Genesis 9:18
King James Version
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.
It's a curious thing.
Why Noah cursed Canaan.
When it was Canaan's father, Ham, who transgressed.
This is the incident which happened:
Genesis 9:20-24
King James Version
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.
22 And Ham, the father of Canaan,
saw the nakedness of his father,
and told his two brethren without.
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.
24 And Noah awoke from his wine,
and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
Ham's transgression must have been extremely serious.
For Noah cursed Canaan, Ham's son:
Genesis 9:25-27
King James Version
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.
27 God shall enlarge Japheth,
and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem;
and Canaan shall be his servant.
That changed the life, lineage, and country of Canaan forever.
To better understand this, we look deeper into what this transgression may have been.
We look to TWO sets of verses for clues:
Genesis 9:22
King James Version
22 And Ham, the father of Canaan,
saw the nakedness of his father,
and told his two brethren without.
(What does "saw the nakedness of his father" mean?)
Genesis 9:24
King James Version
24 And Noah awoke from his wine,
and knew what his younger son
had done unto him.
(What did Ham do to Noah?)
Somehow, we got clues from Wikipedia*, with the telling verse:
Leviticus 20:11
Expanded Bible
11 If a man ·has sexual relations [L lies]
with his father’s wife,
·he has shamed
[L exposing/revealing the nakedness of] his father,
and both the man and his father’s wife must be put to death.
They have brought ·it [L blood] on themselves
[18:8; Deut. 22:30].
Following the thread of verses, we gather:
Leviticus 18:8
King James Version
8 The nakedness of thy father's wife
shalt thou not uncover:
it is thy father's nakedness.
Deuteronomy 22:30
King James Version
30 A man shall not take his father's wife,
nor discover his father's skirt.
That source suggested that Ham may have had relations* with his father's wife, thus, he "saw the nakedness of his father".
Who was Noah's wife?
This is all the Bible mentions:
Genesis 7:5-7
King James Version
5 And Noah did according
unto all that the Lord commanded him.
6 And Noah was six hundred years old
when the flood of waters was upon the earth.
7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife,
and his sons' wives with him, into the ark,
because of the waters of the flood.
It was further suggested that if this illicit union produced a child, then Canaan must have been that child.
Other researchers suggest Ham may have literally looked* upon the nakedness of his father, while Shem and Japheth avoided looking.
To make matters worse, Ham may have gossiped, or mocked, about it with his brothers.
I'm no scholar, merely following the threads SPIRIT leads me to explore.
My aim is to understand why Canaan, and the country named after him, has been cursed throughout, starting with Noah.
In a future post, we shall look into why GOD abhors the nations connected with Canaan.
That will be for a very interesting post.
Just so you know, Noah lived this long:
Genesis 9:28-29
King James Version
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.
The next page tells us more about the generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth -- the THREE sons of Noah.
*Wikipedia (check the "Voyeurism" and "Maternal incest" sections)
Related material:
Don Stewart :: Why Was Canaan Cursed Instead of Ham?
Image: Clipart Library
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