Noah's Three Sons
THIS STUDY was begun in 1938. It started with one of those incidental observations that occasionally end up proving exceptionally fruitful. Some fifteen years later, the material had more or less become organized into a tentative philosophy of history. Shortly afterwards, it was presented as a paper to a Scientific Affiliation in the United States. Its fate was swift and terrible to behold.
Probably it deserved it at the time. But it was not the basic idea that was faulty. It was the presentation which suffered because the author lacked formal training in certain fields that figure prominently in the thesis. This, I believe, has now been corrected and a fresh attempt to communicate the central idea seems justified. One of the main stumbling blocks to early acceptance has been thoroughly swept away by subsequent research. In fact, the Canadian Government was sufficiently impressed by the evidence to undertake to publish for internal use a 250-page report on the matter, (1) which was then supplied to a number of their research laboratories.
The thesis contains a simple concept, the kind of concept which is either beautifully true and correspondingly useful, or is bound to become self-evidently false and will simply die a natural death. Every year supplies new evidence for the essential truthfulness of it. Yet even if it should, after all, prove to be mistaken, it can still be of real value as a working hypothesis. It is not so much false theory as mistaken observation of fact that is dangerous. Dr. A. Lewis (2) observed that history is filled with instances where false theories proved fruitful because they stimulated the imagination of competent people, who were then led to undertake further research and purify the concept.
Now, it is obvious that in such a wide ranging thesis as this turns out to be, there are bound to be some errors in basic information, and personal bias is almost certain to have coloured the selection of data, as well as their interpretation. Nevertheless, while personal factors are unavoidable, a very serious effort has been made to keep close to the facts. Yet certain problems presented themselves from the start, especially in the matter of terminology. For example, it seems logical to call the descendants of Ham Hamites, as the descendants of Shem are called Shemites. But the term Hamitic has come to be applied by anthropologists and ethnologists in a rather restricted way to a group of people which, it seems evident from Genesis 10, by no means now represents all the nations that can with some justification be traced back to Ham. So I have to remind the reader that I am reverting, in my use of the terms Hamite and Hamitic, to their older and strictly biblical meaning.
A second problem arises from the current confusion of technology with science, a confusion which I feel has been very detrimental to our understanding of the nature of each. James B. Conant has dealt excellently with this in his little book On Understanding Science, (3) and many other writers have underscored the fundamental distinction between the two areas of human endeavour. Technology is directed toward the solution of specific problems: what has been aptly termed "mission oriented." Science, by contrast, is ideally concerned only with understanding the laws of nature, understanding for its own sake rather than to make use of nature. Technology is often a spinoff from scientific endeavour, but technology existed for centuries and became highly developed in some countries where science, in the pure sense, was not only of no interest but was essentially unknown. The Hamitic people have all been, virtually without exception, technologically oriented and extremely adept, whether highly civilized or very primitive. Japhethites, or Indo-Europeans, have essentially carried the torch of pure science.
The reader is urged to keep this distinction between Technology, which is applied to practical ends, and Science, which is directed toward intellectual satisfaction, constantly in mind.
This is a study of the contribution to civilization made by the descendants of the three sons of Noah: Shem, Ham and Japheth. My basic thesis is that the tenth chapter of Genesis, the oldest Table of Nations in existence, is a completely authentic statement of how the present world population originated and spread after the Flood in the three families headed respectively by Shem, Ham, and Japheth. I further propose that a kind of division of responsibilities to care for the specific needs of man at three fundamental levels - the spiritual, the physical, and the intellectual - was divinely appointed to each of these three branches of Noah's family. History subsequently bears out this thesis in a remarkable way. Scripture itself clearly takes this into account and makes consistent allowance for it, even in respect to one notable exception which will be considered in due course. The interaction of these contributions has at times wholly obliterated their specific nature, but a discerning view of history permits us to identify each stream, so that although the currents mingle quite freely, careful analysis can often still separate them, allowing each to be traced back to its individual source. Rightly understood, the thesis is a key that proves to be an exciting tool of research into the spiritual, the technological, and the intellectual history of mankind since the Flood.
Whether this thesis receives a favourable hearing or not will depend to a large extent on the attitude of the reader towards Scripture. This is particularly true, for example, on whether one takes the genealogy of Nations, given in Genesis 10, at its face value. If this Table is an historically trustworthy document and its generalized conclusions are valid (particularly the universality of verse 32), then it is clear that the present population of the world has been derived from the eight souls who survived the Flood, and can be grouped together under three family headings: Shemites or Semites, Japhethites or Indo-Europeans, and Hamites. No people exist or have existed anywhere in the world since the Flood who are not members of one of these three family groupings. This point is examined in Volume II of this series.
With this settled, the Semites are not difficult to identify. The Indo-Europeans, or Japhethites, also seem clearly to be a related family of people. The balance of mankind, in short what might comprehensively be referred to as "the coloured races," must then be members of the third family group, the Hamites. And by coloured races I have in mind simply all those who would not in common parlance list themselves under the heading, "The White Man."
It is at this point, probably, that the most violent exception to the thesis of these papers will be taken, since it is not customary to lump together such people as the Mongoloids and the Negroids. It is more usual to set forth the racial divisions of mankind as being Caucasian, Mongoloid or Negroid. The Semitic people are seldom singled out as a race (or stock). There are good reasons for this reluctance since racial mixture, especially in Europe, has proceeded so far that any attempt to classify a segment of the population, such as the Jewish people, along racial lines is not considered possible.
It sometimes helps, however, to stand back from a situation and view it oversimply. Almost all philosophies of history do this, and for many people some kind of philosophy of history seems essential. Such people create patterns because their minds work that way, and thus they satisfy a need to assure themselves that there is some meaning to life as a whole. These imposed, or discovered, patterns can be highly stimulating, and as long as it is recognized that a particular view is, to some extent, a mental creation which inevitably reflects the bias of the originator, not too much harm will be done. Those who are horrified at such ethnological over-simplification as we are proposing may find some comfort in the knowledge that the author is keenly aware of the extent to which this thesis cuts across pretty well-established orthodoxies of modern anthropological opinion.
From an extensive study of the identification of all the names listed in Genesis 10, The Table of Nations (undertaken in Volume II), it may be said here that the Semites would include such people as the Jews, the Arabs, certain people in Asia Minor, and the ancient Babylonians and Assyrians. The Japhethites would include the Indo-Europeans who, although now strictly denominated by their languages, seem for the most part to have preserved a certain racial character in spite of considerable mixture with the Semites and Hamites. The Hamites, according to my thesis, include virtually all the people who in ancient times were the originators and creators of civilization in both the Old and the New Worlds. It is this fact, for which we now have massive evidence, that comes as such a surprise to most Indo-European readers, and which, in the words of one high Canadian government authority, came almost as a "revelation." Out of Ham have been derived all the so-called coloured races - the "yellow," "red," "brown," and "black" - the Mongoloid and the Negroid. Their contribution to human civilization, in so far as it has to do with technology, has been absolutely unsurpassed. The contribution of Japheth has, by contrast, been essentially in the realm of thought. The contribution of Shem, in terms of both true and false religious conceptions, has been in the realm of the spirit.
Where Japheth has applied his philosophical genius to the technological genius of Ham, science has emerged. Where Japheth has applied his philosophical genius to the spiritual insights of Shem, theology has emerged. The interaction of these three contributions is the theme of history. Human potential reaches its climax when all three brothers (in their descendants) jointly make their common contribution with maximum effectiveness.
These are brash statements as they stand, but the remarkable thing is that they can be substantiated to a degree quite unsuspected by most students of history up to the present time.
Let us turn, then, to Scripture itself in order to examine to what extent the continuance of the threefold division of mankind, which originated with Shem, Ham and Japheth, was subsequently preserved through the historical period covered by the biblical record.
It is often found that what is obviously true, is actually false. It is obvious enough that the sun moves round the earth, but until this erroneous view was corrected, little progress could be made in the Science of Astronomy.
It also happens occasionally, however, that what is obviously false turns out to be actually true. The thesis of this Paper might prove to be a case in point. While scientific knowledge is on the whole undoubtedly characterized by a progressive approach to ultimate reality, it has often proved most detrimental to the progress of understanding in the things which it has denied.
Scepticism is an essential element in the scientific method. But in certain forms it can be very harmful. We cannot prove negatives as a rule, and therefore when we undertake to say what could not be, we are in fact merely expressing an opinion. But the public tends to feel our negative statements have the same kind of quality as our positive ones.
There is a tendency in Christian circles among scientists to deny much real validity to those parts of Scripture which appear to encroach upon the domain of science. Yet they are surely intended to supply information where the possibility of finding it by any other means is slight - or virtually impossible.
But when such information is used by the Christian apologist and intelligently interpreted, there is a certain prejudice against it. Experience has taught us that the subject of this Paper is likely to meet with this kind of reception. Yet we believe that it is the truth. The Word of God is beautifully consistent - and full of wonderful things yet to be discovered.
God who made the world
And all things therein...
Hath made of one blood all nations of men
For to dwell on all the face of the earth.
And he hath determined the appropriate times
And the bounds
Of their settlement,
That they should seek the Lord
If haply they might feel after Him
And find Him.
Although
He be not far from any one of us:
For in Him we live,
And move,
And have our being....(Acts 17.24-28)
References:
1. Custance, A. C., Does Science Transcend Culture?, Ph.D. thesis, University of Ottawa, Can, 1959 (now available from UMI - University Microfiche Inc.).
2. Lewis, Aubrey, "Between Guesswork and Uncertainty in Psychiatry," Lancet, Jan. 25, 1958, 171. He even quotes De Morgan as saying, "Wrong hypotheses, rightly worked, have produced more useful results than unguided observations." E. R. Leach, gives an excellent illustration ("Primitive Time Reckoning," in A History of Technology, edited by Charles Singer, et al, Oxford, UK, Oxford University Press, 1954, Vol. 1, 111).
3. Conant, James B., On Understanding Science, New York, NY, Mentor Books, New American Library, 1955, 144 pages.
Corrections, May 9, 1997.
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