Genesis Chapters 10 & 11
The following points are an incomplete synopsis from our Genesis commentaries discussing the Japhethites, the Hamites, the Shemites, the Hebrews and The Appearance of the Sons of Noah. There was also an installment discussing the Curse of Canaan and the resulting nations of the Canaanites. Because of the length of our comments and citations on this subject, which span well over 50,000 words in the aforementioned presentations, we are not goinf to be explanatory here, but only make certain identifications.
For many centuries the Roman Catholic Church has claimed that different races had sprung from the sons of Noah, which is patently ridiculous considering the reason why Noah and his family were preserved by Yahweh God, which is that Noah was perfect in his race, or descent from Adam, as were his sons. So the Church claims are blasphemous, and all of the Protestant churches have followed in making such claims.
If we can establish that one nation from each of Shem, Ham and Japheth were demonstrably White, then the entire Roman Catholic Church paradigm disintegrates. So here is a short list of the nations of the sons of Noah which may be identified with particular historical nations or regions:
The sons of Japheth:
Gomer, and his sons Ashkenaz, Riphath [or in some mss. Diphath, according to Strong and others] and Togarmah. Of these, only the name of Togarmah appears in inscriptions. This tribe, and probably the others, dwelt in ancient times near the eastern edge of the Black Sea and the border regions of modern Turkey, Greogia and Armenia.
Magog is unknown by this name in later history and Scripture, in spite of being mentioned by Ezekiel, in a prophecy which seems to identify him with the Slavic tribes of Eastern and Central Europe.
Madai is the eponymous ancestor of the historical Medes. They dwelt along the southwest edge of the Caspian Sea in northern Iran, and parts of Armenia and Azerbaijan. There is historical evidence that remnants of the Medes are found in the Slavic nations of modern history.
Javan may be confidently identified with the Ionian Greeks, and are also identified in that manner in Persian inscriptions, such as the famous Behistun Rock.
Of the sons of Javan: Both Elishah and Kittim are identified with the island Cyprus, with several varying spellings of these names found in ancient inscriptions. Kittim, usually spelled as Chittim, is the word for Cyprus throughout the Hebrew prophets. But in antiquity, Elishah, which is often spelled as Alashiya or Alasiya, can be connected with Cyprus with even more certainty than Kittim, which is found in Egyptian inscriptions. The name Dodonim is evidently another case of confusion with the Hebrew letters ר or resh, and ד or daleth, and Dodanim should be read as Rodanim, or Rhodians. Lastly there is Tarshish, which was a region of what is now southern Spain and which was known to the Greeks as Tartessus.
Tubal and Meshech are well known from Assyriaan inscriptions and from later Greek historians. They originally lived on the shores of the Black Sea and in the Caucasus Mountains, however eventually they apparently migrated northwards.
Tiras is the seventh and last of the sons of Japheth. The name may be connected to Thrace etymologically and historically, and had been by Flavius Josephus and others.
The sons of Ham:
Cush is the first son of Ham. Nimrod, a son of Cush, founded his empire with what had become notable cities in Mesopotamia, and which apparently developed in to Akkadian Empire of history in the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. From there, the Cushites spread into parts of Arabia, the "land of Cush" in the early life of Moses, where the Midianits had dwelt from whom he had taken a wife. Cush also founded a colony bear the horn of Africa, which is not the same nation but which is still called Ethiopia today. The Greek word Ethiopia originally meant shining or sunburnt face, which we explain at length in our commentary. Of the sons of Cush, Seba was apparently near Egypt, on the western shores of the Red Sea. Havilah, mentioned in Genesis chapter 2, was in northern Arabia. Sheba may be roughly identified with modern Yemen. Seba must also have been in Arabia, as we read in the 72nd Psalm we read “10 The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents: the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts.” Dedan was also an early city in Arabia, in the land which later became Edom. Raamah was a city within the proximity of Sheba (Ezekiel 27:22).
Mizraim is the Hebrew word for Egypt throughout Scripture and the land known as Egypt at that time was only the area around the Nile delta, and the Nile valley along both banks of the river as far south as Elephantine, or the fourth cataract of the Nile, below which was a land called Cush or Ethiopia, which seems to have been a colony of Cushites from Arabia. the sons of Mizraim may mostly be identified with placves in and around Egypt, and the greatest division of them apart form Egypt seems to be the Philistines, and Caphtor seems to have been with them on the southern coast of Palestine in what is now Gaza.
Phut was associated in later Scriptures with Libya, where it is mention in the prophets along with the Lubim, a name which must have developed much later. Phut seems to have been the Punt of Egyptian inscriptions.
The Canaanites of Ham:
Sidon was a city on the coast of Palestine, the northern extent of land later belonging to the Israelite tribe of Asher. The Sidonians were held in bondage for many centuries by the Israelites.
Heth is the eponymous ancestor of the Hittites, who dwelt in central Anatolia and had an empire there for several centuries leading up to about the end of the 13th century BC.
The Jebusites lived in Jerusalem until the timeof David.
The Amorites dwelt in deserts between Palestine and Babylonia. They founded a short-lived Babylonian Empire in the 19th century BC under their famous king Hammurabi, and also made up part of the fabric of the later Mittani Kingdom to the north, along with the Horites who are errantly called Hivites in Genesis.
The Girgasites or Girgashites were a Canaanite tribe of Canaan mentioned along with other Canaanite tribes in Deuteronomy, Joshua and as late as Nehemiah.
The Hivites are the historical Horites, and in Scripture the reash was confused for a vav, which caused the misspelling. The Horites were a large portion of the Mittani Kingdom, an empire of the early 2nd millennium BC in northern Syria, and Horites also dwelt along the eastern coast of the Dead Sea, among whom Esau had alter settled and intermingled. So Horittes are found in the genealogy of the sons of Esau in Gebesis chapter 36.
The sons of Shem:
Elam is consistently identified with the historical Persians.
Asshur is consistently identified with the historical Assyrians.
Arphaxad had no land of his own which may be identified in history, but had apparently settled inn the mountains north of Syria, in part of what was called Padan-Aram in Genesis.
Lud is the eponymous ancestor of the Lydians of Anatolia, from whom had later come the Etruscans.
Aram is the father of the Syrians, for whom the Hebrew word is Aram throughout Scripture. The Chaldaeans were apparently an early division of Aram. From early times, tribes of Aram dwelt in Damascus and eastward to the shore of Euphrates River, and also northward into the mountains and the Plain of Aram, or Padan-Aram, which was north of the river.
There are many more identifications of these tribes in our commentaries. In our presentation titled The Appearance of the Sons of Noah, it is plainly demonstrated through archaeological discoveries and historical information that the Egyptians, Ionian Greeks, Assyrians, Persians, Medes and others were all White, and these represent tribes of all three of Noah's sons.
We will probably improve this page further in the near future.
Resources:
The Race of Genesis 10 (2006 essay by William Finck)
On Genesis, Part 14: The Japhethites
On Genesis, Part 15: The Hamites
On Genesis, Part 16: The Curse of Canaan
On Genesis, Part 17: The Shemites
On Genesis, Part 18: The Hebrews
On Genesis, Part 19: The Appearance of the Sons of Noah
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