This series will be covering the path of the three sons of Noah. I want to give a shout out to Johnny Tatum for leading the way for me on this one and getting me thinking on these chapters of Genesis. I hope you, too, will glean as much as you can out to this series and hopefully walk away with a better appreciation for who we all are and a new found wonder for who God is. Let’s get going.

We start in Genesis 9:

“Then God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. [The KJV actually translates the Hebrew “malé” into “replenish” which gives more definition than simply “fill”] Every living creature of the earth and every bird of the sky will be terrified of you. [Here we see God telling us that we will be at odds with nature. Wild animals will be skiddish of humans, and this is when this happened] Everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea are under your authority. [The Hebrew for “authority” is “nathan” and means we will be “in charge of” while the animals have been “entrusted” into our care] You may eat any moving thing that lives. [Here God says we can eat anything we want, but He will trim the list down some when He gives His statutes to the priests in Levticus as a means of protecting them from unclean animals, another inevitable result of The Fall] As I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything. [Here we see God give the green light for vegans to become omnivores]

The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Now Ham was the father of Canaan.) [This comment about Ham being the father of Canaan probably denotes that some time had passed since the ark landed on Mount Ararat, and he and his wife had become parents] These were the sons of Noah, and from them the whole earth was populated. [Right here we should realize that all mankind descends from these three in some fashion or another, either purely within that branch of one the three sons or maybe as a mix between descendants of two sons] Noah, a man of the soil, began to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of the wine, he got drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent. [Noah was the only one God was fit to save from the judgement and wrath of the flood, but here we see him in a moment of poor decision making and Ham apparently does something to or with his father or his fathers wife (his mom) while dad is passed out. We won’t speculate or go into any of that for now, suffice it to say it would be likely NSFW]

When Noah awoke from his drunken stupor he learned what his youngest son had done to him.” [Again, we don’t know what happened, but it did not sit well with Noah]

“So he said, “Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of {slaves} he will be to his brothers.” He also said, “Worthy of praise is the LORD, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the {slave} of Shem! May God enlarge Japheth’s territory and numbers! May he live in the tents of Shem and may Canaan be his {slave}!”

The entire lifetime of Noah was 950 years, and then he died.”

[The Hebrew word for “slaves” is “ébed” and can mean slave but more often it means a servant who chooses to serve other… think waiters, couriers, etc… as a course of action or role/position within a social construct.] Genesis‬ ‭9:1-3, 7, 18-21, 24‬-27,29 NET

So, as we can see from verses 25-27, Noah is setting a trajectory for the three brothers.

Continue this series here