positive side of this problem, the following facts should be kept in mind: (1) As to the area from which the dispersion began to take place certainly the highlands of Armenia (the mountains of Ararat) were especially adapted to be the center from which peoples (after Babel) began to move in all directions. Thence diffusion continued at first by way of the great river systemsthe Tigris-Euphrates, the Nile, the Indus, the Hwang-ho and Weithe invention of the sail-boat having made these the arteries of transportation. Just before the beginning of the historic period the peoples began to move in several directions at once: some into India, China, and across the Bering Strait into the Americas; others toward the Mediterranean and into the Lower Nile; still other groups such as the Megalithic traversed the Mediterranean into the Atlantic and up the coast as far as the Tin Islands (Great Britain), and as the Beaker peoples who brought bronze into Europe made their way up the Danube to the Baltic areas. That Southwest Asia was the cradle of the human race seems evident from the testimony of anthropology and early history. The unity of the race is a scientific fact; as one anthropologist, Goldenweiser, puts it (Anthropology, 32): All the fundamental traits of the psychic make-up of man anywhere are present everywhere. Philology, the study of the origin of language, insofar as science has been able to penetrate this mystery, corroborates this view. (2) The geographical explanations which appear in the Table itself greatly facilitate the identification of the peoples who are named. (3) Through the help afforded by classical sources and by the ancient inscriptions which tell us so much about the world in which ancient Israel lived, a surprising number of the names in this Table of Nations have been reliably identified (Kraeling, BA, 47). (4) Note the following summary by Mitchell (NBD, 867): The names in the Table were probably originally the names of individuals, which came to be applied to the people descended from them, and in some cases to the territory inhabited by these people. It is important to note that such names could have different meanings at different points in history, so that the morphological identification of a name in Gn. x with one in the extra-biblical sources can be completely valid only if the two occurrences are exactly contemporary. The changes in significance of names of this kind are due largely to the movements of peoples, in drift, infiltration, conquest, or migration. There are three principal characteristics of a people which are sufficiently distinctive to form some nuance of their name. These are race or physical type: language, which is one constituent of culture; and the geographical area in which they live or the political unit in which they are organized. Racual features cannot change, but they can become so mixed or dominated through intermarriage as to be indistinguishable. Language can change completely, that of a subordinate group being replaced by that of its rulers, in many cases permanently. Geographical habitat can be completely changed by migration, Since at times one, and at other times another, of these characteristics is uppermost in the significance of a name, the lists in Gn. x are unlikely to have been drawn up on one system alone. Thus, for instance, the descendants of Shem cannot be expected all to have spoken one language, or to have lived all in one area, or even to have belonged to one racial type, since intermarriage may have obscured this. That this could have taken place may be indicated by the presence of apparently duplicate names in more than one list, Asshur (see Assyria), Sheba, Havilah, and Lud (im) under both Shem and Ham, and probably Meshek (Mash in Shems list) under Shem and Japheth. Though these may indicate names that are entirely distinct, it is possible that they represent points where a strong people had absorbed a weaker. Again: It is necessary to observe that names have been adopted from this chapter for certain specific uses in modern times. Thus in language study the terms Semitic and Hamitic are applied, the former to the group of languages including Hebrew, Aramaic, Akkadian, Arabic, etc., and the latter to the group of which (ancient) Egyptian is the chief, This is a usage of convenience, however, and does not mean that all the descendants of Shem spoke Semitic languages or all those of Ham Hamitic. Thus the entry of Elam under Shem, and Canaan under Ham, is not necessarily erroneous, even though Elamite was non-Semitic and Canaanite was a Semitic tongue. In short, the names in Genesis 10 probably indicate now geographical, now linguistic, and now political entities, but not consistently any one alone. W. F. Albright comments that the Table of Nations shows such a remarkably modern understanding of the linguistic situation in the ancient world . . . that it stands absolutely alone in ancient literature, without even a remote parallel even among the Greeks, where we find the closest approach to a distribution of the peoples in genealogical framework. But among the Greeks the framework is mythological and the people are all Greeks or Aegean tribes (quoted by Cornfeld, AtD, 37). Cornfeld adds: This Table is not the basis of the division of the races of mankind into the Aryan, Semitic and dark-skinned races. It knows nothing of the Far East and the Pacific and Atlantic races or of dark Africa south of Egypt. But it contains data about the geographical distribution of the ancient Near East, from the confines of Iran and Edom down to Arabia, of commercial and linguistic ties, and far-scattered tribes, nations, countries and towns.
REVIEW QUESTIONS
See Gen. 10:21-32.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(1) Shem, Ham, and Japheth.This is the un-deviating arrangement of the three brothers. (See Note on Gen. 9:24; Gen. 10:21.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
(Gen 10:1 a) ‘This is the history of the sons of Noah.’
The writer intends us to know the original source of his material, passed down orally through many feasts and finally put into writing we know not when or by whom, but we can be sure that it was very early on, well before the time of Moses who undoubtedly made use of these records.
The Table of Nations And the Explanation of the Divisions ( Gen 10:1 b – Gen 11:10 a) TABLET V.
Gen 10:1
‘Shem, Ham and Japheth, to these were born sons after the flood.’
This is in the nature of a heading and is typical of a link connecting with a previous tablet. (Compare ‘Shem, Ham and Japheth’ (Gen 9:18).) Its purpose is to draw attention to the descent of known nations from the three sons of Noah (Gen 10:32).
When considering the record we must beware of interpreting it by modern assumptions. Tribal groups and nations were extremely complicated affairs, constantly affected by intermarriage, tribal movements in times of crisis, conquest, assimilation, and merger. We only have to consider Israel to recognise the truth of this. Israel began as the clan group round the patriarchs, made up of the core of descendants of Terah, but including a large number of ‘servants’ described as their ‘households’ (Abraham could call on 318 fighting men – Gen 14:14), probably from a number of races. These later became known as ‘the children of Israel’, but the majority were only children by adoption.
Then when ‘Israel’ left Egypt they were joined by a ‘mixed multitude’, again of many nations (Exo 12:38). These too were assimilated into ‘the children of Israel’. So the ‘children of Israel’ who entered Canaan were far from being directly children of Jacob, any more than the whole of the nations in this chapter were directly related to only one of the sons of Noah. Israel itself was undoubtedly inclusive of Hamites and Japhites as well as Semites.
It is almost certain that later years saw further assimilation of groups and individuals with Israel, who were mainly of similar background and who were prepared to submit to the Yahweh covenant. This is evidenced in names borne by such people (Uriah the Hittite no doubt looked on himself as a ‘child of Israel’). Thus not all Israelites were strictly Semites even if they had absorbed the Semite culture.
Indeed clans, nations and people were united by treaty, by intermarriage, by conquest, by assimilation and by convenience. This phenomenon was common in the ancient world, as indeed it is today. The terms normally employed for physical relationships (‘sons of’; ‘bore/begat’) are all elsewhere used in Babylonian and Hebrew literature to denote such political alliances.
So the direct relationship of later clans and nations to the sons of Noah must not be seen as implying that all such were direct descendants of one particular son. Rather it shows their association in a variety of ways with those who were directly descended from one or the other.
It is certain from the heading of the Table of Nations, ‘These are the descendants (generations, genealogies or family histories – toledoth) of the sons of Noah’ (Gen 10:1), and from the words ‘ These are the families (mispahot) of the sons of Noah according to their generations by their nations (goyim) and from these came the separate nations on earth after the flood’ (Gen 10:32) that the differentiation of nations was the main purpose of the narrative, and the assertion that they were all descended from Noah in one way or another. Further we cannot go.
In many ways the distinctions are based on territory occupied. The writer is seeking to explain to his readers the derivation of the peoples they are aware of. But it would be too simplistic to assume that that was the only basis for distinction. Some are mentioned twice, possibly because of intermarriage and marriage treaties, possibly because of the movement of part of a tribe to a different area. There were many movements of peoples in the Ancient Near East caused by various circumstances, including pressure from other peoples.
However, one main message of this record is that the ‘world’, as known to the writer, descended from Noah, was originally of one language, but that as a result of their behaviour towards God and each other, they split up into many nations and languages.
Bearing this in mind we will briefly look at the people and nations described.
The names of Noah’s sons are dealt with in reverse order, Shem being the last. This is in order to deal with the other two before concentrating on the one important to the future narrative. This is a feature of the whole of Genesis 1-11 and demonstrates the emphasis on one particular line chosen by God.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
“The Histories of the Sons of Noah” – The Flood ( Gen 6:9 b – Gen 10:1 a) – TABLET IV
It has been common practise among a large number of scholars to seek to split the flood narrative into different so-called ‘documents’. This has partly resulted from not comparing them closely enough with ancient writings as a whole and partly from over-enthusiasm for a theory. There is little real justification for it. Repetitiveness was endemic among ancient writings, and is therefore not a hint of combined narratives, and the intermixture of statistical material, such as dating, with story type is known elsewhere. The interchanging of the divine names Yahweh and Elohim has already been noted as occurring for good reasons (Gen 4:25-26; Gen 5:29).
The whole account is a clear unity, and is formulated on a 7 day – 40 day – 150 day – 150 day – 40 day – 7 day pattern (the numbers partly inclusive), taking us from when God commanded Noah to enter the ark to the return of the dove with the olive leaf which showed the Flood was over. The causes of, and purposes for, the Flood are consistent throughout, as are its final aims. There is certainly expansion in thought, but there is no contradiction. (Alternately we may see it as a 7 – 40 – 150 – 40 – 7 pattern depending on how we read Gen 8:3).
The Flood
The word for flood is ‘mabbul’ which only occurs outside Genesis 6-11 in Psa 29:10, where its meaning is disputed. In Psalms 29 its use follows the description of an extremely devastating storm ‘caused’ by Yahweh which strips the trees bare, and ‘Yahweh sits enthroned over the flood’ may well therefore mean that He causes, and takes responsibility for, even the subsequent cataclysmic flood. But it may alternatively mean that ‘Yahweh sits enthroned over the cataclysm’, the storm we have just read about. (The writer sees all natural phenomena as under God’s control and is using a massive storm and cataclysm as a picture of Jahweh’s great power. If the word does mean flood he may well have had Noah’s flood in mind). In the New Testament and in the Septuagint mabbul is ‘translated’ as kataklysmos (Mat 24:38-39; Luk 17:27; 2Pe 2:5). It therefore can be taken with some confidence as meaning in this context a ‘cataclysmic flood’ with the emphasis on the cataclysm.
The basis of the account consistently throughout is that man will be destroyed because of his extreme sinfulness (Gen 6:5-7; Gen 6:11-13; Gen 7:4; Gen 7:21-23; Gen 8:21). This contrasts strongly with Mesopotamian flood myths where the innocent admittedly die with the guilty, and the flood is the consequence of the anger of gods over some particular thing which annoys them.
How Extensive Was the Flood?
The question must again be raised as to what the writer is describing. There is no question but that it is a huge flood of a type never known before or since, but how far did it in fact reach?
In Hebrew the word translated ‘earth’ (eretz) even more often means ‘land’. This latter fact derived from the fact that ‘the earth’ (our world) as compared with the heavens (Gen 1:1), became ‘the earth’ (dry land) as opposed to the sea (Gen 1:10), became ‘the earth’ (their land) on which men lived (Gen 12:1). It is thus quite in accordance with the Hebrew that what is described in this passage occurred in just one part of what we would call the earth, occurring in ‘Noah’s earth’ where Noah was living with his family.
This is not just a matter of choosing between two alternative translations. The reason eretz could be so used was because of how the ancients saw things and applied language to them. To them there was their known ‘earth’, their land, and then their land with the surrounding peoples, and then the rather hazy world on the fringes and then beyond that who knew what? Thus to them ‘the earth’ could mean different things in different contexts.
Even in its wider meaning it meant what was indeed a reasonably large area, and yet from our point of view would be seen as a fairly localised area, and ‘the whole earth’ to them was what to us would still be limited horizons. We can compare Gen 41:57 where ‘the whole earth’ come to Egypt to buy food and 1Ki 10:24 where ‘the whole earth’ come to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Compare also how the Roman world and its fringes were ‘the world’ in the New Testament (Luk 2:1; Act 24:5; Rom 1:8; Col 1:6).
Thus there are three possible answers to the question as to how far the flood stretched, looking at it from the writer’s point of view.
1). That all mankind was involved and that the Flood was global. However, it could not strictly mean this to the writer, or to Noah, for both were unaware of such a concept. All they could think of was ‘the world’ according to their conception of it. What the writer could have meant was ‘all that there is’. But was he not rather concerned with the world of man?
2). That all mankind was involved, but that they were still living within a certain limited area and were therefore all destroyed in a huge flood, which was not, however, global, as it would not need to involve lands which were uninhabited.
The fact of the worldwide prevalence of Flood myths might be seen as supporting one of these two views. So also might the argument that had the area been too limited Noah could have been instructed to move with his family outside the area, however large. Against this latter, however, it could be argued that God was seen as having a lesson to teach to future generations, and that He had in view the preservation of animal life as part of Noah’s environment.
3). That it was only mankind in the large area affected by the demonic activity (Noah’s ‘earth’ or ‘world’) that were to be destroyed, and that the Flood was therefore vast, but not necessarily destroying those of mankind unaffected by the situation described.
What cannot be avoided is the idea that the Flood was huge beyond anything known since. It was remembered in Mesopotamia, an area which had known great floods, as ‘the Flood’which divided all that came before it from all that followed (see, for example, the Sumerian king lists) . They too had a memory of how their king Zius-udra survived the Flood by entering a boat and living through it, although in his case others, apart from his family, were seen as surviving with him in the boat. Alternative suggestions offered have been the consequences of the ice age ceasing, raising water levels and causing huge floods, or the falling of a huge asteroid into the sea.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Introduction Gen 10:1 introduces the three patriarchs in the Table of Nations, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
Gen 10:1 Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.
Gen 10:1
[136] The Talmud reads, “And that the Scripture used to enumerate according to wisdom, and not age, may be seen from [ibid. vi. 10]: ‘And Noah begat three sons–Shem, Ham, and Japheth.’ And from the latter passage it is inferred that Shem was the youngest, and nevertheless he is named first, because of his wisdom. Said R. Kahana: I told this to R. Zebith of Nahardea, and he answered: Ye learned this from the cited passage. We, however, infer this from [ibid. x. 21]: ‘But unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Elier the brother of Japheth the elder.’ Hence we see that Japheth was the oldest of all the brothers.” ( Sanhedrin book 8, folio 69b) See Michael L. Rodkinson, New Edition of the Babylonian Talmud, vol. 15-16 (New York: New Talmud Publishing Company, 1902), 204.
Gen 10:21, “Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber, the brother of Japheth the elder , even to him were children born.”
On every occasion in the Scriptures when the three sons of Noah are listed together, they are always listed in the same order (Gen 5:32; Gen 6:10; Gen 7:13; Gen 9:18, 1Ch 1:4).
Gen 5:32, “And Noah was five hundred years old: and Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth.”
Gen 6:10, “And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.”
Gen 7:13, “In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah’s wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark;”
Gen 9:18, “And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.”
1Ch 1:4, “Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.”
Gen 10:1 Word Study on “Shem” Strong tells us that the Hebrew name “Shem” ( ) (H8035) means, “name,” and that it is derived from the same Hebrew primitive root ( ) (H8034), which means, “name, reputation, fame, glory, memorial, monument.”
Gen 10:1 Word Study on “Ham” Strong tells us that the Hebrew name “Ham” ( ) (H2526) means, “hot,” and that it is derived from the same Hebrew primitive root ( ) (H2525), which means, “hot, warm.”
Gen 10:1 Word Study on “Japheth” Strong tells us that the Hebrew name “Japheth” ( ) (H3315) means, “expansion,” and is derived from the primitive root ( ) (H6601), which means, “to be spacious, be open, be wide.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
The Table of Nations – The Seventy Nations that Came Forth from the Three Sons of Noah Gen 10:1-32 tells us the names of the nations that descended from the three sons of Noah. We are told in the ancient Jewish writing of The Book of Jubilees that there were seventy nations and seventy languages divided upon the earth prior to the time of Abraham.
“And all the souls of Jacob which went into Egypt were seventy souls. These are his children and his children’s children, in all seventy, but five died in Egypt before Joseph, and had no children. And in the land of Canaan two sons of Judah died, Er and Onan, and they had no children, and the children of Israel buried those who perished, and they were reckoned among the seventy Gentile nations.” ( The Book of Jubilees 44.32-34)
Outline Here is a proposed outline:
1. Introduction Gen 10:1
2. The Sons of Japheth (Fourteen Nations) Gen 10:2-5
3. The Sons of Ham (Thirty Nations) Gen 10:6-20
4. The Sons of Shem (Twenty-Six Nations) Gen 10:21-31
The Original Language of Adam and Eve – As we read the list of names in Gen 10:1-32 we realize that this passage is telling us that the nations on earth were divided by their languages and by their families (Gen 10:5). We find that there are indeed seventy names listed here besides the names of Noah and his three sons. These seventy descendants listed in Gen 10:1-32 represent the seventy nations of the earth that were established after the Tower of Babel with Abraham’s descendants being reckoned among the nations at a later date. We have a hint of the nation of Israel within this passage when it refers to Eber before his name comes up in the genealogy, “Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber.” (Gen 10:21); for the Hebrew people derived their name from this ancestor. The final verse of this passage says, “and from these (names) the nations were divided on the earth after the flood” (Gen 10:32), which tells us that the nations of the earth were in fact divided according to the names listed in this passage.
What would have happened to the original language that God gave to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, which would have been spoken up until the time of the Tower of Babel? The Book of Jubilees tells us that God gave this language back to mankind when He had called and separated Abraham. Thus, tradition says that Abraham spoke the original language of creation, which was Hebrew and handed it down to the children of Israel.
“And I opened his (Abraham’s) mouth, and his ears and his lips, and I began to speak with him in Hebrew in the tongue of the creation. And he took the books of his fathers, and these were written in Hebrew, and he transcribed them, and he began from henceforth to study them, and I made known to him that which he could not (understand), and he studied them during the six rainy months.” ( The Book of Jubilees 12.26-27)
The Significance of the Number of Nations – It is interesting to note that just as God called seventy nations at the tower of Babel to serve as the foundation for the nations of the earth, so did God call seventy souls to found the nation of Israel (Exo 1:1-7). We know that Moses called seventy elders to establish the laws of the nation of Israel (Exo 24:1, Num 11:24-25). Jesus trained seventy disciples to carry the Gospel to the world (Luk 10:1; Luk 10:17). Thus, the number seventy is found when God establishes a new government institution upon the earth: when He established the nations, called out the nation of Israel, instituted the Law of Moses, and established the New Testament Church. The number seven or multiples of seven are popularly believed to express “the idea of completeness or perfection.” [134] Jim Goll says the number ten represents “law” or “government.” [135] Thus, the combination of the numbers seven and ten serves as a testimony that God divinely orchestrated a complete number of seventy nations upon earth to establish law and order.
[134] R. F. Youngblood, F. F. Bruce, R. K. Harrison, and Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary, rev. ed. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1995), in Libronix Digital Library System, v. 2.1c [CD-ROM] (Bellingham, WA: Libronix Corp., 2000-2004), “Number(s): Rhetorical Use of Numbers.”
[135] Jim Goll says, “Multiples of these numbers, or doubling or tripling carry basically the same meaning, only they intensify the truth.” See Jim W. Goll, The Seer: The Prophetic Power of Visions, Dreams, and Open Heavens (Shippensburg, PA: Destiny Image Publishers, Inc., 2004), 111.
The Times of the Gentiles in Prophetic Prophecy Although there were many nations that divided themselves upon the earth after the Tower of Babel, from God’s perspective, it was the nation of Israel that took front and center stage in the history of mankind from its inception through the loins of Abraham up until Israel’s deportation into Babylon in 586 B.C. At this time in history, prophetic prophecy enters a time, or dispensation, which Jesus Christ (Luk 21:24) and Paul the apostle (Rom 11:25) call “The Times of the Gentiles.”
Luk 21:24, “And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.”
Rom 11:25, “For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.”
The Times of the Gentiles is a period in history when Gentile nations began to control the affairs of mankind and even fulfilled biblical prophecy. We have a clear description of this time of Gentile dominion upon the earth in Dan 2:1-49 when God gave King Nebuchadnezzar a dream and showed him the four kingdoms that would dominate the earth during the time of the Gentiles. However, a fifth kingdom would be made without the hands of man, referring to the Kingdom of God, and this Kingdom would grow and crush the kingdoms of man to dust. I believe that the Time of the Gentiles will end at Jesus’ Second Coming when He will set up His earthly kingdom in the holy city of Jerusalem where He will rule and reign while the nation of Israel will serve as place where all nations come to bring their offerings unto the Lord in order to be blessed.
It is also important to note that some of the nations listed in Gen 1:1-31 will be named as nations who play a key role in these end times. For example, Eze 38:1 to Eze 39:28 refers to at least eight of these nations by name when it tells us of one of three end-time prophetic events that will usher Israel back into the forefront of world history. This passage of Scripture is about Israel’s great and final battle with Magog, Meshech and Tubal, Libya (Phut), Ethiopia (Cush) and the nations under Persian control, with Sheba, Dedan, and Tarshish also being mentioned. Thus, end-time prophecy reflects back to this Table of Nations and draws from these names, rather than using the names of nations who developed out of the original seventy nations, such as the modern nations of the U.S.A., Great Britain, Russia, Germany, etc. I believe that just because some modern nations are not mentioned by name in these end-time prophecies, it does not mean that they are excluded from partaking in such prophecies; for these predictions only draw upon the Table of Nations, and not upon modern names.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Ten Genealogies (Calling) – The Genealogies of Righteous Men and their Divine Callings (To Be Fruitful and Multiply) – The ten genealogies found within the book of Genesis are structured in a way that traces the seed of righteousness from Adam to Noah to Shem to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob and the seventy souls that followed him down into Egypt. The book of Genesis closes with the story of the preservation of these seventy souls, leading us into the book of Exodus where we see the creation of the nation of Israel while in Egyptian bondage, which nation of righteousness God will use to be a witness to all nations on earth in His plan of redemption. Thus, we see how the book of Genesis concludes with the origin of the nation of Israel while its first eleven chapters reveal that the God of Israel is in fact that God of all nations and all creation.
The genealogies of the six righteous men in Genesis (Adam, Noah, Shem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob) are the emphasis in this first book of the Old Testament, with each of their narrative stories opening with a divine commission from God to these men, and closing with the fulfillment of prophetic words concerning the divine commissions. This structure suggests that the author of the book of Genesis wrote under the office of the prophet in that a prophecy is given and fulfilled within each of the genealogies of these six primary patriarchs. Furthermore, all the books of the Old Testament were written by men of God who moved in the office of the prophet, which includes the book of Genesis. We find a reference to the fulfillment of these divine commissions by the patriarchs in Heb 11:1-40. The underlying theme of the Holy Scriptures is God’s plan of redemption for mankind. Thus, the book of Genesis places emphasis upon these men of righteousness because of the role that they play in this divine plan as they fulfilled their divine commissions. This explains why the genealogies of Ishmael (Gen 25:12-18) and of Esau (Gen 36:1-43) are relatively brief, because God does not discuss the destinies of these two men in the book of Genesis. These two men were not men of righteousness, for they missed their destinies because of sin. Ishmael persecuted Isaac and Esau sold his birthright. However, it helps us to understand that God has blessed Ishmael and Esau because of Abraham although the seed of the Messiah and our redemption does not pass through their lineage. Prophecies were given to Ishmael and Esau by their fathers, and their genealogies testify to the fulfillment of these prophecies. There were six righteous men did fulfill their destinies in order to preserve a righteous seed so that God could create a righteous nation from the fruit of their loins. Illustration As a young schoolchild learning to read, I would check out biographies of famous men from the library, take them home and read them as a part of class assignments. The lives of these men stirred me up and placed a desire within me to accomplish something great for mankind as did these men. In like manner, the patriarchs of the genealogies in Genesis are designed to stir up our faith in God and encourage us to walk in their footsteps in obedience to God.
The first five genealogies in the book of Genesis bring redemptive history to the place of identifying seventy nations listed in the Table of Nations. The next five genealogies focus upon the origin of the nation of Israel and its patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
There is much more history and events that took place surrounding these individuals emphasized in the book of Genesis, which can be found in other ancient Jewish writings, such as The Book of Jubilees. However, the Holy Scriptures and the book of Genesis focus upon the particular events that shaped God’s plan of redemption through the procreation of men of righteousness. Thus, it was unnecessary to include many of these historical events that were irrelevant to God’s plan of redemption.
In addition, if we see that the ten genealogies contained within the book of Genesis show to us the seed of righteousness that God has preserved in order to fulfill His promise that the “seed of woman” would bruise the serpent’s head in Gen 3:15, then we must understand that each of these men of righteousness had a particular calling, destiny, and purpose for their lives. We can find within each of these genealogies the destiny of each of these men of God, for each one of them fulfilled their destiny. These individual destinies are mentioned at the beginning of each of their genealogies.
It is important for us to search these passages of Scripture and learn how each of these men fulfilled their destiny in order that we can better understand that God has a destiny and a purpose for each of His children as He continues to work out His divine plan of redemption among the children of men. This means that He has a destiny for you and me. Thus, these stories will show us how other men fulfilled their destinies and help us learn how to fulfill our destiny. The fact that there are ten callings in the book of Genesis, and since the number “10” represents the concept of countless, many, or numerous, we should understand that God calls out men in each subsequent generation until God’s plan of redemption is complete.
We can even examine the meanings of each of their names in order to determine their destiny, which was determined for them from a child. Adam’s name means “ruddy, i.e. a human being” ( Strong), for it was his destiny to begin the human race. Noah’s name means, “rest” ( Strong). His destiny was to build the ark and save a remnant of mankind so that God could restore peace and rest to the fallen human race. God changed Abram’s name to Abraham, meaning, “father of a multitude” ( Strong), because his destiny was to live in the land of Canaan and believe God for a son of promise so that his seed would become fruitful and multiply and take dominion over the earth. Isaac’s name means, “laughter” ( Strong) because he was the child of promise. His destiny was to father two nations, believing that the elder would serve the younger. Isaac overcame the obstacles that hindered the possession of the land, such as barrenness and the threat of his enemies in order to father two nations, Israel and Esau. Jacob’s name was changed to Israel, which means “he will rule as God” ( Strong), because of his ability to prevail over his brother Esau and receive his father’s blessings, and because he prevailed over the angel in order to preserve his posterity, which was the procreation of twelve sons who later multiplied into the twelve tribes of Israel. Thus, his ability to prevail against all odds and father twelve righteous seeds earned him his name as one who prevailed with God’s plan of being fruitful and multiplying seeds of righteousness.
In order for God’s plan to be fulfilled in each of the lives of these patriarchs, they were commanded to be fruitful and multiply. It was God’s plan that the fruit of each man was to be a godly seed, a seed of righteousness. It was because of the Fall that unrighteous seed was produced. This ungodly offspring was not then nor is it today God’s plan for mankind.
Outline Here is a proposed outline:
1. The Generation of the Heavens and the Earth Gen 2:4 to Gen 4:26
a) The Creation of Man Gen 2:4-25
b) The Fall Gen 3:1-24
c) Cain and Abel Gen 4:1-26
2. The Generation of Adam Gen 5:1 to Gen 6:8
3. The Generation of Noah Gen 6:9 to Gen 9:29
4. The Generation of the Sons of Noah Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9
5. The Generation of Shem Gen 11:10-26
6. The Generation of Terah (& Abraham) Gen 11:27 to Gen 25:11
7. The Generation Ishmael Gen 25:12-18
8. The Generation of Isaac Gen 25:19 to Gen 35:29
9. The Generation of Esau Gen 36:1-43
10. The Generation of Jacob Gen 37:1 to Gen 50:26
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
The Genealogy of the Sons of Noah – The fourth genealogy in the book of Genesis is entitled “The Genealogy of the Sons of Noah” (Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9), which tells us how the sons of Noah fulfilled the divine commission to be fruitful and multiply. The previous genealogy of Noah tells us that the calling and destiny of Noah was to multiply and to replenish the earth (Gen 9:1). This genealogy shows the fulfillment of this commission in his sons. This passage of Scripture contains the Table of Nations, which show us that God divided mankind up into seventy nations in order to fulfill this commission. This table lists the genealogies of the sons of Noah, but only one of them would carry the seed of righteousness, which was Shem. All of their genealogies are listed briefly in this table because Noah had favor with God, so that God’s blessings would come upon his children; however, only Shem fulfilled his divine destiny that was a part of God’s eternal plan of redemption in that the seed of righteousness descended from him through Abraham. The other sons of Noah failed to fulfill their destinies, bearing wicked seed that continued the seed of corruption upon the earth. After reading in the Table of Nations concerning the seventy nations that were divided by their families and their tongues (Gen 10:1-32), we read the story of Babel of how the tongues of man were divided, which caused in the division of the nations (Gen 11:1-9). The Genealogy of the Sons of Noah closes by saying that God spread the seventy nations upon the earth (Gen 11:9), which would be to fulfill the divine commission for mankind to be fruitful and multiply.
Outline Here is a proposed outline:
1. The Table of Nations Gen 10:1-32
2. The Tower of Babel Gen 11:1-9
The Origin of the Nations Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9 describes the origins of the nations as we know them today. After Gen 1:1 to Gen 9:29 takes us through the series of events that shaped characteristics of the heavens and the earth as we know them today, which are listed as “seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Gen 8:22), we are given a passage of Scripture that explains the origin of the seventy nations speaking distinct tongues that make up prophetic history until the new heavens and earth are created in eternity (Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9). This passage will serve as a foundation for the next section in the book of Genesis, which explains the origin of the nation of Israel that God calls out to create a righteous people to repopulate the earth (Gen 11:10 to Gen 50:26).
The Importance of Possessing Land – Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9 identifies the names of seventy nations of the earth which were divided at the Tower of Babel. The Scriptures will refer to them from now until the book of Revelation as “the Gentiles” in contrast to the nation of Israel, which has yet to be established from the loins of Abraham whose ancestor is Heber. It is important to note that from God’s perspective the nation of Israel will then take center stage throughout the history of mankind, except for the two thousand period of Church history. This is why Paul was able to identify three distinct people groups that exist on earth from a divine perspective, which is Israel, the Church and the Gentiles (1Co 10:32).
1Co 10:32, “Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God:”
The Importance of Land Ownership – If we look at the existing boundaries of these 70 nations, we immediately begin to understand their economic importance. Each of these nations departed from the Tower of Babel with an equal opportunity for prosperity. We know that some countries inherited more productive land than others. A country’s wealth is determined by its ability to subdue its land and exploit its resources. A drive into Brownsville, Texas is a clear illustration of this point. Part of this town is in the U.S.A. and part of it is in Mexico. As you pass from Texas through customs and into Mexico, you go from prosperity to poverty. The boundary fence running through this border city determines whether people are wealthy or poor, based upon the divine blessings upon their nation.
The Lord was so accurate regarding the importance of His people owning real estate that He had Joshua divide the Promised Land by lot to the twelve tribes. These tribes divided their lots up by clans, families and individuals. Without land ownership a person would have no hope for prosperity. This is why God gave the tribes certain rules on how to provide for the Levites since they had no land inheritance, but were scattered throughout the other tribes. When a person fell into poverty, he sold his land and served as a slave to others with no hope of obtaining prosperity. So, under the Mosaic Law, land ownership was carefully regulated because it held the keys to one’s potential for prosperity.
I have lived in East Africa for a number of years now. As I observe wise investors in a country where corruption is widespread and inflation is high, it appears that the only sure place for someone to invest their money is in land. Having come from the U.S.A. with a strong economy, I felt that there were many secure investment opportunities; but in developing countries, land becomes the only secure investment. This helps illustrate the importance of these nations having their own secure boundaries, because this was a major factor in determining their future prosperity.
We read a statement in Ecc 5:9 “Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field.” This tells us that through the principles of economics, taxes eventually make their way into the hands of the king. From the laborer all of the way up to the king, every person in a society experiences the blessings from the field. Note that everything that you see around you, buildings, cars, furniture, even our physical bodies, comes from the ground. These minerals are the building blocks of materials and even life. So land is important and the boundaries of nations and the ownership and control of real estate plays a leading role in the conflicts and wars that are fought throughout the Scriptures between these seventy nations.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
The Sons of Japheth
v. 1. Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth; and unto them were sons born after the Flood.
v. 2. The sons of Japheth, v. 3. And the sons of Gomer: Ashkenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah, v. 4. And the sons of Javan: Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim, v. 5. By these were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
PART II. THE POST–DILUVIAN AGE OF THE WORLD. CH. 10:1-11:26.
FROM THE DELUGE TO THE CALL OF ABRAM.
5. THE GENERATIONS or THE SONS OF NOAH (CH. 10:1-11:9).
I. THE historical credibility of the present section has been challenged.
1. On account of a fancied resemblance to the ethnographic mythologies of Greece, the genealogical table of the nations has been relegated to the category of fictitious invention. It has been assigned by many critics to a post-Mosaic decried, to the days of Joshua (Delitzsch), to the age of Hebrew intercourse with the Phenician Canaanites (Knobel), to the era of the exile (Bohlen); and the specific purpose of its composition has been declared to be a desire to gratify the national pride of the Hebrews by tracing their descent to the first-born son of Noah, that their rights might appear to have a superior foundation to those of other nations (Hartmann). But the primogeniture of Sham is at least doubtful, if not entirely incorrect, Japheth being the oldest of Noah’s sons (vide Gen 5:32; Gen 10:21); while it is a gratuitous assumption that not until the days of the monarchy, or the exile, did the Israelites become acquainted with foreign nations. The authenticity and genuineness of the present register, it is justly remarked by Havernick, are guaranteed by the chronicler (Gen 1:1). “In the time of the chronicler nothing more was known from antiquity concerning the origin of nations than what Genesis supplied. Supposing, then, that some inquiring mind composed this table of nations from merely reflecting on the nations that happened to exist at the same period, and attempting to give them a systematic arrangement, how could it possibly happen that his turn of mind should be in such complete harmony with that of the other? This could only arise from the one recognizing the decided superiority of the other’s account, which here lies in nothing else than the historical truth itself belonging to it” (Intro; 17). And the historical truthfulness of the Mosaic document is further strikingly authenticated by the accredited results of modern ethnological science, which, having undertaken by a careful analysis of facts to establish a classification of races, has divided mankind into three primitive groups (Shemitic, Aryan, Turanian or Allophylian), corresponding not obscurely to the threefold arrangement of the present table, and presenting in each group the leading races that Genesis assigns to the several sons of Noah; as, e.g; allocating to the Indo-European family, as Moses has done to the sons of Japheth, the principal races of Europe, with the great Asiatic race known as Aryan; to the Shemitie, the Assyrians, Syrians, Hebrews, and Joktauite Arabs, which appear among the sons of Sham in the present table; and to the Allophylian, the Egyptians, Ethiopians, Southern Arabs, and early Babylonians, which the primitive ethnologist of Genesis also writes among the sons of Ham.
2. The narrative of the building of the tower of Babel has also been impugned, and that chiefly on two grounds: viz.,
(1) an incorrect derivation of the term Babel, which is now said to have no connection whatever with the confusion of tongues, but to be the word “Babil,“ the house or gate of God, or “Bab-Bel,“ the gate or court of Bolus; and
(2) an incorrect explanation of the present diversity of tongues among mankind, which modern philology has now shown to be due to local separation, and not at all to a miraculous interference with the organs or the faculty of speech. To each of these objections a specific reply will be returned in the exposition of the text (q.v.); in the mean time it may be stated that there are not wanting sufficiently numerous testimonies from ancient history, archaeological research, and philological inquiry to authenticate this most interesting portion of the Divine record.
II. The literary unity of the present section has been assailed. Tuch ascribes Gen 10:1-32. to the Elohist and Gen 11:1-9 to the Jehovist; and with this Bleek and Vaihinger agree, except that they apportion Gen 10:8-12 to the Jehovist. Davidson assigns to him the whole of Gen 10:1-32; with the exception of the expression “every one after his tongue” (Gen 10:5), the similar expressions (Gen 10:20, Gen 10:31), the story of Nimrod commencing at “he began” (Gen 10:8), Gen 10:21, and the statement beginning “for” (Gen 10:25), all of which, with Gen 11:1-9, he places to the credit of his redactor. But the literary unity of the entire section is so apparent that Colenso believes both passages, “the table of nations” and “the confusion of tongues,” to be the work of the Jehovist; and certainly the latter narrative is represented in so intimate a connection with the former that it is much more likely to have been composed by the original historian than inserted later as a happy afterthought by a post-exilian editor.
EXPOSITION
It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of this ethnological table. Whether regarded from a geographical, a political, or a theocratical standpoint, “this unparalleled list, the combined result of reflection and deep research,” is “no less valuable as a historical document than as a lasting proof of the brilliant capacity of the Hebrew mind.” Undoubtedly the earliest effort of the human intellect to exhibit in a tabulated form the geographical distribution of the human race, it bears unmistakable witness in its own structure to its high antiquity, occupying itself least with the Japhetic tribes which were furthest from the theocratic center, and were latest in attaining to historic eminence, and enlarging with much greater minuteness of detail on those Hamitic nations, the Egyptian, Canaanite, and Arabian, which were soonest developed, and with which the Hebrews came most into contact in the initial stages of their career. It describes the rise of states, and, consistently with all subsequent historical and archaeological testimony, gives the prominence to the Egyptian or Arabian Hamites, as the first founders of empires. It exhibits the separation of the Shemites from the other sons of Noah, and the budding forth of the line of promise in the family of Arphaxad. While thus useful to the geographer, the historian, the politician, it is specially serviceable to the theologian, as enabling him to trace the descent of the woman’s seed, and to mark the fulfillments of Scripture prophecies concerning the nations of the earth. In the interpretation of the names which are here recorded, it is obviously impossible in every instance to arrive at certainty, in some cases the names of individuals being mentioned, while in others it is as conspicuously those of peoples.
Gen 10:1
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah (cf. Gen 5:1; Gen 6:9), Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Not the order of age, but of theocratic importance (vide Gen 5:32). And unto them were sons born (cf. Gen 9:1, Gen 9:7, Gen 9:19, Gen 9:22) after the flood. An indication of the puncture temporis whence the period embraced in the present section takes its departure.
Gen 10:2
The sons of Japheth are first mentioned not because Japheth was the eldest of the three brothers, although that was true, but because of the greater distance of the Japhetic tribes from the theocratic center, the Hamites having always been much more nearly situated to and closely connected with the Shemites than they. The immediate descendants of Japheth, whose name, , occurs again in the mythology of a Japhetic race, were fourteen m number, seven sons and seven grandsons, each of which became the progenitor of one of the primitive nations. Gomer. A people inhabiting “the sides of the north” (Eze 38:6); the Galatae of the Greeks (Josephus, ‘Ant.,’ 1.6); the Chomarii, a nation in Bactriana on the Oxus (Shulthess, Kalisch); but more generally the Cimmerians of Homer (‘Odyss.,’ 11.13-19), whose abodes were the shores of the Caspian and Euxine, whence they seem to have spread themselves over Europe as far west as the Atlantic, leaving traces of their presence in the Cimhri of North Germany and the Cymri in Wales (Keil, Lange, Murphy, Wordsworth, ‘Speaker’s Commentary ). And Magog. A fierce and warlike people presided over by Gog (an appellative name, like the titles Pharaoh and Caesar, and corresponding with the Turkish Chak, the Tartarian Kak, and the Mongolian Gog: Kalisch), whose complete destruction was predicted by Ezekiel (Eze 38:1-23; Eze 39:1-29.); generally understood to be the Scythians, whose territory lay upon the borders of the sea of Asoph, and in the Caucasus. In the Apocalypse (Gen 20:8-10) Cog and Magog appear as two distinct nations combined against the Church of God. And Madai. The inhabitants of Media (Mada in the cuneiform inscriptions), so called because believed to be situated (Polyb. 5.44) on the south-west shore of the Caspian And Javan. Identical with (Greek), Javana (Sanscrit), Juna (Old Persian), Jounan (Rosetta Stone); allowed to be the father of the Greeks, who in Scripture are styled Javan (vide Isa 66:19; Eze 27:13; Dan 8:21; Dan 10:20; Joe 3:6). And Tubal, and Meshech. Generally associated in Scripture as tributaries of Magog (Eze 38:2, Eze 38:3; Eze 39:1); recognized as the Iberians and Moschi in the north of Armenia, between the sources of the Tigris and Euphrates, and the Black Sea (Josephus, Knobel, Lange, Kalisch). And Tiras. The ancestor of the Thraciaus (Josephus), of the Tyrrheni, a branch of the Pelasgians (Tuch), of the Asiatic tribes round the Taurus (Kalisch), in support of which last is a circumstance mentioned by Rawlinson, that on the old Egyptian monuments Mashuash and Tuirash, and upon the Assyrian Tubal and Misek, stand together as here. Tiras occurs nowhere else in Scripture.
Gen 10:3
And the sons of Gomer; Ash-kenaz. Axenus, the ancient name of the Euxine, is supposed to favor Phrygia and Bithynia as the locality possessed by Askenaz (Bochart); Iskus; equivalent to Ask, Ascanios, the oldest son of the Germanic Mannus, to point out Germany as his abode (Jewish commentators); but Jer 51:27 seems to indicate the region between the Euxine and the Caspian. Kalisch, following Josephus, identifies the name with the ancient town Rhagae, one day’s journey to the south of the Caspian. Murphy and Poole, on the authority of Diodorus Siculus, believe the Germans may have been a colony of the Ashkenians. And Riphath. Diphath (1Ch 1:6)the Paphlagonians (Josephus); more generally the tribes about the Riphaean mountains, on the north of the Caspian (Knobel, Kalisch, Clericus, Rosenmller, Murphy, ‘ Speaker’s Commentary’); but both are uncertain (Keil). And Togarmah. Mentioned again in Eze 27:14; Eze 38:6; the Phrygians (Josephus), the Cappadocians (Bochart), the Armenians (Michaelis, Gesenius, Rosenmller), the Taurians, inhabiting the Crimea (Kalisch). The tradition preserved by Moses Chorensis, that the ancestor of the Armenians was the son of Thorgom, the son of Comer, is commonly regarded as deciding the question.
Gen 10:4
And the sons of Javan; Elizhah. The isles of Elishah are praised by Ezekiel (Eze 27:7) for their blue and purple; supposed to have been Elis in the Peloponnesus, famous for its purple dyes (Bochart); AEolis (Josephus, Knobel); Hellas (Michaelis, Rosenmller, Kalisch); without doubt a maritime people of Grecian stock (‘Speaker’s Commentary’). And Tarshish. Tarsus in Cilicia (Josephus); but rather Tartessus in Spain (Eusehius, Michaelis, Bochart, Kalisch). Biblical notices represent Tarshish as a wealthy and flourishing seaport town towards the west (vide 1Ki 10:22; Psa 48:7; Psa 72:10; Isa 60:9; Isa 66:19; Jer 10:9; Eze 27:12). Kittim. Chittim (Num 24:24); Citium in Cyprus (Josephus), though latterly the name appears to have been extended to Citium in Macedonia (Alexander the Great is called the king of Chittim, 1 Macc. 1:1; 8:5), and the colonies which settled on the shores of Italy and Greece (Bochart, Keil, Kalisch). Isa 23:1, Isa 23:12; Dan 11:30 describe it as a maritime people. And Dodanim. Dordona in Epirus (Michaelis, Rosenmller); the Dardaniaus, or Trojan’s (Gesenius); the Daunians of South Italy (Kalisch); the Rhodani in Gaul, reading as in 1Ch 1:7 (Bochart). Josephus omits the name, and Scripture does not again mention it.
Gen 10:5
By these were the isles of the Gentiles. Sea-washed coasts as well as islands proper (cf. Isa 42:4 with Mat 12:21). Isaiah (Gen 20:6) styles Canaan an isle (cf. Peloponnesus). The expression signifies maritime countries. Divided in their lands; every one after his tongue. Indicating a time posterior to the building of Babel (Gen 11:1). After their families (LXX.); in their tribes or clans, a lesser subdivision than the next. In their nations. The division here exhibited is fourfold:
(1) geographical,
(2) dialectical,
(3) tribal, and
(4) national
The first defines the territory occupied, and the second the language spoken by the Japhethites; the third their immediate descent, and the rough the national group to which they severally belonged.
Gen 10:6
And the sons of Ham. These, who occupy the second place, that the list might conclude with the Shemites as the line of promise, number thirty, of whom only four were immediate descendants. Their territory generally embraced the southern portions of the globe. Hence the name Ham has been connected with , to be warm, though Kalisch declares it to be not of Hebrew, but Egyptian origin, appearing in the Chme of the Rosetta Stone. The most usual ancient name of the country was Kern, the black land. Scripture speaks of Egypt as the land of Ham (Psa 78:51; Psa 105:23; Psa 106:22) Cush. Ethiopia, including Arabia “quae mater est,” and Abyssinia “quae colonia” (Michaelis, Rosenmller). The original settlement of Cush, however, is believed to have been on the Upper Nile, whence he afterwards spread to Arabia, Babylonia, India (Knobel, Kalisch, Lange, Rawlinson). Murphy thinks he may have started from the Caucasus, the Caspian, and. the Cossaei of Khusistan, and. migrated south (to Egypt) and east (to India). Josephus mentions that in his day Ethiopia was called Cush; the Syriac translates (Act 8:27) by Cuschaeos; the ancient Egyptian name of Ethiopia was Keesh, Kish, or Kush (‘Records of the Past, Gen 4:7). The Cushites are described as of a black color (Jer 13:23) and of great stature (Isa 45:14). And Mizraim. A dual form probably designed to represent the two Egypts, upper and lower (Gesenius, Keil, Kalisch), though it has been discovered in ancient Egyptian as the name of a Hittite chief, written in hieroglyphics M’azrima, Ma being the sign for the dual. The old Egyptian name is Kemi, Chemi, with obvious reference to Ham; the name Egypt being probably derived from Kaphtah, the land of Ptah. The singular form Mazor is found in later books (2Ki 19:24; Isa 19:6; Isa 35:1-10 :25), and usually denotes Lower Egypt. And Phut. Phet (Old Egyptian), Phaiat (Coptic); the Libyans in the north of Africa (Josephus, LXX; Gesenins, Bochart). Kalisch suggests Buto‘ or Butos, the capital of the delta of the Nile. And Canaan. Hebrew, Kenaan (vide on Gen 9:25). The extent of the territory occupied by the fourth son of Ham is defined in Gen 10:15-19.
Gen 10:7
And the sons of Cush; Seba. Meroe, in Nubia, north of Ethiopia (Josephus, ‘Ant.,’ 2. 10). And Havilah. (LXX.); may refer to an African tribe, the Avalitae, south of Babelmandeb (Keil, Lange, Murphy), or the district of Chaulan in Arabia Felix (Rosenmller, Kalisch, Wordsworth). Gen 10:29 mentions Havilah as a Shemite territory. Kalisch regards them as “the same country, extending from the Arabian to the Persian Gulf, and, on account of its vast extent, easily divided into two distinct parts” (cf. Gen 2:11). And Sabtah. The Astaborans of Ethiopia (Josephus, Gesenius, Kalisch); the Ethiopians of Arabia, whose chief city was Sabota (Knobel, Rosenmller, Lange, Keil). And Raamah. (LXX.); Ragma on the Persian Gulf, in Oman (Bochart, Rosenmller, Kalisch, Lange). And Sabtechah. Nigritia (Targum, Jonathan), which the name Subatok, discovered on Egyptian monuments, seems to favor (Kalisch); on the east of the Persian Gulf at Samydace of Carmania (Bochart, Knobel, Rosenmller, Lange). And the sons of Raamah; Sheba. The principal city of Arabia Felix (1Ki 10:1; Job 1:15; Job 6:19; Psa 72:10, Psa 72:15; Isa 60:6; Jer 6:20; Eze 27:22; Joe 3:8); occurs again (Gen 5:28) as a son of Joktan; probably was peopled both by Hamites and Shemites. And Dedan. Daden on the Persian Gulf (vide Isa 21:13; Jer 49:8; Eze 25:13; Eze 27:12-15).
Gen 10:8
And Cush begatnot necessarily as immediate progenitor, any ancestor being in Hebrew styled a fatherNimrod; the rebel, from maradh, to rebel; the name of a person, not of a people;Namuret in ancient Egyptian. Though not one of the great ethnic heads, he is introduced into the register of nations as the founder of imperialism. Under him society passed from the patriarchal condition, in which each separate clan or tribe owns the sway of its natural head, into that (more abject or more civilized according as it is viewed) in which many different clans or tribes recognize the sway of one who is not their natural head, but has acquired his ascendancy and dominion by conquest. This is the principle of monarchism. Eastern tradition has painted Nimrod as a gigantic oppressor of the people’s liberties and an impious rebel-against the Divine authority. Josephus credits him with having instigated the building of the tower of Babel. He has been identified with the Orion of the Greeks. Scripture may seem to convey a bad impression of Nimrod, but it does not sanction the absurdities of Oriental legend. He began to be a mighty oneGibbor (vide Gen 6:4); what he had been previously being expressed in Gen 10:5in the earth. Not (LXX.), as if pointing to his gigantic stature, but either among men generally, with reference to his widespread fame, or perhaps better “in the land where he dwelt, which was not Babel, but Arabia (vide Gen 10:6).
Gen 10:9
He was a mighty hunter. Originally doubtless of wild beasts, which, according to Bochart, was the first step to usurping dominion over men and using them for battle. “Nempe venationum prsetextu collegit juvenum robustam manum, quam talibus exercitus ad belli labores induravit” (‘Phaleg.,’ 54.12). Before the Lord.
1. (LXX.), in a spirit of defiance.
2. Coram Deo, in God’s sight, as an aggravation of his sincf. Gen 13:3 (Cajetan).
3. As a superlative, declaring his excellenceof. Gen 13:10; Gen 30:8; Gen 35:5; 1Sa 11:7; Joh 3:3; Act 7:20 (Aben Ezra, Kimchi, Kalisch, ‘ Speaker’s Commentary’).
4. With the Divine approbation, as one who broke the way through rude, uncultivated nature for the institutions of Jehovah (Lange). Cf. Gen 17:18; Gen 24:40; 1Sa 11:15; Psa 41:12. Probably the first or the third conveys the sense of the expression. Wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the (a) mighty hunter before the Lord. The precise import of this is usually determined by the view taken of the previous phrase.
Gen 10:10
And the beginning of his kingdom. Either his first kingdom, as contrasted with his second (Knobel), or the commencement of his sovereignty (Keil, Kalisch), or the principal city of his empire (Rosenmller); or all three may be legitimately embraced in the term reshith, only it does not necessarily imply that Nimrod built any of the cities mentioned. Was Babel. Babylon, “the land of Nimrod” (Mic 5:6), the origin of which is described in Gen 11:1, grew to be a great city covering an area of 225 square reties, reached its highest glory under Nebuchadnezzar (Dan 4:30), and succumbed to the Medo-Persian power under Belshazzar (Dan 5:31). The remains of this great city have been discovered on the east bank of the Euphrates near Hillah, where there is a square mound called “Babil” by the Arabs (Rawlinson’s ‘Ancient Monarchies,’ vol. 1. Gen 1:1-31). And Erech. The Orchoe of Ptolemy, identified by Rawlinson as Wurka, about eighty miles south of Babylon. And Accad. (LXX.); the city Sittace on the river Argade (Bochart); Sakada, a town planted by Ptolemy below Ninus (Clericus); Accete, north of Babylon (Knobel, Lange); identified with the ruins of Niffer, to the south of Hillah (Keil); with those of Akkerkoof, north of Hillah (Kalisch). Rawlinson does not identify the site; George Smith regards it as “the capital of Sargon, the great city Agadi, near the city of Sippara on the Euphrates, and north of Babylon (‘Assyrian Discoveries,’ Gen 12:1-20.). And Calneh. Calno (Isa 10:9); Canneh (Eze 27:23); Ctesiphon, east of the Tigris, north-east of Babylon (Jerome, Eusebius, Bochart, Michaelis, Kalisch); identified with the ruins of Niffer on the east of the Euphrates (Rawlinson). In the land of Shinar. Babylonia, as distinguished from Assyria (Isa 11:11), the lower part of Mesopotamia, or Chaldaea.
Gen 10:11
Out of that land went forth Asshur, the son of Shem (Gen 10:22; LXX; Vulgate, Syriac, Luther, Calvin, Michaelis, Dathe, Rosenmller, Bohlen). i.e. the early Assyrians retired from Babylon before their Cushite. invaders, and, proceeding northward, founded the cities after mentioned; but the marginal rendering seems preferable: “Out of that land went (Nimrod) into Asshur,” or Assyria, the country northeast of Babylon, through which flows the Tigris, and which had already received its name from the son of Shem (the Targums, Drusius, Bochart, Le Clerc, De Wette, Delitzsch, Keil, Kalisch, Lange, et alii). And builded Nineveh. The capital of Assyria, opposite Mosul on the Tigris, afterward became the largest and most flourishing city of the ancient world (Jon 3:3; Jon 4:11), being fifty-five miles in circumference (Diod; Gen 2:3), and is now identified with the ruins of Nehbi-yunus and Kouyunjik. And the city Rehoboth. Rehoboth-ir, literally, the streets of the city (cf. Platea, a city in Boeotia), a town of which the site is unknown. And Calah. The mounds of Nimroud (Layard and Smith), though Kalisch and Murphy prefer Kalah Shergat (about fifty miles south of Nineveh), which the former authorities identify with Asshur, the original capital of the country.
Gen 10:12
And Resen, i.e. Nimrod, between Kalah Shergat and Kouyunjik (Kalisch); but if Calah be Nimroud, then Rosen may be Selamiyeh, a village about half way, between Nineveh and Calah, i.e. Kouyunjik and Nimroud, ut supra (Layard). The same. Rosen (Kalisch), which will suit if it was Nimroud, whose remains cover a parallelogram about 1800 feet in length and 900 feet in breadth; but others apply it to Nineveh with the other towns as forming one large composite city (Knobel, Keil, Lange, Wordsworth). Is a great city. With this the record of Nimrod’s achievements closes. It is generally supposed that Nimrod flourished either before or about the time of the building of the tower of Babel; but Prof. Chwolsen of St. Petersburg, in his ‘Ueber die Ueberreste der Altbabylonischen Literatur,’ brings the dynasty of Nimrod down as late as 1500 B.C; relying principally on the evidence of an original work composed by Qut ami, a native Babylonian, and translated by Ibnwa hachijah, a descendant of the Chaldaeans, and assigned by Chwolsen to one of the earlier periods of Babylonian history, in which is mentioned the name of Nemrod, or Nemroda, as the founder of a Canaanite dynasty which ruled at Babylon. Perhaps the hardest difficulty to explain in connection with the ordinary date assigned to Nimrod is the fact that in Gen 14:1-24; which speaks of the reigning monarchs in the Euphrates valley, there is no account taken of Nineveh and its kinga circumstance which has been supposed to import that the founding of the capital of Assyria could not have been anterior to the days of Abraham. But early Babylonian texts confirm what Gen 14:1-24. seems to implythe fact of an Elamite conquest of Babylonia, B.C. 2280, by Kudur-nanhundi (Kudurlagamar, the Chederlaomer of Genesis), who carried off an image of the goddess Nana from the city Erech (vide ‘Assyrian Discoveries,’ Gen 12:1-20; ‘Records of the Past,’ vol. 3.), so that this difficulty may be held to have disappeared before the light of archaeological discovery. But at whatever period Nimrod flourished, the Biblical narrative would lead us to anticipate a commingling of Hamitic and Shemitic tongues in the Euphrates valley, which existing monuments confirm.
Gen 10:13
And Mizraim begat Ludim. An African tribe, a colony of the Egyptians, like the next seven, which are “nomina non singulorum hominum sed populorum” (Aben Ezra, Michaelis, Rosenmller, Kalisch, Murphy); probably referred to in connection with Tarshish and Put (Isa 66:19), with Kush and Put (Jer 46:9), and in connection with Put (Eze 27:10; Eze 30:5). Lud (Gen 10:22) was Shemitic. And Anamim. Not elsewhere mentioned; the inhabitants of the Delta (Knobel). And Lehabim. Lubim (2Ch 12:3; Dan 2:43; Nah 3:9); Libyans (Dan 11:43); probably the Libyaus west of Egypt (Michaelis, Kalisch, Murphy). And Naphtuhim. Nephthys, near Pelusium; on the Lake Sirbenis (Bochart); the Libyan town Napata (Kalisch); the people of Middle Egypt (Knobel).
Gen 10:14
And Pathrusim. Pathros in Upper Egypt. And Casluhim. The Colchians, of Egyptian origin (Bochart, Gesenius); the inhabitants of the primitive Egyptian town Chemuis, later Panoplis (Kalisch). Out of whom came Philistim. The Philistines on the Mediterranean from Egypt to Joppa, who had five principal citiesGaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron. They are here described as an offshoot from Casluhim. The name has been derived from an Ethiopic root falasa, to emigrate; hence “immigrants” or “emigrants.” Jer 47:4 and Amo 9:7 trace the Philistines to the Caphtorim. Michaelis solves the difficulty by transposing the clause to the end of the verse; Bochart by holding the Casluhim and Caphtorim to have intermingled; Keil and Lange by the conjecture that the original tribe the Casluhim was subsequently strengthened by an immigration from Caphtor. Against the Egyptian origin of the Philistines the possession of a Shemitic tongue and the non-observance of circumcision have been urged; but the first may have been acquired from the conquered Avim whose land they occupied (Deu 2:28), and the exodus from Egypt may have taken place prior to the institution of the rite in question. And Caphtorim. Cappadocia (Bochart), Syrtis Major (Clericus), Crete (Calmer, Ewald), Cyprus (Michaelis, Rosenmller), Coptos, Kouft or Keft, a few miles north of Thebes (Kalisch).
Gen 10:15
And Canaan begat Sidon his firstborn. A famous commercial and maritime town on the coast of Syria (1Ki 5:6; 1Ch 22:4; Isa 23:2, Isa 23:4, Isa 23:12; Eze 27:8); here including Tyre. From the mention of the circumstance that Sidon was Canaan’s firstborn, we may infer that in the rest of the table the order of seniority is not followed. And Heth. The father of the Hittites (Gen 23:3, Gen 23:5), identified by Egyptologers with the Kheta, a powerful Syrian tribe.
Gen 10:16
And the Jebusite. Settled at and around Jerusalem (Jos 15:8; Jdg 19:10, Jdg 19:11; 1Ch 11:4, 1Ch 11:5). And the Amorite. On both sides of the Jordan, though dwelling chiefly in the Judaean mountains (Gen 14:7; Jos 10:5), to which the name “mountaineer,“ from “Amor,” elevation (Gesenius), is supposed to refer. And the Girgasite. The name only is preserved (Jos 24:11).
Gen 10:17
And the Hivite. “Villagers” (Gesenius); “settlers in cities” (Ewald); their localities are mentioned in Gen 34:2; Jos 9:1, Jos 9:7; Jos 11:3; Jdg 6:3. And the Arkite. Inhabitants of Arka, a city of Phoenicia (Josephus): afterwards called Caesarea Libani; its ruins still exist at Tel Arka, at the foot of Lebanon. And the Sinite. The inhabitants of Sin. Near Arkf are a fortress named Senna, ruins called Sin, and a village designated Syn.
Gen 10:18
And the Arvadite,dwelt in Arvad, Aradus, now Ruad (Josephus)and the Zemarite,Simyra, a city of Phoenicia (Bochart, Michaelis, Gesenius, Kalisch) whose ruins are still called Sumrahand the Hamathite. The inhabitants of Hamath, called Hammath Rabbah (Amo 6:2); Epiphaneia by the Greeks; now Hamah. And afterwardsi.e. subsequent to the formation of these distinct tribes by the confusion of tongueswere the families of the Canaanites spread abroad.
Gen 10:19
And the border of the Canaanites was from Sidon (its northern boundary), as thou comesti.e. as thou goest, in the direction ofto Gerar,between Kadesh and Shur (Gen 20:1)unto Gaza (now called Guzzeh, at the south-west corner of Palestine); as thou gout, unto Sodom, and Gomorrah, and Admah, and Zeboim (vide Gen 19:24),Callirrhoe (Hieronymus, Jerusalem Targum, Josephus, Rosenmller, Keil, Kalisch); possibly a variation of Laish and Leshem, a Sidonian city near the sources of the Jordan (Murphy).
Gen 10:20
These are the sons of Ham, after their families, after their tongues, in their countries, and in their nations (vide Gen 10:5).
Gen 10:21
Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber,as Ham of Canaan (Gen 9:22; vide Gen 9:24)the brother of Japheth the elder. Either the eldest brother of Japheth (Syriac, Arabic, Vulgate, Gesenius, Rosenmller, Kalisch); or the brother of Japheth who was older (LXX; Symmachus, Onkelos, Raschi, Aben Ezra, Luther, Clerieus, Michaelis, Dathe); or the elder of Japheth’s brothers, as distinguished from Ham the younger, i.e. the son who was older than Ham, But younger than Japheth (Murphy, Quarry; vide Gen 5:32). Even to him were children born.
Gen 10:22
The children of Shem were twenty-six in number, of whom five were sons. Elam. Elymais, a region adjoining Snaiana and Media, stretching from the Persian Gulf to the Rod Sea; the people first met with as Persians. And Asshur. The ancestor of the Assyrians (vide Gen 10:11). And Arphaxad. A region in the north of Assyria; the Arrhapacitis of Ptolemy (Rosenmller, Keil, Kalisch). The explanation of the name is “fortress of the Chaldaeans ‘ (Ewald); “highland of the Chaldaeans” (Knobel). And Lud. The Lydians of Asia Minor, to which they appear to have migrated from the land of Shem (Josephus, Bochart, Keil, Kalisch). And Aram. “The high land;” Mesopotamia being the Aram of the two rivers, and Syria the Aram of Damascua
Gen 10:23
And the children of Aram; Uz, from whom was named the land of Uz (Job 1:1), south-east of Palestine, a tract of the Arabia Deserta. And Hul. In Armenia (Josephus); that part called Cholobetene, or house of Hul (Bochart); the Hylatae of Syria, near the Emesenes (Delitzsch); Coele-syria (Michaelis); Huleh, near the sources of the Jordan (Murphy). And Getherof uncertain situationand Mashtraced in Mous Masius of Armenia (Bochart).
Gen 10:24
And Arphaxad begat Salah. The nation descended from him has not been identified, though their name, “Extension,“ may imply that they were early colonists. And Salah begat Eber. The father of the Hebrews or Emigrants (vide Gen 10:21).
Gen 10:25
And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg. “Division,“ from palg, to divide; cf. and pelagus, a division of the sea. For in his days was the earth divided. At the confusion of tongues (Bochart, Rosenmller, Keil, Lange, Murphy); at an earlier separation of the earth’s population (Delitzsch), of which there is no record or trace. And his brother’s name was Joktan. Father of the Arabians, by whom he is called Kachtan.
Gen 10:26-30
And Joktan begat Almodad. Usually said to be Yemen. And Sheleph. The Salapenoi of Ptolemy, belonging to the interior of Arabia. And Hazarmaveth. Hadramaut, southeast of Arabia (Bochart, Michaelis). And Jerah. Contiguous to Hadramaut. And Hadoram. Adramitae of Ptolemy, or the Atramitae of Pliny (Bochart) And Uzal. Awzal, the capital of Yemen (Bochart). And Diklah. The palm-bearing region of Arabia Felix (Bochart); a tribe between the mouth of the Tiber and the Persian Gulf (Michaelis). And Obal, and Abimael, whose settlements are not known. And Sheba. Vide supra, Gen 10:7. And Ophir. In Arabia; probably in Oman, on the Persian Gulf (Michaelis, Rosenmller, Kalisch, Keil), though it has also been located in India (Josephus, Vitringa, Gesenius, Delitzsch). The gold of Ophir celebrated (1Ki 9:27, 1Ki 9:28; 2Ch 9:10, 2Ch 9:13, 2Ch 9:21). And Havilah. The Chaulan in Arabia Felix, but vide supra, Gen 10:7. And Jobab. The Jobabitae of Ptolemy, near the Indian Sea (Michaelis, Rosenmller); but more probably a tribe in Arabia Deserta if JobabArabic jebab, a desert (Bochart, Gesenius, Kalisch). All these were the sons of Joktan. And their dwelling was from Mesha. The seaport of Muza (Bochart); Messene, at the mouth of the Tigris (Michaelis, Rosenmller, Kalisch). As thou goest into Zephar. Zafar or Dhafari, on the coast of the Hadramut. The difficulty of identifying a seaport town with a mountain is got over (Kalisch) by reading “to the” instead of a mount of the eastthe thunderous range of hills in the vicinity.
Gen 10:31, Gen 10:32
These are the sons of Shorn, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations. The pedigree of the Shemite tribes is closed with the customary formula (vide Gen 10:5); that which follows being the concluding formula for the entire table of nations. These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations (literally, according to their Tholdoth, or historical developments), in their nation,: and by these (literally, from the) were the nations divided (or, did the nations scatter themselves) in the earth after the flood.
HOMILETICS
Gen 10:32
The ethnological register.
I. PROCLAIMS THE UNITY OF THE RACE.
1. It declares all the successive families of mankind to have sprung from a common stock. Diverse as they flow are in their geographical situations, ethnic relations, physical capabilities, national peculiarities, according to the doctrine of this genealogical table they all trace their origin to Noah and his sons.
2. It condemns all those theories which derive man from several pairs. Equally the heathen superstition which assigned to each particular region its own Autochthones, and the modern scientific dogma of varieties of species and distinct centers of propagation is here condemned. Even now ethnologists, archaeologists, and philologists of the highest repute lend their sanction to the sublime sentiment of the great Mars’ hill preacher, that “God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell upon all the face of the earth.” The anatomical structure of the human frame, especially of the brain and skull, the physiological properties and functions possessed by the body, the psychological nature of man, and the power of indefinite propagation, which are the same in all nations, with the ascertained results of comparative grammar, which have already traced back all existing languages to three primitive branches, tend in a powerful degree to confirm the doctrine which this table teaches.
3. It implies certain other truths on which Scripture with equal emphasis insists, such as the brotherhood of man, the universal corruption of the race, and the necessity and universality of Christ’s redemption.
II. ATTESTS THE DIVISION of the RACE.
1. It asserts the fact of the division. It states that in the days of Peleg the earth’s population was divided. The means employed are described in the succeeding chapter.
2. It confirms the truth of this division. Had the confusion at Babel not occurred. and the subsequent dispersion not followed. this table could not have been written. Its existence as a literary document in the time of Moses authenticates the fact which it reports.
3. It defines the extent of this division. It shows that the scattered race were to be split up into nations, families, tongues.
III. ILLUSTRATES THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACE. The geographical distribution of the earth’s population was
1. Effected in an orderly manner. They were neither scattered promiscuously nor suffered to wander and settle at hazard. Divided into tribes and nations according to their tongues and dialects of speech, they were allocated to distinct portions of the earth’s surface.
2. Specially adapted to the characters and destinies of the several nations. The operation of purely natural principles makes it impossible that tribes can permanently settle in countries that are either incapable of yielding to them a maintenance or affording an outlet to their powers. More extensive information would doubtless enable the suitability of each locality in this table to the occupying people to be exhibited; but in broad outline it is perceptible even hereJapheth, whose destiny it was to spread abroad, being established on the coasts of the Euxine, the Caspian, and the Mediterranean; Ham finding rest in the warmer climates, whose enervating influences tended largely to develop his peculiar character, and ultimately to lay him open to subjection by the more vigorous races of the North; and Shem, whose function in the Divine economy it was to conserve religion and religious truth, being concentrated mainly in the Tigris and Euphrates valley.
3. The result of Divine appointment. Moses (Deu 32:8) and Paul (Act 17:26) conspire to represent the allocation of territory to the different races of mankind as the handiwork of God (the special means employed for the breaking up of the originally united family of Noah’s sons is detailed in the ensuing chapter); the import of which is, that nations have a God-assigned title to the countries which they occupy.
4. The Divinely-ordered distribution of the earth’s population is capable of being disturbed by the sinful interference of man. Instances of this appear in the present table, e.g. the intrusion of the Cushite into Shinar, and of the Canaanite into what originally belonged to Skein.
IV. PREDICTS THE FUTURE OF THE RACE. As it were, the separation of the earth’s population into races and the moving of them outward to their respective habitations was the starting of them on the lines along which it was designed they should accomplish their respective destinies and common work. They were meant to overspread the globe; and this was the initiation of a great movement which would only terminate in the complete occupation of their God-given heritage.
Lessons:
1. The equal rights of men.
2. The sinfulness of wars of aggression.
3. The hopefulness of emigration.
HOMILIES BY W. ROBERTS
Gen 10:8
Nimrod.
1. His ancestral pedigreea Cushite.
2. His early occupationa hunter of wild beasts, a pioneer of civilization.
3. His rising ambitionhe began to be a “Gibber,” or mighty one.
4. His regal authoritythe beginning of his kingdom was Babel.
5. His extending empireout of that land went he forth into Asshur.
6. His posthumous renown: “Wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod.”W.
Gen 10:15-19
The Canaanites.
I. DESCENDANTS OF A WICKED FATHER.
II. INHERITORS OF AN AWFUL CURSE.
III. POSSESSORS OF A FAIR DOMAIN.
IV. USURPERS OF ANOTHER‘S LAND.
Lessons:
1. Wicked men and nations may greatly prosper.
2. Prosperity sometimes leads to greater wickedness.
3. The greatest prosperity cannot turn aside the punishment of sin.W.
Gen 10:25
Peleg, or the division of the people.
I. WHEN IT TOOK PLACE. In the fourth generation after the Flood.
II. How IT WAS EFFECTED.
1. By the Divine interposition.
2. By the confusion of tongues.
III. FOR WHAT IT WAS DESIGNED.
1. To punish sin.
2. To separate the Church.
3. To occupy the earth.
IV. BY WHAT IT WAS REMEMBERED. The naming of Eber’s son.
Learn
1. To read well the signs of the times.
2. To understand well the cause of God’s judgments.
3. To remember well the gift of God’s mercies.W.
Gen 10:32
Nations.
I. THEIR ROOTS. Individuals.
II. THEIR RISE.
1. As to time, after the Flood.
2. As to cause, Divine impulse.
3. As to instrumentality, variation of speech.
III. THEIR CHARACTERISTICS.
1. A common head.
2. A common tongue.
3. A common land.
IV. THEIR DESTINIES. To overspread the earth.W.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
Gen 10:1. Now these are the generations, &c. To give an exact and satisfactory comment on this chapter, would far exceed the bounds we have prescribed ourselves: we shall therefore beg leave only to insert as plain an exposition of the names as we can collect, and refer our learned readers for proof and fuller discussion of these matters to those writers who have treated of them at large, but especially to the Phaleg of Bochart, Calmet, the Universal History, Wells, Shuckford, and others. It may be proper to observe, that though this chapter be placed before the eleventh, yet in order of time it ought to follow; for the foundation of Nimrod’s kingdom, and the dispersion of mankind through the different regions of the earth, are facts posterior to the confusion of Babel. And it should also be observed, that the design of the holy penman is not to present us with an exact enumeration of all Noah’s descendants, (this would have been endless,) nor to determine who were the leading men above all the rest; but only to give us a catalogue or general account of the names of some certain persons descended from Noah, who were patriarchs and founders of such nations, as were more immediately known to the Hebrews in the time of Moses.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
THIRD SECTION
The Ethnological Table.
Gen 10:1-32
1Now these are the generations [genealogies] of the sons of Noah; [they were] Shem, Ham, and Japheth; and unto them were sons born after the flood.
1. The Japhethites (Gen 10:2-5).
2The Sons of Japheth; Gomer [the Cimmerians, in the Taurian Chersonesus; Crimea], and Magog [Scythians], and Madai [Medes], and Javan [Ionians], and Tubal [Tibereni], and Meschech 3[Moschi], and Tiras [Thracians]. And the sons of Gomer1; Ashkenaz1 [Germans, Asen], and Riphath [Celts, Paphlagonians], and Togarmah [Armenians]. 4And the sons of Javan2; Elishah2 [Elis, olians], and Tarshish [Tartessus; Knobel: Etruscans], Kittim [Cyprians, Carians], and Dodanim [Dardanians]. 5By these Were the isles [dwellers on the islands and the coasts] of the Gentiles [the heathen] divided3 in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.
2. The Hamites (Gen 10:6-20).
6And the sons of Ham; Cush [thiopians], and Mizraim4 [Egyptians], and Phut 7[Lybians], and Canaan [Canaanites, Lowlanders]. And the sons of Cush; Seba [Meroe], and Havilah [Abyssinians], and Sabtah [thiopians in Sabotha], and Raamah [Eastern Arabians], and Sabtecha [thiopian Caramanians]: and the sons of Raamah; Sheba and Dedan 8[Saban and Dadanic Cushites, on the Persian Gulf]. And Cush begat Nimrod [we will rebel]: Hebrews 9 began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was [he became] a mighty hunter before the Lord5; wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod [is he] the mighty hunter before the Lord. 10And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel [Babylon, see ch. xi. 9], and Erech [Orchoe], and Accad, and Calneh [Ktesiphon], in the land of Shinar [Babylonia]. 11Out of that land went forth Asshur6 [Assyrians], and builded Nineveh [city of Ninus], and the city Rehoboth 12[city markets], and Calah [Kelach and Chalach; completion], And Resen [bridle] between Nineveh and Calah; the same is a great city. 13And Mizraim begat Ludim [Berbers? Mauritanian races], and Anamim [inhabitants of the Delta], and Lehabim [Libyans of Egypt], and Naphtuhim 14[middle or lower Egyptians], And Pathrusim [upper Egyptians], and Casluhim [Cholcians], out of whom came Philistim [emigrants, new comers], and Caphtorim [Cappadocians? Cretans?]. 15And Canaan begat Sidon [Sidonians, fishers?] his firstborn, and Heth [Hittites, terror], 16And the Jebusite [Jebus, Jerusalem, threshing-floor], and the Amorite [inhabitants of the hills], and the Girgasite [clay, or marshy soil], 17And the Hivite [paganus?], and the Arkite [inhabitants of Arka, at the foot of Lebanon], and the Sinite [in Sinna, upon Lebanon], 18And the Arvadite Arabians on the island Arados, north of Tripolis], and the Zemarite [inhabitants of Simyra, on the western foot of Lebanon], and the Hamathite [Hamath, on the northern border of Palestine]: and afterwards were the families of the Canaanites spread abroad. 19And the border of the Canaanites was from Sidon as thou comest to Gerar [city of the Philistines], unto Gaza [city of Philistines, stronghold]; as thou goest unto Sodom [city of burning], and Gomorrah [city of the wood], and Admah [in the territory of Sodom, Adamah?], and Zeboim [city of gazelles or hyenas], even unto Lasha [on the east of the Dead Sea, earth cleft]. 20These are the sons of Ham, after their families, after their tongues, in their countries, and in their nations.
3. The Shemites (Gen 10:21-31).
21Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber [on the other side], the brother of Japheth the elder [Lange, more correctly, translates, elder brother of Japheth], even to him were children born. 22The children of Shem; Elam [Elymans, Persians], and Asshur [Assyrians], and Arphaxad [Arrapachitis, in Northern Assyria, fortress, or territory of the Chaldans], and Lud 23[Lydians in Asia Minor], and Aram [Aramans in Syria, highlanders]. And the children o Aram; Uz [Aisites? native country of Job], and Hul [Celo-Syria], and Gether [Arabians], and Mash 24[Mesheg, Syrians]. And Arphaxad begat Salah [sent forth]; and Salah begat Eber [from the other side, emigrant, pilgrim]. 25And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg [division]; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brothers name was Joktan [diminished; by the Arabians called Kachtan, ancestor of all the Arabian tribes]. 26And Joktan begat Almodad [measured], and Sheleph [Salapenians, old Arabian tribe of Yemen, drawers of the sword], and Hazarmaveth [Hadramath, in S. E. Arabia, court of death], and Jerah [worshipper of the moon, on 27 the Red Sea], and Hadoram [Atramites, on the south coast of Arabia], and Uzal [San, a city in Yemen], 28and Diklah [a district in Arabia, place of palm-trees], And Obal [in Arabia, stripped of leaves], and Abimael [in Arabia, father of Mael, the Minans?], and Sheba [Sabans, with their capital city, Saba], 29And Ophir [in Arabia, probably on the Persian Gulf], and Havilah [probably Chaulan, a district between San and Mecca, or the Chaulot, on the border of stony Arabia], and Jobab: all these were sons of Joktan. 30And their dwelling was from Mesha [according to Gesenius, Mesene, on the Persian Gulf], as thou goest unto Sephar [Himyaric royal city in the Indian Sea, Zhafar], a mount of the east. 31These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations. 32These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations [genealogies], in their nations: and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood.
GENERAL REMARKS ON THE ETHNOLOGICAL TABLE, OR THE GENEALOGICAL TREE OF THE NATIONS
1. The Literature.See Matthew, p. 19; the present work, p. 119; Kurtz: History of the Old Testament, p. 88; Knobel, p. 107; Keil, p. 108; a full and well-arranged survey see in Delitzsch, p. 287; also the notes in Delitzsch, p. 629. See also the articles, Babel, Babylon, Nineveh, and Mesopotamia, in Herzogs Real-Encyclopedia. Layards account of Excavations at Nineveh, together with the Description of a Visit to the Chaldan Christians in Kurdistan, and to the Jezidi or Worshippers of Satan. German of Meissner, Leipsic, 1852. Here belong also the Ethnographical Works, or the National Characteristics, etc: Lazarus and Steinthal. Journal of Popular Psychology. Berlin: Dumler, 1859. Berghaus, Friedrich von Raumer, Vorlander, and others.
2. The basis of the genealogical table. According to Hvernik and Keil, this document was grounded on very old tradition, and had its origin in the time of Abraham. According to Knobel, the knowledge of the nations that is represented in it, had its origin, in great part, in the connection of the Hebrews with the Phnician Canaanites. Delitzsch assigns its composition to the days of Joshua. The signs of a high antiquity for this table present themselves unmistakably in its ground features. There belong here: 1. The small development of the Japhethan line; on which it may be remarked, that they were the people with whom the Phnicians maintained the most special intercourse; 2. the position of the thiopians at the head of the Hamites, the historical notices of Nimrod, as also the supposition that Sodom and Gomorrah were then existing; 3. the discontinuance of the Jewish line with Peleg, as well as the accurate familiarity with the branching of the Arabian Joktanites, who have as much space assigned to them alone as to all the Japhethites, when for the commercial Phnicians they would be of least significance. The table indicates various circles of traditionmore universal and more special. The Japhethan groups appear least developed. Besides the seven sons, the grandchildren of Japheth are given only in the descendants of Gomer and Javan, in the people of anterior Asia, and in the inhabitants of the coasts and islands of the Mediterranean Sea. Magog, Madai, Thubal, Meshech, and Tiras are carried no farther. The table certifies a very copious tradition of the Hamites. First, there are mentioned the four sons of Ham, then five sons of his firstborn, Cush, then the two sons of Raamah, the fourth son of Cush. These two are, therefore, great-grandchildren of Ham. Nimrod is next presented as a specially prominent son of Cush. Then follows the second son of Ham, Mizraim, with six sons. The sixth, Casluhim, is again presented in the mention of the Philistim and Caphtorim, who are, therefore, also great-grandchildren of Ham. Phut, the fourth son of Ham, is the only one who is carried no farther. The fifth, Canaan, appears with eleven sons; namely, Sidon, the ancestor of the Phnicians, and the heads of the other Canaanitish tribes. Shem, finally, has five sons, of whom, again, Elam, Asshur, and Lud, are no farther developed. The line of his son, Aram, appears in four sons, grandchildren of Shem. Of the sons of Shem, Arphaxad is treated as most important. The line goes from Shem through Arphaxad and Salah, even to the great-grandchild, Eber. Eber forms the most important point of connection in the Shemitic line. With his son Peleg the earth is divided; that is, there is formed the strong monotheistic, Abrahamic line, in contrast with the line of his brother Joktan and the Arabian Joktanites. Joktan is developed in thirteen sons, great-grandchildren of Shem.
From this survey it appears: 1. That the table has a clear and full view of the three ground-types or points of departure of the Noachian humanityShem, Ham, Japheth. It however, inverts the order of the names, because Shem, as the ancestor of the people of the promise, is the peculiar point of aim in the representation. Japheth, however, comes first, because, since the history of Israel stands in nearest reciprocal connection with that of the Hamites, the Japhethites in this respect take the background. 2. The table has, in like manner, a clear view of the nearest descendants of the three sons of Noah, of the seven sons of Japheth, of the four sons of Ham, and the five sons of Shem. It presents us, therefore, the sixteen ground-forms of commencing national formations. 3. In the case of five sons of Japheth, one son of Ham, and three sons of Shem, the genealogy is not carried beyond the grandchildren. 4. In respect to the Japhethites, it does not, generally, go beyond the grandchildren; among the Hamites it passes through the grandchild, Raamah, to the great-grandchildren; so, likewise, through the grandchildren, the Casluhim; among the Shemites, through Arphaxad, it proceeds to the great-great-grandchildren, and these, through the great-great-grandchild, Joktan, are carried one step farther. 5. The table occupies itself least with the Japhethans; beyond the Medes, the people of Middle Asia and the eastern nations generally come no farther into the account. It appears, however, to have little familiarity with the Phnicians proper, since it only makes mention of Sidon, whilst it exhibits a full acquaintance with the Egyptians, with the inhabitants of Canaan, and with the Arabian tribes. In this peculiar form of the table lies the mark of its very high antiquity. 6. It contains three fundamental geographical outlines, one political, and besides this, an important theocratic-ethnographic notice. Geographical: 1. The mention of the spreading of the Javanites (Ionians) over the isles and coasts of the Mediterranean; 2. the spreading of the Canaanites in Canaan; 3. the extension of the Joktanites in Arabia. Political: The first founding of cities (or states) by Nimrod. Theocratic: The division of the world in the time of Peleg, the ancestor of Abraham.
Kurtz recommends the following as fundamental positions in deciding on the names in the ethnological table: 1. The names denote, for the most part, groups of people, whose name is carried back to the ancestor; the race, together with the ancestor, forming one united conception. 2. Moreover, the one designation for a land and its inhabitants, must not be misapprehended; for example, the names Canaan, Aram, etc., pass over from the land to the people, and then from the people to the ancestor. 3. In general, the table proceeds from the status in quo of the present, solving the problem of national origin formally in the way of evolution (unity for multiplicity), but materially in the way of reduction, in that it carries back to unity the nations that lie within the horizon of the conceiving beholder. The last position, however, hardly holds of the sons of Noah himself; just as little can it be applied to the genealogies of the Shemitic branching. In regard, then, to the sources of the table, Kurtz also remarks: together with Hengstenberg and Delitzsch, we regard the sources of this ethnological table to have been the patriarchal traditions, enriched by the knowledge of the nations that had reached the Israelites through the Egyptians. Hengstenberg had already begun to make available, in proof of this origin, the knowledge of the peoples that was expressed on the Egyptian monuments. In assigning its composition (as a constituent element of Genesis) to about the year 1000 b. c., Knobel must naturally regard the ethnological knowledge of the Phnicians as its true source. On the significance of the table, the same writer (Kurtz) remarks: Now that the sacred history is about to leave the nations to go their own way, the preservation of their names indicates, that notwithstanding this, they are not wholly lost to it, and that they are not forgotten in the counsel of everlasting love. Its interest for the Old Testament history consists particularly in this, that it presents so completely the genealogical position which Israel holds among the nations of the earth. It is, moreover, like the primitive history everywhere, in direct contrast with the philosophemes and myths of the heathen. In relation to the idea, that henceforth the nations are to be suffered to go their own way, Keil reminds us of Act 14:16; in relation to the prospect of their restoration, he describes the ethnological table as a preparation for the promise of the blessing which is to go forth from the promised race over all the races of the earth (Gen 12:23). For the historicalness of the ethnological table, Keil presents the following arguments: 1. That there is no trace of any superiority claimed for the Shemites; 2. no trace of any design to fill up any historical gaps by conjecture or poetic invention. This is seen in the great differences in the narration as respects the individual sons of Noah; in one case, there is mention made only to the second; then again to the third and fourth member; of many the ancestors are particularly mentioned; whilst in other cases the national distinctions alone are specified; so that in respect to many names we are unable to decide whether it is the people or the ancestor that is meant to be denoted; and this is especially so because, by reason generally of the scantiness and unreliability of ancient accounts that have come down to us from other sources concerning the origin and commencements of the nations, many names cannot be satisfactorily determined as to what people they really belong.
Against the certainty of this ethnological table, there have been made to bear the facts of linguistic affinity. The Phnicians and the Canaanites are assigned to Ham, but their language is Shemitic. Tuch ascribes this position of the people aforesaid among the Hamites to the Jewish national hatred, and would regard it as false. But on the contrary, it must be remembered that the Jews, notwithstanding their national hatred, never denied their kinsmanship with the Edomites and others. Knobel solves the philological problem by the supposition that the Canaanites who migrated to that country might have received the Shemitic language from Shemites who had previously settled there. Add to this that the affinity of the Phnicians and Canaanites with the Hamitic nations of the south seems to be established (Kurtz, p. 90; Kaulen, p. 235). As to what concerns the Elamites on the Persian Gulf, we must distinguish them from the eastern Japhethic Persians. Besides these philological difficulties, there has been set in opposition to the ethnological table the hypothesis of autochthonic human races. We have already spoken of this. And again, say some, how, in the space of four hundred years, from Noah till the Patriarchal time, could such a formation of races have been completed? On that we would remark, in the first place, that the American and Malayan races have only been known since the time of modern voyages of discovery. The Mongolian race, too, does not come into the account in the patriarchal age. There is, therefore, only the contrast between the Caucasian and the thiopic. For the clearing up of this difficulty, it is sufficient to note: 1. The extraordinary difference, which, in the history of Noah, immediately ensued between Shem and Japheth on the one side, and Ham on the other; 2. the progressive specializing of the Hamitic type in connection with the Hamitic spiritual tendency towards its passional and the sensual; 3. the change that took place in the Hamitic type in its original yielding conformity to the effect of a southern climate. The Hamitic type had, moreover, its universal sphere as the thiopic race; this constituted its developed ground-form, whilst single branches, on the other hand, through a progress of ennobling, might make an approach to the Caucasian cultivation.7 That Shem and Japheth, however, in their nobler tendency, should unite in one Caucasian form, is not to be wondered at. The great difference between the Shemitic type and the Japhethan, as existing within the Caucasian, is, notwithstanding, fully acknowledged. Since, however, the Shemitic type in its nobler branches, may make transitions to the Caucasian; so also may separations from the Japhethic and Shemitic form, perhaps, the Mongolian and the American races, in consequence of a common tendency (see Kurtz, p. 80. The Direction of the Noachid.)
There have also been objected to the table chronological difficulties; in so far as it forms a middle point for the assumption of Jewish and Christian chronology. According to Bunsen, the time before Christ must be reckoned at 20,000 years,namely, to the flood, 10,000, and from the flood to Abraham, 7,000 (see, on the contrary, Delitzsch, p. 291). Taking these 20,000 years, the ante-Christian humanity loses itself in a Thohu Vabohu running through many thousand years of an unhistorical, beastly existence, wherein the human spirit fails to find any recognition of its nobility.
Delitzsch, in his admirable section on the ethnological table, remarks, p. Genesis 286: The line of the promise with its chosen race, must be distinguished from the confusion of the Gentiles; such is the aim of this great genealogical chart, and in accordance with which it is constructed. It is a fundamental characteristic of Israel, that it is to embrace all nations as partakers of a like salvation in a participation of hope and love,an idea unheard of in all antiquity beside.8 The whole ancient world has nothing to show of like universality with this table. The earth-describing sections of the Epic poems of the Hindoos, and some of the Puranas, go greatly astray, even in respect to India, whilst the nearest lands are lost in the wild and monstrous account that is given of them. Their system of the seven world islands (dvpas) that lay around the Meru, seems occupied with the worlds of gods and genii rather than with the world of man. (Lassen, in the Journal of Oriental Knowledge, i. p. 341; Wilson, The Vishnu Purana). Nowhere is there to be found so unique a derivation of the national masses, or so universal a survey of the national connections. A tinge of hopeful green winds through the arid desert of this ethnological register. It presents in perspective the prospect that these far-sundered ways of the nations shall, at the last, come together at the goal which Jehovah has marked. Therefore does Baumgarten complete the saying of Johannes von Mller, that history has its beginning in this ethnological table, with a second equally true, that in it also, as its closing limit, shall history find its end. We may undervalue this table if we overlook the fact that, in its actual historical and ethnological ground-features it presents, symbolically, a universal image of the one humanity in its genealogical divisions. We may overvalue it, or rather, set a false value upon it, when we attempt to trace back to it, with full confidence, all the known nations now upon the earth. Even the number 70, as the universal symbol of national existences, can only be deduced from it by an artificial method; as, for example, in Delitzsch, p. 289. It is only in the symbolical sense that the catalogue may be regarded as amounting to this number.
Neither can we derive this subdividing the nations to such a multiplicity of national life, from the confusion of languages at Babel. The natural subdivision of the people has something of an ideal aspect; the increased impulse given to it at Babel had its origin in sin. We regard it, therefore, as a strong proof of the canonical intuition that this ethnological table precedes instead of following the history of the tower-building. Kurtz treats the history of Babel as earlier than that of the register; and Keil, too, would seem inclined to identify the diversity of the nations with the confusion of tongues (p. 107).
After these general remarks, we will confine ourselves to the most necessary particulars.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Gen 10:2-5.The Japhethites.Gomer.The Cimbri, as well as the Cumry or Cymry in Wales, and in Bretagne, are to be regarded as in relation with the Cimmerians; They represent the north-western portion of the Japhethan territory.Magog appears to represent the whole northeast, as the Scythians, in the most general way, denote the cycle of the northeastern nations. The Sarmatians, for the most part, lie to the west. The chief people in the army of Gog, Eze 38:2-3; Eze 39:1, is , that is the Rossi, or Russians. Knobel.Madai; the Medes, who inhabit the south and Southwest.Javan, belonging to the south, the Grco-Italian family of nations.Thubal and Meshech as well as Thogarma, inhabiting the middle tracts: Iberians, or Tahomans, Armenians, Pontus, the districts of Asia Minor generally.Gomers Sons: Ashkenaz is referred to the Germans, by others to Asia Minor, the Asiones. Ashkenaz is explained by Knobel as denoting the race of Asen. The oldest son of the Germanic Mannus was called Iskus, equivalent to Ask, Ascanios.Riphat is referred by Knobel to the Celts, by Josephus to the Paphlagonians; in which there is no contradiction, since the Celts also (the Gauls) had a home in Asia (Galatia).Thogarma.The Armenians to this day call themselves the House of Thorgom or Thorkomatsi.Sons of Javan: Elisa is referred to Elis and to the olians, Tarshish to Tartessus, and also to the Etruscans, whom, nevertheless, Delitzsch holds to have been Shemites; Kittim is referred to the Cyprians and the Carians; Dodanim to the Dardanians.
2. Gen 10:6-20.The Hamites. The three first sons of Ham settled in Northern Africa. 1. The thiopians of the upper Nile; 2. the Egyptians of the lower Nile; 3. the Libyans, west of the Egyptians, in the east of Northern Africa. The Cushites appear to have removed from the high northeast (Coss), passing over India, Babylonia, and Arabia, in their course towards the south; for in these lands the ancients recognized a dark-colored people, who were designated by them as thiopians, and who have since, in part, perished, whilst a few have kept their place to this day. Knobel.Mizraim.The name denotes narrowing, enclosing; its dual form denotes the double Egypt (upper and lower Egypt); is probably from Kah-ptah, land of Ptah. The old Egyptian name is Kemi, Chemi, (with reference to Ham).Canaan.Between the Mediterranean Sea and the western shore of Jordan.The name Pni (Puni), allied to , blood, and , blood-red, denotes the Phnicians in their original Hamitic color.Sons of Cush. Seba.Mero, which, at one time, according to Josephus, was called Seba.Chavila.In the Septuagint, . The Macrobians (or long living), thiopians of the modern Abyssinia.Sabta.Sabbata, a capital city in Southern Arabia. To this day there is in Yemen and Hadramaut a dark race of men who are distinct from the light-colored Arabians. So it is also in Oman on the Persian Gulf. Knobel.Raamah.Septuagint: , in Southeastern ArabiaOman. There, too, there are obscure indications of Raamahs sons Sheba and Dedan.Sabtecha.Dark-colored men on the east side of the Persian Gulf, in Caramania.Aside from these, Nimrod is also made prominent as a son of Cush, Gen 10:8-12. Knobel regards this section as a Jehovistic interpolation, and so does Delitzsch. The name Jehovah, however, as occurring here, is no proof of such a fact; it comes naturally out of the accompanying thoughts. The only thing remarkable is, that Nimrod is not named in immediate connection with the other sons of Cush, but that the two sons of Raamah go before him. It is, however, easy enough to be understood, that the narrator wished first to dispose of this lesser reference.9 Interruptions similar to it are of repeated occurrence in the table, as is the case also in other genealogies (1Ch 2:7; 1Ch 23:4; 1Ch 23:22).He was a mighty hunter.The author presents Nimrod as the son of Cush, putting him far back before the time of Abraham, and assigns him to the thiopian race. In fact, the classical writers recognize thiopians in Babylonia in the earliest times. They speak, especially, of an thiopian king, Cepheus, who belongs to the mythical time, and there is mention of a trace of the Cephenians as existing to the north of Babylon. Knobel. In the expression, he began to be a hero, or a mighty one upon the earth, there is no occasion for calling him a postdiluvian Lamech (Delitzsch). He began the unfolding of an extraordinary power of will and deed, in the fact mentioned, that he became a mighty hunter in the presence of Jehovah. The hunting of ravenous beasts was in the early time a beneficent act for the human race. Powerful huntsmen appear as the pioneers of civilization; a fact which clearly proclaims itself in the myth of Hercules. And so the expression, Nimrod was a mighty hunter before Jehovah, may mean, that he was one who broke the way for the future institutions of worship and culture which Jehovah intended in the midst of a wild and uncultivated nature. There is another interpretation: he was so mighty a hunter, that even by Jehovah, to whom, in other respects, nothing is distinguished, he was recognized as such (Knobel; Delitzsch); but this seems to us to have little or no meaning. Keil holds fast to the traditional interpretation: in defiance of Jehovah, and, at the same time, takes the literal sense of animal-hunting in connection with the tropical sense of hunting men, so that he explains it, with Herder, as meaning an ensnarer of men by fraud and force. Neither the expression itself, nor the proverb: like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord, justifies this view. By such a proverb, there may be denoted a praiseworthy, Herculean pioneer of culture, as well as a blameworthy and violent despot. In truth, the chase of the animals was, for Nimrod, a preparatory exercise for the subjugation of men. For him and his companions, the chase was a training for war, as we are told by Xenophon (Kunegete, C. i.), the old heroes were pupils of Chiron, and so, , disciples of the chase. Delitzsch.And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel.Knobel: His first kingdom in contrast with his second. This, however, is not necessarily involved in the expression, the beginning. It denotes rather the basis. In thus playing the hero, Nimrod established, in the first place, a kingdom that embraced Babel, that is, Babylon, Erech, or Orech, in the southwest of Babylonia, Akkad (in respect to situation ), in a northern direction, and in the Northeast, Calneh, in respect to territory corresponding to Chalonitis, or Ktisiphon, on the east shore of the Tigris. This establishment of an empire transforming the patriarchal clan-governments into one monarchy is not to be thought of as happening without force. The hunter becomes a subjugator of men, in other words, a conqueror.Out of that land went forth Asshur. [Lange translates: Out of that land went he forth towards Asshur.]The Septuagint, Vulgate, and many interpreters (Luther, Calvin) regard Asshur as the grammatical subject, and give it the sense: Asshur went forth from Shinar. On the contrary, the Targum of Onkelos, Targum of Jonathan, and many other authorities, (Baumgarten, Delitzsch, Knobel) have rightly recognized Nimrod as the subject. Still, it does not seem clear, when Knobel supposes that Nimrod had left his first kingdom for the sake of founding a second. Moreover, it is not to be supposed that he barely extended his rule over an uninhabited territory for the purpose of colonizing it. It was rather characteristic of Nimrod, that he should seek still more strongly to appropriate to himself the occupied district of Assyria by the establishment of cities. The first city was Nineveh (at this day the ruin-district called Nimrud), above the place where the Lycus flows into the Tigris; the second was Rehoboth, probably east of Nineveh; the third Calah, northward in the district of Kalachan, in which there is found the place of ruins called Khorsabad; the fourth was Resen, between Nineveh and Calah.The same is a great city.The first suggested sense would seem to denote Resen as the great city, or as the greater city in relation to the others named with it. On the contrary, remarks Knobel: Resen is nowhere else mentioned as known to antiquity, and could not possibly have been so distinguished, as to be called in this short way the great city. Rather does the expression denote the four cities taken together, as making Nineveh in the wider sense, and which, both by Hebrews and Assyrians, was thus briefly called the great city. According to Ktesias, it had a circumference of four hundred and eighty stadia (twenty-four leagues), with which there well agrees the three days journey of Jon 3:3; it embraced the quarter founded by Nimrod, out of which it grew in the times that followed Nimrod, when the Assyrian kings gradually combined the four places into one whole; thus the whole city was named Nineveh after its most southern part. The ancient assertions respecting the circuit of the city are confirmed by the excavations. These four cities correspond, probably, to the extensive ruins on the east of the Tigris, that have lately been made known by Layard and Botta, namely, Nebi-Junus and Kujundschik, opposite Mosul, Khorsabad, five leagues north, and Nimrud, eight leagues north of Mosul. Keil. See also the note (p. 112) on the agreement of Rawlinson, Grote, Niebuhr, and others, as opposed by the conjectures of Hitzig and Bunsen.The sons of Mizraim: 1. Ludim. As distinguished from the Shemitic Ludim, Gen 10:22; Movers regards it as the old Berber race of Levatah that settled by the Syrtis,so called after the manner of other collective names of the Mauritanian races. According to Knobel it was the Shemitic Ludim, who, after the Egyptian invasion, were called Hyksos. This is in the face of the text. 2. Anamim. This is referred by Knobel to the Egyptian Delta. 3. Lehabim. gyptian Libyans, not to be confounded with , the Libyans proper. 4. Naphtuhim. According to Knobel, the people of Phthah, the god of Memphis, in Middle Egypt; according to Bochart, it agrees with , that connects with the northern coast-line of Egypt. 5. Pathrusim. Inhabitants of Pathros, Meridian land, equivalent to Upper Egypt, or Thebais. 6. Casluhim. The Colchians, who, according to Herod., ii. c. 105, had their descent from the Egyptians. This may probably be held of one branch of Mizraim; whereas the origin of the Cushites themselves would seem to point back to Colchis (see Genesis 2.).Out of whom came Philistim.The name is explained as meaning emigrants, from the thiopian word fallasa. According to Amo 9:7; Jer 47:4, the Philistines went forth from Caphtor. We may reconcile both these declarations, by supposing that the beginning of the settlement of the Philistines on the coast-line of Canaan, had been a Casluhian colony, but that this was afterwards strengthened by an immigration from Caphtor, and then their territory enlarged by the dispossession of the Avim, Deu 2:23.And Caphtorim.By old Jewish interpreters these are described as Cappadocians; they are regarded by Ewald as Cretans. Both suppositions may agree in denoting the course of migration taken by the Caphtorim.The sons of Canaan:Notwithstanding the Shemitic language, the Phnician Canaanites are here reckoned among the Hamitic nations, and must, therefore, have had their origin from the South. In fact, ancient writers affirm that they came from the Erythran Sea, that is, from the Persian Gulf, to the Mediterranean. And with this agrees the mythology which makes the Phnician ancestors, Agenor and Phnix, akin, partly to Belus in Babylonia, and partly with Egyptus (Danaus the thiopian). Knobel. 1. Zidon. Although originally the name of a person, this does not exclude its relation to the famous city so called, , primarily, to lay nets; it appears, however, to denote fishing as well as hunting proper. Sidon was the oldest city of the Phnicians. 2. Heth. This also stands as the name of a person, whereas the designations of the Canaanites that follow have the form of national appellations. In this position of Heth, together with Sidon the first-born, they would appear to be denoted as the peculiar point of departure of the Canaanitish life. The Hittites (Hethites) on the hill-land of Judah, and especially in the neighborhood of Hebron, were only a branch of the great original Hittite family (1Ki 10:29; 2Ki 7:6). The Kittim also, and the Tyrians, are, according to Knobel, comprehended in this name. 3. The Jebusites. Distinguished as the inhabitants of the old Jebus, Jerusalem. 4. The Amorites. On the hill-land of Judah, and on the other side of Jordan, the mightiest family of the Canaanites; therefore may their name embrace all Canaanites (chs. Gen 15:16; Gen 48:22) 5. The Girgasites. (Gen 15:21; Deu 7:1; Jos 24:11); their relation to the Gergesenes (Mat 8:28) is very uncertain. 6. Hivites (or Hevites) in Sichem (Gen 34:2), at Gibeon (Jos 9:7), and at the foot of Hermon (Jos 11:3). The five last sons of Canaan dwelt northward in Phnicia. Knobel. The Arkites. Denoted from the city Arka, north of Sidon. The Sinites, named from the city Sina, mentioned by Hieronymus, still farther north. More northern still the Zemarites, named from the city Simyra (Smrah, by the moderns). Farthest north the Arvadites (also on the island Aradus); on the northeast, the Hamathites, name from the city Hamath, still existing.And afterwards were spread abroad.This spreading extends from the Phnician district along the coast. The Kenites, mentioned Gen 15:19-21, the Kenezites, and the Kadmonites, are regarded by Delitzsch as people of Hamitic descent. So also the Rephaim, besides whom there are still farther named the Perezites. The same thing may probably be said of the Geshurim, mentioned 1Sa 27:8. The Susim and Emim, Genesis 14, he (Delitzsch) holds to be not Canaanites, but a people of a later introduction (p. 300). An immigration of Shemites must, in truth, have preceded that of the Hamites into Canaan.The sons of Shem (Gen 10:21-31). The father (ancestor) of all the children of Eber.This declaration calls attention beforehand to the fact, that in the sons of Eber the Shemitic line of the descendants of Abraham separates again in Peleg, namely, from Joktan or his Arabian descendants. 1. Elam. Elamites, the most easterly Shemites who dwelt from the Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea; at a later day they are lost, together with their language, in the Persians. 2. Asshur. Assyrians to the east of the Tigris, from thence extending towards Syria and Asia Minor. Their mother-country was a plain; hence the name (from ). Their Shemitic language also underwent a change, and became foreign to the Hebrew. 3. Arphaxad. Their dwelling-place was in Arrapachitis, on the east side of the Tigris, from which they spread out; by Ewald and Knobel it is interpreted as referring to the Chaldans, which Keil, however, regards as uncertain. 4. Lud. The Lydians of Asia Minor, related to the Assyrians (see Keil, p. 114; by Knobel they are referred to the Canaanite and Arabian races). 5. Aram. Aramans, in Syria and Mesopotamia.The sons of Aram: Uz and Gether, probably Arabians; Hul and Mash, probably Syrians.The sons of Arphaxad:The names Salah and Eber (sending forth and passing over) denote the already commencing emigration of the Abrahamic race. The two sons of Eber are called Peleg (division) and Joktan (diminished, small). With them there is a division of the Abrahamic and the Arabian lines. Peleg is the ancestor of the first. This is the explanation: in this manner was it that in his day the earth was divided. Fabri interprets this expression of a catastrophe that took place in the body of the earth, whose form was then violently divided into the later continental relations (in his treatise on the Origin of Heathenism, 1859). Delitzsch interprets it as referring, in general, to the division of the earlier population; Keil explains it of the division that took place in consequence of the building of the tower of Babel.10 Knobel refers the language of the separa of the two brothers, Peleg and Joktan, in which Joktan and his sons took their way to the south. We find here indicated the germ of the facts by which the earth, that is, the population of the earth, became divided into Judaism and Heathenism. For the separation of Abraham is no immediate or sudden event. The interrupted emigration of Terah had been previously prepared in Salah and Eber; fully so in Peleg. Therefore is Pelegs son called , friend of God. In contrast with Salah (the sent), Eber (the passing over), and Peleg (the separating, division), Serug denotes again the complicated or entangled, Nahor, the panting, possibly the ineffectual striving, and, finally, Terah, the loitering, the one who tarries on the way. Then comes Abram, the high father, with whom the race of the promise decidedly begins. We have no hesitation in taking these names as at the same time historical and symbolical.The sons of Joktan: In their multiplicity they present a remarkably clear figure of the Arabian tribes. Thirteen names, some of which can still be pointed out in places and districts of Arabia, whilst others have not, as yet, been discovered, or have been wholly extinguished. Knobel. Concerning their strife, and perhaps, too, their merging in the Hamites, who were in Arabia before them, compare Knobel, p. 123The beni Kahtan, sons of Joktan, or Joktanid, form their leading point of view in Northern Yeman. 1. Almodad. The name El Mohdad is found among the princes of the Djorhomites, first in Yemen, and then in Hedjez. 2. Sheleph, the same as Salif, the Salapenians in a district of Yemen. 3. Hazarmaveth, the same as Hadramaut (court of death), in Southeastern Arabia, by the Indian Ocean; so named because of the unhealthy climate. 4. Jereh. Sons of the moon, worshippers of the moon; south from Chaulan. 5. Hadoram. The Adramites, on the south coast of Arabia. 6. Uzal. One with Sanaa, a city of Yemen. 7. Diklah, meaning the palm; probably cultivator of the palm-tree; they may be placed conjecturally in the Wady Nadjran, abounding in dates. 8. Obal. Placed by Knobel with Gebal and the Gebanites. 9. Abimael. Father of Mael;11 undetermined. 10. Sheba. The Sabans, a trading people whose capital city is Maraba. 11. Ophir. Placed by Knobel to the southwest of Arabia, the land of the Himyarites. Lassen, Ritter, and Delitzsch, remove Ophir to the mouths of the Indus. For the different views, see Gesenius. It would appear, however, that the point of departure for Ophir must still be sought in Arabia. 12. Havilah. District of Chaulan, in Northern Yemen; probably also colonized in India (see Delitzsch, p. 308). 13. Jobab.And their dwelling was from Mesha.Concerning these undetermined bounding districts of Mesha and Sephar, compare Keil.And by these were the nations divided.A preparation for what follows, see the next chapter.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
See the Exegetical.
1. The religious significance of the ethnological table: 1. Personal characters form the basis of the human world; the relation of God to humanity is conditioned by the personal relation of God to personal being. The revelation of salvation, therefore, tends also to take upon itself a genealogical form. The ethnological table is the extended ground-outline of the relation between God and humanity, and of those that men bear to one another. The genealogies are trees of human life that God has planted. 2. In the christological point of view, the genealogical table is the prefiguration of the universality of the gospel, corresponding to the universality of the divine love, grace and compassion. 3. It gives us a clear idea of the regular gravitation of humanity to its centre in Shem, Eber, Abraham, Christ; that is, the genealogy of Christ. 4. As the branching of the three principal races places them in contrast, so, in a special manner, is this the case with the branching of the Hamitic race into the better lines, and in the Canaanites; and so also the branching of the Shemites, or that of the sons of Eber in the line of the descendants of Joktan, and in the line of the promise. 5. The signs of preparation for the later calling of Abraham are already contained in the names of his ancestors from Salah and Eber onward.
2. On the names Babel and Nineveh, compare the Theological dictionaries; on the history of Babel and Nineveh, see the historical works. We must be careful here, not to confound the beginning of this very old city, including in it the Babylonian tower, with its later world-historical development, and its falling into ruin. Nevertheless, even the ruins of that city are still a speaking witness, not only for the fulfilling of the divine predictions and threatenings, by the prophets, but also of the historical consistency and truthfulness of these very narrations in Genesis. Concerning the geographical relations, especially the situation of Babylon on the Euphrates, and of Nineveh on the Tigris, compare the maps of the old world in the Bible-atlas of Welland and Ackerman; the Historico-Geographical Atlas of the Old World, by Kiepert; the Atlas of Kutscheit, and others. Already, in Xenophons time, Nineveh lay in ruins; according to Strabo, it perished with the Assyrian Empire (see in Herzogs Real-Encyclopedia the article on the Ruins of Nineveh). Babylon was much broken by the Persian kings, especially by Xerxes; Alexander the Great would have restored it, but contributed only the more to its destruction; the founding of Seleucia laid it in ruins. As Seleucia lies opposite to the ruins of Babylon, so does Mosul to those of Nineveh.
3. Starke: In this chapter we see the origin of many nations in all parts of the world, and therefore, the power of the blessing which God, after the flood, had renewed to men in respect to their multiplying and propagation; and so, finally, we learn the fathers from whom Christ was born according to the flesh. Neither Noah nor his sons begat any offspring during the time of the flood. The same may be conjectured to be true of the animals which were shut up with him in a dark dungeon, and as it were in the midst of death.Lange: Many readers, when they come to this tenth chapter, are wont to regard it as of little value; some really think it to be superfluous, or of little use, on account of so many unknown names. But, in truth, we ought to regard it as a right noble gem in the crown of Holy Writ, the like of which has never been, or can be shown, from any writings of the old heathenism that yet remain to us.12Gerlach: There is no account of antiquity which gives us so full and so general a survey of the ancient nations, as this ethnological table; as appears from the fact, that the exactness and truth of the national divisions as presented in the same, are ever more and more confirmed. The heathen had no other relations to people who were foreign to them, than those of war and trade, with the addition, perhaps, of a certain community of religious legends, knowledge, and culture; irrespective of this, however, each nation remained shut up within itself. In the history of revelation, on the other hand, before the narrative of the dispersion of the nations stands the promise that Japheth shall find a home in the tents of Shem.Bunsen: So much is now clear, that the races of Shem are the Shemites of philology. This is not clear at all; just as little, in fact, as that the Gallic Franks must be of Romanic origin. Compare in other places the learned explanation of the ethnological table by Bunsen. Says the same authority (vol. i. part 2, p. 63): The ethnological table is the most learned among all the ancient documents, and the most ancient among the learned. For tradition predominates far above research, though the latter is not wanting. In its core it must be regarded as earlier than the time of Abraham; but this by no means excludes the idea that Moses may have made investigations respecting it. So says Schrder: From this chapter must the whole universal history of the world take its beginning. To the same effect Joh. von Mller. Citation of the historical catalogues of Heathen nations, as they are found in the palace of Karnak, a ruin of the old city Thebes, in Bendidad, and on the monuments of Persepolis. These have throughout a national character. Nimrods chase of the beasts was the bridge of transition to the hunting of men (Jer 16:16; Lam 3:52; Lam 4:18; Mat 4:19; Luk 5:10).
4. On the numbering of the seventy nations, which the Rabbins make out of this table, as Delitzsch farther constructs it, see Keil, p. 116. Delitzsch traces a relation between the seventy peoples, and the seventy disciples, Luk 10:1, and designates the number as that of the divinely-ordained multiplicity of the human. Probably, also, the name of the Septuagint has reference to the heathen nations for whom the Alexandrian translation of the Old Testament was designed. Keil objects, that the numbering can only come out clean and round when we assign the name of nations to Salah and Eber. But Salah might have actually had more sons. And, besides, it is not necessary that the symbolical numbers should always literally correspond to the historical. This frequent appearance of the number seventy resolves itself into some early symbolizing. Seven is the number of Gods work, including his holy day of rest; ten is the number of the perfect human development; the seventy nations were, therefore, the entire outspreading of Gods host, under his rule.
5. Nimrods despotic power, at least if we judge from the name, was denoted as a rebellion, as a revolution. It partook of both forms of revolution against the divine ordinance: 1. From above downwards; 2. from below upwards; of which the first seems, in truth, to have been the oldest.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
In the homiletical treatment of the ethnological table, we must, of all things, avoid giving way to uncertain and etymological and historical conjectures. It contains, however, enough points of certainty to make it a page of Holy Writ rich in life and instruction. Thereto belongs the threefold division of the nations according to the names Japheth, Ham, and Shem, the wide, wide, world-wandering of Japheth, in which the grandchildren and great-great-grand-children disappear from the horizon of the theocratic consciousness; the early ripe, yet most ancient development of the Hamitic culture, with its corruptions, in which the ungodly Cainitic culture once more mirrors itself; the reciprocal intercourse of the Shemites and the Hamites in the early time; finally, the gradual, yet authentically historical preparation for the calling of Abraham, and for the Messianic theocracy in the line of Shem. If the sermon is designed with reference to the ethnological table, the best ground will be furnished by taking directly Gen 10:1, or Deu 32:8; or better still, some New Testament text most appropriate for the purpose, as Mat 28:19; Joh 10:16; Act 14:16-17; Act 15:18; Act 17:26; Rom 11:32; Eph 3:6; 1Pe 4:6; Rev 21:24.The baptism of the flood a forerunning emblematic baptism of the whole human race. As God knows the name of the stars (that is, their most interior being, Isaiah 40), so does he likewise know the name of all men and of all races (Mat 22:32). The theocratic, believing consciousness hath ever proved itself to be also a humanitarian consciousness, or one that embraces all humanity.The higher significance of historical tradition.The commendation of the worlds history in the history of Gods kingdom.The relation between the history of Gods kingdom and the world-history: 1. The contrast; 2. the connection; 3. the unity (in its wider sense is the whole worlds history a history of the kingdom of God).Shems history, the last in the world, the first in the kingdom of God.The elect and their appointment to be salvation for all.The distinction: 1. Among the sons of Noah; 2. of Japheth; 3. of Ham; 4. of Shem.Nimrods threefold position: 1. As the pioneer of civilization; 2. as oppressor of the patriarchal liberties; 3. as the instrument of God for the development of the world.Peleg, or the dividing and the uniting again of humanity.
Schrder: All these sons, the white posterity of Japheth, the yellow and dark sons of Ham, however they may live in temporal separation, are all still Gods children, and brothers to one another.
[Excursus on the Hebrew Chronologythe state of the Primitive Menthe Rapid Beginnings of History. The brief Hebrew chronology is urged as an objection to the Scriptures. Hence the tendency, even among believers, to prefer the numbers given in the Septuagint. There is hardly time enough, it is thought, for the great historical commencements, and the scale on which they appear, so soon after the flood. Others, like Lepsius and Bunsen, would go very far beyond the LXX., carrying up the human chronology, and that of the Egyptian monarchy along with it, twenty thousand years before the time of Christ, and twelve or fifteen thousand years before the flood. The main ground of this theory is not so much the monuments, though Bunsen has much to say about them, as an assumption respecting the earliest condition and slow progress of the human race. With regard to the monuments, on which so much reliance is placed, there is not space, nor occasion, to say much here. Those who refer to them with most confidence have to admit that there is great difficulty in determining their meaning as well as their historical authority, even if rightly interpreted. It is made a question, too, whether, in many cases, they represent successive or cotemporaneous dynasties. Their barrenness in respect to almost everything else but names, detracts also from their chronological testimony. Like the Chaldean, Hindoo, and Chinese statements, they are hardly anything else but numbers. There is little or no filling up of these blank statistical spaces with anything like a veritable life-like history. Had much that is on these monuments been found in the early Scriptures, it would have made them the scoff of the infidel and the rationalist. There is, however, one concise argument, which, if rightly considered, ought to dispose of the whole matter. Egypt was visited, two thousand three hundred years ago, by a most intelligent Greek, whose valuable history has come down to us entire. In faithful narrative of what he saw, as he saw it, and of what he heard, as he heard it, Herodotus is excelled by no writer, ancient or modern. His pains and fidelity are attested by those immense journeys, whose extent would be deemed a wonder, even with all the facilities of modern travel. Now this most credible witness saw these monuments in their freshness, and when they were as intelligible to the Egyptian priests, as would be to us the contents of a modern census. They decipher for him these hieroglyphics, now so puzzling, and give him, as deduced therefrom, what they understand to be the Egyptian history. It is contained in his second book. Can we ever expect a better interpretation than the one made under such circumstances, and under the direction of such competent guides? They had every motive to present their nation in its most antique and imposing aspect, knowing, as they doubtless did, that the inquirer was collecting materials for a history of the world, as then known. If they erred at all, it would most likely have been on the side of an excessive antiquity. And yet, the chronology of Herodotus13 may, without any great difficulty, be made to agree with that of the Biblecertainly with that of the Septuagint. In regard to the monuments, such a view should be deemed conclusive. Herodotus is, after all, the great historical authority in respect to the antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy; and he is likely to remain so, since we have no reason to expect any interpretation of these hieroglyphics that escaped his eager search, or the intelligence of his well-informed and zealous instructors.
The other ground, that is, the necessity of a very long time to bring about such results in the slow progress of mankind, is a sheer assumption, that may at once be met by arguments drawn from the intrinsic aspects of the case. It all depends upon the hypothesis with which we start in respect to the condition of the primitive men; and this involves, first of all, an inquiry as to the primitive man, or the primus homo, or whether there ever really was such a distinct individual, the head of a distinct race, having a supernatural beginning at a distinct moment of time. Some, who favor the view of the low primitive condition of man, from which he struggled slowly up into language and a distinct human consciousness, making his appearance in history only after he had been many ages upon the earth, may still hold to something like a creation of the species; but logically it is very difficult to separate such a doctrine from that eternal-development theory, which, in opposition to the axiom de nihilo nihil, or, what is equivalent to it, that more cannot come out of less, would bring the highest life out of the lowest forms of matter, and make God himself (supposing it to acknowledge something under that name) the end instead of the beginning of nature. On the contrary, the admission of a creation, in any intelligible sense of the word, is the admission of a distinct time, a distinct moment of time, when the thing created began to be, which a moment before was not. This, however, does not demand the idea of an instantaneous coming from nothing, or even de novo, of everything belonging to, or connected with the new existence, but only the new and distinct, beginnning of that which especially makes it what it is, a new, peculiar entity, separate from everything else. To apply this to man, the origin of his physical, his earthly, may have been as remote as any geological theory of life-periods, or any biblical interpretation supposed to be in accordance with it, may allow. If we admit the idea of growth, or succession in creation, as perfectly consistent with supernatural starts regarded as intervening and originating its successive processes, then man may have been long coming from the earth, from the deepest parts of the earth, as is said Psa 139:15. The formation of the human physical may have begun in the earliest stages of the , or world-building. The words , from the dust, may denote a process comparatively quick or slow. The essential faith is satisfied either way; since it only demands two thingsa dual derivation of the completed humanity, and an order, that is, a succession, whether in nature or in time (or in both), rather than any precise duration. Even the common notion of an outward plastic formation of the body implies the use of a previous nature in a previous material or materialsthat is, a use of them according to such natures. There is essentially the same idea in the employment of previous growths and processes, as in that of previous material, although with the conception of such successions there necessarily comes that of time, longer or shorter. How many steps there were we cannot know; but in thus bringing up the human physical through lower structural forms, there may have been outwardly approximations to the human, long before there was reached that humanity proper in Which nature and spirit unite. Without scientific comparison and deduction, the simplest inspection of nature is sufficient to suggest the thought that man is built upon types from below him, even as he is formed in the image of that which is above him. If then such a view of successive evolutions from the dust, instead of an immediate outward plastic formation of the human earthly, be not inconsistent with the comprehensive language of Scripture, we should not be startled at the thought of there having been anthropoidal forms14 of various degrees of approximation, some of them, perhaps, larger than any now found upon earth, and which may have perished, like some of the larger or mammoth species of mammalia. If the explorations of science have brought to light any such remains, our faith need not be disturbed by the question of their pre-historicalness. The interpreter of Scripture is little concerned, either in affirming or denying such discoveries. Whatever be their date, we have not yet come to the humanity proper, the Adamic humanity, that humanity which Christ assumed and raises to a still higher sphere. The animal world is not yet surpassed. But there is a moment when the human race now upon the earth had its distinct beginning, and that, too, in a primus homo,the first Adameven as there is a new man, a new humanity, that is to have its finish or completion in a second Adam, or last Adam ( ), as the apostle calls him. This beginning of humanity upon earth was not a physical act merely, or the mere completion of a physical progress. It took place in the spiritual sphere. The true creation of man was not merely a formation, or an animation, but an inspiration, a direct, divine inspiration (Gen 2:7); and now there is what before was not, a , a new thing upon earth, not simply something higher physically (though even that would require a divine intervention), but an entity distinct as connected with a higher or supernatural world. This Adamic man, thus divinely raised out of nature, and lifted above the pure animality, is the one of whom the Bible gives us so particular an account. He was the one who first awoke to a true rational human consciousness. Thus man became a living soul. The emphasis is in the manner of the inbreathing; but to distinguish it wholly from the animation of other kinds who are also called , the wondrous event is described in other language as a sealing, a forming into a higher type, pattern, idea, or image,not physically, but spiritually. The all-important article of faith is the dual succession, whether regarded as an order in time, or as an order of constitution without reference to time: first the natural ( , the animal), afterwards that which is spiritual ( ). First that which comes from nature ( ), from the earth, earthy, second, that which bore the image of the heavenly,15 or of the Lord from heaven.
Corresponding to this is the specific designation by which man is distinguished among the created orders. The animals and plants are made each , after its , , species, form, denoting difference in organic structure, and therefore something ultimately outward as exhibited in its last analysis, however hidden it may seem to the primary observation of the sense. It is not to be thought that the Scripture writers, in their simplicity, intended to speak scientifically or philosophically, but a deeper term was wanted in the case of man, and we have it in a remarkable change of language. Man is nowhere said to be , juxta genus suum, or secundum speciem suam, but when this new entity is to be brought into the kosmos, God is represented as saying to himself, or as though addressing some higher associate than nature, Let us make man in our image. The , therefore, in the case of humanity, may be said to make the , or to come in place of it. In other words, it is the spiritual image here, and not the physical organization, that makes the species; and most important is the distinction in all our reasonings about the essential oneness of humanity, and what most truly constitutes it.
From this primus homo, thus inspired, thus sealed, comes all of human kind that ever has been, or is now upon the earth. To apply what has been said to the more direct subject of this note, there is here the decisive answer to that view which would represent man as commencing in the savage state regarded as barely and imperceptibly rising above the animal. This inspiration is a great and glorious beginning. It is a new divine force in the earth. The fall does not at once destroy it, though giving a tendency to spiritual death, and spiritual degeneracy, carrying with it a physical decline. Even with this, however, the primitive divine impulse in the first man, and in the first men, makes them something very different from what is now called the savage state, and which is everywhere found to be the dregs of a once higher condition, the setting instead of the rising sun, the dying embers fast going out, instead of the kindling and growing flame. All past and present history may be confidently challenged to present the contrary case. Among human tribes, wholly left to themselves, the higher man never comes out of the lower. Apparent exceptions do ever, on closer examination, confirm the universality of the rule in regard to particular peoples, whilst the claim that is made for the worlds general progress can only be urged in opposition by ignoring the supernal aids of revelation that have ever shone somewhere, directly or collaterally, on the human path.
The high creative impulse manifested itself in the Antediluvian period in its resistance to the death-principle, which, through the spiritual, the fall had introduced into the human physical organization. It showed itself in a rapidly developed, though a suicidal or self-corrupting civilization, in the line of Cain, and in an extreme longevity in the holier line of Seth. With a branch of the latter it passed the flood, impaired, it may be, but unspent. The preserved race, tending again to a sensual gregariousness, received a new divine impulse, which may almost be regarded as resembling a second subordinate creation. It was not the renewal of holiness, but of spiritual vigor, making humanity sublime even in its wickedness. It was the spirit of discovery, sending men over the face of the before unknown earth. It was the pioneering spirit, ever leading them on to make new settlements, to overcome new difficulties, to engage in great works, all the more astounding when we consider the little they possessed of what may be called science. What a grand conception was that of building a tower that should reach unto the skies, and make them independent of the mutations they beheld in nature! How has such a thought, though taking far more scientific forms, ever swayed mankind, showing itself still in the pretentious claims of our present knowledge, so boasting, yet so small in comparison with the great unknown, and so little able to relieve the deep-seated evils of our fallen race. Go to, said they, let us build a city and a tower, as a defence against heaven. It was the same language that was afterwards re-echoed in the Promethean boast,16 and that we still sometimes hear from a godless science, vaunting that it has annihilated space and time, that it has disarmed the lightning:
Eripuit clo fulmen
that it will yet deprive the ocean of its terrors, and introduce, at last, that millennium of human achievement which will make man independent of any power above or without him.
It was but a short time after the flood, when there appears this new heroic spirit, this vast ambition, in the very opening of the worlds history. Scripture gives us but few points in the picture, but these are most impressive: Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord, beginning the kingdom of Babylon; settlements rapidly following it on the upper Euphrates; the descendants of Ham already upon the Nile; the sons of Javan wending their way by the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean; Tyre and Sidon taking their place at the entry of the sea, as though already looking out to become the merchant of the people for many isles. It was the time of the tower-builders, the pyramid-builders, the great city-builders, the empire-founders. Along with the pioneering and colonizing spirit, there was also the associative tendency, so different from any thing we now see in any modern savagism. There was, also, in vigorous exercise, the government idea, or the government instinct, if any prefer thus to name it, leading men to form great polities, and to recognize in government something of a divine or supernatural nature. We may call it hero-worship, but it was something very different from anything now known in savage tribes, and led to results utterly unknown as ever following from such a state.
Such were the primitive men as the Bible presents them to us, although their mere worldly greatness was to the Scripture writers a wholly subordinate subject. Secular history confirms the account. This it does in two ways: 1st, by its silence as to all before. If men had been so many ages on the earth, what were they doing all this time? What traces have they left of their existence? At the most, only a few ambiguous bones here and there discovered, after the keenest search, and in respect to whose real antiquity men of science are still contending. We ask in vain for the marks of progress, or of any transition state. A speaking silence, like that which seems to come from the blank chamber of the great pyramid, proclaims that man, the Adamic or Noachic man, is not much older than the pyramids,two thousand years, perhaps, a little more or a little less. If we pay no attention to this striking fact, of the almost total absence of any human remains, it might, perhaps, be said, that history only commences after the emergence from the long savage state, and, therefore, gives no testimony to the many ages of human existence that might have been before it. This, however, supposes a sudden emergence, such as would seem to demand some new power, something like a divine or ab extra impulse, unfelt in the ages before, and which would not greatly differat least in the marvellousness and apparent supernaturalness of itfrom what the Bible tells us of a new creation of humanity. It would imply something coming into the human movement, greatly accelerating it, at least, if not wholly originating. It would be something undeveloped, or very suddenly and strangely developed, from what went before. And this brings us to the second or positive evidence of history. If it testifies by its silence, still more impressive is it when it begins to speak, and this is at the time when something in human action deemed notable, or worthy of remembrance, demands its voice. The strong self-consciousness which is the result of awakened action immediately seeks its record. The observation of passing times, or chronology, begins with it. It is this commencement of movement that creates history, whether in writing of some kindwhich there is good reason to believe was among the very earliest things, and called out by this very demand for a recording mediumor in the measured language of song, or in formal traditions, which, however vague and exaggerated, present an expressive contrast to an utterly unrecording silence.
The history that thus begins to speak has not the exactness of modern annals, but, as compared with what might have been expected on the other theory, its voice is loud and clear. It comes not with muttered tones, inarticulate and unintelligible. Its utterance is more emphatic in the very beginning than in some of the lapsed ages that follow it. How much more distinctly stand out the first Pharaohs, whether of sacred or secular history (see Herod., ii. 100, 101), than the later shadows upon the monuments! The earliest history bursts upon us, as it were. It begins with men doing great things, raising pyramids, building cities,17 founding states. It opens with the Egyptian and Babylonian empires, and that, too, as new powers in fullest vigor, and presenting every appearance of youthful greatness. The proper names given to us, whether of men or places, have nothing of the cloudy, mythical aspect, but stand out with all the distinctness of veritable life. Less is known of the most early East, of India and China, but sufficient to warrant the belief, that by the Ganges, as well as by the Nile and the Euphrates, a young humanity was giving evidence of mighty bodily powers and high spiritual energy; different, indeed, from the present, and presenting some aspects strange to our modern conceptions, yet very unlike the savage state, or a rise from such a state, had such a rise been ever shown in any early or later history of the world. In briefthe first historical appearances of men upon the earth are at war with this theory of savagism. Such independent emergings as are contended for do not now take place, and never have taken place within the times of known history. The savage condition, as has been said, and cannot be denied, is one ever sinking lower and lower, until aid is brought to it from without; and at the early time referred to there was no such aid except from a supernal and supernatural source.
On either view, we are compelled to admit the fact of a great beginning of humanity on the earth. The primitive man was a splendid beingnot scientific, nor civilized, in our modern sense of the words, but possessing great power, both of body and soul. He had all to learn, yet learned most rapidly. Researches among the earliest monuments sometimes astonish us by the suggestions they offer of a knowledge supposed to belong only to modern times, or to which, in some cases, modern discovery has not yet reached. There is brought out evidence of results in the arts, in manufactures, and in the employment of mechanical aids, that we find it very difficult to account for. If we cannot believe them to have come from processes of investigation strictly scientific, then must we ascribe them to other powers of a high order, and in which we fail to surpass themsuch as keen observation awake to every outward application of natural forces, most acute senses, and unrivalled manual skill. If it was the greatness of force and magnitude, it was greatness still, such as was never attained to by any savage people in historical times. These early men had great aims, they attempted great things, and they accomplished them rapidly. We have only to take this view, fortified as it is by Scripture and the early profane history, to account for what seems so wonderful to some writers, and which has drawn them to their long chronologies. As remarked elsewhere (p. 317), the history of human progress has ever been one of starts and impulses. As in the geological ages, so also within historical times, there are periods in which more has been done in a few generations, than, under other circumstances, has been accomplished in many centuries. Thus the time that intervened between the Scriptural flood and the first mention of the Egyptian monarchy, even as reckoned by the shorter chronology, may have brought on the worlds history faster than ages of comparative torpor, such as have appeared in the varied annals of mankind.
Again, there is an intrinsic difficulty in such views as that of Bunsen, which, when closely examined, presents a greater incredibility than anything of which it professes to give the explanation. Admitting such idea of emergence after ages of unhistorical savagism, still the questions arise: Why was not this more universal after it had commenced? Why did it not appear in other parts of the earth? Why did the early light confine itself to one people for so long a time, making Mitzraim historically what it is geographically and etymologically, the narrows, a line immense in length with the scantiest breadth? During these fifteen thousand years, or more, of monumental history, all the rest of the earth was in comparative night. Established institutions, a regular monarchy for ten thousand years, at least, king inheriting from king, or dynasty succeeding dynasty, a political state unbroken for a period three times as long as the whole series of Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Roman, Mongolian, and Turkish empiressocial orders uninterruptedly transmitted, records of all this preserved, monuments attesting it! It is incredible in itselfmuch more so when we consider the condition of the rest of the earth, even the nearest parts. In Egypt, ten thousand years of government, of civilization, of advanced agriculture, of social order, and all this time Greece, Italy, and even Asia Minor, in total darknessuninhabited, or in the lowest unhistorical savagism! It is very hard to believe this. It presents a marvel greater than anything recorded in Genesis about the origin and early condition of mankindgreater for the imagination, far greater for the reason. Egyptian history would be like an Egyptian obelisk standing in the desert, spindling up to a vast height, whilst all around was desolation in the view that height presented. Such an antiquity in this one people, should we reason from it a priori, and connect with it the modern claim of progress, would throw out of proportion all the other chapters of history. It would bring the Roman empire before the days of Abraham, and make our nineteenth century antedate the Trojan war.
These considerations do not only support the Bible chronology as prolonged in the LXX., but furnish an argument in favor of the still shorter Hebrew reckoning. Taking the primitive men as the Bible represents them, and the latter gives ample time for all that is recorded. Connected with this there is another thought. How came this Hebrew chronology to present such an example of modesty as compared with the extravagant claims to antiquity made by all other nations? The Jews, doubtless, had, as men, similar national pride, leading them to magnify their age upon the earth, and run it up to thousands and myriads of years. How is it, that the people whose actual records go back the farthest have the briefest reckoning of all? The only answer to this is, that whilst others were left to their unrestrained fancies, this strange nation of Israel were under a providential guidance in the matter. A divine check held them back from this folly. A holy reserve, coming from a constant sense of the divine pupilage, made them feel that we are but of yesterday, whilst the inspiration that controlled their historians directly taught them that man had been but a short time upon the earth. They had the same motive as others to swell out their national years; that they have not done so, is one of the strongest evidences of the divine authority of their Scriptures. And how fair is their representation! Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Tyre, the early Javanic settlements, all starting about the same time, and from the same quarter of a late inhabited earth; this is credible, probable, making harmonious sacred and profane history. The other view of the long and lonely Egyptian dynasties is monstrous, out of all proportionincredible. Had the Bible given such a long, narrow, solitary antiquity of twenty thousand, or even ten thousand, years, to the people whose history it mainly assumes to set forth, it would, doubtless, have called out the scoff of those whose sceptical credulity so easily receives the fabulous chronology of other nations.T. L.)
Footnotes:
[1][Gen 10:3., Gomer (G M R). These radical letters are found extensively combined in the history and geography of Europe; as though some early, roving people had left the mark of their name from the Pontus, or Black Sea, to Ireland: G M R., K M R., K y M M e R i i Cymmerians), by metathesis, K R M., C R i M e a, G R M., Germani, C y M R I, Cymri, Cimbri, Cumbri, Cumberland, Humberland, Northumberland, Cambria, etc. They may not be all etymologically connected, but there is every probability that they were left by the same old people, ever driven on Westward by successive waves of migration. , Ashkenaz, by metathesis , Aksenaz, Axenas, may be the old name for the Black Sea, or the country lying upon it. The Greeks called it , for which they accordingly found a meaning in their own languagethe inhospitableafterwards euphemized to the Euxine.T. L.]
[2][Gen 10:4., Jwan, Javan, Iwan, Ion. There can be no doubt that this is Greece. Compare Joe 4:6; Eze 27:13; Dan 8:21. It is the name or patrial epithet of Greece in the cognate languages, as given to it in historical terms: Syriac, , Chald. , Arab. , and also by the Greeks themselves, when they would present the name in its old, Oriental form; as in the Pers of schylus, when the mother of Xerxes is made to call them , and their land (line 175), and in another place, 563, . See also, Herod.,i. 56, 58. , . , in some Hebrew copies , which the LXX read, and rendered .T. L.]
[3][Gen 10:5., were parted. Maimonides says this term was applied to the Japhethites because of their far roving, which parted them from each other in separate isles and coasts; whereas it is not said of Hams descendants, because they were near to each other, forming dense and contiguous populations.T. L.]
[4][Gen 10:6.. This dual name has been supposed to denote the political division of Upper and Lower Egypt. It would seem more likely to have a geographical significance; The Narrowsthe two narrows, or the double narrowsthe straits. What could be more descriptive of this long and very narrow strip of territory, lying on both sides of the Nile, many hundred miles in length, and averaging only a dozen or so in breadth. It is strange that Rosenmller should say of this name, that it is uncertain whether it is Hebrew or Egyptian. It is purely Hebrew, and no other proper name in the language ever had a clearer significance. This appearance of extreme narrowness, with mountains or deserts on each side, must have suggested itself at the earliest date, whereas, the other idea must have had a later origin. The son of Ham, who first settled Egypt with his children, must have been at once struck with this territorial peculiarity, so different from anything in the Northern or Eastern regions, whence he came. The name which he gave to it afterwards came back to him as its settler and proprietor. There is reason to suppose that Mitzraim was not his earliest name. It was rather a territorial designation, afterwards genealogically and historically adopted. The original name of this first settler may have been Gupt, Copt, or Cupht, from which came the other popular designation, –, Egypt.T. L.]
[5][Gen 10:9.Mighty hunter (whether of men or beasts) before the Lord, to express his notoriety for boldness and wickedness, as something ever before the divine presence; so bad, that God could not take his eyes from it. Compare with it Gen 6:10, the whole earth corrupt, .T. L.]
[6][Gen 10:11. . In support of the view that here denotes the place whither, instead of being the subject of the verb , Maimonides refers to Num 34:4-5, , and it went out (to) Hazar-addar, and passed over (to) Azmonah; also to Num 21:33, , And Og, king of Bashan, went out (to) Edrei; in neither of which cases is there a preposition. He refers also to Mic 5:5, where Asshur and the land of Nimrod are mentioned together.T. L.]
[7][Caucasian Cultivation. Caucasus, or Caucasia, denotes, geographically, the region between the Black and Caspian Seas. Ethnologically, no term is more indefinite. If we take it of the territory above indicated, it may be truly said, that its inhabitants were, at this early time, and long afterwards, the lowest in the human scale. Where it was not , as described by schylus, it was occupied by tribes proverbial for their barbarism. The savage Caucasus (, ) becomes a name for all that was most rude and ferocious. See the account given by Herodotus of the wretched hordes that then lived the lowest nomadic life between these two seas, , deriving their sustenance from the wild products of the forest, painting themselves with the figures of animals, and living like them, in ways so gross, that Rawlinson and others omit the passage in their translations, . Herod. i. 203. To say that the Egyptians and Phnicians, or the Hamites in general, or any single branches of them, through an ennobling (durch Veredelung) might make an approach to the Caucasian culture, that is, be raised higher in the scale of civilization, would be very much like ascribing a similar elevating influence to the Finns and the Laplanders, as exercised upon the French and English. The savage, as we now understand the term, was not the primitive condition of mankind; but the earliest appearance of it as a degeneracy, as a loss of the humane-ness, of spiritual superiority, and a tendency to the wilder animal state, presented itself in this very region. The inhabitants have shown the same ever since. No part of the earth, geographically known, has had less of a history, or been less connected with history (if that is a criterion of ethnological rank) than this boasted Caucasia, or Circassia. The Kalmuc, and other Tartar tribes that even now roam its wilds, though perhaps possessing a more comely personal appearance, like the wild horses of the same region, are inferior in civilization, and in some kinds of literary culture, to the inhabitants of Bornou and other kingdoms of Central Africa, in which the old Egyptian and Ethiopian humane-ness has not wholly gone out, or has been kept alive through Arabian influence. The sons of Japheth, who went north, were the earliest of the human race to become wholly savage, and the longest to continue such, until met, at a much later day, by the Southern and Mediterranean streams of civilization carrying with it the Christian cullus. Even the Javanites, the Greeksnot the earliest Pelasgi, merely, but the later Hellenes and Dorianswere, for a long time, the Barbarians, as compared with the Egyptians and the Phnicians. See how Homer everywhere speaks of these older and more civilized peoples, as compared with his own countrymen. The ancient stream of light has since turned northward, as it may again be deflected to the south; but all the boasting about Caucasian supremacy is in the face of history. It is a carrying of the most modern ideas, and the most irrational of modern prejudices, into our estimate of the ancient world, or of the human race, during much the greater part of its existenceT. L.]
[8][The most secluded people in ancient times, the only one possessing, and carrying with them in their history, a world-idea, and this dating from the very earliest period! See Gen 28:14, and still earlier, Gen 3:15 : In thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth he blessed. This certainly presents the Jewish nation in a most remarkable light, demanding the attention of all who talk about the philosophy of history, and especially of those who are fond of describing the Old Testament as presenting an outward, narrow, and exclusive economy. How universal the influence of Grecian culture and Roman conquest, yet neither of them had what may be called a world-idea, or anything like the Messianic conception.T. L.]
[9][Maimonides seems to give a better explanation of this. He says: These, Seba and Havilah, were heads of peoples, and the sons of Raamah became two peoples: but Nimrod did not become a people (genealogically), wherefore the Scripture saith simply, and Cush begat Nimrod, and not, the sons of Cush were Nimrod, and Seba, and Havilah. That is, Nimrod does not come in the ethnological register of peoples, though he is mentioned afterwards as a historical person. He applies the same principle of interpretation to other similar cases.T. L.]
[10][This would seem to be the interpretation which most readily commends itself to the plain reader. The division of the earth is referred to as something easily known from what is contained in the narrative, or is soon to be mentioned. Had there not been such a division so prominently put forth in the xith chapter, there might be some room for speculation. But the obvious connection seems to shut out every other view : He was called Peleg (division), for in his day did that great event take place that is soon to be mentioned, and which is a ground of all these genealogical divisions. See Bochart : Phaleg.T.L.]
[11][, Abi-maela kind of naming similar to that by which Ham was designated, , Abi–Canaan, father of Canaan, a method which afterwards becomes quite common among the Arabians. In this, and in the appearance of the article in , El-modad, verse 26 above, we have germs of peculiar forms in the Arabic dialect, showing that it was already deviating from the Hebrew, or the Hebrew from it, whichever may have been the oldest.T. L.]
[12][It is as essential to an understanding of the Bible, and of history in general, as is Homers catalogue, in the second book of the Iliad, to a true knowledge of the Homeric poems and the Homeric times. The Biblical student can no more undervalue the one than the classical student the other.T. L.]
[13][The Egyptian chronology here intended is that which can be made out, though in a very general way, from the outlines of actual history as derived by Herodotus from the monuments, and the priests interpretation of them, together with other accounts, traditional or otherwise, which they give to him. Menes was the first king, who stands away back at the beginning of Egyptian history. The next one of any historical note is Mris, who had not been dead 900 years when Herodotus was in Egypt, and must have been, therefore, about 1,350 years before the time of Christ. All that the priests had between these two was contained in a papyrus roll, having the bare names of 330 monarchs, whom, if real, a thousand years, or so, would easily dispose of, on the supposition of cotemporaneous dynasties, or frequent revolutions, such as Egypt must have had as well as other nations, reducing reigns to one or two years, and many of them to months. Let the reader call to mind how rapidly emperors succeed each other during some parts of the later Roman history. These other kings, the priests tell him, were persons of no account, with the exception of Mris, before mentioned, thus showing, that with all their parade of rolls and dynasties, Menes and Mris were the only two conspicuous points in the Egyptian antiquity, until 1,400 years before Christ. Such are the only data for chronology, though the Egyptian priests pretend to fill up this empty, unhistorical space, with 341 generations, making about 10,000 years (see Herod., ii. 100, 142); but this is evidently due to that national pride which elsewhere led to the same extravagant reckoning. They found little or nothing of record or monument to confirm it, or they certainly would have given it to the historian. What they tell him, that during this period of 300 generations, the sun had twice risen where he now sets, and twice set where he now rises, is enough to show what historical value belongs to the empty numbers with which they would fill up this waste extent of time. See Rawlinsons Herodotus.T. L.]
[14][There is so much of caricature and grotesqueness in the appearance of the simia tribe of animals, that we revolt at the thought of any connection with them, even as a link in the mere physical. Their actions are so absurd, they are such a mere mimicry of reason, ludicrous, yet actually lower than the sober instinct of other kinds, that the outward resemblance makes us the more disdain the idea of even a physical relationship. It is thus that the ape-nature places itself in stronger contrast to the human than that of other animals having less outward likeness, either in form or in action. And yet such resemblance, in some degree, is very general. There is something in the most common animal-faces around us, that would startle us by its human look if we had seen nothing of the kind before.T. L.]
[15][There is a very great difficulty in confining this language of the apostle, 1Co 15:46-47, to the historical incarnation, or to the effect of the coming of Christ at the beginning of the Christian era. It must refer to something constitutive of humanity in the beginning, before the fall, and in the very process of the becoming man. Otherwise it would follow, that before such historical advent, man was an animal merely, wholly earthly and sensual, , . If the , the life-giving spirit, in distinction from the , the soul of life, or merely living soul, was not in our humanity at its first constitution, then not only Adam, but Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, were only natural men, animal men, having nothing, in a true sense, spiritual about them. If we would avoid this very strange consequence, the language referred to must have something of a creative or constitutive sense, and the , must be regarded as the , the Light that lighteth every man coming into the world of Joh 1:9, making, in the beginning, that peculiar constitution which we may call the completed man, and which was never wholly lost as a high spiritual power, however much it may have been marred in its ethical aspect. Christianity is indeed , a new creation, 2Co 5:17, or the making of a new man, but this is not inconsistent with the idea of a restoration, a re-creation, a renewed spirituality, or even the bringing back to a higher state than that from which man fell. The second Adam was not absent from the creation of the first. In the spiritual image of Him who is himself styled the express image, or hypostatic image, , Heb 1:3, was man spiritually formed. Through it he became man, and therefore it is truly said of the incarnate Logos, that he came to his own; and thus also is he truly bar–nosho, son of man, the Hebrew and Syriac term for the generic homo. In his eternity, and in his historical incarnation, he is the root as well as the offspring of humanity.T. L.]
[16]
,
, .
schylus, Prom. Vinct. 919.
[17][Four great cities are started in the very beginning of Nimrods kingdom, Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh in the land of Shinar, Gen 10:10. This is confirmed by Herodotus. He speaks of it as a remarkable peculiarity of Assyria in his daythe number and greatness of its cities. They must have been founded in the earliest times, and by a people who had a passion for great structuressee Herod., i. 178. Rawlinson regards this large number of important cities as one of the most striking features of the Assyrian greatness. He shows, too, how remarkably it is confirmed by the modern discoveries among the vast Assyrian ruins: Grouped around Nineveh were Calah (Nimrud), Scripture Calneh; Dur Sagina (Khorsabad); Tarbisa (Sherifkhan); Arbel (Arbil); Khazeh (Shamamek); and Asshur (Shirgut). Lower down, the banks of the Tigris exhibit an almost unbroken line of ruins from Tekrit to Baghdad, while Babylonia and Chaldea are throughout studded with mounds from north to south, the remains of the great capitals of which we read in the inscriptions. Again, in upper Mesopotamia, between the Tigris and the Khabour, Mr. Layard found the whole country covered with mounds, the remnants of cities belonging to the early Assyrian period. Rawlinsons Herodotus, vol. i. p. 243. These go back to the very beginnings of history. They make history. There is none before them, as there is no historical place for them in later annals, when these empires began to crumble, as they did at a very early period. So everything confirms the idea, that the pyramids and the great structures of Thebes and Memphis belong to the very beginnings of Egyptian history. They are monuments of the primval men. From these ruins they yet speak to us of a period of great action, of a vast ambition suddenly manifesting itself, and before which silence reigned over all the earth.T. L.]
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
This Chapter contains the history of the first branching out of the race of men, into families and households, of which, in after ages, the whole earth is overspread. Here are no less than seventy distinct roots of nations noticed, but only one nation upon earth, and that is, God’s ancient people, the Jews, who can say from which of the seventy it sprung. The sacred historian gives a short account of the posterity of Japheth, and of Ham, but enlargeth chiefly upon that of Shem, because from that stock, after the flesh, the Messiah was to arise.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
The Fountains of History
Gen 10:1-5
Shall I be far wrong if I suppose that few of you have ever read the tenth chapter of Genesis right through? Certainly, from a glance at the long, hard names, one would think that there is not much here for the edification of the reader, and that the best thing that can be done is to skip the chapter. Yet there are some home-words here, and hidden under rough husks are some germs, out of which perhaps we ourselves may have come! In the fifth verse you find the word “Gentiles.” Pause at that word. It may be like the writing outside a letter which is meant for your reading! There is also the word “isles.” No Englishman can pass that word lightly over. He himself is an islander, the sea-fog dims his windows and the sea boom wakes the gruff bass of all his songs. Perhaps the Hebrew writer had his prophetic eye upon these very shores of ours, so sea-worn and bleak. There is also the word “families.” Surely we know that word well; we live at home; we have made poetry sing “The Old Arm-chair,” “My Ain Fireside,” and “The Children’s Hour.” The poorest Englishman tells you what “family” he belongs to, though he slept in the gutter last night, and pawned his coat for a shilling, which he spent in gin. So you see even here, in this chapter which seems to be all Hebrew and meant only for a Jew’s eye, we pick out odd words that are plain good old English, the very freehold and charter of our own people.
Thus conciliated I think an Englishman might now stand at the point of view occupied by the writer of the tenth chapter of Genesis, from which he sees the going forth of the descendants of the sons of Noah, by whom “were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.” A wonderful going forth, truly; having in it the germ of every civilisation, the outline of every tragedy, the promise of final redemption and glory. To us the chapter is full of difficult reading, because full of strange, hard names that mean nothing to our memory or our love. Who are Gomer and Magog, and who are Sabtah and Dedan? Is there any home-music in Ashkenaz, or is any heart-chord touched by Cush and Mizraim? Yet learned ethnologists have seen wonderful things in this tenth chapter of Genesis. They have seen the descendants of Gomer seeking for themselves a dwelling in the confines of Asia and Europe, making an irruption into Asia Minor, disappearing in Asia, and coming up long ages after in the Cimbri, and as the founders of the great Celtic race. From Javan they have seen arising, in wondrous beauty, chaste and strong, the whole Hellenic people. Tubal and Meshech have been followed into the Cappadocians and the Iberians; so that even in those few names we begin to see the peopling of Northern Europe, the land of Greece, and the region between the Euxine and the Caspian. From Tiras will come the Thracian stock, and collaterally the Goths and the Teutons; and the ethnologist pauses at Ashkenaz, for in that root he thinks he finds the Scandinavian and the Saxon. So if we say, standing beside this great Hebrew cemetery, Can these dry bones live? the breath of the Lord is blown upon them, and behold they start up and claim even ourselves here and there as their own kindred, according to the flesh. And as for God, “is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also.”
A clear conception of the import of this marvellous chapter should enlarge and correct our notions in so far as they have been narrowed and perverted by our insular position. We should recognise in all the nations of the earth one common human nature. “God hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on the face of the earth.” This reflection is both humbling and elevating. It is humbling to think that the cannibal is a relative of ours; that the slave crouching in an African wood is bone of our bone; and that the meanest scum of all the earth started from the same foundation as ourselves! On the other hand, it is elevating to think that all kings and mighty men, all soldiers renowned in song, all heroes canonised in history, the wise, the strong, the good, are our elder brothers and immortal friends. If we limit our life to families, clans, and sects, we shall miss the genius of human history, and all its ennobling influences. Better join the common lot. Take it just as it is. Our ancestors have been robbers and oppressors, deliverers and saviours, mean and noble, cowardly and heroic; some hanged, some crowned, some beggars, some kings; take it so, for the earth is one, and humanity is one, and there is only one God over all blessed for evermore!
If we take this idea aright we shall get a clear notion of what are called home and foreign missions. What are foreign missions? Where are they? I do not find the word in the Bible. Where does home end; where does foreign begin? It is possible for a man to immure himself so completely as practically to forget that there is anybody beyond his own front gate; we soon grow narrow, we soon become mean; it is easy for us to return to the. dust from whence we come. It is here that Christianity redeems us; not from sin only, but from all narrowness, meanness, and littleness of conception; it puts great thoughts into our hearts and bold words into our mouths, and leads us out from our village prisons to behold and to care for all nations of mankind. On this ground alone Christianity is the best educator in the world. It will not allow the soul to be mean. It forces the heart to be noble and hopeful. It says, “Go and teach all nations”; “Go ye into all the world”; “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others”; “Give and it shall be given unto you, good measure, pressed down, heaped up, and running over.” It is something for a nation to have a voice so Divine ever stirring its will and mingling with its counsels. It is like a sea breeze blowing over a sickly land; like sunlight piercing the fogs of a long dark night. Truly we have here a standard by which we may judge ourselves. “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” If we have narrow sympathies, mean ideas, paltry conceptions, we are not scholars in the school of Christ. Let us bring no reproach upon Christ by our exclusive-ness. Let us beware of the bigotry of patriotism, as well as of the bigotry of religion. We are citizens of the world: we are more than the taxpayers of a parish.
A right view of this procession of the nations will show us something of the richness and graciousness of Christ’s nature. What a man must he have been either in madness or in Divinity who supposed that there was something in himself which all these people needed! The disciples asked what were five loaves amongst five thousand people, and truly we may magnify their amazement, as we ask, What is one man amongst all the nations of mankind? Truly Christ is bold when he says to his Church, Go ye into all the world. Has he considered the difficulties of travelling? how hard a thing it is to go a thousand miles from home, up hill and over sea? Has he considered the difficulties of language one set of peoples writing from right to left, another from left to right, another knowing nothing about grammar and literature one speaking nothing but monosyllables, another speaking hardly anything but polysyllables one language a rhythmic stream, another something between a grunt and a growl? Has he considered the expense of the undertaking? Men cannot travel for nothing. Men cannot live upon nothing. Men cannot support their families upon nothing. Yet Christ said, Go; go everywhere; go at once, and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Christ is undoubtedly to be credited with bold and daring conceptions. He had no material rewards for his messengers. He sent them away with the least possible allowance of personal comfort; no portmanteaus, no wardrobes, no retinue; he said, Go after all these people and tell them that I only am their Saviour and Lord. Never man spake like this man!
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
XVI
ORIGIN OF NATIONS AND LANGUAGES
Gen 10:1-11:9
Genesis, section six: “These are the generations of the sons of Noah.”
1. Unity of stock and speech.
2. Attempt at centralization.
3. Confusion of tongues.
4. Consequent grouping into nations.
5. Assignment of their respective territories.
6. Dispersion to allotted homes.
The tenth chapter of Genesis, with the first nine verses of the eleventh chapter, constitutes our sixth division of the book, under the title: These are the generations of the sons of Noah. This section closes the Bible history of man as a race. Next to the account of the creation, and the fall of man, and of the flood, it is the most valuable gem of literature. Indeed the most forcible writers fall short of the reality in attempting to express the significance and value of this record. Some of them say that it is the most ancient and reliable account of the origin of nations. But this language implies that there are in the world’s literature parallel histories, though later and less reliable. But there is no other account. This history has no parallel. It is unique, without a model and without a shadow. It is both ancient and solitary. Moreover, to call it the ancient and solitary history of merely the origin of nations falls far below the facts. It not only cites the sires from whom all peoples have descended, but also tells us by whom, where, why, how, and when the people of one stock and tongue were parted into separate nations and divers tongues, and by whom and in what lifetime came the allotment, of their respective territories. It is therefore the foundation of ethnology, philology, and geography; the root of history, prophecy, and religion.
UNITY OF STOCK AND SPEECH The whole of the tenth chapter, with the first nine verses of the eleventh, should be treated as one section. The tenth chapter cannot be understood without this paragraph of the eleventh chapter. The table of the nations comes first, and then follows the explanation of the division into nations. So that in order of time the nine verses of the eleventh chapter precede nearly all of the tenth chapter. We therefore take as our starting point a clause of the sixth verse of the eleventh chapter: “And Jehovah said, Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language.” Their oneness of speech is expressed by two discriminating words: “And the whole land was of one lip, and one stock of words.” “Stock of words” means the materials of languages. “Lip,” one of the organs of articulation, denotes manner of speaking, or the use of the material. Family ties and common speech hold them together. Hence as they multiplied and began to move out for homes, the trend of the movement was in one direction only. A proverb of our day is, “Westward the march of Empire takes its way.” It was not so in the beginning. The movement was toward the rising, not the setting sun. As the years roll by and the population rapidly increases, this eastward tide of emigration becomes as a mighty river in volume. But all migrations of men fall under some leadership. The most daring, capable and dominant spirit, by sheer force of character and qualities, naturally forges to the front and directs and controls the movement, and as power increases, his ambition soars. He begins to scheme and plan toward selfish ends. Our record names the man. Not without adequate design does the author in giving his tables of nations turn aside to sketch an episode when he comes to a certain man. “Ham begat Cush, and Gush begat Nimrod; and he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before Jehovah: . . . And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land he went forth into Assyria, and builded Nineveh and Calah (the same is the great city).” This descendant of Ham becomes a leader. His name signifies “The Rebel,” or “we shall rebel.” He makes himself a king. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel in the land of Shinar.
This episode of the tenth chapter connects with the migration eastward in the eleventh chapter: “And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said to one another, Come, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Come, let us build us a city” (Gen 11:2-4 ). In v. II we find that the city was Babel. Here, then, we find the man, the leader. He was a mighty hunter, this mighty man, as later (1Sa 24:11 ; Jer 16:16 ), a hunter of men. The expression, “before the Lord,” evidently means that he pushed his designs of whatever kind in open and brazen defiance of God’s sight and rule.
ATTEMPT AT CENTRALIZATION There now comes into his mind this ambitious scheme, the establishment of a world empire. To accomplish this there must be a center of unity, a city, and to insure stability and to hedge against the natural and disintegrating fear of another deluge there must be a refuge. To induce submission on the part of his following they must be supplied with a motive: “let us make a name.” This brings the situation into similarity with the conditions that preceded and necessitated the deluge as set forth in Gen 6:4 , the days of the giants and the mighty men, men of renown. This inordinate thirst for fame is idolatrv It is the most cruel of the passions. Everything beautiful, good, holy, and true goes down before it. As an illustration consider the ambition attributed to an ancient painter: “Parrhasius, a painter of Athens, among the Olythian captives Philip of Macedonia brought home to sell, bought one very old man. And when he had him at his house put him to death with extreme torture and torment, the better, by his example, to express the pains and passions of his Prometheus whom he was then about to paint.”
On this excerpt N. P. Willis writes his famous poem, “Parrhasius.” According to the poet when the tortured victim asks for pity the painter replies:
I’d rack thee though I knew a thousand lives were perishing in thine
What were ten thousand to a fame like mine
Again, when the dying captive threatens him with the hereafter, the painter mocks him by denial of future existence:
Yet there’s a deathless name!
A spirit that the smouldering vault shall spurn,
And like a steadfast planet mount and burn
And though its crown of flame
Consume my brain to ashes as it shone
By all the fiery stars I I’d bind it on!
Aye though it bid me rifle
My heart’s last fount for its insatiate thirst
Though every life-strung nerve be maddened first
Though it should bid me stifle
The yearning in my throat for my sweet child,
And taunt its mother till my brain went wild
All I would do it all Sooner than die, like a dull worm, to rot
Thrust foully unto earth to be forgot!
Upon which the poet concludes:
How like a mounting devil in the heart
Rules the unreined ambition! Let it once
But play the monarch, and its haughty brow
Glows with beauty that bewilders thought
And unthrones peace forever. Putting on
The very pomp of Lucifer, it turns
The heart to ashes, and with not a spring
Left in the bosom for the spirit’s lip,
We look upon our splendour and forget
The thirst of which we perish!
We are thus prepared to understand the history: “And they said, Come, let us build a city, and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make a name; lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth” (Gen 11:4 ).
All popular movements of this kind are directed by leaders who suggest the watchwords and crystallize the agitation into forms of their own choosing. The sin of the movement was manifold. It meant rebellion against God and ruin to the race. The divine plan was diffusion, and the command was to push out in all directions, not one; to occupy and subdue all the earth. But Nimrod’s plan was to keep the people all together under his leadership to serve his ends. The object is thus expressed: “Lest we be scattered.” To this day tyrants pursue the same plan and put embargoes on outward movements. And to this day God’s providence has thwarted them by bringing about some discovery or attraction that draws out and diffuses population, relieving the congestion at, the crowded centers of life. A very interesting lesson of history is the study of the ways of Providence in sending out migrations of men to colonize the unoccupied parts of the earth. More wonderful and interesting is the way of that Providence in dispersing Christians that they may carry the gospel to all the world. The one thing that made Nimrod’s plan of centralization possible was the one language of the people. The audacity and rebellion of the plan provoked divine inquisition and judgment. To allow its successful execution would defeat every purpose of God concerning world occupation and bring about a corruption of the race equal to that of the antediluvians. A world crisis had arrived. The case called for heroic treatment and instant relief. What was the divine remedy?
CONFUSION OF TONGUES “Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So Jehovah scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth; and they left off building the city. Therefore was the name of it called Babel; because Jehovah did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did Jehovah scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth” (Gen 11:7-9 ).
This is one of the mightiest and most far-reaching miracles of history. It transcends in importance all the plagues of Egypt. Indeed it finds no counterpart until the descent of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Dr. Conant thus quotes from Schelling’s Philosophy of Mythology:
Humanity cannot have left that condition, in which there was no distinction of peoples, but only of races, without a spiritual crisis, which must have been of the deepest significance, must have taken place in the basis of human consciousness itself. . . . For we cannot conceive of different peoples without different languages; and language is something spiritual. If difference of peoples is not something that was not from the first, but is something that has arisen, then must this also hold true of the different languages. . . . Here we fall in with the oldest account of the human race, the Mosaic writings; toward which so many are disinclined, only because they know not what to do with it, can neither understand nor use it. Genesis puts the rise of peoples in connection with the rise of different languages; but in such a way, that the confounding of the language is the cause, the rise of the peoples the effect.
To evade the significance of this miracle the higher critics resort to their usual refuge, the document hypothesis. They magnify the tenth chapter and disparage the first nine verses of the eleventh. The former, an Elohist document, is credible; the latter, a Jehovah document, is incredible. They claim that chapter 10 leaves us to suppose that the nations were distributed upon the face of the earth in obedience to the natural laws which govern colonization and migration, and that the present striking varieties in human languages are wholly the natural result of the dispersion of the nations. The tenth chapter does not leave us to any such suppositions, the episode of Nimrod, the references to Peleg, and the Gen 10:5 ; Gen 10:20 ; Gen 10:31 , summing up respectively the families of Japheth, Ham, and Shem, demand the explanation in the next chapter. When asked to account naturally for these striking and irreconcilable varieties in the few great parent languages, they reply: Philology has as yet nothing very definite to say as to the possibility of reducing to one the larger families of human speech. In fact, their oracle, philology, is not merely dubious it is dumb. Dr. Conant well sums up all that philology can do with this problem:
The diversities in the languages of the earth present a problem which philosophy has in vain laboured to solve. Comparative philology has shown, however, that many different languages are grouped together by common affinities, as branches of the same family, all having the same original language for their common parent. Notwithstanding the great number and diversity of languages, they may all be traced to a very few original parent tongues. The difficulty lies in the essential and irreconcilable diversity between those several parent tongues, not the remotest affinities existing to indicate a common origin, or any historical relation; a problem for which speculative philosophy can find no solution.
They cannot account for it naturally, but deny the supernatural account, passing the matter by with a sneer, “Oh that account is found only in the Jehovah document.” Or if they wish to be a little more respectful, they say, “The fact is that here, as elsewhere, the Jehovist aims not so much at presenting historical information as showing the ethical and religious significance of the leading points in history and the chief changes in man’s condition.” How happens it that they have such an infallible knowledge of the aim of the Jehovist, and how can there be an ethical and religious significance of history, which is not history but falsehood? If the historical element of the first nine verses of the eleventh chapter be eliminated there is nothing of any kind left, out of which to construct ethics or religion. If the aim of the writer is not history, then words are not signs of ideas. It would be far manlier and more consistent to follow the more destructive higher critics and expunge what they call the Jehovistic record as spurious and unworthy, than to weakly hold on to it and discredit it. The following maxims of literary composition have long obtained:
Never introduce a god into the story unless there be an occasion for a god.
When introduced, let his speech and deeds be worthy of a god.
Let the result of his intervention be worthy of a god. Here was a worthy occasion. Race ruin was imminent and unavoidable by human means. Here was speech and deed worthy of divinity, and results too grand and far-reaching and beneficial to admit of human conception or execution. The author of the book follows his own appropriate method in the use of the divine means. When the divine being, invisible and unapproachable and unknowable, is the subject, the name is Elohim. Whenever it is God manifested particularly by interventions of mercy, it is Jehovah and Jehovah God.
CONSEQUENT GROUPINGS INTO NATIONS The first effect of the confusion of tongues is the stopping of the work, from inability to comprehend each other. The consciousness that a supernatural power had intervened would necessarily fill them with dread, lest a greater evil befall them if they persisted in disobedience. Those who could best understand each other would naturally group themselves and form the nucleus of a separate nation. And this grouping also was naturally according to family origin, whether of Shem, Ham, or Japheth, thus accounting for the three great root languages whose barriers philology cannot pass. This harmonized also with
ASSIGNMENT OF THEIR RESPECTIVE TERRITORIES The proof of this divine allotment of territory is abundant in the lesson and elsewhere. In summing up the histories of the sons of Japheth the record says, “Of these were the isles of the nations divided in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.” Similarly of Ham: “These are the sons of Ham, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, in their nations.” And of Shem: “These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations.” More particular is the testimony in Gen 10:25 : “And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.” This evidence not only establishes the fact of the division of territory, but shows that the event was so extraordinary and impressive as to give a name to a child born at the time, namely, Peleg, i.e., Division. It is not probable that they could agree among themselves as to the partition of territory. This question could be settled only by supreme authority. And to this fact testify the Scriptures. Paul said at Athens, “And he made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation” (Act 17:26 ). But the author of Genesis in another book puts the matter beyond controversy:
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples According to the number of the children of Israel. Deu 32:8
This allotment of territory, after the confusion of tongues was followed by an irresistible divine impulse that brought about
DISPERSION TO ALLOTTED HOMES
They had said, “Lest we be scattered.” When God acts the record says, “So Jehovah scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off building the city. Therefore was the name of it called Babel; because Jehovah did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did Jehovah scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth” (Gen 11:8-9 ). It has been objected that the division of the land which gave rise to the naming of Peleg, came too early to be connected with the dispersion following the confusion of tongues. The objection is ill advised. The division and assignment of territory long preceded the dispersion. The very sin of the attempt at centralization consisted in its deliberate rebellion against this prior division. In the order of our chapter we have considered the division after the confusion of tongues, not because it was then ordained, but because it was then enforced. We are now prepared to take up chapter 10, and consider specially the parts of the earth occupied by the descendants of the several sons of Noah, which, however, is reserved for another chapter.
QUESTIONS 1. What can you Bay of the value of the tenth chapter of Genesis, (1) as literature; (2) as history; (3) as instruction?
2. In order of time, which comes first. Gen 11:1-9 , or the tenth chapter, and why this order?
3. What, then, was the starting point and what held the people together at this time?
4. As they multiplied, what was the trend of their movement and what modern proverb to the contrary?
5. Who became their leader, what was the meaning of his name, what great cities did he build and where?
6. What was the meaning of “a mighty hunter” and “before the Lord”?
7. What was his ambitious scheme, the essentials to its accomplishment and what was its motive?
8. Give an illustration of cruel, unbridled ambition.
9. What was the manifold sin of this movement and the divine remedy for it?
10. What was God’s plan of defeating such movements in modern times?
11. What was the counterpart of this mighty miracle?
12. What is Dr. Conant’s explanation of the rise of the different peoples?
13. How do the critics try to evade the significance of this miracle and what is this expositor’s reply?
14. According to Dr. Conant what has comparative philology shown with respect to the many different languages?
15. What is the position of the more respectful (mediating) critics and this expositor’s reply?
16. What three maxims of literary composition obtain and their application to the matter in hand?
17. What was the first effect of the confusion of tongues and how account for the three great root languages?
18. What is the Scripture proof of the divine allotment?
19. What brought about the dispersion, and how?
20. What objection is sometimes urged with respect to the dispersion, and the reply thereto?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
XVI
ORIGIN OF NATIONS AND LANGUAGES
Gen 10:1-11:9
Genesis, section six: “These are the generations of the sons of Noah.”
1. Unity of stock and speech.
2. Attempt at centralization.
3. Confusion of tongues.
4. Consequent grouping into nations.
5. Assignment of their respective territories.
6. Dispersion to allotted homes.
The tenth chapter of Genesis, with the first nine verses of the eleventh chapter, constitutes our sixth division of the book, under the title: These are the generations of the sons of Noah. This section closes the Bible history of man as a race. Next to the account of the creation, and the fall of man, and of the flood, it is the most valuable gem of literature. Indeed the most forcible writers fall short of the reality in attempting to express the significance and value of this record. Some of them say that it is the most ancient and reliable account of the origin of nations. But this language implies that there are in the world’s literature parallel histories, though later and less reliable. But there is no other account. This history has no parallel. It is unique, without a model and without a shadow. It is both ancient and solitary. Moreover, to call it the ancient and solitary history of merely the origin of nations falls far below the facts. It not only cites the sires from whom all peoples have descended, but also tells us by whom, where, why, how, and when the people of one stock and tongue were parted into separate nations and divers tongues, and by whom and in what lifetime came the allotment, of their respective territories. It is therefore the foundation of ethnology, philology, and geography; the root of history, prophecy, and religion.
UNITY OF STOCK AND SPEECH The whole of the tenth chapter, with the first nine verses of the eleventh, should be treated as one section. The tenth chapter cannot be understood without this paragraph of the eleventh chapter. The table of the nations comes first, and then follows the explanation of the division into nations. So that in order of time the nine verses of the eleventh chapter precede nearly all of the tenth chapter. We therefore take as our starting point a clause of the sixth verse of the eleventh chapter: “And Jehovah said, Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language.” Their oneness of speech is expressed by two discriminating words: “And the whole land was of one lip, and one stock of words.” “Stock of words” means the materials of languages. “Lip,” one of the organs of articulation, denotes manner of speaking, or the use of the material. Family ties and common speech hold them together. Hence as they multiplied and began to move out for homes, the trend of the movement was in one direction only. A proverb of our day is, “Westward the march of Empire takes its way.” It was not so in the beginning. The movement was toward the rising, not the setting sun. As the years roll by and the population rapidly increases, this eastward tide of emigration becomes as a mighty river in volume. But all migrations of men fall under some leadership. The most daring, capable and dominant spirit, by sheer force of character and qualities, naturally forges to the front and directs and controls the movement, and as power increases, his ambition soars. He begins to scheme and plan toward selfish ends. Our record names the man. Not without adequate design does the author in giving his tables of nations turn aside to sketch an episode when he comes to a certain man. “Ham begat Cush, and Gush begat Nimrod; and he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before Jehovah: . . . And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land he went forth into Assyria, and builded Nineveh and Calah (the same is the great city).” This descendant of Ham becomes a leader. His name signifies “The Rebel,” or “we shall rebel.” He makes himself a king. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel in the land of Shinar.
This episode of the tenth chapter connects with the migration eastward in the eleventh chapter: “And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said to one another, Come, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Come, let us build us a city” (Gen 11:2-4 ). In v. II we find that the city was Babel. Here, then, we find the man, the leader. He was a mighty hunter, this mighty man, as later (1Sa 24:11 ; Jer 16:16 ), a hunter of men. The expression, “before the Lord,” evidently means that he pushed his designs of whatever kind in open and brazen defiance of God’s sight and rule.
ATTEMPT AT CENTRALIZATION There now comes into his mind this ambitious scheme, the establishment of a world empire. To accomplish this there must be a center of unity, a city, and to insure stability and to hedge against the natural and disintegrating fear of another deluge there must be a refuge. To induce submission on the part of his following they must be supplied with a motive: “let us make a name.” This brings the situation into similarity with the conditions that preceded and necessitated the deluge as set forth in Gen 6:4 , the days of the giants and the mighty men, men of renown. This inordinate thirst for fame is idolatrv It is the most cruel of the passions. Everything beautiful, good, holy, and true goes down before it. As an illustration consider the ambition attributed to an ancient painter: “Parrhasius, a painter of Athens, among the Olythian captives Philip of Macedonia brought home to sell, bought one very old man. And when he had him at his house put him to death with extreme torture and torment, the better, by his example, to express the pains and passions of his Prometheus whom he was then about to paint.”
On this excerpt N. P. Willis writes his famous poem, “Parrhasius.” According to the poet when the tortured victim asks for pity the painter replies:
I’d rack thee though I knew a thousand lives were perishing in thine
What were ten thousand to a fame like mine
Again, when the dying captive threatens him with the hereafter, the painter mocks him by denial of future existence:
Yet there’s a deathless name!
A spirit that the smouldering vault shall spurn,
And like a steadfast planet mount and burn
And though its crown of flame
Consume my brain to ashes as it shone
By all the fiery stars I I’d bind it on!
Aye though it bid me rifle
My heart’s last fount for its insatiate thirst
Though every life-strung nerve be maddened first
Though it should bid me stifle
The yearning in my throat for my sweet child,
And taunt its mother till my brain went wild
All I would do it all Sooner than die, like a dull worm, to rot
Thrust foully unto earth to be forgot!
Upon which the poet concludes:
How like a mounting devil in the heart
Rules the unreined ambition! Let it once
But play the monarch, and its haughty brow
Glows with beauty that bewilders thought
And unthrones peace forever. Putting on
The very pomp of Lucifer, it turns
The heart to ashes, and with not a spring
Left in the bosom for the spirit’s lip,
We look upon our splendour and forget
The thirst of which we perish!
We are thus prepared to understand the history: “And they said, Come, let us build a city, and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make a name; lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth” (Gen 11:4 ).
All popular movements of this kind are directed by leaders who suggest the watchwords and crystallize the agitation into forms of their own choosing. The sin of the movement was manifold. It meant rebellion against God and ruin to the race. The divine plan was diffusion, and the command was to push out in all directions, not one; to occupy and subdue all the earth. But Nimrod’s plan was to keep the people all together under his leadership to serve his ends. The object is thus expressed: “Lest we be scattered.” To this day tyrants pursue the same plan and put embargoes on outward movements. And to this day God’s providence has thwarted them by bringing about some discovery or attraction that draws out and diffuses population, relieving the congestion at, the crowded centers of life. A very interesting lesson of history is the study of the ways of Providence in sending out migrations of men to colonize the unoccupied parts of the earth. More wonderful and interesting is the way of that Providence in dispersing Christians that they may carry the gospel to all the world. The one thing that made Nimrod’s plan of centralization possible was the one language of the people. The audacity and rebellion of the plan provoked divine inquisition and judgment. To allow its successful execution would defeat every purpose of God concerning world occupation and bring about a corruption of the race equal to that of the antediluvians. A world crisis had arrived. The case called for heroic treatment and instant relief. What was the divine remedy?
CONFUSION OF TONGUES “Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So Jehovah scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth; and they left off building the city. Therefore was the name of it called Babel; because Jehovah did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did Jehovah scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth” (Gen 11:7-9 ).
This is one of the mightiest and most far-reaching miracles of history. It transcends in importance all the plagues of Egypt. Indeed it finds no counterpart until the descent of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Dr. Conant thus quotes from Schelling’s Philosophy of Mythology:
Humanity cannot have left that condition, in which there was no distinction of peoples, but only of races, without a spiritual crisis, which must have been of the deepest significance, must have taken place in the basis of human consciousness itself. . . . For we cannot conceive of different peoples without different languages; and language is something spiritual. If difference of peoples is not something that was not from the first, but is something that has arisen, then must this also hold true of the different languages. . . . Here we fall in with the oldest account of the human race, the Mosaic writings; toward which so many are disinclined, only because they know not what to do with it, can neither understand nor use it. Genesis puts the rise of peoples in connection with the rise of different languages; but in such a way, that the confounding of the language is the cause, the rise of the peoples the effect.
To evade the significance of this miracle the higher critics resort to their usual refuge, the document hypothesis. They magnify the tenth chapter and disparage the first nine verses of the eleventh. The former, an Elohist document, is credible; the latter, a Jehovah document, is incredible. They claim that chapter 10 leaves us to suppose that the nations were distributed upon the face of the earth in obedience to the natural laws which govern colonization and migration, and that the present striking varieties in human languages are wholly the natural result of the dispersion of the nations. The tenth chapter does not leave us to any such suppositions, the episode of Nimrod, the references to Peleg, and the Gen 10:5 ; Gen 10:20 ; Gen 10:31 , summing up respectively the families of Japheth, Ham, and Shem, demand the explanation in the next chapter. When asked to account naturally for these striking and irreconcilable varieties in the few great parent languages, they reply: Philology has as yet nothing very definite to say as to the possibility of reducing to one the larger families of human speech. In fact, their oracle, philology, is not merely dubious it is dumb. Dr. Conant well sums up all that philology can do with this problem:
The diversities in the languages of the earth present a problem which philosophy has in vain laboured to solve. Comparative philology has shown, however, that many different languages are grouped together by common affinities, as branches of the same family, all having the same original language for their common parent. Notwithstanding the great number and diversity of languages, they may all be traced to a very few original parent tongues. The difficulty lies in the essential and irreconcilable diversity between those several parent tongues, not the remotest affinities existing to indicate a common origin, or any historical relation; a problem for which speculative philosophy can find no solution.
They cannot account for it naturally, but deny the supernatural account, passing the matter by with a sneer, “Oh that account is found only in the Jehovah document.” Or if they wish to be a little more respectful, they say, “The fact is that here, as elsewhere, the Jehovist aims not so much at presenting historical information as showing the ethical and religious significance of the leading points in history and the chief changes in man’s condition.” How happens it that they have such an infallible knowledge of the aim of the Jehovist, and how can there be an ethical and religious significance of history, which is not history but falsehood? If the historical element of the first nine verses of the eleventh chapter be eliminated there is nothing of any kind left, out of which to construct ethics or religion. If the aim of the writer is not history, then words are not signs of ideas. It would be far manlier and more consistent to follow the more destructive higher critics and expunge what they call the Jehovistic record as spurious and unworthy, than to weakly hold on to it and discredit it. The following maxims of literary composition have long obtained:
Never introduce a god into the story unless there be an occasion for a god.
When introduced, let his speech and deeds be worthy of a god.
Let the result of his intervention be worthy of a god. Here was a worthy occasion. Race ruin was imminent and unavoidable by human means. Here was speech and deed worthy of divinity, and results too grand and far-reaching and beneficial to admit of human conception or execution. The author of the book follows his own appropriate method in the use of the divine means. When the divine being, invisible and unapproachable and unknowable, is the subject, the name is Elohim. Whenever it is God manifested particularly by interventions of mercy, it is Jehovah and Jehovah God.
CONSEQUENT GROUPINGS INTO NATIONS The first effect of the confusion of tongues is the stopping of the work, from inability to comprehend each other. The consciousness that a supernatural power had intervened would necessarily fill them with dread, lest a greater evil befall them if they persisted in disobedience. Those who could best understand each other would naturally group themselves and form the nucleus of a separate nation. And this grouping also was naturally according to family origin, whether of Shem, Ham, or Japheth, thus accounting for the three great root languages whose barriers philology cannot pass. This harmonized also with
ASSIGNMENT OF THEIR RESPECTIVE TERRITORIES The proof of this divine allotment of territory is abundant in the lesson and elsewhere. In summing up the histories of the sons of Japheth the record says, “Of these were the isles of the nations divided in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.” Similarly of Ham: “These are the sons of Ham, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, in their nations.” And of Shem: “These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations.” More particular is the testimony in Gen 10:25 : “And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.” This evidence not only establishes the fact of the division of territory, but shows that the event was so extraordinary and impressive as to give a name to a child born at the time, namely, Peleg, i.e., Division. It is not probable that they could agree among themselves as to the partition of territory. This question could be settled only by supreme authority. And to this fact testify the Scriptures. Paul said at Athens, “And he made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation” (Act 17:26 ). But the author of Genesis in another book puts the matter beyond controversy:
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples According to the number of the children of Israel. Deu 32:8
This allotment of territory, after the confusion of tongues was followed by an irresistible divine impulse that brought about
DISPERSION TO ALLOTTED HOMES
They had said, “Lest we be scattered.” When God acts the record says, “So Jehovah scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off building the city. Therefore was the name of it called Babel; because Jehovah did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did Jehovah scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth” (Gen 11:8-9 ). It has been objected that the division of the land which gave rise to the naming of Peleg, came too early to be connected with the dispersion following the confusion of tongues. The objection is ill advised. The division and assignment of territory long preceded the dispersion. The very sin of the attempt at centralization consisted in its deliberate rebellion against this prior division. In the order of our chapter we have considered the division after the confusion of tongues, not because it was then ordained, but because it was then enforced. We are now prepared to take up chapter 10, and consider specially the parts of the earth occupied by the descendants of the several sons of Noah, which, however, is reserved for another chapter.
QUESTIONS 1. What can you Bay of the value of the tenth chapter of Genesis, (1) as literature; (2) as history; (3) as instruction?
2. In order of time, which comes first. Gen 11:1-9 , or the tenth chapter, and why this order?
3. What, then, was the starting point and what held the people together at this time?
4. As they multiplied, what was the trend of their movement and what modern proverb to the contrary?
5. Who became their leader, what was the meaning of his name, what great cities did he build and where?
6. What was the meaning of “a mighty hunter” and “before the Lord”?
7. What was his ambitious scheme, the essentials to its accomplishment and what was its motive?
8. Give an illustration of cruel, unbridled ambition.
9. What was the manifold sin of this movement and the divine remedy for it?
10. What was God’s plan of defeating such movements in modern times?
11. What was the counterpart of this mighty miracle?
12. What is Dr. Conant’s explanation of the rise of the different peoples?
13. How do the critics try to evade the significance of this miracle and what is this expositor’s reply?
14. According to Dr. Conant what has comparative philology shown with respect to the many different languages?
15. What is the position of the more respectful (mediating) critics and this expositor’s reply?
16. What three maxims of literary composition obtain and their application to the matter in hand?
17. What was the first effect of the confusion of tongues and how account for the three great root languages?
18. What is the Scripture proof of the divine allotment?
19. What brought about the dispersion, and how?
20. What objection is sometimes urged with respect to the dispersion, and the reply thereto?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Gen 10:1 Now these [are] the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.
Ver. 1. And unto them were sons born after the flood. ] Great store of sons: else how could they so soon have peopled the whole earth? See here the virtue of that divine benediction, Gen 9:1 ; Gen 9:7 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Gen 10:1
1Now these are the records of the generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah; and sons were born to them after the flood.
Gen 10:1 Now these are the records of the generations This phase is repeated three times in the context of Genesis 10, 11 (Gen 10:1; Gen 11:10; Gen 11:27). This may have been the author’s way to outline the book or a Babylonian colophon to mark the cuneiform clay tablets that go together.
Shem, Ham, and Japheth This order of listing their names is not primarily related to their age but a theological arrangement, listing those in the Messianic line first, and those farthest removed last.
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
Shem. Note the Asyndeton (App-6) here, and contrast the Polysyndeton of Gen 7:13. This order in Gen 5:32; Gen 6:10; Gen 6:7. Gen 6:13; Gen 9:18. 1Ch 1:4.
Japheth, the eldest, 1Ch 1:5. 1Ch 10:21.
Ham, second, Gen 9:24. “Younger” than Japheth.
Shem, the youngest. Compare Gen 5:32 with Gen 11:10. Last here (in Introversion) because his history is to be continued. Japheth = enlargement. Ham = Heat, Black. Shem = Name or Renown.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah ( Gen 10:1 ),
And as we get into chapter ten, this chapter has been called the “Table of Nations”. And here you have the beginning of all of the various nations of the world, the various ethnic groups with these sons of Noah. “These are the generations of the sons of Noah.”
Seth is probably the one who put these generations together. We follow for a little bit the line of Ham, a little bit the line of Japheth, and then when we get to the line of Shem we continue to follow the generations from Shem because it is from Shem that Abraham will come. It is from Abraham that the nation will come. It is from the nation and Abraham, of course, that the seed Christ will come. And so we’ll continue to follow the line down to Christ. But the others will follow for a few generations to establish their ethnic groups that sprung from them. Then we’ll leave them go, because the whole message really is centering and zeroing down towards Jesus Christ.
So many names are not given. Many of the families are not named at all. It isn’t intended to be a complete historical record but only a record that will lead us to Abraham, which will lead us to David, which will lead us to Jesus Christ. Once we’ve come to Jesus Christ it wasn’t necessary to keep the genealogies anymore. God has proven that Jesus Christ was as promised, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham, the Son of Adam. So that’s all that’s necessary to follow that line that leads to Christ.
Now the sons of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras ( Gen 10:2 ).
Gomer was more or less the father of the ancient Sumerians. Magog were the Scythians, the area of Russia. And Madai was the father of the Medes. Javan the Greeks. Tubal and Meshech, they believe that Meshech actually is the ancient Moskobi, modern day Moscow. And Tubal the modern Tublanx, and Tairas, of course, is the Taircians. And so we see that basically you’re getting into the Asian European nations as descendants from Japheth.
Now we take one of the sons.
Gomer ( Gen 10:3 );
the first one listed, and we have the Germanic people;
Ashkenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah ( Gen 10:3 ).
Togarmah is thought to be the Armenians but the Ashkenaz, more or less, the Germanic people coming again from Japheth.
And by these were the islands of the Gentiles divided ( Gen 10:5 )
Actually Tarshish, and so forth. So you’re getting into the area of Europe, Scandinavia, of course on into ultimately England, all the descendants. The Caucasian race descended from Japheth.
Now the sons of Ham; Cush, and Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah ( Gen 10:6-7 ).
And all of these various names. We’re not going to try and go through them all. But they basically went south and populated the areas of Africa. Also a portion of them, the descendants of Canaan were Sidon, which were the Phoenicians, the sister city of Sidon. And of course the city Sidon up on the northern coast of Mediterranean, the sister city of Tyre which were the Phoenicians. The Jebusites who inhabited the area around Jerusalem, and in verse seventeen there’s “Sinite”.
Now it is felt that some of the inhabitants of the Sinites moved east and where the Chinese descended from this particular branch. And it is interesting that the Chinese are still called Sino people. And you read of the Sino-Japanese war, for instance and the name still holding; many of the Chinese names beginning with this S-I-N.
So from Ham, Africa on over into the Far East and the area of Canaan. Now he does stop with one of the descendants when he gets to.
Cush begat Nimrod: and he began to be a mighty one in the eaRuth ( Gen 10:8 ).
Instead of
a mighty hunter before the LORD ( Gen 10:9 ):
It should be translated “he was a mighty tyrant in the face of the LORD.” The hunting was the hunting of men’s soul. Nimrod became a leader in apostasy, developer of a great religious system later to become known as the Babylonian religious system or the “mystery Babylon”. That whole religious system was begun by Nimrod.
Now his mother Semiramis was later to be called the queen of heaven and to be worshipped. It was her claim that Nimrod was actually born without the benefit of a father; that he was born while she was a virgin.
Nimrod was known for his hunting prowess’s. A great man with the bow. In those days the people were probably, because of their primitive type weapons, very fearful of the wild animals-the lions and the tigers and leopards and so forth. And he was known as a protector of the people because of his ability and skills in hunting.
But one day while hunting boar, a wild boar turned on him and gored him. And he supposedly was dead for three days lying there in the woods and after three days his life returned. And so they began to celebrate his resurrection by coloring eggs and having great festivities in the springtime of the year. Incidentally, his birth was December twenty-fifth and they usually celebrated his birth by giving of gifts, drunken orgies, and cutting trees and decorating them with silver and gold in their homes. And this is just a few generations after Noah.
The worship of his mother Semiramis, queen of heaven, the whole thing, Satan’s counterfeit of God’s intended work began with Nimrod. And when you start reading the history of the Babylonian religion, the way they set up the celebrations and all, you will be absolutely shocked at the historic church and how much of the activities of the historic church were borrowed directly from Nimrod. He was also known as Tammuz, several names, Astarte, Semiramis, the various names for his mother who was worshipped. And actually the name Easter coming from Astarte.
It’s amazing that this Babylonian system could have so thoroughly infiltrated the church. But God brings Nimrod into the record here.
And the beginning of the kingdom of Babel ( Gen 10:10 ),
Verse ten, and it was he who inspired the people to build this tower that would reach into heaven. It was he who began to inspire them to the worship of the stars. The beginning of astrology and all of these things began in this ancient Babylonian religion.
The tower really literally not to reach into heaven but the tower was to worship. It was an observatory where they would go and worship the stars, the constellations and so forth. And many such towers have been uncovered in the archaeological diggings there in the Babylonian plain. There were areas of worship.
So the descendants of Ham then in verse twenty-one, we come to the descendants of.
Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber ( Gen 10:21 ),
It is from Eber that we get the name Ibriy or the Hebrew. So Abraham was not the beginning of the idea or the name of the Hebrews. It came from Abraham’s ancestor Eber. And so Shem
the brother of Japheth the elder, even to him were children born. The children of Shem ( Gen 10:21-22 )
Are listed here for you.
And then the children of Aram ( Gen 10:23 );
And we’re going to narrow it down to Eber because we want to follow Eber.
Eber had two sons: the name of one was Peleg; and in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan ( Gen 10:25 ).
Now this idea of the earth being divided, there are some who try to relate this to a current scientific theory of the continental, the continent dividing, you know. The continents have been drifting apart. Originally there was only one landmass but this continental drift theory that is a current theory in some scientific areas and they some of them point to this reference in scripture it was in the time of Peleg that the earth was divided.
However, if you’ll follow the chronological charts and all, you’ll find out that Peleg lived in the days of the tower of Babel. And it was at the tower of Babel that the earth was really divided into the ethnic groups, and so that is probably what the reference is to. The division of the earth into the ethnic groups following the tower of Babel experience, rather than a scripture that would somehow lend support to the continental drift theory. So that’s the way it is. It could refer to the continental drift but more than likely the reference is to the division of the earth from the tower of Babel.
Among the names here in the descendants, we do find the name Jobab, which could very well be the Job of the Scriptures. And so I guess that’s a little further down when we get into the descendants of Abraham.
Chapter 11
Now in chapter eleven.
The whole earth was of one language, and one speech ( Gen 11:1 ).
Probably Hebrew because in the earlier record of the book of Genesis, the names of the people were Hebrew names that have Hebrew meanings. And so the original language was perhaps the Hebrew language itself. “The whole earth was of one language, one speech.”
And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly ( Gen 11:2-3 ).
Now this is an interesting thing because it shows that very early after the flood, they had brick kilns and rather than just building their houses out of rocks, they were advanced to the state of making bricks and putting them in the kiln, burning them thoroughly. So rather than just adobe kind of buildings, they were now using a mortar with a cured brick or a burned brick and they began to build, of course, the city of Nineveh, the city of Babylon, all began to be built in this period by Nimrod himself.
And so they said, Let us build a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole eaRuth ( Gen 11:4 ).
Now God’s command was to actually fill the earth. It’s an attempt to sort of countermand God’s commandment. “Lest we be scattered abroad throughout all the earth.” Let’s join together. Let’s just, you know, congregate in this area.
And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded ( Gen 11:5 ).
Now again we’re describing the activities of God in human terms as though God were coming down and looking things over. In reality, God is omnipresent. He was watching the thing the whole while.
The LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they all have one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do ( Gen 11:6 ).
The developing of this religious system. Now it is very possible that originally God placed the stars in the heavens for signs and that the Gospel is actually given in the Zodiac, the virgin, the lion. But as Satan has always taken the things of God and twisted them and perverted them, so from the original message that God had placed there in the heavens of His plan for the ages, that there was that perversion of it into what is the modern astrology, which began way back again in the Babylonian era here in Babel where they were going to build this tower as an observatory to observe the constellations and so forth at the sky. But it is quite possible that originally the Gospel was there indeed in the stars as far as the message of God to man.
Now it would seem that the Magi who came from the east to find the Christ child were reading correctly the heavens. “We have seen His star in the east, we’ve come to worship Him”. And that they were reading truly the signs that God had placed there. Now the Bible says that God has placed the stars for signs and for seasons. And it is very possible that originally there was indeed the message of God in the stars but has been perverted, as I say, into the modern astrology. And the perversion began way back there where they began to look at the stars for the influence over their lives, rather than looking to God.
And so God in His Word puts down astrologers, stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, those who sought them to govern their lives by the influence of the stars upon them and so forth. And God really speaks out very heavily against that in the prophecy of Isaiah. But it is an ancient, ancient thing, the horoscopes and all. But as with so many things, it is possible that in the beginning it was pure and had a true message of God, but it has been perverted as time has gone on.
So God seeing this development said
Let us go down, and confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. And so the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel ( Gen 11:7-9 );
Babel, whichever pronunciation you prefer. It really is a word that just sort of it was a word that was adapted because of what the sound sounded like. Just like the word “barbarian” is a word that was developed by the Greeks and the word “barbarian” in Greek literally is barbar. And anybody who didn’t speak Greek was a barbar because your language sounded so funny. So anybody who didn’t speak Greek, they just considered them uncultured, you know; they’re barbar. It just means that they talk some other language rather than the cultured Greek.
And so from that we get the word “barbarian” but it originally was just a, you know, just a sound that they made, unintelligible sound by which they were sort of mimicking any language other than Greek. It’s barbar, oh; he’s a barbar. And so this “Babel” is the same thing. It’s a mimicking of a sound that was not understood. Babel just is somewhat like the barbar. Babel. It’s just “I don’t understand what you’re saying”. What do you mean “ba-ba”? And so the word has come to mean confusion, lack of understanding. And so they called the name of the place Babel.
because the LORD did there confound or confuse the languages of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the eaRuth ( Gen 11:9 ).
And so at this point, the people who were speaking. Of course this was a tremendous miracle indeed, the development of all of these languages. Now the interesting thing about languages is that many times we think of the English language because we grew up with it, you know, it’s such an excellent language in communicating ideas. And we think, you know, people who are living in say, primitive cultures, in stone age cultures surely they must have a primitive form of language. Ours must surely be a highly cultured form of language, the English language. And they must have very primitive language, but it is an interesting thing that many of the primitive cultures have the most complex languages, highly complex languages, much more so than English. And thus, there is great difficulty in translating into many of these languages of primitive people.
You think, oh, it would be easy to translate, you know, “The man went to church.” But some of these primitive cultures have so many words for “man”. So you’d have to know if the man was one that you knew well, or you knew slightly because they have one word for man that you know well, and another one for a man that you know slightly. Then you’d have to know whether you like the man or not. And then you’d have to know whether or not you respected him. And actually they have maybe twenty different words for “man.” So you’d have to know all kinds of things about this man before you know which word would fit the text or the translation.
Now the word “he went,” did he go once in his life? Or did he go occasionally? Was it something that he was accustomed to doing? Or something that was rare for him to do? And so even in the verb you have so many different words that would describe it, that you get into the translation and really you want to throw up your hands and quit because these languages are so many times so much more complex.
I have a friend who was translating the gospel of Mark into the Choco dialect in Panama and he came to the place where he was working with his translating helper, and he came to the place where Jesus spit in the ground and made mud and put it in the blind man’s eyes and told him to go to the pool of Siloam and wash it out. So in translating this word “spit” the native said, But how did he spit? You know there’s many different ways to spit. Well, we only have one English word but the Choco Indian has so many different words.
You have a different way of spitting and of course how do you know which word it is? We don’t know what word it is. And because you know they have so many different words he said, “Well”, he said, “did he hock and spit? Or did he pick up-did he pick up the dirt in his hand and just spit and mix it up? Or did he spit on the ground and mix it up? Or did he put the dirt in his eye and spit in his eye and mix it up?” And he would have a different word for each action. Oh, we don’t know what Jesus did, but this development of language.
Now it is interesting that man has in any and every culture, no matter how primitive, highly complex method of communicating of ideas, and I don’t care how primitive or ignorant that particular culture may be. Their languages are highly developed in the ability to communicate their ideas, whether they do it through grunts, through a singsong, or whatever. They are able to communicate their ideas no matter how primitive their culture.
This certainly is something that separates man from the animal kingdom. There is nothing in the animal kingdom that even approximates a complex form of communication of ideas. But yet in the most primitive culture of man, and in every culture of man, there is a language communication. So this was the beginning of the separation of languages.
Now after the separation into the basic language groups, there of course have become modifications even within the same language or generalized language. We find the romance languages and similarities between the Spanish and the Portuguese and the Italian and the French. We find that there is certain similarity between the German and the Scandinavian. We find that English is a language that has borrowed much from Latin and from Greek.
So there have been developed languages from the basic language system, but God divided their languages. And instantly they no doubt got together in groups that they could communicate to, family groups and so forth where they could communicate to each other, but it caused the division and the separation. And that spreading out then into the world and scattering abroad upon the face of the earth as is described.
Now we’re going to zero in down to Abraham because that’s where our story must move.
So these are the generations of Shem ( Gen 11:10 ):
Getting now again a repetition of the generations of Seth, Shem, but moving definitely just down towards Abraham.
He was a hundred years old, and he begat Arphaxad two years after the flood: he lived after he begat Arphaxad five hundred years, and he begat sons and daughters ( Gen 11:10-11 ).
So he lived to be about six hundred years old approximately.
Arphaxad lived five, thirty-five years, and begat Salah ( Gen 11:12 ):
And we get, he begat Eber and we follow down to Abraham, and actually that’s the one where we’re coming to, so let’s go on to verse twenty-six.
Terah lived seventy years, and he begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran ( Gen 11:26 ).
Now whether or not this is the order in which they were born, we do not know. Whether or not you know how old was Terah when Abraham was born, we don’t know. Maybe he was the third son. We have no way of knowing but he lived seventy years and he had these three sons, Abram, Nahor and Haran. Now he lived after that for many years also.
Now these are the generations of Terah: Terah begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran begat Lot. And Haran died before his father Terah in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees. And Abram and Nahor took them wives ( Gen 11:27-29 ):
So their brother Haran died early having married and born one son, Lot. Actually he bore some daughters, too. And they took wives and
the name of Abram’s wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milcah, for she was also the daughter of Haran ( Gen 11:29 ),
So he married his niece.
the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah. But Sarai was barren; and she had no child. And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran ( Gen 11:29-31 )
So with Haran dead, Lot being his son, Abraham sort of adopted Lot because Abraham did not have any sons of his own. So he sort of adopted Lot and Lot became a journeyer with Abraham.
But they altogether went from the Ur of the Chaldees ( Gen 11:31 ),
Now it was in the Ur of the Chaldees, in this area where this false religious systems, the Pantheism and Polytheism and all began to develop and the perverted religious systems, and so they left the Ur of the Chaldees.
to go to the land of Canaan; and they came to Haran, and dwelt there ( Gen 11:31 ).
Now the fact that they all left to go to Canaan means that in the beginning, it could be that Abraham’s father also received the call of God to leave and get out of this area that had begun to become religiously polluted and to come into a whole new area. But Terah, they came as far as Haran and there they dwelt.
And the days of Terah were two hundred and five years: and Terah died in Haran ( Gen 11:32 ).
Now there is a seeming contradiction of scripture here when you get in the New Testament and Stephen is talking about Abraham being called of God to leave the Ur of the Chaldees and to go to Israel, how that after he said Terah died, Abraham then went on to Canaan. But when you start putting the ages together, you find that Abraham actually left, if Terah lived to be two hundred and five years old, then he was seven years old when Abraham was born then, and Abraham was seventy-five when he left. The seventy-five and the seventy makes a hundred and forty-five years, and yet he lived to be two hundred and five years old. So you have a discrepancy in mathematics here. So what is the solution or what is the answer?
There are a couple possible suggestions. Number one, Abraham may not have been the firstborn son. They may not be listed in the order of their births but in the order of precedence of their son, and Abraham could have been born many years after. In other words, seventy years and maybe Haran was born when he was seventy years old. And it doesn’t give his age at the time of Abraham’s birth. That’s one possibility. So that Abraham was sort of a late child and that indeed by the time he was seventy-five his father was two hundred and five years old, very possible.
Another possibility is that Stephen is talking in sort of a spiritual sense that he died. You remember one day a young fellow came to Jesus and said, “I’ll follow you but allow me first to go bury my father”. And Jesus said, “Let the dead bury the dead. Come and follow Me” ( Mat 8:21-22 ). Now the “let me first bury my father” was a common term. It didn’t mean that his father was dead. It isn’t that Jesus is showing a disrespect for a father who had died, but it is a term whereby a person was saying “I don’t want to do it now. I want to wait until my father dies”. It’s just a term of procrastination or putting something off until later. I want to do it later. Wait till my father dies. Your father can be alive and healthy. He may be good for another fifty, sixty years. But it was a term of procrastination, a common term of procrastination.
Now knowing the use of Jesus in this term in the ideas that were given by it, it could be that Stephen is using it in the same sense and that Terah, when they came to Haran, died spiritually because Terah began to actually apostatize and became also a worshipper of false gods. So it could be that he’s referring to the spiritual death of Terah when he turned to spiritual apostasy. And it was at that point, when Terah spiritually was dead unto God, that Abraham realized he had to make his journey alone. And he took off with his -with Lot and the servants and so forth, and his wife Sarah. And they began then to journey onto the land that God had promised to show him.
Actually going from the area of the Ur of the Chaldees going to Haran, they were going about six hundred miles northwest. It was about four hundred miles from Haran, down to the land of Canaan to the area of Shechem where he was ultimately to end up. But Abraham started off journeying in obedience to God from the Ur of the Chaldees. They stopped with his father. It could be that his dad said “hey, this is good. Let’s settle here. Let’s settle in this area. It’s nice, you know, it’s productive and all”.
Let’s settle here and there was a spiritual death of Terah to the call of God and awareness of God or the spiritual death. And Stephen could be referring to that when Terah died, then that spiritual death, Abraham realized that he had to leave now his father and that family and journey on by himself to the land that God had promised to show him.
So don’t cast off your faith because of a bit of mathematics here. There are possible explanations for and which one is correct, of course, we don’t know.
Chapter 12
Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy family ( Gen 12:1 ),
So Abraham really wasn’t totally obedient at this point. And this to me is interesting, because Abraham is always held as the model of faith in the New Testament, the model of a man who believed and trusted God. He’s the prime example of the man who believes. And so many times when we read about faith and the exploits of faith, we think, “But I’m so weak and I’ve blown it so many times, surely I can’t do it”. It’s good to know that Abraham wasn’t perfect nor was his faith perfect. It’s good to know that you don’t have to be perfect and your faith doesn’t have to be perfect for God to honor you.
So God said, “Get away from your family”. He took his dad with him from the Ur of the Chaldees to Haran. That was an incomplete obedience. Stopping at Haran was incomplete obedience to God. So even men noted as men of faith have their moments. And just because you slipped back and have your moments doesn’t mean that God won’t honor you and honor your faith, or that God doesn’t love you and wants to still work in a powerful way in your life, just because you blow it and you stop at Haran. It doesn’t mean that the call of God is going to be removed and there’s no chance for you to go on and fulfill that which God has laid upon your life and your heart to do.
Many people have stopped at Haran, but the time came for him to move on, which he did. Maybe the time has come for you to move on from your Haran. “The Lord said, Get thee out of thy country, from thy father’s family.”
from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you ( Gen 12:1 ):
So by the very virtue of the fact that Terah went with him, it could be the old man was saying, “Oh no, don’t leave. I want to go with you, son”. Or it could be Abraham was saying, “Okay, dad, all right”, you know. And he could have been weak in this area. But then his dad began to drag him down and slow him down, until his father died spiritually following after the pagan practices, and Abraham moved on.
I will make of thee [God said] a great nation ( Gen 12:2 ),
Now God is establishing covenant with Abraham. “Get away from your family, your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. I’ll make you a great nation”.
I will bless you, I will make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing ( Gen 12:2 ):
All of these promises God fulfilled to Abraham. He made of him a great nation. God has blessed him and made the name of Abraham great. It’s honored and respected. “And thou shalt be a blessing.”
And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee: and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed ( Gen 12:3 ).
And from that is the promise that the Messiah would come from Abraham. “In thee all the families of the earth.” Not just the Jews but all the families of the earth will be blessed from Abraham’s progeny, even Jesus Christ.
So Abram departed, as the LORD had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed out of Haran. And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten in Haran; and they went forth to go to the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came ( Gen 12:4-5 ).
Four hundred-mile journey, which in those days, with all of the animals and everything else, must have taken quite a long time indeed.
And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Shechem, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanites [or the descendants or Canaan] were then in the land. And the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there he built an altar unto the LORD, who appeared unto him ( Gen 12:6-7 ).
Now the promise of giving the land to Abraham’s seed at this point would also include the Palestinians, because the Arabs also were descendants of Abraham through Ishmael. So at this point, the land is promised not just to the Jews but also to thy seed, which would include the Arabs, Palestinians. But later on, when God repeats it to Jacob, it excludes the Arabs.
And he removed from thence unto a mountain on the east of Bethel, and he pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west, and Hai [or Ai] on the east ( Gen 12:8 ):
Now when Joshua came in later to conquer the land, he came up from Jericho and conquered Ai and then onto Bethel. Abraham now has a favorite spot there near Bethel in between Bethel and Ai. It’s the highest part of the land in that particular area. It gives you just a fabulous view. It’s about ten miles north of Jerusalem and about twenty miles or so from Shechem. But from there you can see down into the Jordan valley, you can see up towards the area of Samaria, you can see Jerusalem and the area south. You can look over towards the Mediterranean. It just is a beautiful vantage-point in that mountainous area between Bethel and Ai. And when Abraham came to this area, he built an altar. “And the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed I give this land.”
he built an altar unto the LORD, and called on the name of the LORD. And Abram journeyed, going on down now to the south. And there was a famine in the land: so Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was grievous in the land ( Gen 12:8-10 ).
So there was a drought in the-of course, he went on south towards Beersheba. There is always a drought down there. The place is really dry. It’s ‘deserty’.
And it came to pass, when he was come near to Egypt, that he said to Sarai his wife ( Gen 12:11 ),
Now here’s our great man of faith, our example.
Behold now, I know that you are a beautiful woman to look upon ( Gen 12:11 ):
Hey, that’s saying a lot to your wife when she’s sixty-five years old. But because of the longevity, at sixty-five you were still really, you know, in your prime of youth in a sense of beauty. Abraham lived to be over one hundred and sixty. So at sixty-five you’re really not that old yet in those times. But it does, you know, when you think of sixty-five years old and talking about her great beauty, it does sound to be very interesting. “I know that you are a beautiful woman to look upon.”
Therefore when it comes to pass, when the Egyptians will see you, they will say, This is his wife: and they will kill me, and keep you alive ( Gen 12:12 ).
They’ll take you into their harem. Now this was a common practice among the Egyptian kings is to just, if a man, if he saw a beautiful woman, he’d kill her husband and take her as his wife. And so he said,
I pray that you’ll tell them that you are my sister: that it might be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee ( Gen 12:13 ).
Hey, this is our great man of faith, Abraham. You see, even great men of faith have their weaknesses and their moments. Now that encourages me for some silly reason because I also have my moments of weaknesses. But I have the concept that when I get weak, God just says, “All right, that’s it. You had your chance”. You know, wipe out, but not so. God continued to honor Abraham. God continued to bless Abraham. He wasn’t perfect.
God doesn’t use perfect people because they don’t exist. So don’t worry that you’re not perfect. Don’t think that God is going to reject you because you’re not perfect. Don’t think that God can’t use you because you’re not perfect. God blessed Abraham. God used Abraham though he had his lapses of faith, just like we have our lapses of faith.
So it came to pass, that, when Abram was come to Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman that she was very beautiful. And the princes also of Pharaoh saw her, and they commended her before the Pharaoh: and the woman was taken into the Pharaoh’s house. And he entreated Abram [or he treated Abraham] well for her sake: and he had sheep, and oxen, and asses, and menservants, maidservants, she asses, camels. And the LORD plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai Abram’s wife. And the Pharaoh called Abram, and said, What have you done to me? Why didn’t you tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say, She is my sister? I might have taken her to be my wife: now behold your wife, take her, go your way. And Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him: and they sent him away, and his wife, and all that he had ( Gen 12:14-20 ).
So he came under then a special protective edict of the Pharaoh so that he would not fall prey to the men in order that they might take Sarai his wife.
So an introduction now to Abraham. We’re beginning now to follow and we will from now on follow Abraham as we come on down towards Christ, as the Bible now is the developing of the nation and from the nation the coming forth of the Savior of the world.
So next week we’ll continue on beginning with chapter thirteen. Shall we stand? God bless you and enrich your heart and your mind in the things of the Spirit, giving you understanding of His Word. And may God increase your faith and your knowledge and understanding of Him. God go with you and bless you and watch over you and keep you in all your ways, strengthening you and ministering to you through His love. In Jesus’ name. “
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
In this chapter we have a simple and straightforward account of the dispersion of the sons of Noah and their families after the Flood. The descendants of Japheth moved toward the isles or the coastlands. The descendants of Ham moved toward the plains of Shinar and thence on. The descendants of Shem moved toward the hill country of the east.
It is not possible very clearly to define geographically today the districts occupied by various descendants of Noah.
What is clear, however, and to be carefully observed is that their movements were under a direct divine guidance, even though they may not have been conscious of it. Christian ethnologists still claim that all the races of today may be traced back to these revealed origins.
This chapter finds interpretation, in some measure, in the address of Paul on Mars’ Hill in which he declared that God “made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation.”
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
Gen 10:32
This is the summing up of the Scriptural account of the second spreading of the human race through the earth, after it had been laid bare by the Deluge, just as the fourth and fifth chapters of Genesis give the history of the first increase from Adam and his sons. But there is this remarkable difference between the two: the first is manifestly a history of families; this is a history of nations.
I. Notice first the degree in which the original features of the founders of a race reproduce themselves in their descendants so as to become the distinct and manifest types of national life. The few words wherein, according to the wont of patriarchal times, Noah, as the firstborn priest of his own family, pronounces on his sons his blessing and his curse, sketch in outline the leading characteristics of all their after progeny.
II. We may observe also adumbrations of a mode of dealing with men which seems to imply that in His bestowal of spiritual gifts God deals with them after some similar law. We have seen this already in the descent of spiritual blessings along the line of the pious firstborn of Noah; and the same may be traced again: (1) in the blessing bestowed upon the race of Abraham; and (2) in the transference to the devouter Jacob and his seed of the blessing which was set at nought by the profane firstborn of Isaac.
S. Wilberforce, Sermons, p. 176.
References: Gen 10.-Expositor, 2nd series, vol. 1., p. 275, vol. vi., pp. 356, 357. Gen 10:1-5.-Parker, vol. i., p. 172. Gen 10:8-10.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xvi., p. 31. Gen 10:10, Gen 10:11.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. vii., p. 317.
Fuente: The Sermon Bible
V. THE GENERATIONS OF THE SONS OF NOAH
CHAPTER 10 Shem, Ham, and Japheth and Their Seed
1. The sons of Japheth (Gen 10:2-5)
2. The sons of Ham (Gen 10:6-20)
3. The sons of Shem (Gen 10:21-32)
Here we have the beginning of the nations. God knows them and keeps track of the nations of the earth. The order of the sons of Noah is here changed. Japheth comes first. Hams place is unchanged. Shem comes last. This order is given in view of Noahs prophecy. Among the descendants of Ham we find Nimrod, a mighty hunter. His name means Let us rebel. Here also we find Babel mentioned for the first time. Babylon has for its founder a mighty one in the earth-a mighty hunter. Mentioned here for the first time Babylon is seen springing from the race which is under a curse, and having for its founder a mighty one in the earth, a second Cain. We have here the birth of Babylon, while the entire Bible, from now on to the eighteenth chapter of the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, gives us its development, its Satanic opposition to all that is from above, and its final great fall and destruction. Babylon! what a sinister word! Both city and system, such as is seen in its finality in Rev. 17 and 18, are Satans stronghold.
It would be interesting to follow all these names and trace them in the Scriptures and in history. But this we cannot do.
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
are the: Gen 2:4, Gen 5:1, Gen 6:9, Mat 1:1
and unto: Gen 9:1, Gen 9:7, Gen 9:19
Reciprocal: Gen 5:32 – Shem Gen 7:13 – and Shem Gen 9:18 – Shem Gen 10:32 – are the Gen 37:2 – the generations Num 3:1 – generations 1Ch 1:5 – General 2Ch 14:13 – Gerar
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THE NATIONS
This chapter is more than a list of names of individuals. Several are names of families or nations, and make it the most important historical document in the world. You will see that the stream of the race divides according to the three sons of Noah. Whose division is first traced (Gen 10:2)? What part of the world was settled by his offspring (Gen 10:5)? This might read: By these were the coast lands of the nations divided, and research indicates that the names of these sons and grandsons are identical with the ancient names of the countries bordering on the seas of northern and northwestern Europe. (Examine map number 1 in the back of your Bible). Whose offspring are next traced (Gen 10:6)? A similar examination will show that these settled towards the south and southwest in the lands known to us as Palestine, Arabia, Egypt, Abyssinia, etc. Whose offspring are last named (Gen 10:21)? What distinction is given to Shem in that verse? Eber is another form of the name Hebrew, and the distinction of Shem is that he was the ancestor of the Hebrews or the Israelites. His descendants settled rather in the south and southeast, Assyria, Persia, etc.
THE FIRST WORLD-MONARCHY (Gen 10:8-12)
The verses relating to Nimrod call for attention. What describes the energy of his character? How does (Gen 10:9 show his fame to have descended even to Moses time, the human author of Genesis? What political term is met with for the first time in Gen 10:10? Attention to the map will show the land of Shinar identical with the region of Babylon in Asia, affording the interesting fact that this kingdom was thus founded by an Ethiopian. Gen 10:11 might read, but of that land [i.e., Shinar] he went forth into Assyria, etc., indicating Nimrod to have been the inspiration of the first world- monarchy in the sense that he united under one head the beginnings both of Babylon and Assyria, proving him a mighty hunter of men as well as wild beasts. Rawlinsons Origin of the Nations says: The Christian may with confidence defy his adversaries to point out any erroneous or impossible statements in the entire [tenth] chapter, from its commencement to its close.
Fuente: James Gray’s Concise Bible Commentary
Gen 10:1. Although this chapter may appear to some unprofitable, it is indeed of great use. 1st, It gives us a true, and the only true account of the origin of the several nations of the world. 2d, It discovers and distinguishes from all other nations, the people in which Gods church was to be preserved, and from which Christ was to come. 3d, It explains and confirms Noahs prophecy concerning his three sons, and makes the accomplishment of it evident. 4th, It enables us to understand many other parts of Scripture, as well prophetical and poetical, as historical and doctrinal. It is therefore well worth our attention. These are the sons of Noah, Shem, &c. Although Shem is always named first, when the sons of Noah are enumerated, because he was the progenitor of Abraham and of Christ, and because the church of God was continued in his line, yet it is generally thought he was the youngest of the three, and that Japheth, though always mentioned last, was the eldest.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Gen 10:2. The sons of Japhet were Gomer, &c. Japhet is the Iapetos of the Greeks. His blessing Niphtha occasioned him to be called Neptune by the Greeks. Gomer, the father of the Galatinians, or Galatians. Magog, father of the Scythians, north of the Euxine. Eze 38:15. Madai, father of the Medes. Javan, the Prometheus of the Greeks; and Janus, father of the Ionians. Tubal, father of the Iberians, or ancient Spaniards, and others north of the Mediterranean sea. Meshech, father of the Moscovites, called Moschenos, Moschicos, Moschini, Mossyni, &c. Tiras, father of the Thracians, as all critics agree, for his name is evidently the primitive of the names of many towns and rivers.
Gen 10:3. The sons of Gomer, Ashkenaz, or Ascenaz, father of the Esclavonians, or the Ascanii, who found their way in the east of Germany. Riphath, or Diphath, (1Ch 1:6) father of the Paphlagonians, who inhabited Pontus and Bithynia. Togarmah, father of the Tygramenians, or the Turks,
Gen 10:4. The sons of Javan, Elishah, father of the Greek tribes, generally called Hellenists, who inhabited Achaia, &c. From them arose many names of persons, as Helen; of towns, as Eleusis, Elis; and the country Peloponnesus. Tarshish, father of the Tharsenians; hence Tarsis, a city of Cilicia. This name is often rendered by the LXX Carthage, as Isa 23:6. Jonah took a ship, it is more likely, to Carthage than to Tarsis. We cannot deny that the first settlers in Cadiz might give the name of Tartessus, from the same father of a race who delighted in the seas. Kittim, or Chittim, father of the Cittii, Cretians, Cyprians, &c. Dodanim, or Rhodamis, (1Ch 1:7) father of the Rhodians; hence the names of cities, Rhodano and Dodano.
Gen 10:6. The sons of Ham, Cham, or Jupiter Hammon, the Cronus of the Greeks, were Cush, the Coum of the Greeks, the father of the Ethiopians and Abyssinians. It pleased God, whose works are various, to change the colour of his skin to black. Mizraim, or Misor of Sanchoniatho, and Osiris, worshipped in Egypt, was father of the Egyptians; the word is plural, and refers to his posterity. Egypt is called Masor. Isa 19:7. Mic 7:12. And the capital of Egypt was called Messri by the Egyptians, Memphis by the Greeks, and Noph by the Hebrews. This change of the letters is common in ancient names, as Vulcan for Tubal Cain. Phut, father of the Lybians, and Mauritanians; that is, the country of the blacks. Many names of towns and rivers are derived from this primitive, as Pharsi, and Fez, &c. Canaan, father of the Canaanites. The word, applied to his posterity, no doubt designates a merchant. He is the Mercury of pagan fable.
Gen 10:7. The sons of Cush; Saba, father of the Sabeans, who took Jobs oxen. They inhabited the south of Arabia, or the desert. Havilah, who gave his name to Ophir or Africa, the land where there is much gold. To place this patriarch near the Sabeans is without support; yet many make the Pison to be the Ganges, and place Havilah near the sources of that river.
Gen 10:8. Nimrod; that is, tyrant, revolter, rebel. A giant, as the LXX read; a man who formed designs of empire, by the subjugation of other tribes. He is generally regarded as the father of Ninus, and as having been worshipped under the name of Baal. But this idea does not seem to accord with a prophecy in the Voluspa, a northern poem of very high antiquity, which says, Balthur shall come, and dwell with Hauthur in Thropts abode.
Gen 10:10. Erech. The kingdom connected with this city, was called Irak by the Arabians, or Iran, as in Sir William Joness sixth discourse before the Society of Calcutta. Parthia, now Persia, afterwards obtained as the name of the whole country.
Gen 10:11. Asshur, from whom the Assyrians derived their name.
Gen 10:22. Arphaxad, generally reputed to be father of the Chaldeans. Elam, father of the Elamites or Persians. Lud, (or Ludim, a people) father of the Lydians. Aram, father of the Armenians.
Gen 10:24. Heber, thought to be a patriarch of great worth, and from him, as a paternal honour, the Hebrews derive their name.
Gen 10:25. Peleg Palag, he divided. Usher, as in our Bible, places his birth in the 102nd year after the flood. As he was the fifth from Noah, and as the first four post-diluvian fathers cannot be supposed to marry till they were fifty years of age, though Peleg married at thirty, his birth may be placed in the year 200 or 250. He lived to the age of 239. At what year of his age the event happened, and from which he received his surname, is not said: perhaps about 400 years after Noah left the ark: Helvicus thinks 500. What the division of the earth means we are not told, except by the rabbins, that it was a division of the earth by lot among the descendents of Noah, at the head of which was a princely patriarch. But Noah had already given Asia to Shem, Europe to Japhet, and Africa to Ham, and Canaans family had settled in Palestine on the road, a land which according to Noahs will, was not theirs.But the name is applied to a divided fountain or waters, as well as to divided lands.
Now, we know that there was an inundation of the sea on the lower marshes, which drowned king Ogyges at Thebes. From this inundation to the first Greek olympiade Eusebius reckons above 1020 years. Prp. Gen 10:10. Our miners also inform us, that there is a rent across the county of Durham, in which one side of the earth has subsided 120 yards. Baileys Hist. Mr. Whitehurst has given us plates of the strata at Chatsworth in Derbyshire, in which there is a subsidence of all the strata of lias, toadstone, and coal, for the like space of 120 yards. Dr. Price states the like subsidence of one side in Cornwall for 38 yards. This event probably proceeded from the bursting of the earth by subterranean fires, which drove the winds and waves to fury. De Lisle found trees near Thorne, from 12 to 14 feet thick towards the roots. The tides, still warping up their estuaries, have covered the bog-timber in some places to the depth of 10 or 20 feet. Thus in all the marshes of America, as well as in Europe, trees are found, and largely mixed with the horns and bones of herbivorous animals. The body of a woman, with antique sandals on her feet, was dug up at the Isle of Axholme near Epworth. Many papers in the Royal Society, as well as the assent of Dr. Edward Clarke, our accredited traveller in the East, perfectly coincide with this account of the Ogygian inundation. See more, Gen 47:25.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Genesis 10
This section of our book records the generations of Noah’s three sons, noticing, especially, Nimrod, the founder of the kingdom of Babel, or Babylon, a name which occupies a very prominent place on the page of inspiration. Babylon is a well-known name – a well known influence. From Genesis 10 to Revelation 18 Babylon, again and again, appears before us, and always as something decidedly hostile to those who occupy, for the time being, the position of public testimony for God. Not that we are to look upon the Babylon of Old Testament scripture as identical with the Babylon of the apocalypse. By no means. I believe the former is a city; the latter, a system; But both the city and system exert a powerful influence against God’s people. Hardly had Israel entered upon the wars of Canaan when “a Babylonish garment” brought defilement and sorrow, defeat and confusion, into the host. This is the earliest record of Babylon’s pernicious influence upon the people of God; but every student of Scripture is aware of the place which Babylon gets throughout the entire history of Israel.
This would not be the place to notice, in detail, the various passages in which this city is introduced. I would only remark, here, that whenever God has a corporate witness on the earth, Satan has a Babylon to mar and corrupt that witness. When God connects His name with a city on the earth, then Babylon takes the form of a city; and when God connects His name with the Church, then Babylon takes the form of a corrupt religious system, called “the great whore,” “the mother of abominations,” &c. In a word, Satan’s Babylon is always seen as the instrument moulded and fashioned by his hand, for the purpose of counteracting the divine operations, whether in Israel of old, or the Church now. Throughout the Old Testament Israel and Babylon are seen, as it were, in opposite scales: when Israel is up, Babylon is down; and when Babylon is up, Israel is down. Thus, when Israel had utterly failed, as Jehovah’s witness, “the king of Babylon broke his bones,” and swallowed him up. The vessels of the house of God, which ought to have remained in the city of Jerusalem, were carried away to the city of Babylon. But Isaiah, in his sublime prophecy, leads us onward to the opposite of all this. He presents, in most magnificent strains, a picture, in which Israel’s star is in the ascendant, and Babylon entirely sunk. “And it shall come to pass in the day that the Lord shall give thee rest from thy sorrow, and from thy fear, and from the hard bondage wherein thou wast made to serve, that thou shalt take up this proverb against the king of Babylon, and say, How hath the oppressor ceased! the golden city ceased! . . . . since thou art laid down, no hewer is come up against us.” (Isa. 14: 3-8.)
Thus much as to the Babylon of the Old Testament. Then, as to the Babylon of Revelation, my reader has only to turn to Rev. 17 and Rev. 18 to see her character and end. She is presented in marked contrast with the bride, the Lamb’s wife; and as to her end, she is cast as a great millstone into the sea; after which we have the marriage of the Lamb, – with all its accompanying bliss and glory.
However, I could not attempt to pursue this most interesting subject here: I have merely glanced at it in connection with the name of Nimrod. I feel assured that my reader will find himself amply repaid, for any trouble he may take in the close examination of all those scriptures, in which the name of Babylon is introduced. We shall now return to our chapter.
“And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.” Here, then, we have the character of the founder of Babylon. He was” a mighty one in the earth” – “a mighty hunter before the Lord.” Such was the origin of Babylon; and its character, throughout the entire book of God, remarkably corresponds therewith. It is always seen as a mighty influence in the earth, acting in positive antagonism to everything which owes its origin to heaven; and it is not until this Babylon has been totally abolished, that the cry is heard, amid the hosts above, “‘Alleluia; for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth” Then all Babylon’s mighty hunting will be over for ever, whether it be its hunting of wild beasts, to subdue them; or its hunting of souls, to destroy them. ALL its might, and all its glory, all its pomp and pride, its wealth and luxury, its light and joy, its glitter and glare, its powerful attractions and wide-spread influence, shall have passed away for ever. She shall be swept with the besom of destruction, and plunged in the darkness, the horror and desolation, of an everlasting night. “How long, O Lord?”
Fuente: Mackintosh’s Notes on the Pentateuch
Genesis 10. The Table of Nations.From P and J. To P we may assign Gen 10:1-7; Gen 10:20; Gen 10:31 f. The rest belongs to J, for the most part to its secondary stratum, with some elements from R. The genealogy, as was customary among the Semites, expresses national rather than individual relationships. The true character of the lists may be seen quite clearly from many of the names, which are names of countries (e.g. Cush, Mizraim, Ophir), or cities (e.g. Tarshish, Zidon), or peoples (e.g. Ludim). It is an attempt to explain the origin of the various nations, before the author proceeds to the special ancestry of Israel. It is of great importance for the Hebrew view of other peoples, alike in its extent and its limitations, and for the degrees of affinity which they believed to subsist between them. It raises problems too intricate for discussion in our space. It need hardly be said that the various races of mankind now existing cannot be traced back to a single ancestor at a period so near to us as the date to which the OT assigns Noah; nor indeed do peoples originate in the way here described.
Gen 10:5. Insert, These are the sons of Japheth before in their lands (cf. Gen 10:20; Gen 10:31).
Gen 10:8-10. The name Nimrod has not been discovered in the cuneiform inscriptions, and the identifications proposed are most uncertain. That he was a mighty one in the earth is explained by Gen 10:10, which should follow Gen 10:8; he was a king who founded a large empire. In Gen 10:9 his fame is explained in another way. He was a hero of the chase, and a popular proverb is quoted, in which he figures in this character. He was a mighty hunter before Yahweh, i.e. (probably) in Yahwehs estimation.
Gen 10:14. The Philistines came from Caphtor, i.e. Crete (Amo 9:7*, Jer 47:4; cf. Deu 2:23); the parenthesis would, therefore, be in place at the end of the verse.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
DESCENDANTS OF NOAH
In this chapter the genealogy of Japheth is given first (vs.1-5). Their history is not pursued in the book of Genesis: their character was that of the energy of independence, and though at first it seems they were involved in the building of the tower of Babel (for all Noah’s family evidently remained at that time close to that area), yet they soon spread northward and had no significant connection with Abraham and his descendants.
There is more said about the family of Ham (vs.6-20). Nimrod was his grandson, and he became a mighty hunter in the earth (vs.8-9). There is more implied in this than merely his being a literal hunter of animals. His name means “we will rebel” not only “will rebel.” He was a leader in hunting the souls of man, to make them rebels. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, where man was exalted in defiance of God. Other places are also mentioned in the land of Shinar. “From that land he went forth to Assyria and built Ninevah, Rehoboth, Caleh and Resen” (v.11- NASB). This was no doubt after the Lord scattered the people from Babel (ch.11:8). Nimrod’s ambitious course of self-will was not stopped even by God’s judgment at the tower of Babel.
Canaan is spoken of in verse 15, along with his descendants, who took up the land that God had before decided was to be Israel’s possession (v.19). Because the Canaanites sank down in idolatry and demon worship in later years, Israel was told to completely dispossess them of that land (Cf.Gen.15:16; Lev 18:24-25; Lev 20:23-24; Deu 31:3-5). God’s sovereign choice for His people was absolute to begin with. Whoever took possession of their land in the meanwhile, this would have no effect as to their eventual possession of it. But also, there was no doubt as to the righteousness of God in the expulsion of the Canaanites in due time because of their idolatry and demon worship.
Verses 21 to 31 consider the family of Shem. One name stands out, Peleg, the name meaning “divided.” This likely refers to the division of the nations when languages were confounded (ch.11:7-8). At this time the family of Shem settled toward the east, from which direction Abram later came when God called him from Ur of the Chaldees (Gen 11:31).
Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible
10:1 {a} Now these [are] the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.
(a) These generations are here recited, partly to declare the marvellous increase, and also to set forth their great forgetfulness of God’s grace towards their fathers.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
E. What became of Noah’s sons 10:1-11:9
This section gives in some detail the distribution of Noah’s descendants over the earth after the Flood (cf. Gen 9:18-19).
This fourth toledot section (Gen 10:1 to Gen 11:9) brings the inspired record of primeval events to a climax and provides a transition to the patriarchal narratives. All the nations of the world in their various lands with their different languages descended from Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Of special interest to the original Israelite readers were the Canaanites and the other ancient Near Eastern powers.
"From this section we learn that the ’blessing’ is for all peoples because all nations have their source in the one man, Noah, whom God favored. Moreover, the disunity among Noah’s offspring that resulted from the tower event [Gen 11:1-9] did not prevent the blessing God had envisioned for humanity." [Note: Mathews, p. 427.]
"The Tower of Babel incident (Gen 11:1-9), though following the table in the present literary arrangement, actually precedes chronologically the dispersal of the nations. This interspersal of narrative (Gen 11:1-9) separates the two genealogies of Shem (Gen 10:21-31; Gen 11:10-26), paving the way for the particular linkage between the Terah (Abraham) clan and the Shemite lineage (Gen 11:27). The story of the tower also looks ahead by anticipating the role that Abram (Gen 12:1-3) will play in restoring the blessing to the dispersed nations." [Note: Ibid., p. 428.]
1. The table of nations ch. 10
This table shows that Yahweh created all peoples (cf. Deu 32:8; Amo 9:7; Act 17:26). Like the genealogy in chapter 5, this one traces 10 main individuals, and the last one named had three sons.
This chapter contains one of the oldest, if not the oldest, ethnological table in the literature of the ancient world. It reveals a remarkable understanding of the ethnic and linguistic situation following the Flood. Almost all the names in this chapter have been found in archaeological discoveries in the last century and a half. Many of them appear in subsequent books of the Old Testament.
". . . the names in chapter 10 are presented in a dissimilar manner: the context may be that of an individual (e.g., Nimrod), a city (e.g., Asshur), a people (e.g., Jebusites) or a nation (e.g., Elam).
"A failure to appreciate this mixed arrangement of Genesis 10 has led, we believe, to numerous unwarranted conclusions. For example, it should not be assumed that all the descendants of any one of Noah’s sons lived in the same locality, spoke the same language, or even belonged to a particular race." [Note: Barry J. Beitzel, The Moody Atlas of Bible Lands, p. 76. See pages 76-79 for discussion of each name in chapter 10.]
"The table of nations is a ’horizontal’ genealogy rather than a ’vertical’ one (those in chaps. 5 and 11 are vertical). Its purpose is not primarily to trace ancestry; instead it shows political, geographical, and ethnic affiliations among tribes for various reasons, most notable being holy war. Tribes shown to be ’kin’ would be in league together. Thus this table aligns the predominant tribes in and around the land promised to Israel. These names include founders of tribes, clans, cities, and territories." [Note: Ross, "Genesis," p. 42.]
In contrast to the genealogy in chapter 5, this one lists no ages. It contains place and group names, which are spoken of as the ancestors of other places or groups, as well as the names of individuals. God built nations from families. Thus it is quite clearly a selective list, not comprehensive. The writer’s choice of material shows that he had particular interest in presenting Israel’s neighbors. Israel would deal with, displace, or subjugate many of these peoples, as well as the Canaanites (ch. 9). They all had a common origin. Evidently 70 nations descended from Shem, Ham, and Japheth: 26 from Shem, 30 from Ham, and 14 from Japheth (cf. Deu 32:8). Seventy became a traditional round number for a large group of descendants. [Note: Wenham, Genesis 1-15, p. 213.] Jacob’s family also comprised 70 people (Gen 46:27), which may indicate that Moses viewed Israel as a microcosm of humanity as he presented it here. God set the microcosm apart to bless the macrocosm.
Japheth’s descendants (Gen 10:2-5) settled north, east, and west of Ararat. [Note: For helpful diagrams showing the generational relationships of the descendants of Japheth, Ham, and Shem respectively, see Mathews, pp. 440, 444, and 459.] Their distance from Israel probably explains the brief treatment that they received in this list compared with that of the Hamites and Shemites. The "coastlands" (Gen 10:5) are the inland areas and the northern Mediterranean coastlands on the now European shore from Turkey to Spain. The dispersion of the nations "according to . . . language" (Gen 10:5) took place after Babel (ch. 11) all along these coasts as well as elsewhere. [Note: For discussion of the identities of each name, see Wenham, Genesis 1-15, pp. 216-32; or the NET Bible notes on these verses.]
Ham’s family (Gen 10:6-20) moved east, south, and southwest into Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Africa. Canaan’s descendants (Gen 10:15-21) did not migrate as far south but settled in Palestine. [Note: For explanation of the locations the individuals, cities, tribes, and nations cited in this table, see Allen P. Ross, "The Table of Nations in Genesis 10 -Its Content," Bibliotheca Sacra 138:549 (January-March 1981):23-31.] The length of these Hamite Canaanite lists indicates the importance of these people and places in Israel’s later history. Note the absence of the common sevens in the structuring in Canaan’s genealogy, suggesting chaos. [Note: Waltke, Genesis, pp. 164-65.]
It is possible that Sargon of Agade, whom many secular historians regard as the first ruler of Babylon, may be the Nimrod (meaning "We shall rebel") of Gen 10:8-10. [Note: Oliver R. Blosser, "Was Nimrod-Sargon of Agade, the First King of Babylon?" It’s About Time (June 1987), pp. 10-13.] Many people in ancient times had more than one name. Reference to him probably foreshadows Gen 11:1-9.
"The influx of the Amorites in Canaan is disputed. It does not necessarily follow that the original Amorites, attributed to Hamite descent in Genesis 10, were a Semitic people since the term ’Amorite’ in ancient Near Eastern documents does not serve as a definitive source for designating ethnicity. Moreover, linguistic evidence does not always assure true ethnic derivation." [Note: Mathews, p. 456. See also The New Bible Dictionary, 1962 ed., s.v. "Amorites," by A. R. Millard.]
Shem’s posterity (Gen 10:21-31) settled to the northeast and southeast of the Canaanites. This branch of the human family is also important in the Genesis record of Israel’s history.
"When the two lines of Shem are compared (Gen 10:21-31; Gen 11:10-26), there is a striking divergence at the point of Eber’s descendants, Peleg and Joktan [Gen 10:25]. In chap. 10 Peleg is dropped altogether after his mention, while the nonelect line of Joktan is detailed. It is left to the second lineage in chap. 11 to trace out Peleg’s role as ancestral father of Abraham . . ." [Note: Mathews, p. 459.]
"This Table of Nations, then, traces affiliation of tribes to show relationships, based on some original physical connections.
"It is clear that the writer is emphasizing the development of these nations that were of primary importance to Israel (yalad sections) within the overall structure of the Table (b’ne arrangement)." [Note: Allen P. Ross, "The Table of Nations in Genesis 10 -Its Structure," Bibliotheca Sacra 137:548 (October-December 1980):350. See also Eugene H. Merrill, "The Peoples of the Old Testament according to Genesis 10," Bibliotheca Sacra 154:613 (January-March 1997):3-22.]
"The three geographical arcs of the branches intersect at the center-that is, Canaan, Israel’s future homeland." [Note: Mathews, p. 433. See Yohanan Aharoni and Michael Avi-Yonah, The Macmillan Bible Atlas, map 15.]
This section reveals that it was God’s plan to bless the human race by dividing the family of man by languages, locations, and leaders. God formerly blessed the earth by dividing the light from the darkness, the earth from the heavens, and the land from the seas (ch. 1). Some creationists believe that the division of the earth in Peleg’s day (Gen 10:25) refers to continental drift, but many creationists do not hold this view. [Note: For a creationist discussion of the subject of continental drift, see Ham, et al., pp. 11-12, 41-63; or David M. Fouts, "Peleg in Genesis 10:25," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 41:1 (March 1998):17-21.]
"By correlating the number of nations [in ch. 10, i.e., 70] with the number of the seed of Abraham [in Gen 46:27], he [the writer] holds Abraham’s ’seed’ before the reader as a new humanity and Abraham himself as a kind of second Adam, the ’father of many nations’ (Gen 17:5)." [Note: Sailhamer, The Pentateuch . . ., p. 131.]
". . . his intention is not to give an exhaustive list but rather a representative list, one which, for him, is obtained in the number seven." [Note: Ibid., p. 132.]
"The table’s figure of ’seventy’ for the world’s nations is alluded to by Jesus in the sending forth of the seventy disciples, as recounted by Luke (Gen 10:1-16). Here the evangelist emphasizes the mission of the church in its worldwide evangelistic endeavors." [Note: Mathews, p. 437. See also Umberto Cassuto, A Commentary on the Book of Genesis. Part II. From Noah to Abraham, pp. 175-80.]