On Genesis, Part 13: Thy Father’s Nakedness

On Genesis, Part 13: Thy Father’s Nakedness

Presenting Part 12 of this Genesis commentary, titled Solid Ground we hope to have elucidated from the situation of his descendants as it is described in Genesis chapters 10 and 11 and from the context of these chapters which describe the flood of Noah, that the most plausible location for the flood is the Mesopotamian Plain, and that the most likely landing spot for the ark after the flood is the foothills of Ararat which border that plain on the north. Here we should add one word of caution, that although we are confident of that assessment, we can never be absolutely certain given the relatively little information which we have in Scripture. But to this day, zealous denominational Christians and archaeologists both amateur and professional have sought Noah’s ark in the great heights of Mount Ararat, which has an elevation of over 17,000 feet. However we have found that the term ararat in Hebrew describes a mountainous region, and not merely a single mountain peak. The truth is that the ark must have landed on a foothill in that region, so that it would have even been possible for Noah, his family and the many animals with them to have survived after the flood, and that the wood from the ark either rotted away in its place, or more likely, it was repurposed by Noah and his family, or even others who lived in the region at a later time. The process of hewing logs into beams and planks by hand is quite arduous, and already-hewn logs from the ark would have been valuable for that reason alone. As we hope to establish later in Genesis, there are more than five hundred and thirty years between the time of the flood and the events of Genesis chapter 11 and the division of the sons of Noah, so it would be natural for his descendants to slowly spread into the plain south of Ararat, which is much more suitable for agriculture and husbandry than the mountains. As we have said, the site of ancient Babylon is about 250 miles from the southern edge of those mountains, and that is where the descendants of Noah are found in Genesis chapter 11.

Now at the end of that last presentation we have already discussed aspects of the first seven verses of Genesis chapter 9, but perhaps we should summarize that discussion, and, if possible, even augment it here.

1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth. And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.

Here we had observed that this is a repeat of the original commission given to Adam, that he should have dominion over everything which moves upon the earth, in Genesis chapter 1. So Noah and his sons are once again instructed to fulfil that original commission.

3 Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things. 4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.

Here we would continue to assert that men had been eating the flesh of animals long before Noah, and at least since the time that Abel was a shepherd, although Adam must have also practised husbandry in that same manner. Many modern vegetarians claim that Adam and Eve were vegetarians before the fall, however from the beginning they had been given dominion over the animals. But as we have also said, the very fact that man was created in order to tread down and subdue all of the other beasts of the creation serves to prove that man was expected to domesticate animals, or to hunt them down if they could not be domesticated. The only motivation for man to do those things is if he could use them for food. At the beginning, Adam was introduced to every animal of Yahweh’s creation, and it is the most likely point at which he was shown to distinguish between clean and unclean animals, a distinction which Noah must have also known long before the flood. Then we asserted that since Yahshua Christ Himself had said that He was the “Lamb slain before the foundation of the world”, then the concept of animal sacrifice and the consumption of meat must have existed before the foundation of the world. Here, we would not interpret the phrase “every moving thing” to be a nullification of the distinction between clean and unclean animals, with which Noah was already familiar.

5 And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. 6 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man. 7 And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.

This is the first commandment against murder, and the end of the commandments which Yahweh had given to Noah after the flood. As we discussed in brief in our first comments on this chapter, The Jews have devised a set of so-called Seven Noahide Laws from these few commandments.

The following list and explanation is found at the satanic Jewish website, Chabad.org:

The 7 Noahide Laws are rules that all of us must keep, regardless of who we are or from where we come. Without these seven things, it would be impossible for humanity to live together in harmony.

1. Do not profane G-d’s Oneness in any way. 
   Acknowledge that there is a single G-d who cares about what we are doing and desires that we take care of His world.

2. Do not curse your Creator. 
   No matter how angry you may be, do not take it out verbally against your Creator.

3. Do not murder. 
   The value of human life cannot be measured. To destroy a single human life is to destroy the entire world—because, for that person, the world has ceased to exist. It follows that by sustaining a single human life, you are sustaining an entire universe.

4. Do not eat a limb of a still-living animal. 
   Respect the life of all G-d’s creatures. As intelligent beings, we have a duty not to cause undue pain to other creatures.

5. Do not steal. 
   Whatever benefits you receive in this world, make sure that none of them are at the unfair expense of someone else.

6. Harness and channel the human libido. 
   Incest, adultery, rape and homosexual relations are forbidden. 
   The family unit is the foundation of human society. Sexuality is the fountain of life and so nothing is more holy than the sexual act. So, too, when abused, nothing can be more debasing and destructive to the human being.

7. Establish courts of law and ensure justice in our world. 
   With every small act of justice, we are restoring harmony to our world, synchronizing it with a supernal order. That is why we must keep the laws established by our government for the country’s stability and harmony.

These laws were communicated by G-d to Adam and Noah, ancestors of all human beings. That is what makes these rules universal, for all times, places and people:

Of course, Jews lie continually, and this list of so-called laws and the accompanying assertions are also lies. First, Adam was not given these laws. Secondly, there is no insistence in the Old Testament that there is only one god, even if Christians should know that from their own perspective, and the concept is not transmitted to Noah here. Neither is there any command here in Genesis not to curse God, and even if that command does exist later, it only pertains to the children of Israel and it cannot justly be inserted into the context of Genesis chapter 9. The Jewish insistence that there is only one god, which is also refuted in their own Talmud, is a Jewish lie by which they seek to include and then also to rule over all other races, and the Old Testament prophets themselves refute the notion. But here it must be added, that the Word of God in the Old Testament does insist that the children of Israel have only one God, that they must recognize only one God, something which is not made evident until the books of Exodus and Leviticus.

We would not accept that the gods of other races or nations as the ex nihilo creators of those nations, however it is recognized in Scripture that the other races and nations had different gods, and that Yahweh is not their God. So, for example, in Micah chapter 4 we read: “5 For all people will walk every one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever.” Then we read in Malachi chapter 2: “10 Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us? why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers? 11 Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the LORD which he loved, and hath married the daughter of a strange god. 12 The LORD will cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar, out of the tabernacles of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering unto the LORD of hosts.”

So in both Micah and Malachi, each of whom had written long after Noah, the Word of God explains that nations other than Israel would continue to walk with their own gods, and that they were born of their own gods, and never is there any expectation or insistence that Yahweh should be their God. For that reason, we also read in the 147th Psalm: “19 He sheweth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel. 20 He hath not dealt so with any nation: and as for his judgments, they have not known them. Praise ye the LORD.” Therefore the concept that nations other than Israel have Yahweh as their God is refuted by the Old Testament. But the Jewish insistence that all nations follow these Noahide laws, most of which were not even given to Noah, is not for their enrichment or justification, but only so that Jews may rule over them, which is the hope and intention that they express in their Talmud. The Noahide laws are just one means by which they seek to fulfil that aspiration.

Following the false Jewish laws concerning the God whom they do not even worship, the article from Chabad enumerates commandments not to commit murder or “eat a limb of a still-living animal”. While these are in the commandments which were given to Noah, the Jews murder their own enemies with impunity. Then the jews also unjustly limit their interpretation of the admonition from verse 4 which says “But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.” They confine this to the “limb of a still-living animal” while it actually prohibits the eating of any blood. But in that manner, their rabbis may continue sucking and swallowing the blood from freshly circumcised baby-penises, which is also a clear violation of a later commandment which is found several times in Leviticus. So, as it is in Leviticus chapter 7: “27 Whatsoever soul it be that eateth any manner of blood, even that soul shall be cut off from his people.” The Jews do not respect the laws of Noah, or the laws of Moses.

Next in their so-called Noahide laws are demands that all men do not steal, and that they “harness and channel the human libido.” The first commandment is not found until Exodus chapter 20, so it was not given to Noah, and the later is an elaboration on Yahweh’s instruction to Noah to “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.” While “Incest, adultery, rape and homosexual relations are forbidden”, as they put it, and they are indeed forbidden in the laws of Moses, once again, those things were not among the commandments given to Noah. The latter portion of this ninth chapter of Genesis does contain a lesson in sexual morality, but most denominational churches do not even realize what had actually transpired when Ham “saw the nakedness of his father”, and why Canaan was cursed as a result of that. If Noah and his sons had been commanded not to commit incest, then Ham should have been punished for uncovering his father’s nakedness, but he was not. Instead, his son Canaan was cursed. That situation will be further discussed as we near the end of this chapter of Genesis. We can also only wonder at why Jews would seek to prohibit sexual activities such as Sodomy, which they themselves practice most frequently.

Finally, the Noahide laws insist that men “Establish courts of law and ensure justice in our world”, and since the precise instruction given to Noah certainly does not go so far as creating a legal profession of trained lawyers and judges, the jews are also conveniently elaborating upon that. Then where it says here in Genesis chapter 9 that “at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man”, that is not a command to set up courts of justice, but rather it foreshadows the later law of the kinsman avenger, that the every brother of a slain man must avenge his murder. But even worse, the Jewish so-called Noahide laws are a trap door for Christians, who are not considered monotheistic by Jewish rabbis. So if the Noahide laws become legally enforceable throughout the world, then Christianity may be prohibited under those laws. The following explanation is from another Jewish source named Sefaria.org:

Shituf (Hebrew: שִׁתּוּף);; also transliterated as shittuf or schituf; literally "association") is a term used in Jewish sources for the worship of God in a manner which Judaism does not deem to be purely monotheistic. The term connotes a theology that is not outright polytheistic, but also should not be seen as purely monotheistic.

The term is primarily used in reference to the Christian Trinity by Jewish legal authorities who wish to distinguish Christianity from full-blown polytheism. Though a Jew would be forbidden from maintaining a shituf theology, non-Jews would, in some form, be permitted such a theology without being regarded as idolaters by Jews. That said, whether Christianity is shituf or formal polytheism remains a debate in Jewish philosophy.

Jewish views, as codified in Jewish law, are split between those who see Christianity as outright idolatry and those who see Christianity as shituf. While Christians view their worship of a trinity as monotheistic, Judaism generally rejects this view. [2]

[1 What are the Seven Noahide Laws? Chabad.org, https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/62221/jewish/The-7-Noahide-Laws-Universal-Morality.htm, accessed May 4th, 2023; 2 Do we all worship the same God? By “Rabbi Dina Rosenberg”, Sefaria.org, https://www.sefaria.org/sheets/289962?lang=bi, accessed May 4th, 2023.]

So any Christian pastor or presumably Christian society which accepts the Noahide laws is unwittingly assisting the Jews in their 2,000-year endeavor to destroy Christianity. One of the first arguments against Christianity made by Jews was an accusation of idolatry, because Jews rejected Christ as Messiah, and many of them even reject the notion of a personal Messiah, rather believing that they collectively are their own Messiah, which is once again in direct contradiction with the Old Testament, especially in Daniel chapter 9 (9:24-27) and Isaiah chapter 9 (9:6).

This threat is real, since the Orthodox Jews at Chabad.org, although they represent only a minority of Jews, are extremely influential and have their fingers in the affairs of national governments throughout the modern world. In April, 1982, a joint resolution of the U.S. Congress became public law, creating a “National Day of Reflection” in honor of a devil known as Rabbi Schneerson, whom many from Chabad believed was a Messiah. In that resolution, which became Public Law 97-166, we read in part: “Whereas these ethical values and principles which, from the dawn of civilization when they were known as the Seven Noahide Laws, have been the bedrock of society without which the edifice of civilization stands in serious peril of returning to chaos…” The same resolution became Public Law 101-267 declaring April 6th, 1990 to be “Education Day, U.S.A.” and was repeated in Public Law 103-14 designating April 2nd, 1993 as “Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A.” It appeared as recently as 2022 in a resolution of the Kentucky state legislature, and probably in many others as well.

While I do not know whether these resolutions have been repeated consistently for every year, it is clear that the Jews will not relent from pushing these so-called “Seven Noahide Laws” into law, or at least, from being mentioned and promoted in law. Perhaps the only thing preventing them from being law is the fact that they openly oppose Sodomy, even if those Jews may define Sodomy differently, because their Talmud actually approves of it in certain limited forms, such as if a boy is under the age of nine years then it declares that pederasty is not punishable, and neither is intercourse with a girl of that age, where it states that “only he who is able to engage in sexual intercourse, may, as the passive subject of pederasty throw guilt [upon the active offender]” [3]. Elsewhere, the Talmud actually recognizes eight genders, rather than the two which appear in Scripture [4]. Orthodox rabbis are just as perverted as all other Jews, but only in a slightly more limited manner.

[3 Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin 54b – 55a, Soncino 1961 Edition, page 371; 4 The Eight Genders in the Talmud, Rachel Scheinerman, myjewishlearning.com, https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-eight-genders-in-the-talmud/ accessed May 5^th, 2023.]

When will Christians ever stop falling for Jewish tricks? Most of the Noahide laws are not from the time of Noah, and none of them were ever intended for every race and nation of men. Rather, the commandments given to Noah are exclusively for him and his descendants, and the later commandments given to the children of Israel at Sinai are exclusively for them and their descendants. The Israelites may be included in the commandments given to Noah, but the other nations having descended from Noah cannot be justly included in the commandments given to Israel, unless they live in the lands governed by Israel whereby the Israelites themselves were commanded by Yahweh to hold the sojourners to the same laws. But of course, none of them were Jews in the first place. The historical identity of the descendants of Noah is fully revealed in Genesis chapter 10, according to Moses where he lists them all, and places them into the context of the world of his own time. But those nations of Noah’s descendants do not include all races of men as they are so-called in modern times, or as we shall see, even in the time of Moses.

In essence, here in Genesis chapter 9 Noah was only told that he and his sons should be fruitful and multiply, that they should have dominion over everything that moves upon the earth, and that all such animals and beasts should be in fear of them. They were commanded not to eat blood, nor to commit murder, and to avenge murder if it were committed. That is all they were commanded, and anything else is a lie. Of course, the earlier commandment given to Adam, not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, still stands even to this day since it was never retracted, it never expired, and that is also evident since the promise of the Tree of Life was never retracted or expired, but rather, it is fulfilled in Yahshua Christ.

Now, commencing from where we had left off in Genesis chapter 9:

8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, 9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you; 10 And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth. 11 And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.

With periodic patterns of severe weather and the daring of men who would live in zones which inevitably flood, floods are certain to happen in diverse times and places. So many Christians become discouraged when they suffer from floods, and sometimes they suppose that God has lied. But the promise here is not a promise that floods would not happen. Rather, it is only a promise that all flesh would not again die in a flood. Where it promises that there shall no longer be “a flood to destroy the earth” it is not speaking of the Mississippi River valley, Southern California or the Florida coasts, nor is it speaking of the entire planet, but only within the context that all flesh would not be destroyed again. Furthermore, it is only speaking within the context of the flood of Noah and the land in which the descendants of Noah had lived from that time. If man dares to live in flood zones, as I myself do, then it is inevitable that he will suffer flooding, but he cannot justly place any blame on God.

12 And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: 13 I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. 14 And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: 15 And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. 16 And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.

Once again, even if this covenant is perpetual, it does not say that no man shall ever drown in a flood, but only that all men will not drown in a flood. If one man builds a dam, or a levee, and chooses to live by it and dies when it breaks, then he cannot blame God for breaking His promise. Rather, he himself had ventured to dare natural forces, and suffered the inevitable consequences, because none of the things which men build can last forever, or often, not even for long.

Rather, this promise of the rainbow is an assurance that men should not fear rain, as the first time they had experienced rain all flesh was destroyed except for those who were with Noah. So now when it rains, the rainbow would be an assurance that Yahweh God would not cause that to happen once again. Here Yahweh is again portrayed as having to remember something, although it is certain that God cannot forget anything. Rather, the assurance is that He would recall His attention to something in order to make certain that His promises are kept.

So the promise concludes:

17 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.

Here I am reluctant to mention the modern use of the Sodomite banner referred to as the “rainbow flag”, but this is the least of the many blasphemies committed by Sodomites, lesbians and other corrupt perverts. While Christians should indeed be offended by Sodomites, and reject them completely, the rainbow flag is not even representative of a true rainbow, and it should not evoke the rainbow of this promise in Genesis chapter 9. As it is recorded in Genesis chapter 19, Yahweh God had destroyed the Sodomites in the five cities of the plain in a rain of fire, and He shall do it once again. When that happens, they will not be protected by any rainbow.

Now the sons of Noah are mentioned once again, and a new chapter in their lives is introduced, where Moses, writing Genesis, seems to have been compelled to give one of Noah’s grandsons a special mention:

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.

There must be a particular reason why Canaan was mentioned here, out of all of the other grandsons which Noah would have, and that reason becomes evident in the verses which follow.

19 These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread.

Or “of them was the whole land overspread.” Although in Genesis chapter 10 it becomes apparent that they eventually inhabited a much wider region than that which had originally been covered by the flood, that was only precipitated by Yahweh God Himself, and they all remained in Mesopotamia for at least another five hundred years. So for the five centuries following the flood, this passage supports our earlier assertion that after the flood, Noah and his descendants had slowly spread into the Mesopotamian plain south of Ararat.

As we had already explained in part 9 of this commentary, titled Perfect in His Race: “the Hebrew word שם or shem (# 8035) primarily means name, and for that reason also good name or reputation or a celebrated name, among other similar things [5]. The word יפת iapet or iapheth (# 3315) is from a verb which means opened, or as Gesenius explains, it bears the sense of widely-extending [6]. The word חם or cham (# 2526) is hot or warm, and in another entry (# 2527) the same word is heat [7].” Evidently, the name Ham meaning hot or heat, this son of Noah must have borne those human traits that are often described with those terms, which are things such as anger or passion.

Many commentators have claimed that Ham had such a name because his descendants lived in the heat of Africa and turned black, but that is not true. Nimrod, a descendant of Cush, a son of Ham, had founded a long-lasting empire in Mesopotamia and Arabia, and Heth, a son of Canaan the son of Ham, is the eponymous ancestor of an empire in northern and central Anatolia, which is modern Turkey, much of which was further north than any of the habitats of those nations which had descended from Shem, and some of those which had descended from Japheth. Some of those same commentators also claim that Ham’s descendants were black because Ham was cursed, but neither is that true. Ham was never cursed, only Canaan was cursed. Therefore Ham’s other sons, Cush, Mizraim and Phut, were not cursed. Neither were they black, as we shall hope to establish in our discussion of Genesis chapter 10.

[5 Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, translated by Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, Baker Books, 1979, p. 833; 6 ibid., p. 359; 7 ibid., p. 285.]

20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard: 21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.

In Proverbs chapter 20 we read that “1 Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.” Yet here it is evident only that Noah had fallen asleep being drunken, and “was uncovered within his tent.” But if Noah was uncovered, having had a wife, he was most certainly not alone. So we continue:

22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.

Ham’s son Canaan had already received a special mention here, and now he is mentioned again. Since it is Canaan who is later cursed because of this event, even before he was born, then Canaan must have been a product of whatever sin Ham had committed here. But the precise nature of that sin, and the significance of his having seen “the nakedness of his father” is not fully evident until the giving of the law, in Leviticus chapter 20 where we find a commandment in the law which explains this very event: “11 And the man that lieth with his father's wife hath uncovered his father's nakedness: both of them shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.” So if the laws of Sinai were in place, Ham and his mother may have been executed.

If Noah was passed out drunk in his tent, having had a wife it is certain that she was with him, and it is very likely that she also naked and uncovered. She herself may also have been drunk, along with Noah and his sons, although the narrative does not support that as fact, so it is only conjecture. But it was not extraordinary in antiquity, nor was it forbidden, for a man to see another man naked. Adam and Eve themselves had been naked, and they were not even ashamed until they had sinned with their nakedness. Men were typically naked in the ancient world, as men worked naked even in New Testament times, and as it is also recorded in the art of the Greeks and Romans.

This is evident throughout the New Testament. In Mark chapter 14 (14:51-52), among those who had followed Christ to the garden at Gethsemane on the evening of His arrest was a young man who was covered only in a linen cloth, and when he was accosted by the temple guards and fled, he left the cloth and ran away naked. But because men customarily worked while being naked, such a sight must have been common in ancient times. Clothing was costly, it was difficult to launder, and for those reasons men did not want to soil or ruin their clothing by wearing it while they worked. So another example is found in Mark chapter 13, where Christ warned of tribulation and He said: “16 And let him that is in the field not turn back again for to take up his garment.” In other words, when the calamity comes he should flee without his garment. The man working in the field would be naked, laying his garment aside while he worked. In another example, the apostle Peter had been working on a boat fishing, as it is recorded in John chapter 21, when he was informed by John that a man who was calling him from the shore was indeed the resurrected Christ, and he was naked while working. So there we read, where John was initially referring to himself: “7 Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher's coat unto him, (for he was naked,) and did cast himself into the sea.” Earlier, at the final Passover dinner with His disciples as it is recorded in John chapter 13, rather than working entirely naked Christ had modestly girded Himself with a cloth where he washed the feet of the disciples, and there it is evident that the cloth was probably something similar to a large bath towel, because Christ also used it to wipe the feet of the disciples [John 13:5].

Ham had told Shem and Japheth what he had done, and now the brothers react, probably in a manner contrary to what he had expected, for which reason Noah blessed them after he had cursed Ham:

23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father’s nakedness.

For at least 80 years after his sons were born and grew to manhood, Noah most likely worked with sons while they were naked, which is clearly the ancient custom. So where it says that Shem and Japheth “saw not their father’s nakedness”, that may be interpreted as an assurance that they did not partake in the sin which Ham had committed, and their actions show that they chose not to look upon their naked mother. Here we also see that there is a capacity to sin even when one is “perfect in his generations”, or race, as Ham must have been. Many Identity Christians have claimed, or at least have suggested, that every sinner must be a bastard, but Ham was certainly no bastard, whereby we see that even the most pure of the Adamic race are nevertheless subject to sin. As Paul of Tarsus had written in Romans chapter 3, “23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”

24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.

In Genesis chapter 10 we read “21 Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber, the brother of Japheth the elder, even to him were children born.” So there it is evident that Japheth was older than Shem, but here Ham is called the “younger son” and therefore he must have been younger than both of his brothers, even if the order is not given with precedence to age where the three sons are mentioned together, or in the narrative of Genesis chapter 10. For whatever reason, it seems that the line of Shem was given precedence over that of Japheth, because the chosen of Yahweh would come from that line through Abraham, but it is explicitly stated that Japheth was older than Shem. Here it is explicitly stated that Ham was younger than them both.

Here it is apparent that Ham did not merely see Noah naked, but had to have done something to him. So now Noah denounces what Ham had done by cursing Canaan, and the reaction justifies the crime:

25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. 26 And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

Here Noah has not only cursed Canaan, but he is portrayed as having also fulfilled the role of a prophet of God. Peter had called Noah the eighth preacher of righteousness, and this is yet another example of that, in spite of his human frailty and drunkenness. Right from the beginning, Noah not only names Canaan, who could not have yet been born as the sin is portrayed as having occurred only the night before, but doing so he also exhibits a knowledge that there would be a pregnancy, and that the resulting child of this illicit union would be a male. According to the narrative, although it is not stated explicitly, Canaan may have also been the first of Noah’s grandsons, while he was listed as the last of the sons of Ham in Genesis chapter 10. Here it seems that Canaan was the first of the sons of Ham, but due to the circumstances of his birth he was assigned the last place in precedence. We do not know the age of Noah’s wife, but she certainly may have been much younger than Noah.

Now Noah blesses his son Japheth, while at the same time he expresses the fact that Shem would indeed be greater than Japheth, so this blessing is also a prophecy in multiple respects, as well as an indirect blessing of Shem:

27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

Here Noah had not explicitly blessed Shem himself, but only indirectly by blessing Yahweh as the “God of Shem”, indicating that there would be a special relationship between Yahweh and Shem, or perhaps that Shem would receive some special favor of Yahweh. While Japheth receives a promise to be enlarged, which agrees with the meaning of his name, he shall nevertheless dwell in the tents of Shem, so Shem is destined to be much greater, which agrees with the meaning of his name. Yet the fervent passion of Ham had caused him trouble, and it had caused Noah his father much grief. So that exhibition of passion agrees with the meaning of his name. Yet Ham himself was neither cursed nor blessed by Noah.

There is no other passage in Scripture which serves to describe the sin of Ham, and what had truly happened to Noah, other than the law in Leviticus chapter 20 which states that “the man that lieth with his father’s wife hath uncovered his father’s nakedness”. In similar laws given in that same chapter, as well as in Leviticus chapter 18, the act of incest alone is not considered to be the nakedness of the father, but in Leviticus chapter 18 we once again read that “8 The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father's nakedness.” Then a little further on we read a third substantiation: “16 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother's wife: it is thy brother's nakedness.” So the nakedness of a man’s wife is the man’s nakedness, and while Noah must have been naked, Ham could not have fathered Canaan by the mere act of seeing his father naked, and Canaan could not have been held liable for Ham’s sin if Ham had merely laid his own eyes on his naked father. Neither can a man simply happening by and seeing another man naked be liable of any sin, especially since men commonly worked together while naked, as we even saw of the apostle Peter in John chapter 21.

Throughout Leviticus chapters 18 and 20, the phrase “uncover her nakedness” is a euphemism for sexual relations, and the laws forbidding certain sexual relations, and so it is here also, that uncovering his father’s nakedness, Ham had committed the act of sexual intercourse with his own mother. This is thy father’s nakedness: to lie with thy father’s wife, whether or not she also happens to be one’s own mother. Here there are three witness to that which we have cited from the law, and there is no verse in Scripture which offers any other explanation. So Ham, in an act of passion which his own name reflects, must have laid with his mother, and for Canaan to have been cursed, Canaan must have been the result of the ensuing act of incest which Ham committed with his own mother. The curse of Canaan, that he would be a servant to the children of Shem, was at least partially fulfilled in ancient Israel, when the Canaanites who were spared the sword had been enslaved.

Now for the final verses of Genesis chapter 9:

28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years. 29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years: and he died.

As we shall see, Noah lived about within two hundred years of the division of the nations described in Genesis chapter 11, which happened in the days of Peleg who was born around five hundred and thirty years after the flood. We shall continue our chronology, which we had left off with our commentary on Genesis chapter 5 titled The Book of the Race of Adam. There we said in part that: “It is ascertained in Genesis chapter 11 that Japheth, Ham and Shem were all born in close proximity to one another, where we read ‘10 These are the generations of Shem: Shem was an hundred years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood.’ So Shem was born approximately two years after Japheth, who was born 100 years before the flood. With that the Septuagint agrees, and according to our chronology, adding 102 years to the 2,162nd year of Adam in which Japheth was born, Arphaxad was born in the 2264th year of Adam, and the discrepancy with the Masoretic Text still remains at 606 years.” In that same presentation, we had concluded from the better chronology of the Septuagint that Noah was born 1,662 years from the creation of Adam, and the flood having happened in his six hundredth year, that event occurred around 2,262 years from the creation of Adam, and Noah died about 2,612 years from the creation of Adam.

Yahweh willing, soon we shall return to our commentary with Genesis chapter 10 and the historicity of the descendants of Shem, Japheth and Ham, but not necessarily in that order.