Genesis 9:18-28

7. Noah's Last Days (Genesis 9:18-28.)

18 And the sons of Noah, that went forth from the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan. 19 These three were the sons of Noah: and of these was the whole earth overspread. 20 And Noah began to be a husbandman, and planted a vineyard; 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 youngest son had done unto him. 25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. 26 And he said, Blessed be Jehovah, the God of Shem; and let Canaan be his servant. 27 God enlarge Japheth, and let him dwell in the tents of Shem; and let Canaan be his servant. 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.

(1) Noah's Progeny (Genesis 9:18-19).

(a) Cornfeld (AtD, 36): Genesis does not tell us where Noah and his family lived after the Flood, but only that the earth was repopulated by Noah's three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The chronicler regards Noah as the main link in the generations reaching to Abraham, and carefully notes that Ham, father of Canaan, is not of the same stock as Shem, the father of the Hebrews. It should be noted, however, that the emphasis continues to be on the Messianic Line, beginning with Shem and continuing through Noah to Abraham. Cornfeld again (AtD, 36): As we continue to read the genealogies, we note that the focus grows more and more narrow. The emphasis at the conclusion is on Shem, the ancestor of the Semites (see Genesis 10:21-30), which include all the sons of Eber who embraced the Hebrews, The final narrowing of the generations of Eber would come in the next chapter: read Genesis 11:16-26). (b) Of Shem, Ham, and Japheth it is said: of these was the whole earth overspread, This statement leaves us little room for doubt that Noah sired no other children than the three sons mentioned. (Of course again we have to consider the fact that in this text erets could be just as correctly translated land as earth.).

(2) Noah's Sin (Genesis 9:20-23). Noah began to be a husbandman, and planted a vineyard. A husbandman is a farmer, a tiller of the ground. Hence JB renders this line, Noah, a tiller of the soil, was the first to plant the vine. This could mean, without any rending of the text and context, that he was the first to plant a vineyard after the Flood. Two views of this incident have been rather common among Bible students: one is that the patriarch, having been the first to cultivate a vineyard was not aware of the intoxicating qualities of its fruit, and that his intoxication was the consequence of this ignorance. Thus Skinner (ICCG, 181): Noah is here introduced in an entirely different character, as the discoverer of the culture of the vine, and the first victim to immoderate indulgence in its fruit. The other view is simply that Noah, probably in an exuberance of joy over his deliverance and newly found freedom, imbibed a little too freely of the fermented juice of the grape, even to the point of intoxication and some of the shameful indecencies which not infrequently attend such overindulgence. The present writer can hardly convince himself that Noah was the first to plant a vineyard and hence was unaware of the intoxicating character of wine. It is inconceivable that husbandry and vine cultivation were unknown throughout all those centuries before the Flood. Whitelaw (PCG, 148): That Armenia is a vine-growing country is testified by Xenophon (Anab. iv, 4, 9). That the vine was abundantly cultivated in Egypt is evident from representations on the monuments, as well as from Scriptural allusions. The Egyptians said that Osiris, the Greeks that Dioriysos, the Romans that Saturn, first taught men the cultivation of the tree and the use of its fruits.. Though this is the first mention of wine in Scripture, it is scarcely possible that the natural process of fermentation for so many centuries escaped the notice of the enterprising Cainites, or even of the Sethites.. Since the sin of Noah cannot be ascribed to ignorance, it is perhaps right, as well as charitable, to attribute it to age and inadvertence.. But from whatever cause induced, the drunkenness of Noah was not entirely guiltless; it was sinful in itself, and led to further shame. The simple fact is that Noah slipped, lapsed, this one time only, we hope, from the path of virtue. He planted a vineyard and, doubtless through knowledge acquired in antediluvian experience, he made wine from the grapes which his vineyard produced. In spite of his lifelong piety, and his experience with the debauchery and viciousness of his former neighbors, recollections of which should have prompted him to restrain himself, he drank so much of the wine that he became intoxicated. Intoxication naturally leads to sensuality, carelessness, immodesty, and the like, and the old patriarch lay uncovered in his tent, that is, he shamefully exposed himself in some way in the presence of his sons. Ham, it seems, was the first to find him in this condition, and instead of being filled with pity on seeing his father in late age in such a maudlin state, laughed about it as if the whole thing were a lark, and rushed to tell his brothers, Shem and Japheth immediately came to the tent, took a garment, and laid it on both their shoulders, and walking backward placed it over their father without even looking on his nakedness. Thus did the other two brothers act with becoming modesty while at the same time protecting their father's honor, whereas Ham had been guilty of a profane breach of filial piety and disregard for elders in general, which was an offense of the first magnitude among primitive and early historic peoples (cf. Exodus 20:12). (Noah's lapse in his old age is evidence that humankind was still a fallen race).

The fact should be re-emphasized here that the Bible pictures life just as it is. It is the only book in the world which portrays human character realistically. Not for one moment does it turn aside from the faithful record to conceal the weaknesses and derelictions of its great men: it pictures their lives just as they lived them. Biographers of men usually dwell glowingly on the virtues of those about whom they are writing, to the neglect of recording their faults. Not so with the Bible. No matter that Noah was perfect in his generations; no matter that he walked by faith; no matter that he was God's chosen representative in the Messianic Line; he finally sinned, and that in his declining years. And the Bible does not attempt to conceal his fault. There is no false modesty in the Book of Books. It uses old-fashioned words to designate old-fashioned things. It is primarily the Book of Life.

(3) Noah's Prophecy (Genesis 9:24-27). We read that Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his youngest son had done unto him. Evidently he knew this by inspiration (or intuition?), and immediately uttered a series of terse prophetic statements which undoubtedly were inspired. We can hardly question this fact, because human history surely records, in broad outlines at least, the fulfillment of these pronouncements. (A word of caution here: I must be understood that the destinies of the peoples who sprang from the loins of Shem and Ham and Japheth were not foreordained to be what they were. Rather, these destinies were determined by the respective progenies themselves; however, they were foreknown to God and so could be communicated to Noah by Divine inspiration and thus disclosed to mankind long before they actually occurred. We must remember that foreknowledge does not necessarily imply foreordination, except with reference, of course, to the details of the Plan of Redemption. Obviously, in uttering these predictions Noah was not moved by personal resentment, but was acting simply as God's mouthpiece. Prophecy has always been used by the Spirit to attest the truth of revelation.)

(a) Cursed be Canaan, A servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. Note that the dominant feature of this entire prophecy is the curse on Canaan, which not only stands first, but is repeated in the blessing on the two brothers. It seems evident that prophetic insight testified that Canaan would inherit the profane disposition of his father, Ham, and that the Canaanites would abundantly deserve the destiny foretold of them; also that the curse was general in its nature and hence included the entire posterity of Ham and Canaan (for which see Genesis 10:6-20). Note the phrase, a servant of servants, etc. This is the superlative degree, literally, the meanest slave. The curse simply means that the descendants of Canaan were doomed to enslavement to the other two branches of the family. This destiny seemingly was reversed when Nimrod and Mizraim founded Babylonia and Egypt respectively. But it was abundantly fulfilled in early antiquity when the Canaanites in Joshua's time were partly exterminated and partly reduced to abject slavery by the Israelites who belonged to the family of Shem, and those that remained were further reduced by Solomon (Joshua 9:23, 1 Kings 9:20-21). It was fulfilled later when the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, and Egyptians, all of whom belonged to the Line of Canaan, were reduced to subjection by the Japhetic Persians, Macedonians, and Romans, These peoples, the Canaanites included, all were obsessed with the gross sexual indulgences characteristic of the ancient Cult of Fertility, as described by the Apostle Paul in Romans 1:18-32. It may be fulfilled too in the longstanding moral and spiritual (and cultural) backwardness of the South African peoples who perhaps more than any other have been forcibly reduced to abject slavery by Semitic, and more particularly Japhetic, nations. As a matter of fact, African slavery is one of the darkest blots on the whole history of mankind. The fact is that there is no moral ground on which any man can obtain a legitimate title to another man's person: this is true for the simple reason that one soul is worth as much as another in the sight of God and hence that Christ died for all men alike.

(b) Blessed be Jehovah, the God of Shem, And let Canaan be his servant. To bless Yahweh is simply to praise Him. The blessing here must be indirectly a blessing on the Line of Shem, that is, in assuming the spiritual primacy of the Semites by virtue of their having Yahweh for their God. The second part of the prophecy was fulfilled in the conquest of Canaan under Joshua, Saul, David and Solomon. By the time the Israelites were ready to enter Canaan under Joshua, the Canaanites by their grossly idolatrous and licentious religious practices had proved themselves vessels fit only for destruction (Judges 1:28; Judges 1:31; Judges 1:33; Genesis 15:13-16; Acts 7:6).

(c) God enlarge Japheth, And let him dwell in the tents of Shem; And let Canaan be his servant. That is, make room for the one who spreads abroad. This part of the prophecy was simply a foretelling of the widespread diffusion and remarkable prosperity of the Japhetic (Aryan) peoples; as a matter of fact, the history of the human family is largely the record of this enlargement, geographically, politically, economically, and socially. Indeed the phenomenon is evident also in the extension of Biblical religion into all parts of the world. The descendants of Japheth pushed across Asia Minor into Europe, and moving thence both to the North and to the West they populated the European continent, ultimately finding their way to the shores of the Americas. Nordic, Alpine and Mediterranean peoples are all of the Line of Japheth. And let him dwell in the tents of Shem. The fulfillment of this passage is obvious: certainly it occurred in the reception of the Gentiles into the duties, privileges, and rewards of Biblical religion, especially in the admission of the Gentiles into the Body of Christ (cf. Acts 10:44-48; Acts 11:15-18; Ephesians 2:11-18; 1 Corinthians 12:12-13). Smith and Fields (OTH, 443): Japheth has come to dwell in the tents of Shem as a result of the Semitic Jews-' rejection of their Messiah, Jesus. When this occurred the Japhetic Gentiles were given the gospel of God and entered into the spiritual relationship with God that the Jews (except for a believing remnant) forfeited: Romans 11:11; Romans 11:20-24. The last part of this Noahic prophecy, Let Canaan be his servant, was used for many years as a Divine warrant for the institution of African slavery. There is a great difference, however, between a positive command such as in Genesis 9:5-6,and an inspired prophecy. Even though Noah, looking into the future, may have foreseen the spiritual and cultural backwardness of many Hamitic peoples, still and all these words do not constitute a divine authorization of slavery. They should be looked upon as only a prophetic statement of what history shows to have been a fact.

REVIEW QUESTIONS

See Genesis 9:28-29.