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(Heb. Chanz, çָñ , hot [see below]; Sept. ×Üì . [Josephus ×Üìáò , Ant. i, 4, 1], Vulg. Chamn), the name of a man and also of two regions.
1. The youngest son of Noah (Genesis 5, 32; comp. 9:24). B.C. post 2618. Having provoked the wrath of his father by an act of indecency towards him, the latter cursed him and his descendants to be slaves to his brothers and their descendants (Gen_9:25). B.C. cir. 2514. To judge, however, from the narrative, Noah directed his curse only against Canaan (the fourth son of Ham) and his race, thus excluding from it the descendants of Ham's three other sons, Cush, Mizraim, and Phut (Gen_10:6). How that curse was accomplished is taught by the history of the Jews, by whom the Canaanites were subsequently exterminated. The general opinion is that all the southern nations derive their origin from Ham (to which the Hebrew root çָîִí , to be hot, not unlike the Greek Áἰößïðåò , lends some force). This meaning seems to be confirmed by that of the Egyptian word KEM (Egypt), which is believed to be the Egyptian equivalent of Ham, and which, as an adjective, signifies “black,” probably implying warmth as well as blackness. SEE EGYPT.
If the Hebrew and Egyptian words be the same, Ham must mean the swarthy or sun-burnt like Áἰößïø , which has been derived from the Coptic name of Ethiopia, ethops, but which we should be inclined to trace to thops, “a boundary;” unless the Sahidic esops may be derived from Kish (Cush). It is observable that the names of Noah and his sons appear to have had prophetic significations. This is stated in the case of Noah (Gen_5:29), and implied in that of Japheth (Gen_9:27), and it can scarcely be doubted that the same must be concluded as to Shem. Ham may therefore have been so named as progenitor of the sunburnt Egyptians and Cushites. Cush is supposed to have been the progenitor of the nations of East and South Asia, more especially of South Arabia, and also of Ethiopia; Mizrainm, of the African nations, including the Philistines and some other tribes which Greek fable and tradition connect with Egypt; Phut, likewise of some African nations; and Cancan, of the inhabitants of Palestine and Phoenicia. On the Arabian traditions concerning Ham, see D'Herbelot (Bibl. Orient. s.v.). SEE NOAH.
A. Ham's Place in his Family. Idolatry connected with his Name. — Like his brothers, he was married at the time of the Deluge, and with his wife was saved from the general destruction in the ark which his father had prepared at God's command. He was thus, with his family, a connecting link between the antediluvian population and those who survived the Flood. The salient fact of his impiety and dishonor to his father had also caused him to be regarded as the transmitter and representative in the renovated world of the worst features of idolatry and profaneness, which had growls to so fatal a consummation among the antediluvians. Lactantius mentions this ancient tradition of Ham's idolatrous degeneracy: “Ille [Cham] profugus in ejus terra parte consedit, quae nunc Arabia nominatur; eaque terra de nomine suo Chanaan dicta est, et poster ejus Chanianeei. Haec fuit prima gens quae Deum ignoravi, quoniam princeps ejus [Chami] et conditor cultum Deia a patre non accepit, maledictus ab eo; itfaue ignoraootiam divinitatis minoribus suis reliquit” (De, orig. errorts, 2, 13; De falssa Relig. 23). See other authors quoted in Beyer's Addit. ad Seldeni Syntag. de Diis Sytris (Ugolino, Thes. 23, 288). This tradition was rife also among the Jews. R. Manasse says, “Moreover Ham, the son of Noah, was the first to invent idols,” etc. The Tyrian idols called çîðéí , Chamanim, are supposed by Kircher to have their designation from the degenerate son of Noah (see Spencer, De legg. Heb'. [ed. Pfaff.] p. 470482). The old commentators, full of classical associations, saw in Noah and his sons the counterpart of Êñüíïò , or Saturn, and his three divine sons, of whom they identified Jupiter or Æåýò with Ham, especially, as the name suggested, the African Jupiter Ammon ( Á᾿ììïῦí [or, more correctly, Á᾿ìïῦí , so Gaisford and Bahr] ãÜñ Áἰãýðôéïé êáëÝïõóé ôὸí Äßá , Herod. Eute7p. 42, Plutach explains Á᾿ìïῦí by the better known form Á᾿ììùí , Is. et Osir. 9. In Jer_46:25, “the multitude of No” is àָîåֹï îַðֹּà , Amon of No; so in Nah_3:8, “Populous No” is No-Amon, ðàֹ àָîåֹï . For the identification of Jupiter Ammon with Ham, see J. Conr, Dannhauer's Politica Biblica, 2, 1; Is.Vossius, De Idol. lib. 2, cap. 7). This identification is, however, extremely doubtful; eminent critics of modern times reject it; among them Ewald (Geschichte des Volkes Israel, 1, 375 [note]), who says, “Mit dem aegyptischen Gotte Amonl oder Hammdn ihn zusammenzubringen hat man keinen Grund,” u. s. w.). One of the reasons which leads Bochart (Phaleg, 1, 1, ed.Villemand, p. 7) to identify Ham with Jupiter or Zeus is derived from the meaning of the names. çָí (from the root çָîִí ., — to be hot) combines the ideas hot and swarthy (comp. Áἰèßïø ); accordingly, St. Jerome, who renders our word by calidus, and Simon (Onomast. p. 103) by niger, are not incompatible. In like maneier Æåýò is derived ‘afernendo, according to the author of the tynmol. Magn., ðáñὰ ôὴí æÝóéí , èåñìüôáôïò ãὰñ ὁ ἄήñ , ἤ ðáñὰ ôὸ æÝù , to seethe, or boil fervere. Cyril of Alexandria uses èåñìáóßáí as synonymous (I 2, Glaphy.r. in Genes.). Another reason of identification, according to Bochart, is the fanciful one of comparative age. Zeus was the youngest of three brothers, and so was Ham in the opinion of this author. He is not alone in this view of the subject. Josephus (Ant. 1, 6, 3) expressly calls Ham the youngest of Noah's sons, ὸ íåώôáôïò ôῶí ðáßèùí . Gesenius (Thes. p. 489) calls him “filius natu tertius et. minimus;” similarly Furst (Hebr. Wörterbuch 1, 408), Knobel (die Genesis erkl. p. 101), Delitzsch (Comment. über die Gen. p. 280), and Kalisch (Genesis p. 229), which last lays down the rule in explanation of the áְּðåֹ äִ÷ָּèָï applied to Ham in Gen_9:24, “If there are more than two sons, áï âãåì is the eldest, áï ÷èåï the youngest son,” and he aptly compares 1Sa_17:13-14. The Sept., it is true, like the A.V., renders by the comparative-- ὁ íåώôåñïò , “his younger son.'' But, throughout, Shem is the term of comparison, the central point of blessing from whom all else diverge. Hence not only is Ham ä÷ָּèָï , ὁ íåώôåñïò , in comparison with Shem, but Japhet is relatively to the same äִâָּãåֹì , ὁ ìåßæùí (see Gen_10:21). That this is the proper meaning of this latter passage, which treats of the age of Japhet, the eldest son of Noah, we are convinced by the consideration just adduced, and our conviction ‘is supported by the Sept. translators, Symmachus, Rashi (who says, “From the words of the text I do not clearly know whether the elder applies to Shem or to Japhet. But, as we are afterwards informed that Shem was 100 years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the Deluge [11, 10], it follows that Japhet was the elder, for Noah was 500 years old when he began to have children, and the Deluge took place in his 600th year. His eldest son must consequently have been 100 years old at the time of the Flood, whereas we are expressly informed that Shem did not arrive at that, age until two years after the Deluge”), Aben-Ezra, Luther, Junius, and Tremellius, Piscator. Mercerus, Arius, Montanus; Clericus, Dathius, J. D. Michaelis, and Mendelssohn (who gives a powerful reason for his opinion: The tonic accents make it clear that the word äâãåì , the elder, applies to Yapheth; wherever the words of the text are obscure and equivocal, great respect and attention must be paid to the tonic accents, as their author understood the true meaning of the text better than we do.” De Sola, Lindenthal, and Raphall's Trans. of Geneses, p. 43). In consistency with this seniority of Japheth, his name and genealogy are first given in the Toledoth Beni Noah of Genesis 10. Shem's name stands first when the three brothers are mentioned together, probably because the special blessing (afterwards to be more fully developed in his great descendant Abraham) was bestowed on him by God. But this prerogative by no means affords any proof that Shem was the eldest of Noah's sons. The obvious instances of Seth, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, Joseph, Ephraim, Moses, David, and Solomon (besides this of Shem), give sufficient ground for observing that primogeniture was far from always securing the privileges of birthright and blessing, and other distinctions (comp. Gen_25:23; Gen_48:14; Gen_48:18-19, and 1Sa_16:6-12).
B. Descendants of Ham, and their locality. — The loose distribution which assigns ancient Asia to Shem, and ancient Africa to Ham, requires much modification; for although the Shemites had but little connection with Africa, the descendants of Ham had, on the contrary wide settlements in Asia, not only on the shores of Syria, the Mediterranean, and in the Arabian peninsula, but (as we learn from linguistic discoveries, which minutely corroborate the letter of the Mosaic statements, and refute the assertions of modern Rationalism) in the plains of Mesopotamia. One of the most prominent facts alleged in Genesis 10 is the foundation of the earliest monarchy by the grandson of Ham in Babylonia. “Cush [the eldest son of Ham] begat Nimrod the beginning of whose kingdom was Babel [Babylon], and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar” (vers. 6, 8, 10). Here we have a primitive Babylonian empire distinctly declared to have been Hamitic through Cush. For the complete vindication of this statement of Genesis from the opposite statements of Bunsen, Niebuhr, Heeren, and others, we must refer the reader to Rawlisson's Five great Monarchies, vol. 1, chap. 3, compared with his Historical Evidences, etc. (Bampton Lectures), p. 18, 68, 355-357. The idea of an “Asiatic Cush” was declared by Bunsen to be “an imagination of interpreters, the child of despair” (Phil. of Univ. History, 1, 191). But in 1858, Sir H. Rawlinson, having obtained a number of Babylonian documents more ancient than any previously discovered, was able to declare authoritatively that the early inhabitants of South Babylonia were of a cognate race with the primitive colonists both of Arabia and of the African Ethiopia (Rawlinson's Herodotus, 1, 442). He found their vocabulary to be undoubtedly Cushite or Ethiopian, belonging to that stock of tongues which in the sequel were everywhere more or less mixed up with the Shemitic languages, but of which we have the purest modern specimens in the Mahra of southern Arabia and the Galla of Abyssinia (ibid., note 9). He found, also, that the traditions both of Babylon and Assyria pointed to a connection in very early times between Ethiopia, Southern Arabia, and the cities on the lower Euphrates. We have here evidence both of the widely spread settlements of the children of Ham in Asia as well as Africa, and (what is now especially valuable) of the truth of the 10th chapter of Genesis as all ethnographical document of the highest importance. Some writers push the settlements of Ham still more towards the east; Feldhoff (Die Volkertafel der Genesis, p. 69), speaking generally of them, makes them spread, not simply to the south and south-west of the plains of Shinar, but east and south-east also: he accordingly locates some of the family of Cush in the neighborhood of the Paropamisus chain [the Hindu Kûsh], which he goes so far as to call the center whence the Cushites emanated, and he peoples the greater part of Hindfistan, Birmah, and China with the posterity of the children of Cush (see under their names in this art.). Dr. Prichard (Analysis of the Egyptian Mythology) compares the philosophy and the superstitions of the ancient Egyptians with those of the Hindus, and finds “so many phenomena of striking congruity” between these nations that he is induced to conclude that they were descended from a common origin. Nor ought we here to omit that the Arminian historian Abulfaragius among the countries assigned to the sons of Ham expressly includes both Scindia and India, by which he means such parts of Hindfistan as lie west and east of the river Indus (Greg. Abul-Pharagii, Hist. Dynast. [ed. Pocock, Oxon. 1673], Dyn. 1, p. 17).
The sons of Ham are stated to have been “Cush,” and Mizraim, and Phut,- and Caanan” (Gen_10:6; comp. 1Ch_1:8). It is remarkable that a dual form (Mizraim) should occur in the first generation, indicating a country, and not a person or a tribe, and we are therefore inclined to suppose that the gentile noun in the plural îַöְøַéí , differing alone ill the pointing from îַöְøִéַí originally stood here, which would be quite consistent with the plural forms of the names of the Mizraite tribes which follow, and analogous to the singular forms of the names of the Canaanite tribes, except the Sidonians, who are mentioned, not as a nation, but under the name of their forefather Sidon. The name of Ham alone, of the three sons of Noah, if our identification be correct, is known to have been given to a country. Egypt is recognized as the “land of Ham” in the Bible (Psa_78:51; Psa_105:23; Psa_106:22), and this, though it does not prove the identity of the Egyptian name with that of the patriarch, certainly favors it, and establishes the historical fact that Egypt, settled by the descendants of Ham, was peculiarly his territory. The name Mizraim we believe to confirm this. The restriction of Ham to Egypt, unlike the case, if we may reason inferentially, of his brethren, may be accounted for by the very early civilization of this part of the Hamitic territory, while much of the rest w-as comparatively barbarous. Egypt may also have been the first settlement of the Hamites whence colonies went forth, as we know was the case with the Philistines. SEE CAPHTOR.
I. Cush (Josephus ×ïῦóïò ) “reigned over the Ethiopians” [African Cushites]; Jerome (in Quaest. Hebr. in Genes.), “Both the Arabian Ethiopia, which was the parent country and the African, its colony” [Abyssinia = Cush in the Vulg. and Syr.]; but these gradations (confining Cush first to the western shore of the Red Sea, and then extending the nation to the Arabian Peninsula) require further extension; modern discoveries tally with this most ancient ethnographical record in placing Cush on the Euphrates and the Persian Gulf. When Rosenmüller (Scholia in Ges. ad loc.) claims Josephus for an Asiatic Cush as well as an African one, he exceeds the testimony of the historian, who says no more than that “the Ethiopians of his day called themselves Cushites, and not only they, but all the Asiatics also, gave them that name” (Ant. 1, 6, 2). But Josephus does not specify what Ethiopians he means: the form of his statement leads to the opposite conclusion rather, that the Ethiopians were Africans terely, excluded from all the Asiatics [ ὑðὸ ἑáõôῶí ôå êáὶ ἐí ôῇ Á᾿óßᾷ ðÜíôῶí ], the ἑáõôῶí referring to the Áἰèßïðåò just mentioned. ‘(For a better interpretation of Josephus here, see Volney, Systeme Geogr. des Hebreux, in Zieuvres, 5, 224.) The earliest empire, that of Nimrod, was Cushite, literally and properly, not per catachresin, as Heeren, Bunsen, and others would have it.
Sir W. Jones (On the Origin and Families of Nations, in Works, 3, 202) shows an appreciation of the wide extent of the Cushite race in primaeval times, which is much more consistent with the discoveries of recent times than the speculations of the neocritical school prove to be: “The children of Ham,” he says, “founded in Iran (the country of the lower Euphrates) the monarchy of the first Chaldeans, invented letters, etc.” (compare Rosenmüller, as above quoted). According to Volnev. the term Ethiopian, coextensive with Cush, included even the Hintdis; he seems, however, to mean the southern Arabians, who were, it is certain, sometimes called Indians (in Menologio Greco, part 2, p. 197. “Felix Arabia Tindtl vocatur ubi jelix vocatur India Arabica, ut ali Ethiopica et Gangetica distinguatur,” Assemani, Bibl. Orient. 3, 2, 569), especially the Yemenese; Jones, indeed, on the ground of Sanscrit affinities (“Cus or Cush being among the sons of Brahma, i.e. among the progenitors of the Hindus, and at the head of an ancient pedigree preserved in the Ractmyan”), goes so far as to say, “We can hardly doubt that the Cush of Moses and Valmic was an ancestor of the Indian race.” Jones, however, might have relied too strongly on the forged Purana of Wilford (Asiatic Researches, 3, 432); still, it is certain that Oriental tradition largely (though in its usual exaggerated tone) confirms the Mosaic statements about the sons of Noah and their settlements. “In the Rozit ul-SuoTah it is written that God bestowed on Ham nine sons,” the two which are mentioned at the head of the list (Hind, Sicnd, with which comp. Abulfaragius as quoted in one of our notices above), expressly connected the Hindus with Ham, although not through Cush, Who occurs as the sixth among the Hamite brethren. See the entire extract from the Khelassut- Akhibar of Khondemir in Rosenmüller (Bibl. Geogr. Append. to ch. 3, vol. 1, p. 109 [Bib. Cab.]). Bohlen (Genesis, ad loc.), who has a long but indistinct notice of Cush, with his Sanscrit predilections, is for extending Cush “as far as the dark India,” claiming for his view the sanction of Rosenm., Winer, and Schumann. When Job (Job_28:19) speaks of “the topaz of Ethiopia” ( ôַּèְøִúàּëּåּùׁ ), Bohlen finds a Sanscrit word in ôèãú , and consequently a link between Indict and Cush ( ëּåּùׁ , Ethiopia). He refers to the Syriac, Chaldeean, and Saadias versions as having India for Cush, and (after Braun, De Vest. Scaerd. 1, 115) assigns Rabbinical authority for it. Assemani, who is by Bohlen referred to in a futile hope of extracting evidence for the identification of Cush and India (of the Hindus), has an admirable dissertation on the people of Arabia (Bibl. Or. 3:2, 552 sq.); one element of the Arab population he derives from Cush (see below).
We thus conclude that the children of Ham, in the line of Cush, had very extensive settlements in Asia, as far as the Euphrates and Persian Gulf at least, and probably including the district of the Indus; while in Africa they both spread widely in Abyssinia, and had settlements apparently among their kinsmen, the Egyptians: this we feel warranted in assuming on the testimony of the Arabian geographers; e.g. Abulfeda (in his section on Egypt, tables, p. 110 in the original, p. 151 trans. by Reinand) mentions a Cush; or rather Kus, as the most important city in Egypt after the capital Fosthaht: its port on the Red Sea was Cosseyr, and it was a place of great resort by the Mohammedans of the west on pilgrimage. “The sons of Cush, where they once got possession, were never totally ejected. If they were at any time driven away, they returned after a time and recovered their ground, for which reason I make no doubt but many of them in process of time returned to Chaldea, and mixed with those of their family who resided there. Hence arose the tradition that the Babylonians not only conquered Egypt, but that the learning of the Egyptians came originally from Chaldea; and the like account from the Egyptians, that people from their country had conquered Babylon, and that the wisdom of the Chaldaeans was derived from them” (Bryant, On Ancient Egypt, in Works, 6, 250). SEE CUSH.
1. Seba (Josephus Óἀâáò ) is “universally admitted by critics to be the ancient name for the Egyptian [Nubian] Meroe” (Bohlen). This is too large a statement; Bochart denies that it could be Meroe, on the assumption that this city did not exist before Cambyses, relying on the statement of Diodorus and Lucius Ampelius. Josephus (Ant. 2, 10), however, more accurately says that Saba “was a royal city of Ethiopia [Nubia], which Cambyses afterwards named Meroe, after the name of his sister.” Bochart would have Seba to be Saba-eMal reb in Arabia, confounding our Seba ( ñְáָà ) with Sheba ( ùׁáָà ). Meroe, with the district around it, was no doubt settled by our Seba. (See Gesen. s.v., who quotes Burckhardt, Rtippell, and Hoskins; so Corn. a Lap., Rosenm., and Kalisch; Patrick agrees with Bochart; Volney [who differs from Bochart] yet identifies Seba with the modern Arabian Sabbea; Heeren throws his authority into the scale for the Ethiopian Meroi; so Knobel.) It supports this opinion that Seba is mentioned in conjunction with the other Nile lands (Ethiopia and Egypt) in Isa_43:3; Isa_45:14. (The Sheba of Arabia, and our ‘Ethiopian Seba, as representing opposite shores of the Red Sea, are contrasted in Psa_72:10.) See Feldhoff (Volkertafel, p. 71), who, however, discovers manly Sebas both in Africa (even to the southwest coast of that continent) and in Asia (on the Persian Gulf), a circumstance from which he derives the idea that, in this grandson of their patriarch, the Hamites displayed the energy of their race by widely-extended settlements. SEE SEBA.
2. Havilah (Josephus Åὐú v ëáò ), not to be confounded (as he is by Rosenm., and apparently by Patrick, after Bochart) with the son of Joktan, who is mentioned in v. 29. Joseph and Jerome, as quoted by Corn. a Lap., were. not far wrong in making the Gaetulians (the people in the central part of North Africa, between the modern Niger and the Red Sea) to be descended from the Cushite Havilah. Kiepert (Bibel-Atas, fol. I) rightly puts our Havilah in East Abyssinia, by the Straits of Baib el-Mindeb. Gesen., who takes this view, refers to Pliny, 6, 28, and Ptolemy, 4, 7, for the Avalitce, now Zeilah, and adds that Saadias repeatedly renders çåéìä by Zeilah. Bohlen at first identifies the two Havilahs, but afterwards so far corrects himself as to admit, very properly, that there was probably on the west coast of the Red Sea a Havilah as well as on the east of it just in the same way as there was one Seba on the coast of Arabia, and another opposite to it in Ethiopia.” There is no such difficulty as Kalisch (Genesis, Pref. p. 93) supposes in believing that occasionally kindred people should have like namoles. It is not more incredible that there should be a Havilah both in the family of Ham and in that of Shem (Gen_10:7, comp. with Gen_10:29) than that there were Enochs and Lamechs among the posterities of both Cain and Seth (compare Gen_4:17-18, with Gen_4:18; Gen_4:25). Kalisch's cumbrous theory of a vast extent of country from the Persian Gulf running to the south-west and crossing the Red Sea, of the general name of Havilah (possessed at one end by the son of Joktan, and at the other by the son of Cush), removes no difficulty, and, indeed, is unnecessary. There is no “apparent discrepancy” (of which he speaks, p. 249) in the Mosaic statement of two Havilahs of distinct races, nor any violation- of consistency when fairly judged by the nature of the case. Michaelis and Feldhoff strangely flounder about in their opposite conjectures: the former supposes our Havilah to be the land of the Chvalisci, on the Caspian, the latter places it in China Proper, about Pekin (!). SEE HAVLAH.
3. Sabtlah (Joseph. ÓáâÜèá , ÓáâÜèáò ) is by Josephus, with great probability, located immediately north of the preceding, in the district east of Meroe, between the Astabaras (Tacazze), a tributary of the Nile, and the Red Sea, the country of the Astabari, as the Greeks called them ( Óáâáèçíïὶ ὀíïìÜæïíôáé äὲ Á᾿óôÜâáñïé ðáñ ῞Åëëçóéí , Ant. 1, 6, 2). Kalisch quite agrees in this opinion, and Gesenius substantially, when he places Sabtah on the south-west coast of the Red Sea, where was the Ethiopian city ÓáâÜô . (See Strabo, 16, p. 770 ed. Casaub.], and Ptolemy, 4:10.) Rosenm., Bohlen, and Knobel, with less propriety, place it in Arabia, with whom agree Delitsch and Keil, while Feldhoff, with his usual extravagance, identifies it with Thilet. SEE SABTAH.
4. Raamah (Josephus ῾ÑÝãìá , ῾ÑÝãìïò ) and his two sons Sheba ( Óáâᾶò ) and Dedan ( ÉïõäÜäáò ) are separated by Josephus and Jerome, who place the last-mentioned in West Ethiopia ( Áἰäéïðéêὸí ἔèíïò ôῶí Å᾿óðåñἰùí , which Jerome translates Gens AEthiopice in occidentali plaga). Ezekiel, however, in 27:20, 22, mentions these three names together in connection with Arabia. According to Niebuhr, who, in his map of Yemen, has a province called Sabid, and the town of Sabbea (in long. 43° 30', lat. 18°), the country south of Sabid abounds with traces of the name and family of Cush. Without doubt, we have here veritable Cushite settlers in Arabia (Assemani, Bibl. Oriental. 3, 2, 554). All the commentators whom we have named (with the exception of Feldhoff) agree in the Arabian locality of these grandsons and son of Cush. A belt of country ‘stretching from the Red Sea, opposite the Ethiopian Havilah, to the south of the Persian Gulf, across Arabia, comprises the settlements of Raamah and his two sons. The city called ῾ÑÝãìá , or ῾Ñῆãìá , by Ptolemy (6, 7), within this tract, closely resembles Raamah, as it is written in the original ( øִòְîָä ); so does the island Daden, in the Persian Gulf, resemble the name of one of the sons, Dedan. SEE DEDAN.
5. Sabtechah (Joseph. ÓáâáêáèÜ , ÓáâáêÜèáò ) is by Kalisch thought to have settled in Ethiopia, and the former of the word favors the opinion, the other compounds of Sab being apparently of Ethiopic or Cushite origin. “Its obvious resemblance to the Ethiopian name Subatok, discovered on Egyptian monuments (comp. the king ñåà , in 2Ki_17:4, and the Sebechus of Manetho), renders its position in Arabia, or at the Persian Gulf, improbable; but Samydace, in Gedrosia (as Bochart supposes), or Tabochosta, in Persia (as Bohlen suggests), or Satakos, are out of the question. The Targum of Jonathan renders it here æðâàé (Zinti), which is the Arabic name for the African district Zanguebar, and which is not inappropriate here” (EK;lisch). SEE SABTECHAH.
6. Nimrod (Joseph. Íåâñώäçò ), the mighty founder of the earliest imperial power, is the grandest name, not only among the children of Ham, but in primeval history. He seems to have been deified under the title of Bilu- Nipru, or Bel-Nimrod, which may be translated “the god of the chase,” or “the great hunter.” (The Greek forms Íåâñώä and Íåâñώè serve to connect Nipru with ðַîְøֹã The native root is thought to be napar, “to pursue,” or “cause to flee,” Rawlinson, p. 196.) He is noticed here in his place, in passing, because around his name and exploits has gathered a mass of Eastern tradition from all sources, which entirely corroborates the statement of Moses, that the primitive empire of the Chaldaeans was Cushite, and that its people were closely connected with Egypt, and Canaan, and Ethiopia. Rawlinson (Fire Great Mot1., chap. 3) has collated much of this tradition, and shown that the hints of Herodotus as to the existence of an Asiatic Ethiopia as well as an African one (3, 94; 7:70), and that the traditional belief which Moses of Chorene, the Armenian historian, has, for instance, that Nimrod is in fact Belus, and grandson of Cush by Mizraim (a statement substantially agreeing with that of the Bible), have been too strongly confirmed by all recent researches (among the cuneiform inscriptions) it comparative philology to be set aside by criticism based on the mere conjectures of ingenious men. It would appear that Nimrod not only built cities, and conquered extensive territories, “subduing or expelling the various tribes by which the country was previously occupied” (Rawlinson, p. 195; comp. Gen_10:10-12 [marginal version]), but established a dynasty of some eleven or twelve monarchs. By-and-by (about 1500 B.C.; see Rawlinson, p. 223) the ancient Chaldaeans, the stock of Gush and people of Nimrod, sank into obscurity, crushed by a foreign Shemitic stock, destined after some seven or eight. centuries of submission to revive to a second tenure of imperial power, which culminated in grandeur under the magnificent Nebuchadnezzar. SEE NIMROD.
II. MIZRAIM (Joseph. Ìåóñáú v í , Ìåóôñáú v ìïò ), that is, the father of Egypt, is the second son of Cush. Of this dual form of a man's name we have other instances in Ephraim and Shaharaim (1Ch_8:8). We simply call the reader's attention to the fact, vouched for in this genealogy of the Hamites, of the nearness of kindred between Nimrod and Mizraim. This point is of great value in the study of ancient Eastern history, and will reconcile many difficulties which would otherwise be insoluble. “For the last 3000 years it is to the Shemitic and Indo-European races that the world has been mainly indebted for its advancement; but it was otherwise in the first ages. Egypt and Babylon, Mizraim and Nimrod, both descendants of Ham, led the way and acted as the pioneers of mankind in the various untrodden fields of art, literature, and science. Alphabetic writing, astronomy, history, chronology, architecture, plastic art, sculpture, navigation, agriculture, and textile industry, seem, all of them, to have had their origin in one or other of these two countries” (Rawlinson, p. 75).
If, as some suppose, Mizraim in the lists of Genesis 10, and 1 Chronicles 1, stands for Mizrim, we should take the singular Mazor to be the name of the progenitor of the Egyptian tribes. It is remarkable that Mazor appears to be identical in signification with Ham, so that it may be but another name of the patriarch. SEE EGYPT. In this case the mention of Mizraim (or Mizrim) would be geographical, and not indicative of a Mazor, son of Ham.
The Mizraites, like the descendants of Ham, occupy a territory wider than that bearing the name of Mizraim. We may, however, suppose that Mizraim included all the first settlements, and that in remote times other tribes besides the Philistines migrated, or extended their territories. This we may infer to have been the case with the Lehabim (Lubim) or Libyans, for Manetho speaks of them as in the remotest period of Egyptian history subject to the Pharaohs. He tells us that under the first king of the third dynasty, of Memphites, Necherophes, or Necherochis, “the Libyans revolted from the Egyptians, but, on account of a wonderful increase of the moon, submitted through fear” (Cory's Anc. Frag. 2nd edit. p. 100, 101). It is unlikely that at this very early time the Memphite kingdom ruled far, if at all, beyond the western boundary of Egypt. SEE MIZRAIM.
Land of Ham. — By this and similar poetic terms the Psalmist designates Egypt in Psa_105:23 (“Jacob sojourned in the land of-Ham,” çָíáְּàֶøֶåֹ , here parallel and synonymous with îַâְøִéַí ,with which compare Psa_105:27; Psa_106:22-23), and in Psa_78:51 (where “the tabernacles of Ham,” àָäַìֵéàּçָí . , is again parallel with îַöְøִéí ). What in these passages is the poetical name of Egypt in Hebrew, was among the Egyptians themselves probably the domestic and usual designation of their country (Gesenius). According to Gesenius, this name of Ham (“Coptic Chemi,” for which Lepsius, however, substitutes another word, Hem [Memph.] or Hem [Thebaic]) is derived from the swarthy complexion of the people (what Gesenius calls Coptic Lepsius designates by the now more usual term Memphitic: Gesenius adds the Sahidic [Lepsius's Thebaic] form of “our word Keme [from kern, black]; but Lepsius denies that the name of Egypt, Ham [ çָí ],has “any direct connection” with this word; he substitutes the root hem, or hem [Memphitic], which is softened into hhem, or hhem, in the sister dialect of Thebes; the meaning of which is to be hot [Tattam, Lex. ,Egypt. Lat. p. 653, 671]. Chemi, however, and Khem, are, no doubt, the constantly used terms for the name of the country [see Tattam, p. 155, 560, and Uhlemann, Copt. Gr. et Lex. p. 154]), while Lepsius says, “not from the color of its inhabitants, which was red, but from that of its soil, which formed a strong contrast with the adjacent countries.” (Comp. Herodotus's ìåëÜããáéïí , 2, 12, and Plutarch's Áἴãõðôïí ἐí ôïῖò ìÜëéóôá ìåëÜããåéïí ï῏õóáí ×çìßáêáëïὔóé , De Isid. et Osir. [Reiske] 7,437.) In the hieroglyphic language the name occurs as KM. The inscription of it, as it frequently occurs on the Rosetta stone, is pronounced by Champollion, Akerblad, and Spohn, Chmd (Gesen. Thes. p. 489). The name by which Egypt is commonly called in Hebrew, îָöåø îַöְøִéַí should probably be translated Egypt in 2Ki_19:24; Isa_19:6; Isa_37:25; and Mic_7:12; Gesen. and Furst, s.v.), was not used by the Egyptians (Bahr, Herodot. note, ad 1. c.), but by Asiatics it appears to have been much used of the land of the Nile, as is evident from the cuneiform inscriptions. The Median form of the name was Mitzariga; the Babylonian, Mizir; the Assyrian, Aluzri. The Arabic name of the present capital of Egypt is El Mazr, and the country also is Misr (Sir H. Rawlinson, Jour. R. As. Soc. Vol. 14, pt. 1, p. 18; Lepsius, in Herzog, s.v. Egypt). Josephus (Ant. 1, 6, 2) renders the Hebrew name of Egypt by ÌÝóôñç , and of the people by Ìåóôñῖïé . Whether, however, we regard the native name from the father, or the Asiatic from the son, they both vouch for the Hamitic character of Egypt, which probably differed from all the other settlements of this race in having Ham himself as the actual ἀñ÷çãüò of the nation, among whom also he perhaps lived and died. This circumstance would afford sufficient reason both why the nation itself should regard the father as their eponymus rather than the son, who only succeeded him in the work of settlement, and why, moreover, foreigners with no other interest than simply to distinguish one Hamitic colony from another should have preferred for that purpose the name of the son, which would both designate this particular nation, and at the same time distinguish it from such as were kindred to it.
On the sons of Mizraim we must be brief, Josephus noticed the different fortune which had attended the names of the sons from that of the grandsons of Ham, especially in the family of Mizraim; for while “time has not hurt” the former, of the latter he says (Ant. 1, 6, 2), “we know nothing but their names.” Jerome (who in these points mostly gives us only the echo of Josephus) says similarly: “Caeterse sex gentes ignotse sunt nobis... quia usque ad oblivionem prseteritorum nominum pervenere.” They both, indeed, except two names from the obscurity which had oppressed the other six, Labin and Philistim, and give them “a local habitation with their name.” What this is we shall notice soon; meanwhile we briefly state such identifications of the others as have occurred to commentators. Josephus, it will be observed, fenders all these plural Hebrew names by singular forms. These plurals seem to indicate clans speaking their own languages (comp. Mic_7:20, which surmounts our table), centered around their patriarch, from whom, of course, they derived their gentile name: thus, Ludim from Lud; Pathrusim from Pathros, etc. (Feldhoff, p. 94). Lenormant notices the fact of so many nations emerging from Egypt, and spreading over Africa (L'Asie Occidentale, p. 244), for he understands these names to be of peoples, not individuals; so Michaelis, Spicileg. p. 254, who quotes Aben- Ezra for the same opinion. Aben-Ezra, however, does not herein represent the general opinion of the Jewish doctors. The relative àùø îùí misled him; he thought it necessarily implied locality, and not a personal antecedent. Mendelssohn declares him wrong in this view, and refers to Gen_49:24. “It is probable,” he adds, “that Ludim and the other names were those of men, who gave their names to their descendants. Such was the opinion of Rashi, etc.,” who takes the same view as the old Jewish historian.
1. Ludins (Josephus Ëïõäéåßìïò ) is not to be confounded with Shem's son Lud (Gen_49:22), the progenitor of the Lydians. The Ludim are often mentioned in Scripture (Isa_66:19; Jer_46:9; Eze_27:10; Eze_30:5) as a warlike nation, skilled in the use of spear and bow, and seem to have been employed (much as the Swiss have been) as mercenary troops (Gesen. Jesaias, 3, 311). Bochart (who placed Cush in Arabia) reserved Ethiopia for these Ludim; one of his reasons being based on their use of the bow, as he learns of Herodotus, Strabo, Heliodorus, and Diodorus Siculus. But the people of North Africa were equally dexterous with this implement of war; we have therefore no difficulty in connecting the Ludim with the country through which the river Lud or Laud ran (Pliny, 5, 2), in the province of Tingitania (Tangier); so Bohlen, Delitzsch, and Feldhoff, which last writer finds other names of cognate origin in North Africa, e.g. the tribe called Lucdaa, inhabiting one of the oases, and the district of Ludconar, in Nigritia. Kalisch suggests the Egyptian Letopolis or Letus, and Clarke the Mareotis of Egypt; while Keil supposes the Berber tribe Lecwatah; and Lenormant (L'Asie Occid. p. 244) the Nubians; they think a proximity to Egypt would be most compatible with the fact that the Ludim were Egyptian auxiliaries (Jer_46:9). SEE LUINM.
2. Amarnim (Josephus Å᾿íåíßìïò ) are, with unusual unanimity, placed by the commentators in Egypt. Calmet represents the older opinion, quoting Jonathan's Targ. for the Mareotis. Knobel (with whom agree Delitzsch, Keil, and Feldhoff) places them in the Delta, the Sept. rendering Å᾿íåìåôéåßì suggesting to him Sanernhit, the Egyptian word for north country. The word occurs nowhere else in the Old Testament.
3. Leabim (Josephus Ëáâéåßì , Ëáâßìïò ) is; with absolute unanimity, including even Jerome and Josephus (who says, Ë . ôïῦ êáôïéêήóáíôïò ἐí Ëéâýç êáὶ ôὴí ÷ώñáí ἀö᾿ áὑôïῦ êáëÝóáíôïò ), identified with the shorter word ìåּáַéí , Lubim, in 2Ch_12:3; 2Ch_16:8; and again in Nah_3:9; Dan_11:43. They are there the Libyans; Bochart limits the word to the Liby-aegyptii, on the west frontier of Egypt; so Knobel. The Hebrew word has been connected (by Bochart) with ìֶäָáָä , and the plur. of ìִäִá , which means flame; Rashi supposing that they are so called “because their faces were inflamed with the sun's heat” (Isa_13:8), from their residence so near the torrid zone. Hitzig's idea that the Lehabim may be Nubians is also held by Lenormant (L'Asie Occid. p. 244). The opinion of the latter is based upon the general principle entertained by him, that, as Cush peopled Ethiopia, and Phut Libya, and Canaan Phoenicia, so to Mizraim must be appropriated Egypt, or (at least) the vicinity of that country. There is some force in this view, although the application of it in the case of Lehabim need not confine his choice to Nubia. Libya, with which the name is associated by most writers since Josephus, is contiguous to Egypt, on its western frontier, and would answer the conditions as well as Nubia. SEE LEHABIM.
4. Caphtufhins (Josephus ÍÝäåìïò ), according to Bochart and Rosenmüller, should be identified with Nephtys, in the north of Egypt; Bohlen suggests the Nobatce, in Libya; Corn. a Lap. the Numidians; Patrick (after Grotius) Nepata, in Ethiopia; but none of these opinions appear to us so probable as that of Knobel, who thus vindicates for the Memphitic, or Middle Egyptians, the claim to be the Naphtuhim. Memphis was the chief seat of the worship of Phthah, an Egyptian deity. If the plural possessive particle na= ïἱ ôïῦ (Uhlemann, sec. 14, 1) be prefixed, we get the word na-Ptahh, the people of Phthah, ïἱ ôïῦ ÖèÜô , just as the Moabites are designated the people of Chemosh (Num_21:29; Jer_48:46), and the Hebrews the people of Jehovah (Eze_36:20). SEE NAPHTUHIM.
5. Pathrusim (Josephus ( Öåäñùóßìïò ) are undoubtedly the people of Upper Egypt, or the Thebaid, of which the capital, Thebes, is mentioned, under the name of No and No-Amon, in Nah_3:8; Eze_30:14-16; and Jer_46:25. Pathros is an Egyptian name, signifying the South country (pet-res), which may possibly include Nubia also; in Isa_11:11, and probably Jer_44:15, Pathros is mentioned as distinct from, though in close connection with, Egypt. By Greek and Roman writers the Thebaid is called Nomus Phaturites (Pliny, Hist. Xat. v, 9; Ptol. 4:5, 69). So Bochart, Bohlen, Delitzsch, Kalisch, Keil, Knobel. Brugsch's suggestion that our word comes from Pa-Hathor, that is, the Nome of Hathor, an Egyptian deity of the nether world, is an improbable one. SEE PATHAUSIM.
6. Casluhim (Josephus ×åóëïῖìïò ). In addition to what is said under the article CASLUHIM SEE CASLUHIM , it may be observed that the Coptic (Basmuric) name of the district called Casiotis, which Rosenmüller writes Chadsaieloihe, is compounded of ges, a “mount,” and lokh, “to burn,” and well indicates a rugged and arid country, out of which a colony may be. supposed to have emigrated to a land called so nearly after their own home. (Comp. ëִּñְìåֹç , and Cheslokh, and Êïë÷ßò , with the metathesis which Gesenius suggests.) This proximity to southwest Palestine of their original abode also exactly corresponds to the relation between these Casluhim and the next mentioned people, expressed in the parenthetical clause, “Out of whom came Philistim” (Gen_10:14); i.e. the Philistines were a colony of the Casluhim,. probably drafted off into the neighboring province in consequence of the poverty of their parental home, the very cause which we may suppose impelled some of the Casluhim themselves to seek a more favorable settlement on the south-east shore of the Black Sea, in Colchis.
Philistin (Josephus Öõëéóôéíüò ), who, according to Josephus, suggested to the Greeks the name of Palestine. We here advert to the various readings of the Hebrew text suggested by Michaelis (Spiciley. p. 278), who, after Rashi and Masius, would transpose the sentence thus: åְàֶúàּëִּñ 8 åְàֶúàּëִּôְ 8 àֲùֶׁø éָöְàåּ îַùָׁí ôְּì , that is, “And Casluhim, and Capthorim (out of whom came Philistim”). This transposition makes Caphtorin the origin of the Philistines, according to Amo_9:7, and perhaps Deu_2:23; Jer_47:4. Rosenmüller, Gesenius, and Bohlen assent to this change, but there is no authority for it either in MSS., Targums, or Versions; and another rendering of the passage, “Out of whom came Philistim and Caphtorim,” is equally without foundation. In the Hebrew text, as well as the Targums and the Sept., Philistim alone appears as a subject, all the other proper names (including the last, Caphtorim) have the objective sign àֶú , éִú , and ôïýò . This is decisive. SEE PHILISTINES.
7. Capthorim (Josephus ×åöèüñéìïò by Onkelos is rendered ÷ִôּåּèְ÷ָàֵé , “Cappadocians;” in the Peshito also “Cappadocians.” So the other Targums, and (according to Calmet) “veteres omnes ac recentiores stant pro Cappadocibus.” SEE CAPHTHOR. In support of the opinion advanced concerning the Caphthorim in this article, it may be observed that in the Mishna (Cethuboth [Surenh.], 3:103), the very word of the Targum, ÷ôåè÷éà , Cappadocia, repeatedly occurs; and (what escaped the notice of Bochart) Maimonides, an excellent authority in Egyptian topography, and Bartenora, both in their notes explain this Calphutkaja to be Caphtor, and identify it with Damietta, in the north of Egypt, in ‘the immediate vicinity of that Casiotis where we placed the primitive Casluhim. It may be added, as some support to our own opinion, that Benjamin of Tudela says (Asher, p. 158; ed. Bohn, p. 121, 123), “Damietta is Caphtor in Scripture.”
III. PHUT (Josephus Öïýôçò .), the third son of Ham, is thus noticed by Josephus (Ant. 1, 6, 2): “Phut was the founder of Libya; he called the inhabitants Phutites, after himself; there is a river in the country of the Moors which bears that name; whence it is that we may see the greatest part of the Grecian historiographers mention that river and the adjoining country by the appellation of Phut; but its present name has been given it from one of the sons of Mizraim, who was called Libys [the progenitor of the Labin].” Jerome of course adopts this view, which has also been endorsed by Bochart, Michaelis, Rosenmuller, Gesenius, Bohlen, Delitzsch, Keil, and Kalisch. The versions corroborate it also, Tor in Jer_46:9 [Sept. 26:9], ôּåּè (Phut) is rendered “Libyans” in the A.V., Libyes in the Vulg., and Ëßâõåò in the Sept. Similarly the ôּåֹּè of Eze_30:5, is “Libya” in the A.V., Libyes in the Vulg., and Ëßâõåò in the Sept. (so Eze_38:5).
Like some of their kindred races, the children of Phut are celebrated in the Scriptures “as a warlike, well-armed tribe, sought as allies, and dreaded as enemies” (Kalisch). Phut means a bow; and the nation seems to have been skilled in archery, according to the statements of the Bible. We may add, in confirmation of the preceding view of the locality of Phut, that the Coptic name of Libya, nearest to Egypt, was Phaiat. The supposition of Hitzig that Phut was Ðïýôåá , west of Libya, on the north coast of Africa, and of Kalisch that it might have been Buto the capital of the Delta, on the south shore of the Butic lake, are unlikely to find much acceptance by the side of the universal choice of all the chief writers, which we have indicated above. (Pliny, Hist. Nat. 5, 1, has mentioned the river, referred to by Josephus, as the Fut [or Phuth], and Ptolemy, in like manner, as the 4 ῎ïᾷ -, 4:1, 3; comp. Michaelis, Spicileg. 1, 160.) It must be admitted that Josephus and those who have followed him are vague in their identification. Libya was of vast extent; as, however, it extended to the Egyptian frontier, it will, perhaps, best fulfil all the conditions of the case, keeping in view the military connection which seems to have existed between Phut and Egypt, if we deposit the posterity of Phut in Eastern Libya contiguous to Egypt, not pressing too exactly the statement of Josephus, who probably meant no more, by his reference to the country, of the Moors and the river Phut, than the readily allowed fact that in the vast and unexplored regions of Africa might be found traces, in certain local names, of this ancient son of Ham. The only objection to this extent of Libya is that this part of the country has already been assigned to the Lehabins (see above). To us, however, it seems sufficient to obviate this difficulty to hold that while the Lehabim impinged on the border of Upper Egypt, the children of Phut were contiguous to Lower Egypt, and extended westward along the north coast of Africa, and into the very interior of the continent. Phut was no doubt of much greater extent than the Lehabim, who were only a branch of Mizraim; for it will be observed that in the case of Phut, unlike his brothers, he is mentioned alone without children. Their settlements are included in the general name of their father Phut, without the subdivisions into which the districts colonized by his brothers' children were arranged. The designation, therefore, of Phut is generic; of Ludim, Lehabim, etc., specific, and in territory limited.
IV. CANAAN (Josephus ×áíÜáíïò ) was the youngest of the sons of Ham, and there is less obscurity concerning his descendants. “Canaan, the fourth son of Ham,” says Josephus (Ant. 1, 6, 2), “inhabited the country now called Judaea ( ôὴí íῦí êáëïõìÝíçí É᾿ïõäáßáí . In the time of Josephus, it must be recollected, this included the entire country which we loosely call the Holy Land), and called it after his own name, “Canaan.” This country is more distinctly described than any other in Holy Scripture, and in the record o