In the Daniel Fast Part Two, we read about the first recorded fast in the bible, which dealt with sodomites and the effects of compromise. But then I’m wondering, where did it start anyway? The origins of it is found in Genesis 8:5-7; Genesis 9:20-26. We don’t know how small or large the worlds population was—scholars calculate that it could have been 750 million, while another says, 4 billion. But it wasn’t the numbers that bothered God…it was the wickedness. Genesis 6:5-7 says that God saw the wickedness of man, and it was great on the earth.
In Genesis 6:5 the word wickedness (ra` râ`âh) means, bad, evil. This includes the second (feminine) form; as adjective or noun. Do you see that? The women were just as bad as the men! Let’s look up the word, man; `âdâm (aw-dawm`), ruddy, that is a human being (as individual) or the (species) mankind. The offspring of Adam and Eve, men and women, were so evil that God was sorry He created humans! Verse six says “it repented the Lord that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart.” God isn’t a human who needs to repent (Numbers 23:19). The translators used the Old English word, repented, so let’s see what was really meant there. Repented (nâcham); a primitive root; properly to sigh, that is breathe strongly; by implication to be sorry.
God heaved a heavy sigh because He was so sorry He created Adam and Eve. Stop and think about it. We read those words (wicked/evil) throughout the bible, but I don’t think we grasp, or perceive what evil and wicked are truly about. We’ll jump ahead several centuries to Luke 17:26-30; and Matthew 24:37-39. When Jesus came to earth as a human, born of a virgin, that was His first coming. In Matthew and Luke He is prophesying His second coming. He says that before He returns, the earth will be just as evil as it was when Noah was alive. What we read in those few verses is that they were eating, drinking, marrying, getting engaged, and we think; “yeah, so? What’s so bad about that?”
Likewise in Luke, Jesus says the same thing, but keep reading to verse thirty, and He mentions about the days of Lot. Again, eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building. But the story of Lot is nearly the same as the Levite and the concubine in the last three chapters of Judges. Sodomites, surrounding a private residence to sodomize two men, but the two men were holy angels of God. Now do you see the blanks being filled in? We are living in the days before the second coming of Jesus. And what is happening in the world? The numbers of sodomites increasing, lesbianism, feminism, abortions, homicides, suicides, robberies, corruption in high places, assault on children’s minds and bodies, wars, rumors of wars, unrest, riots, division in the nation and families, rebellion against authority. Women want to be men, women want to do everything a man does. Women are lesbians, women marry women, women want to have careers with a man’s paycheck, women want to have sexual partners like a man, women want to get drunk, smoke, get high, dress as they want, say what they want, and if they get pregnant, they abort their offspring so it won’t interfere with future plans. Men who believe they were mistakenly born a man, dress as women, and/or have operations to appear as women. Likewise, females mutilating their bodies because they believe they were born the wrong sex. People calling good evil, and evil, good.
Jesus told us that what is happening now (in the 21st century, the last days before His appearance), happened during the days of Noah. He doesn’t lie. Read it again. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be with the coming of the Son of man (mankind, humans). In the days of Noah, men were building cities, conquering and being conquered, taking more than one wife, dressing like women, having sex with other men, beating their wives, going to war against others and burning cities. Just as women have shouldered their way into all things man, it was that way in the days of Noah. And all this was going on thousands of years ago when Noah was building the ark. Jesus said so. He didn’t read it off a list, but He said, “as it was in the days of Noah, so it will also be at the coming of the Son of man.” All this stuff in the news is what went on during Noah’s time. Because Jesus told the truth. No wonder God was so grieved. King Solomon, using his God given wisdom, stated in Ecclesiastes 1:9,10 that everything that’s happened will happen again, and there’s nothing new under the sun.
Out of all those millions or billions of people on the earth, Noah found favor with God because they had a close relationship (Genesis 6:8,9). Noah was 500 years old (Genesis 5:32) when God told him to build the ark—it was also around the same time that Shem, his first son was born (Genesis 7:6; Genesis 11:10). He was 600 years old when the flood came (Genesis 7:6). It took an entire century for Noah, and later his sons, to build that ark. And though the sons were married by the time they entered the ark, growing up, they were exposed to all that evil.
After departing from the ark, we read—Noah planted a vineyard made wine from it and got drunk…not so fast. What are the rules of survival? Shelter, food, water. Continued living in the ark wasn’t an option. First, they had to get off that mountain, and find a place to build homes. Scholars believe the small family traveled to Mesopotamia. Two years after the flood, Shem’s wife gave birth to Arphaxad (Genesis 11:10). As they’re building, planting, raising farm animals, the three wives are birthing boys and girls. The girls weren’t named—we only have the boys names. Japheth had seven sons, Ham had four sons, and Shem had five sons. The place Noah lived in is called a tent: as clearly conspicuous from a distance, covering, dwelling, place, home. It’s from a primitive root; to be clear, shine.
God would not have given Noah the assignment of building an ark if he was a tent maker, with no experience working with wood. God gave him verbal blue prints which Noah would’ve had to draw on paper or clay. He would also have to be an experienced lumberjack, saw mill worker, carpenter, and shipbuilder. Noah and his sons were experienced carpenters, so it’s only logical that the family would build themselves homes of wood. With lamp light or candle light shining through those windows at dark, it would certainly be conspicuous from a distance. So they’re settling down into daily routines, some years have passed, and Noah decides to start a vineyard.
It can take up to a decade for a vineyard to produce grapes good enough to make into wine. After it was made into wine, it has to age or ferment. If it’s red wine, it depends on the variety of wine as to how long to ferment—up to thirty years. So that’s at least forty years of work and waiting, plus the few extra years it took to travel, build, plant, etc. He may have planned to sell or trade with family members, but Noah can finally enjoy the fruits of his labor. He’s alone in his house, and wow, that’s got a punch! But it tastes so good, and he keeps drinking, and he’s feeling hot, so he peels off his clothes, and passes out from alcohol poisoning.
Noah was not an alcoholic. This couldn’t have been the very first time a man grew a vineyard. A thousand one hundred years have passed since the creation of Adam. In all that time, men had the opportunity to experiment with vineyards and wine making. If he just wanted to get drunk, forty plus years is a looong time to wait! During this time, the grandchildren have grown into adulthood. God cursed the ground because of Adam, so the composition of the grapes and/or soil was changed. Changed so much that the grapes produced an intoxicant. What happens in the next scene has had people perplexed for centuries. Ham is in his dad’s house. There’s no mention he entered, he’s just there. He sees his father naked, and immediately tells his brothers about it. But the brothers react as if their dad were lying out in the open. They grab a cloth, walk backwards into the house, and throw it on him. The author makes the point that they kept their face turned away too, so they didn’t see anything. Preachers have used this as a warning that we shouldn’t see our parents nude—as if it were a huge problem in families.
Did Noah’s family have a habit of walking unannounced into each others homes and bedrooms? Where was Mrs. Noah? Why have preachers claimed that Ham laughed or made fun of his dad, when there’s no evidence of it? And using it as a mini sermon. Why did Noah curse his grandson instead of his son? Was Ham a voyeur, who stood there staring at his father’s nudity for minutes before leaving? Why didn’t he just turn and run out, keeping the awkward moment a secret? Because there’s something else going on here that we need to dig up.
First, verse twenty two—Ham saw his father’s nakedness. The word saw means; to see. Other definitions are; enjoy, approve, behold, gaze. Whoa…this wasn’t a glance. So he told his brothers. The word told is; properly to front, that is stand boldly out, opposite; by implication to manifest; figuratively to announce. The word, and, is a function word, expressing an explanation as to what Ham did next—he sought his brothers, who were outdoors, to announce what he saw. Unable to keep it to himself, he had to tell someone, his brothers, who grew up with him in the wickedness of the pre-flood period. Okay, he definitely dishonored his father by blabbing about it instead of covering him.
Christians make this out to be the impropriety of accidentally seeing one’s parent naked, and the wrong way of reacting to it. In the 80s, I recall Marilyn Hickey commenting on this, and she said, because of the way verse twenty four is worded, means that Ham sodomized his father. But still, there’s more to reveal. “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.” Let’s look up, “had done.” In Hebrew the word is `âώâh (aw-saw`); to do or (make): accomplish, advance, appoint, apt, be at, become, bear, bestow, bring forth, bruise, be busy. The last two words in the sentence (had done) don’t have a reference number which means the translators added it. So Noah woke up and instinctively knew what his younger son had done. If this were a movie, ominous music would start playing.
But Noah was unconscious, you’re thinking. When someone is blacked out from drinking or drugs and are taken advantage of, they may have fractious memories of the incident. If they remember nothing…I don’t need to go into graphic detail here, but if someone is raped during such a vulnerable time, you will know that someone had sex with you. Noah wakens, and something’s off kilter…examines himself. What the…!! And right away he curses his grandson. Why?
So, again, I’m staring and contemplating the words in verse twenty four. “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.” Wait…his younger son is Japheth. Each time his sons are named, they’re presumably named in order of birth. Ham is the middle son. But Japheth was outdoors with Shem. And the Lord pointed something out to me that I hadn’t noticed before—in Genesis 9:18, and 22, it’s twice stated that Ham is the father of Canaan. I stared at it for a moment then looked up the definition of son in those verses.
Son; bên (bane): a son (as a builder of the family name, in the widest sense (of literal and figurative relationship) including grandson.
There it is! There it is! After all these centuries, the key to the puzzle! That’s why Noah cursed his grandson, and not Ham! A dim memory of the incident must have returned. Remember, a couple years of travel and settling, ten years to produce a good crop of grapes, twenty to thirty to let it ferment. Canaan was a grown man. And Noah shouted; “Canaan is cursed! He will be a servant of servants to his brothers! Blessed is the LORD God of Shem, and Canaan will be his servant. God will enlarge Japheth, and he will reside in the home of Shem. And Canaan will be his servant, too.” Wow, that’s low, being a servant to other servants. Ham wasn’t cursed, but neither did he receive blessings. As a father, he was responsible for his children’s upbringing.
Canaan was born after the flood, so where did he get such a perverted thought? All the centuries up to Noah’s time, God didn’t present any new laws. Any kings or leaders pre-flood, would’ve had their own laws. God gave Noah some new laws and instructions before his family left the mountain (Genesis 9:1-17), and It wasn’t until centuries later that God would write down His laws and give it to Moses. I guess you can debate that everything people did in the pre-flood era, and up to Moses, wasn’t a sin. But it was, since He stated that they, humans, were evil.
But God the Creator doesn’t change (Malachi 3:6). When Cain murdered Abel, he was punished. When Adam was a hundred and thirty years old, Eve gave birth to Seth. During his lifetime, men began to call on God. Someone was preaching. All they had to do was talk to God, and He could tell them not to do certain things. God would actually come down to the earth in the garden, and walk and talk with Adam and Eve (Genesis 3:8). It seems He did so again after Enoch was born. In Genesis 5:24 that word walked means: literally and figuratively. They were so close, God carried him away! Any one of Adam’s offspring could’ve done the same.
I’ll mention here that I have heard someone talk about this very subject (of Ham and Noah) a couple weeks after starting this article. They go to great lengths to prove through scriptures that Ham raped his own mother, who gave birth to Canaan. They point to the word nakedness (`ervâh, pronounced, er-vaw’) and its definition: (nudity) literally or figuratively (especially the pudenda) or figuratively disgrace blemish: nakedness shame unclean (-ness). Not having heard such a word before, I looked it up in a Webster’s dictionary. Pudenda: the external genital organs of a human being and especially of a woman—usually used in plural (pudendal). Especially of a woman, but not exclusively. Yet some have grabbed onto to that to mean that Ham raped his own mother. But wait, there’s more! Webster’s continues: First known use (of pudenda), 14th century, in the meaning defined above.
Now, the commissioning of the KJV took place in 1604, and the first edition appeared in 1611. James Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance to the bible was released in 1890. For all the centuries, the Hebrew word nakedness as used in Genesis 9:22 simply meant, nudity. The pudenda word had been used for almost two hundred years by the early 17th century, but we don’t know if the king James translators intended it to be included in the definition of “nakedness.” James Strong certainly did.
But…that same word, nakedness, `ervâh, and the definition, is used later in Genesis 42:9, 12 in the story of Joseph! He’s accusing his brothers of being spies, and seeing the nakedness of the land. Is Joseph saying his brothers are such perverts that they see women’s genitals everywhere in Egypt? Of course not, how stupid. Just as stupid to jump to conclusions that Ham had raped his mother because the pudenda definition was inserted in the late nineteen hundreds. If you have the Strong’s book or app, the number is H6172 for “nakedness”, and you’ll find the pudenda word peppered throughout the OT. Twenty times in Leviticus alone, and seven times in Ezekiel. If you read each scripture pertaining to it, it doesn’t make any sense. In my opinion, it should be removed.
Returning to those who claim Ham raped his mother—they completely ignored the fact that, immediately waking from a drunken stupor, Noah curses his grandson. If the mother had been raped, was Noah comatose for over nine months? Several of my family members and friends were alcoholics—when they passed out from drinking, it lasted anywhere from a couple hours to an entire day. There’s no way any of those men relatives would have known something bad had happened to their woman when they awoke. Most especially screaming out curses to a grandchild who hadn’t been born or named. And Noah was alone in the house. How would he have known she’d been raped, conceived, knew it was a boy, and given the name Canaan? And then there’s the statement that Noah found something had been done to him. Plus, the two statements about Ham being the father of Canaan, prompting us to look up the definition of son.
Canaan sodomized his own grandfather, either told his dad or Ham saw him leaving the house, who went in to view the scene of the crime. Remember the definitions for “saw” and “nakedness”? Go back and look at it again. Ham apparently took some moments looking at his father, before telling his brothers. Double gross. Makes you wonder what sort of quality father and son time that Ham spent with the four boys as they were growing up. He must’ve talked about the good ol’ days to influence Canaan in such a way. The flood was a very traumatic event—it’s logical that Noah’s family would’ve talked about it often. And also the evil they saw and heard. Because of Ham’s reaction, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to accept that he thought lightly of men with men. Maybe indulged. And the bible doesn’t record what Ham told his brothers. All this time, we’ve assumed he told his brothers that dad was merely lying naked in his “tent”. And laughed about it, according to some preachers. Did he…tell them what really happened? Is that why they dramatically took such careful pains to cover him up? No one could see the old guy, and the three brothers and the perp were the only ones who knew about dad’s predicament. What happened was one of the evils God referred to, but the brothers didn’t know how to deal with the situation. So Shem and Japheth solemnly covered their father—giving him the honor that Ham didn’t.
Noah’s reaction when he awoke was one of anger and offense. He did what he could for punishment—put a curse on his grandson. And God allowed it. So Noah cursed his grandson whose name means, humiliated. It’s from a primitive root; to bend the knee; vanquish: bring down into subjection, under, humble, subdue. Humiliation is what Noah felt at the moment. But wait, could he have re-named his grandson? Since Eve gave birth to her first child, baby’s are given a name soon after they’re born. Could Noah’s younger grandson have been re-named in the moment of humiliation? That’s something to meditate on.
From the beginning, names for boy babies were carefully thought of. The definitions of Ham’s first three sons, Cush, Mizraim, and Phut, is lost to time, being listed as foreign in origin, or the name of a son of Ham and his territory. Which makes it strange that the definition of Canaan (as a man’s name) would survive, and even weirder that Ham would purposely name his youngest son, humiliated. Because maybe dad had the final say as an appropriate name for his grandson.
John 4:23, 24 