Son of Noah Ham: a biblical story of a kindred curse

The sons of Noah, or the Table of Nations, are an extensive list of Noah's descendants, described in the book "Genesis" of the Old Testament and representing traditional ethnology.

According to the Bible, God, saddened by the evil deeds that mankind creates, has sent a great flood, known as the World Flood, to Earth to destroy life. But there was one man who was distinguished by virtue and righteousness, which God decided to save with his family so that they could continue the human race. It was the tenth and last of the antediluvian patriarchs called Noah. The ark that he built, at the direction of God, to save himself from the flood, was able to accommodate his family and animals of all kinds that remained on Earth. He had three sons born before the flood.

After the water left, they settled on the lower slopes of Mount Ararat, on the north side. Noah began to cultivate the land, planted a vineyard and invented winemaking. Once the patriarch drank a lot of wine, got drunk and fell asleep. While he was lying drunk and naked in his tent, Noah's son Ham saw this and told the brothers. Sim and Japheth entered the tent, turning away their faces, and covering their father. When Noah woke up and realized what had happened, he cursed Ham's son Canaan.

For two millennia, this biblical story has caused many controversies. What is its meaning? Why did the patriarch cursed his grandson? Most likely, it reflects the fact that in those times when she was recording, the Canaanites (the descendants of Canaan) were enslaved by the Israelites. In the Middle Ages, Europeans interpreted this story as the fact that Ham was the ancestor of all Africans, pointing to racial signs, in particular, to the dark skin. Later slavers of Europe and America used a biblical story to justify their activities, supposedly the son of Noah Ham and his offspring were cursed as a degenerating race. Of course, this is wrong, especially since the compilers of the Bible did not consider him Black or African, nor Canaan.

In nearly all cases, the names of the descendants of Noah are represented by tribes and countries. Sim, Ham and Japheth personify the three largest groups of tribes that were known to the authors of the Bible. Hama is called the ancestor of the southern peoples who lived in the region of Africa that bordered on Asia. The languages they spoke of were called Hamitic (Coptic, Berber, some Ethiopian).

According to the Bible, Noah's son Sim is the first-born, and he receives special reverence because he is the ancestor of Semitic peoples, including Jews. They lived in Syria, Palestine, Chaldea, Assyria, Elam, Arabia. The languages they spoke to were the following: Jewish, Aramaic, Arabic, and Assyrian. Two years after the flood, his third son, Arfaxad, was born, whose name is mentioned in the genealogical tree of Jesus Christ.

Noah's son Japheth is the forefather of the northern peoples (in Europe and north-west Asia).

Until the middle of the nineteenth century, the biblical story of the origins of peoples was seen by many as a historical fact, and today it is still believed by orthodox Jews, some Muslims and Christians. While some believe that the table of peoples refers to the entire population of the Earth, others perceive it as a guide for local ethnic groups.