EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)
(25)
Cursed be Canaan.—The prophecy of Noah takes the form of a poem, like Lamech’s boast in Genesis 4. In it Ham is passed over in silence, as though his unfilial conduct, recorded in
Genesis 9:22, made him unworthy of a blessing, while it was not so wicked as to bring on him a curse. The whole weight of Noah’s displeasure falls on Canaan, whose degraded position among the nations is thrice insisted upon.
A servant of servants. That is, the most abject of slaves. This was fulfilled in the conquest of Canaau by Joshua, but the race had nevertheless a great future before it. The Hittites were one of the foremost nations of antiquity, and the Sido-nians, Tyrians, and Phœnicians were such famous traders, that Canaanite is in our version translated merchant, without even a note in the margin (e.g., Proverbs 31:24). But the whole race was enslaved by one of the most terrible and degrading forms of idolatry, and as Shem’s blessing is religious, so possibly is Canaan’s curse. Lenormant (Manual of Ancient History of the East, 2:219) says of their religion, “No other people ever rivalled them in the mixture of bloodshed and debauchery with which they thought to honour the Deity.” He also quotes Creuzer, who says, “The Canaanite religion silenced all the best feelings of human nature, degraded men’s minds by a superstition alternately cruel and profligate, and we may seek in vain for any influence for good it could have exercised on the nation.”
Genesis 9:25.
Cursed be Canaan — Canaan may be here put, by a well-known figure termed ellipsis, often used in Scripture, for the
father of Canaan, the title given to Ham in
Genesis 9:22. And although Ham had more sons, he may here be described by his relation to Canaan, because in him the curse was more fixed and dreadful, reaching to the utter extirpation of his seed, while many of the other nations descended from Ham were, in after ages, blessed with the knowledge of the true God and the gospel of his Son.
A servant of servants shall he (namely, the father of Canaan, Ham)
be to his brethren — That is, in his posterity; whose condition in every age has remarkably coincided with the prediction. “The whole continent of Africa was peopled principally by the descendants of Ham, and for how many ages did the better parts of that country lie under the dominion of the Romans, and then of the Saracens, as they do now under that of the Turks! In what wickedness, ignorance, barbarity, slavery, misery, live most of the inhabitants! And of the poor how many hundreds, nay thousands, have been annually sold and bought, like beasts in the market, and conveyed from one quarter of the world to do the work of beasts in another!” — Newton
on the Prophecies. “There never has been a son of Ham who hath shaken a sceptre over the head of Japheth. Shem hath subdued Japheth, and Japheth subdued Shem, but Ham never subdued either.” — Mede. The curse, however, principally respects the posterity of Canaan, the devoted nations whom God destroyed before Israel, and is here recorded for the encouragement of the Israelites, who, it is probable, when Moses wrote these words, were about to march against them and to take possession of their country, about eight hundred years after the words were uttered by Noah. The Phœnicians and Carthaginians are also included in the curse denounced on Canaan; for they were descended from him, and were, at length, subdued with dreadful destruction by the Greeks and Romans, and made tributary to them both.
9:24-29 Noah declares a curse on Canaan, the son of Ham; perhaps this grandson of his was more guilty than the rest.
The prophecy consists of two parts - a malediction and a benediction. "Cursed be Kenaan." A curse
Genesis 3:14,
Genesis 3:17;
Genesis 4:11 is any privation, inferiority, or other ill, expressed in the form of a doom, and bearing, not always upon the object directly expressed, but upon the party who is in the transgression. Thus, the soil is cursed on account of Adam the transgressor
Genesis 3:17. It is apparent that in the present ease the prime mover was Ham, who is therefore punished in the prospect of a curse resting on his posterity, and especially on a particular line of it. Let us not imagine, however, that the ways of the Lord are not equal in this matter; for Kenaan and his descendants no doubt abundantly deserved this special visitation. And as the other descendants of Ham are not otherwise mentioned in the prophecy, we may presume that they shared in the curse pronounced upon Kenaan. At all events, they are not expressly included in the blessing pronounced on the other two divisions of the human family, It is proper to observe, also, that this prediction does not affirm an absolute perpetuity in the doom of Ham or Kenaan. It only delineates their relative condition until the whole race is again brought within the scope of prophecy.
A servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. - The curse here consists in servitude, which is in itself an inferiority, and, among the children of self-will, tends more and more to all the horrid ills of slavery. Slavery originated in war and conquest. The mere warrior put the captives to death, the cannibal devoured them, the economist fed them for their labor. Accordingly, slavery soon made its appearance in all countries which were trodden by the conqueror. A system of slavery, imposed without consent and for no crime, is a dire evil. Besides the direct injustice of robbing a fellow-man of his personal liberty, it dissolves wedlock, breaks the family tie, and disregards the conscience. It trades, therefore, in the souls as well as the bodies of mankind. It is a historical fact that the degradation of slavery has fallen especially upon the race of Ham. A portion of the Kenaanites became bondsmen among the Israelites, who were of the race of Shem. The early Babylonians, the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, and Egyptians, who all belonged to the race of Ham, were subjugated by the Assyrians, who were Shemites, the Persians, the Macedonians, and the Romans, who were all Japhethites. And in modern times it is well known that most of the nations of Europe traded in African slaves. "A servant of servants" means a slave of the most abject kind. "Unto his brethren." If the doom of slavery be referred to the race of Ham, then his brethren are the descendants of Japheth and Shem, who have held many of the Hamites in bondage. If we limit the sentence to Kenaan, then his brethren may include the other descendants of Ham. It is said that the servile tribe is also the most tyrannical; and it is the fact that the Africans have lent themselves to the forcible seizing and selling into slavery in distant lands of their own kinsmen and fellow-countrymen.
25. Cursed be Canaan—This doom has been fulfilled in the destruction of the Canaanites—in the degradation of Egypt and the slavery of the Africans, the descendants of Ham.
And he said, not from the passion of revenge, but by Divine inspiration, and the Spirit of prophecy,
Cursed be Canaan; hateful to God, abhorred by men, miserable in his person and posterity.
Quest. Seeing Ham committed the crime, why is the curse inflicted upon his son Canaan?
Answ.
1. When Canaan is mentioned, Ham is not exempted from the curse, but rather more deeply plunged into it, whilst he is pronounced accursed, not only in his person, (which is manifestly supposed by his commission of that sin for which the curse was inflicted), but also in his posterity, which doubtless was a great aggravation of his grief; as on the contrary Joseph is said to be blessed when his children are blessed,
Genesis 48:15-16.
2. It seems therefore very probable from these words, and the Hebrew doctors and others affirm it, that Canaan did partake with his father in the sin, yea, that he was the first discoverer of his father’s shame.
3. Canaan is particularly mentioned by the Spirit of prophecy, in regard of the future extirpation of that people; and this is here remembered for the encouragement of the Israelites, who were now in their expedition against them.
4. This may be an ellipsis, or defect of the word
father; for such relative words are ofttimes omitted and understood in Scripture, as
Matthew 4:21,
James of
Zebedee, for
the son of Zebedee; John 19:25,
Mary of Cleopas, for
the wife of Cleopas; Acts 7:16,
Emmor of Sychem, for
the father of Sychem, as our English translation rightly supplies it from
Genesis 33:19. Thus
Goliath is put for
Goliath’s brother, as is evident by comparing
2 Samuel 21:19, with
1 Chronicles 20:5. So here
Canaan may be put for
the father of Canaan, as the Arabic translation hath it, that is,
Ham, as the
Seventy here render it. And though Ham had more sons, yet he may be here described by his relation to Canaan, because in him the curse was more fixed and dreadful, reaching to his utter extirpation, whilst the rest of Ham’s posterity in after-ages were blessed with the saving knowledge of the gospel.
A servant of servants, i.e. the vilest and worst of servants; as
vanity of vanities is the greatest vanity,
Ecclesiastes 1:2; and
great wickedness, Hosea 10:15, is in the Hebrew
wickedness of wickedness; and
King of kings is put for the chief of kings.
And he said,.... Not in a drunken fit, as some profane persons would suggest, for he was awaked from his wine; nor in the heat of passion, but by inspiration, under a spirit of prophecy:
cursed be Canaan; or, "O cursed Canaan", or rather, "Canaan is", or "shall be cursed" (q); for the words are either a declaration of what was his case, or a prediction of what it should be. It may seem strange that Canaan should be cursed, and not Ham, who seems to he the only aggressor, by what is said in the context; hence one copy of the Septuagint, as Ainsworth observes, reads Ham, and the Arabic writers the father of Canaan; and so Saadiah Gaon supplies it, as Aben Ezra relates; and the same supplement is made by others (r): but as both were guilty, as appears from what has been observed on the former verses, and Canaan particularly was first in the transgression; it seems most wise and just that he should be expressly named, since hereby Ham is not excluded a share in the punishment of the crime he had a concern in, being punished in his son, his youngest son, who perhaps was his darling and favourite, and which must be very afflicting to him to hear of; and since Canaan only, and not any of the other sons of Ham were guilty, he, and not Ham by name, is cursed, lest it should be thought that the curse would fall upon Ham and all his posterity; whereas the curse descends on him, and very justly proceeds in the line of Canaan; and who is the rather mentioned, because he was the father of the accursed race of the Canaanites, whom God abhorred, and, for their wickedness, was about to drive out of their land, and give it to his people for an inheritance; and in order to which the Israelites were now upon the expedition, when Moses wrote this account, and which must animate them to it; for by this prediction they would see that they were an accursed people, and that they were to be their servants:
a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren; the posterities of Shem and Japheth, who stood in the relation of brethren to Canaan and his posterity; and to those he and his offspring were to become the most mean abject servants, as the phrase implies: this character agrees with the name of Canaan, which may be derived from "to depress", "humble", and "make mean and abject".
(q) "maledictus erit Cenahan", Junius & Tremellius. (r) So some in Vatablus.
And he said, {r} Cursed be Canaan; a {s} servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.(r) He pronounces as a prophet the curse of God against all those who do not honour their parents: for Ham and his posterity were cursed.
(s) That is, a most vile slave.