Genesis 10.21-31-Sons of Shem

Wednesday October 12, 2005

Genesis: Genesis 10:21-31-The Sons of Shem

Lesson # 43

Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 10:21.

This evening we will study Genesis 10:21-31, which gives us the record of the sons of Shem and their descendants.

Genesis 10:21, “Also to Shem (“renown”), the father of all the children of Eber (“emigrants” or “to vanish to the region beyond”), and the older brother of Japheth (“opened, enlarged, expanded”), children were born.”

Genesis 10:21 emphasizes that Shem is the ancestor of all the children of Eber because Abraham and the Israelites are identified as descendants of Eber, which would be important to Moses’ readers since they were descendants of Abraham and Israelites.

According to Genesis 10:24, Eber was the son of Shelah and his name means, “region beyond or over (the river)” indicating the land of Canaan that was beyond the Jordan River.

The term “Hebrew” is from “Eber” which anglicized Heber in Luke 3:35.

Abraham was called a “Hebrew” according to Genesis 14:13 indicating that he was a descendant of Eber.

Therefore, from this point forward in Genesis 10:21, Moses is concerned almost exclusively with the Shemites and in particular the most prominent branch of the Shemites, the “sons of Eber,” since he and his readers were descendants of Eber.

Genesis 10:22, “The sons of Shem were Elam (“eternity”) and Asshur (“happy, successful”) and Arpachshad (“he cursed the breast bottle”) and Lud (“firebrand, travailing”) and Aram (“highland”).”

The Elamites settled on the Persian Gulf east of Babylonia or Mesopotamia with Susa (Hebrew: Shushan) as their capital.

Map showing location of Elam

Chedorlaomer, king of Elam, was the leader of the confederacy of nations, which invaded Canaan during the days of Abram according to Genesis 14:4-5.

The Elamites later merged with the Medes who were descendants of Madai and thus of Japheth, to form the Persian Empire (Antiquities of the Jews, book 1, chapter 6, paragraph 4).

“Asshur” was the founder of the Assyrians but as we studied with the descendants of Ham, according to Genesis 10:11, Nimrod invaded the land of Asshur and founded Nineveh and a number of other cities.

Map showing Asshur

Therefore, as a result, the Assyrian people and culture were a mixture of Semitic racial stock and Hamitic (Babylonian) culture, language and religion but eventually, this mixture was entirely supplanted by Semitic culture that spread throughout Mesopotamia.

“Arpachshad” was in the direct line leading to Abraham and his linear lineage is expanded in Genesis 11:12-17 and Josephus claims that Arpachshad was the ancestor of the Chaldeans (Antiquities of the Jews, book 1, chapter 6, paragraph 4).

Map showing Chaldea

The fourth son of Shem was “Lud” who was the ancestor of the Lydians who later settled in western Asia Minor and were famed for the skill of their archers and spoke an Indo-European language and their land was conquered by Cyrus, king of Persia in the year 546 BC.

Map showing location of Lud in western Asia Minor

The fifth son of Shem was “Aram” who is the father of the Aramaeans who are so prominent in Old Testament history and became a great nation whose Aramaic language was adopted by Babylon and Assyria and settled in Syria.

Map showing Syria

Genesis 10:23, “The sons of Aram were Uz (“counsel”) and Hul (“circle”) and Gether (“fear”) and Mash (“drawn out”).”

“Uz” is the first son of Aram and grandson of Shem and we don’t know precisely where his descendants settled but we do know that Job’s home was Uz according to Job 1:1, which was also mentioned in Jeremiah 25:20.

Ptolemy claimed the inhabitants of Uz lived in the Syrian Desert west of Babylon, near Mount Seir or Edom, which is now Jordan.

Map showing Syrian Desert and Jordan

The descendants of “Hul” settled north of the Sea of Galilee, where they gave their name to the lake and vale of Huleh, which in Joshua 11:5 and 7 are called the “Waters of Merom.”

Map showing Sea of Galilee

The descendants of “Gether” settled to the south of Damascus and Josephus identifies them as the latter-day Bactrians who were famous for a breed of camel.

Map showing Damascus Syria

The fourth son of Aram was “Mash” and is associated with the Akkadian region “Mashu,” which appears in the Gilgamesh epic and is identified with the mountains of Lebanon since they are high mountains to the west of Mesopotamia.

Map showing Lebanon

Genesis 10:24, “Arpachshad became the father of Shelah (“sprout”); and Shelah became the father of Eber.”

Nothing appears in secular sources concerning “Shelah” and nothing much is said about him in the Bible except that he was the father Eber who was the ancestor of the Hebrews through Peleg and thirteen Arabian tribes through Joktan.

Genesis 10:25, “Two sons were born to Eber; the name of the one was Peleg, (“division”) for in his days the earth was divided; and his brother's name was Joktan (“smallness, insignificant”).”

Peleg’s name means, “division” and was thus named because of the Tower of Babel where the Lord geographically “divided” the human race as a result of confusing the universal language and vocabulary they used into many different languages and dialects and this event is recorded in Genesis 11:1-9.

Genesis 10:25 contains the figure of speech called “metonymy of the subject” where the earth is put for its inhabitants; therefore, we could translate “the earth” as “the earth’s inhabitants.”

“Divided” is the niphal perfect form of the verb palagh (gl^P*) (paw-lag), which refers to the dividing of the human race geographically as a result of the Lord confusing their universal language into many different languages and dialects.

The meaning of the name Peleg is confirmed by the Akkadian noun pulukku, which means a dividing up of territory by means of borders and boundaries and the Akkadian verb meaning to divide at the borders, is palaka.

Thus, the phrase “in his (Peleg’s) days the earth was divided,” is a reference to the fact that Noah’s descendants were dispersed when God judged them following their attempt to build the tower of Babel.

The phrase “the earth was divided in his days” is “not” a reference to widespread geological landslips separating continents but rather a comparison of Genesis 10:25 with Genesis 11:1-9 indicates that it refers to the human race being divided geographically as a result of the Lord confusing their universal language into many different languages and dialects.

Genesis 11:1-9 records that the human race spoke one language and that they attempted to unite against God and as a result God confused their universal language into many different languages.

The inability to understand one another caused the separation geographically of the human race.

Remember, Genesis 10 is a description of the human race after the Tower of Babel, which is recorded in Genesis 11.

This is indicated by the common refrain that appears in Genesis 10:5, 20, 31, and 32, which records that the descendants of Japheth, Ham and Shem were divided by their ethnicity (“families”), geography (“lands”), language (“every one according to his language”) and politics (“nations”) indicating Genesis 10 was written after the Tower of Babel.

The continents came into existence as a result of the Flood during the days of Noah since according to Genesis 7:11, the subterranean waters underneath the earth erupted and broke apart flooding the earth causing great geological changes in the earth’s geography.

Prior to the Flood, there was a super continent but after the Flood there were seven continents and instead of one ocean as there was prior to the Flood, now there were several oceans.

“Joktan” is the progenitor of the thirteen southern Arabian tribes and is remembered by modern Arabs as Yaqtan.

Modern tribes of South Arabia claim that pure Arabs are Semitic Arabs descended of Joktan whereas they refer to Hamitic Arabs disdainfully as Musta 'rabs, that is, pretended Arabs.

Joktan’s name is preserved in the ancient town of Jectan, near present-day Mecca.

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

Genesis 10:26, “Joktan became the father of Almodad (“not measured”) and Sheleph (“a drawing out”) and Hazarmaveth (ha’zar-ma’veth) (“settlement of death”) and Jerah (“new moon”).”

Joktan had thirteen sons and the oldest of which was “Almodad,” which is a south Arabian name indicating a south Arabian tribe.

“Sheleph” is another southern Arabian tribe who were known to the pre-Islamic Arabs as the “Salif.”

The descendants of “Hazarmaveth” populated the two hundred mile long valley that runs parallel to the southern coast of Arabia, which is known to this day as the “Hadramaut,” which is a direct transposition into Arabic of the name Hazarmaveth.

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

The ancient geographer Strabo tells us that the tribe of “Hazarmaveth” was one of the four main tribes of Arabs in his day.

This area has long been associated with the frankincense trade and in the first and second centuries of the Christian era, was the center of a great civilization (Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopaedia of the Bible, page 3:49).

“Jerah” and his descendants settled in southern Arabia since the Arab city that bore Jerah's name, which was called by Ptolemy as “Jerakon Kome,” lay on the Mahra coast close to the Hadramaut, which is located in southern Arabia.

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

Genesis 10:27, “and Hadoram (“noble honor”) and Uzal (“I shall be flooded”) and Diklah (“palm grove”).”

“Hadoram” and his descendants settled in southern Arabia.

“Uzal” and his descendants settled in Yemen, which is indicated by the fact that Arab historians render the name of “Uzal” as “Azal,” the ancient pre-Islamic name of the city of “Sanaa,” which today is the capital of the modern People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen.

Map showing Yemen on Arabian Peninsula

The Akkadians referred to “Diklah” as “Diklath,” and the Assyrians knew it as “Idiklat,” all of which transpose into Greek as “Tigris” indicating the area in which these people settled, appears to be north of the Persian Gulf or at least in the north-east extremity of the Arabian peninsula.

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

Genesis 10:28, “and Obal (“stripped bare”) and Abimael (a-bim’a-el) (“my father is God”) and Sheba (“seven” or “oath”).”

“Obal” settled in southwest Arabia and probably in the present-day Yemen according to inscriptions and Arab historians who called the descendants of “Obal,” “Ebal.”

The name “Abimael” is linguistically south Arabian and the tribe that bear the name is indicated as south Arabian and this is confirmed by ancient Sabean inscriptions.

“Sheba” is located some one hundred miles north of modern Aden in southwest Arabia and is well known in the Old Testament (1 Kings 10:1; Jer. 6:20).

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

Genesis 10:29, “and Ophir (“reducing to ashes”) and Havilah (“anguish”) and Jobab (“he will cause crying”); all these were the sons of Joktan.”

“Ophir” and his descendants settled in an area between Saba and in the Yemen as claimed by pre-Islamic Arabian inscriptions and their name appears to have been preserved in the coastal town of “Ma'afir” in southwest Arabia.

This region was famous for having gold in its streams according to Job 22:24, Psalm 45:19, Isaiah 13:12 and 1 Chronicles 29:4.

“Havilah” is not the same one mentioned as one of Ham’s descendants and a son of Cush in Genesis 10:7 but rather was the son of Joktan who migrated to southwest Arabia near Kualan, in northwest Yemen, since a Sabaean inscription locates a place named Hualan with this broad region.

Map showing Arabian Peninsula

An Arabian tribe from the southwest corner of the peninsula, in modern Yemen, is named after their ancestor “Jobab” and it is attested in a number of inscriptions.

In Genesis 10:30, Moses defines the borders of the Shemites since it is important to both Moses and his readers who were descendants of Shem.

Genesis 10:30, “Now their settlement extended from Mesha as you go toward Sephar, the hill country of the east.”

“Sephar” is traditionally identified with “Isfar” in the south of Hadramaut or Zafar harbor city in Yemen and “Mesha” is a territory in North Arabia, far south of Hadramaut.

Genesis 10:31, “These are the sons of Shem, according to their families, according to their languages, by their lands, according to their nations.”

Genesis 10:31 records that the descendants of Shem were divided by their ethnicity (“families”), geography (“lands”), language (“every one according to his language”) and politics (“nations”) indicating Genesis 10 was written after the Tower of Babel.

Genesis 10:32, “These are the families of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, by their nations; and out of these the nations were separated on the earth after the flood.”

Seventy nations are presented in the Table of Nations: Fourteen from Japheth, thirty from Ham, and twenty-six from Shem.