First, Phil.jones, welcome to the Straight Dope Message Boards, we’re glad to have you with us. And second, thanks for the compliments on the Staff Report – we do our best. (I’m the self-same “Dex” what wrote this one. These two.)
There have been some prior discussions of the use of God’s name, and I’d like to keep this thread (somewhat vaguely) focused on Noah and Ham and related. I know, we’ve got a bit far afield earlier, but let’s not get too far off track. If you’d like to open another thread on the Name of God, and whether it’s really Iove (“God is Iove”, “all you really need is Iove,” etc.) … let’s do that in the forum called General Questions. Thanks.
The exact history of “sandal” is uncertain, as it turns up in both Indo-European and Semitic languages. But it definitely didn’t get into English from Hebrew.
I may not be the most educated here but I will give this topic a go.
The bible is to be interpreted by the bible and not individually.
The phrase “uncovered his fathers nakedness” is used many times in the bible and it refers to sexual realtions. If you had sex with your mother you “uncoverd your fathers nakedness”. It had nothing to do with Noah, it is a figure of speech. You can’t, as some here have suggested just use the work “nakedness” for your interpretation. The meaning of words change given the words around them and in a figure of speech the words can take on a whole new meaning. God is not vulger and this then gives us a way of reading the bible and not getting grossed out.
Cain had to be cursed by Noah, as Ham was not only his father but his brother. When these things happen it brings in all kinds of wierd family dynamics that cause problems.
Really a simple story if you use the bible to interpret its self.
Is it your hypothesis that Ham had sex with his mother who bore Canaan from that union? It’s an interesting idea, except that it makes no sense with the rest of the story. How does Noah getting drunk relate to anything his wife might have done? Why would Shem and Japheth be blessed for covering Noah when that had nothing to do the act you are stating happened?
So that’s three times. And that’s in the King James Version; the New International Version translates the list of proscribed “nakednesses” in Leviticus 18 as “do not have sexual relations with”, instead of “do not uncover the nakedness of”.
The phrase as a figure of speech in context to improper sexual realtions, uncovering someones nakedness Sorry
other examples:
Leviticus 20:20 - And if a man shall lie with his uncle’s wife, he hath uncovered his uncle’s nakedness: they shall bear their sin; they shall die childless.
Leviticus 20:21 - And if a man shall take his brother’s wife, it is an unclean thing: he hath uncovered his brother’s nakedness; they shall be childless.
It doesn’t really other than this is the first recorded dunkenness in the bible.
And it seems that Ham decieded to take advantage of his mother while she may have very well been drunk.
If you notice that this is the very first mentioning of getting drunk in the whole bible. Even with all that was evil before the flood drunkenness was never mentioned.
Something about the world changed and fermentation happened now.
It can be the only logical, biblical, explanation for the story.
I have read all the others given at one time or another and they were all sketchy at best and relying on some scholars and not the bible its self…
The brothers were blessed for not doing as Ham had done.
Sorry, but this is like saying that since the Serpent isn’t mentioned until Genesis 3, he must have only come into existence after Adam and Eve; however, the Bible clearly teaches that Satan existed before Man was created.
Or like saying that because crucifixion isn’t mentioned until Matthew, that means that crucifixion must have been “invented” in 33 A.D., just for Jesus. Which isn’t true.
The Bible is not a history textbook–you can’t go by what happens to be in the Bible, or by what happens not to be in the Bible. There’s tons of stuff that isn’t in the Bible. Where did Cain get his wife? Who were the Nephilim, exactly? What did the lions in the Garden of Eden eat? The Bible doesn’t say. But just because the Bible doesn’t mention something doesn’t mean that thing doesn’t exist.
Fermentation is not something that Man “invented”. Things ferment all by themselves. It’s a natural process of certain one-celled organisms called yeasts. They eat sugars, and in the process they excrete carbon dioxide, which is a gas, and which goes into the liquid and makes bubbles.
Now, the Bible says that God created everything in Genesis 1. “Everything” would include yeasts, and those yeasts, as soon as they were created, would have begun doing what yeasts do, which is look for sugars and eat them and give off carbon dioxide, which is what we call “fermentation”.
Thus, the process of fermentation has to be as old as Creation itself.
In order for “fermentation” to have come into existence just for Noah, you would have to have God pull off a second, separate Creation, just to create those one-celled organisms. And that’s what “something in the world changed” is going to have to mean. But, where in the Bible does it say that God did a second Creation? Answer: nowhere. Fermentation was always around; just because “drunkenness” wasn’t mentioned in the Bible for the first nine chapters doesn’t mean there wasn’t “fermentation”–or “drunkenness”, for that matter.
Not everything in the world and the universe is in the Bible. The Bible is not a science textbook, or an encyclopedia, or a reference work. It’s a book of religious instruction and guidance. We may abstract general principles for behavior from it, but it’s a mistake to say that because a certain thing isn’t mentioned in the Bible, then it doesn’t exist.
Deut. 21; 22 And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree: 23 His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God ) Paul references this verse as well as Psalm 22 where it speaks of crucifixion of the savior. Your example is not as solid as you may have thought.
Tell me then, since the bible isn’t all of these things that you say The Bible is not a science textbook, or an encyclopedia, or a reference work. Why when it speaks about science things is it always correct? *Job 26:7 - He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing. * Scientist or astronomers have shown us that above or north of the earth is a empty space with no stars. Also when the bible states that the earth is hung on nothing isn’t that about as acurate a description as a science book could give. Since all of the other books of religion as you put it, said that the earth was carried on the back of a turtle or on the shoulders of Atlas. What were they standing on?
Or how about this one: **Job 38:31 - Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion? ** Astronomers have proven that the stars that make up the Pleiades are gravitaionally bound. Then band of Orion are growing farther and farther apart. Thanks to the hubble we have now confirmed the scientific accuracy of the bible when it speaks about the nature of the universe.
I could go on but that is not the point.
There was no rain before the flood. It even states so.** Gen 2:5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. 6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. ** But since there is rain now there must have always been right? So what changed? How was the environment different before the flood verses after? Well we know it didn’t rain. So God held it back somehow and with your nice **It’s a natural process of certain one-celled organisms called yeasts. They eat sugars, and in the process they excrete carbon dioxide, which is a gas, and which goes into the liquid and makes bubbles. ** But that doesn’t just happen correctly to form wine without a correct lack of oxygen. Now if there was a higher oxygen content, not much, just a little, before the flood and greater atomospheric pressure the fermentation of alcohol would not have happened. Ever seen a fossil of a 6’ dragonfly. It could not have flown in our atmosphere of today. But if you just increase the pressure two times it could have.
You are correct Satan as we now know him didn’t exist until after Adam and Eve. It was because of what Satan, as we now call him, did in the garden that he is cursed not something before. So in a manner of speaking your statement of that since the Serpent isn’t mentioned until Genesis 3, he must have only come into existence after Adam and Eve is correct and you didn’t even know it.
Do me a favor. It’s probably dark out right now where you are. Step outside for a moment and look north. What do you see? I’m not sure exactly what that passage is supposed to mean, but it obviously isn’t supposed to mean that there are no stars to the north of the Earth, since any person, then or now, scientist or not, can clearly see with the naked eye that that’s not true. And “the earth hanging in nothing” is not anywhere near as accurate a statement as you’d find in a science textbook, since the Earth isn’t hanging, by any stretch of the imagination. As for the Earth being on the back of a turtle, why, that’s no more ridiculous than saying that the sky is a physical barrier, and the only thing keeping all the water above it from falling down onto the Earth.
You might also want to bone up a bit on exactly what the Bible says: Satan is never mentioned as having been in the Garden of Eden. In fact, the only mention of Satan in the entire Old Testament is in the book of Job. He’s not in the Pentateuch, the historical books, or the Prophets at all.
But Paul was obviously ignorant of Jewish law, since under Jewish law hanging is not a method of execution.
Hanging was a symbolic punishment meted out to some people who received the death penalty. The corpse, obviously, felt no pain in the hanging. And certainly, crucifixion was not meant by the verse in Deuteronomy.
And, needless to say, Jews don’t hold that Psalm 22 speaks of Jesus at all.
Do you know what the North Star is? Do you know why the North Star (Polaris) is the North Star (as opposed to any other star? To say that there are no stars “north” of the Earth is plain wrong.
Well, since the universe is expanding, aren’t all stars moving apart? And aren’t all stars (and all objects) in the universe gravitationally bound with each other?
Maybe the garden didn’t exist until right before man was created and it had not yet rained on the garden?
Is it your contention that there was no rainfall before the flood? That would seem to be contravened by Genesis 2 where it said that there were no plants in the garden because there was no precipitation yet - the upshot of it being that shortly thereafter there was precipitation, and therefore there were plants and trees in the garden.
In any event, I’m kind of curious as to how Cain farmed without rain.
** Satan is never mentioned as having been in the Garden of Eden.**
or the Prophets at all :smack:
Ezekiel 28:12 Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. 13 Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. 14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. 15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
Gen 3:9 And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? 10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. 11 And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? 12 And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. 13 And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat. **And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this,**14 thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: 15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
So do you still think that the bible doesn’t say anything about Satan being in the Garden?
And I know that the majority of Christains believe that Satan was cast out long before the garden but they are wrong. They also believe that everything is predestined just like the pagan greek philosophers did.
It was what Satan, as we now know him, did in the garden that got him in trouble. That was the iniquity that was found in him and he was in the garden when it happened. Not some time before way back when did he fall from grace.
The earth being hung on nothing is a metaphor. How do you describe nothing? It is what rocks dream of ehh… It is a great metaphor since space is a vacum…
Irrigation,
10 And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.
Come on this is simple stuff guys…
It says hung him on a tree not from a tree. It was not hanging that he was talking about here.
Paul knew Jewish law "Acts 26:4 My manner of life from my youth, which was at the first among mine own nation at Jerusalem, know all the Jews; 5 Which knew me from the beginning, if they would testify, that after the most straitest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee.
If Jews don’t believe that psalm 22 speaks of the Messiah what can I say? Does that mean that it doesn’t?
I will find the reference to the whole/gap in the stars to the north of the earth that is there.
Yes, I still say that Satan isn’t mentioned in Genesis or any of the Prophets. How have you challenged that statement? Neither of the two excerpts you quoted there says anything at all about Satan.
The Moderator Ringeth His Bell for Attention: > DING! DING! DING! <
This is a thread about the story of Noah. It is not a thread about Jesus, nor about Paul, nor about Satan, nor about “science” in the Bible. Those topics may be debated in the forum called Great Debates, where they have been debated many, many times.
Back to Noah’s drunkeness, please.
OK, now I’m not speaking as Moderator but as author of the Noah Staff Report. Nolies, your interpretation of Ham’s sin is completely out of line with the plain reading of the text. If Ham had sex with his mother, then the whole bit about the two brother’s sneaking in backwards with a robe to cover Noah makes no sense whatsoever.
However, you’re certainly free to hold it. You might want to read the earlier bits of this thread. The Staff Report covers many of the wild and varied intepretations of an ancient story. There is no one “right” answer to what the story means; through the centuries, various biblical scholars have evolved different explanations. The Staff Report mentions explanations attempted by people who knew biblical Hebrew fluently, and did not have to rely on the KJV, for instance. And by scholars who spent their entire lives studying the bible and nothing else.
If they couldn’t reach agreement, why do you think that you have a single correct answer to what the Noah story is all about? The Staff Report covers what almost every scholar through the centuries has agreed is the plain reading of the text (hint: it’s different from yours), and what different scholars believe to be a hidden meaning to the text.
For centuries Christians and scholars have believed that everything was predestined. This came from a belief that Aristotle and Plato were correct as to the nature of God. Augustine, who by all accounts, is the most influential of all Christains since Paul, could not become a Christain, since when he read the bible it showed a different God than that of Aristotle and Plato. His mother’s bishop, told him that you need to interpret the bible through the light of Aristotle and Plato. This then, resolved all the conflicts that he had with a plain reading of the text as to the nature of God. So now that we can see clearly, that Augustine was wrong to interpret the bible through the lens that is pagan greek philosophy, we can throw off the false beliefs that he held since his conclusions were based on a false assumption.
So, since scholars for centuries can not agree with one another and all of them were influenced by Augustine, who was clearly wrong, I hold little weight to their views when it is obvious that “**If Ham had sex with his mother, then the whole bit about the two brother’s sneaking in backwards with a robe to cover Noah makes no sense whatsoever. **” It makes great sense since it is a figure of speech which says, They did not participate in thier brothers sin.
It really isn’t that mysterious…
And you don’t need to be fluent in Hebrew or greek to understand the bible.
I have yet to find anywhere else in the Bible where “walking backwards carrying a sheet and covering your father” is a figure of speech for “did not sleep with their mother.”
In some respects, you do. I’m sure you’ve heard the famous quote about reading a translation being akin to kissing through a veil. There are all sorts of nuances that get lost in any translation. While you certainly can read and understand the Bible in any language it’s translated into, you certainly get a better sense of what it means when you read it in the original language.
You have probably never heard that uncovering your brother’s nakedness means sleeping with your sister in law also but that doesn’t mean it isn’t so.
They may have very well done it literally.
Ham also bragged about what he had done to his brothers. They then did not participate in his disgusting behavior by covering his father’s nakedness. If uncovering it means having sex with your mother. Then covering it would mean the opposite, would it not? It really isn’t that hard unless you don’t want to see. There are none so blind as those who will not see. Which is why Christ spoke in parables.
If you remember the whole story of Noah in context, they had just come from a time when sin was rampant. Everyone did, as they thought best. This influenced Ham and it showed in his behavior.
Noah was chosen because he was, “Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.” Perfect in his generations. His gene pool had not be contaminated by the angels that were taking the women of the earth. The whole of the story before it was about angels impregnating the women of the earth as they saw fit. Which angels? The fallen ones. When did they fall? When Satan the most cherished of all the created sinned and caused Adam to sin in the garden. I know you say this is so far off. Really? Why is it, that when angels appear in the bible, that they generally, are asked if they want something to eat or if they need to rest? Is it because we have used a wrong view of them? The bible clearly doesn’t represent them as being apparitions but much like us.
So is not biblically correct to believe that this is why Noah was chosen?
If it is, it would explain why the Greeks had all of their gods having sex with humans. Since they would have known about the pre-flood days also. When the languages were confused and they made their own gods, they stole from what they new.
Amazing isn’t it, how accurately the bible describes the whole of history and puts in context all of the societies and their weird ways.
Yes, I still say that Satan isn’t mentioned in Genesis or any of the Prophets. How have you challenged that statement? Neither of the two excerpts you quoted there says anything at all about Satan.
It is obvious to anyone reading the Ezekiel verses that this is describing Satan. And you can see that this was in the Garden.
When God confronted Adam and Eve, in the garden, he then confronted Satan, (Metaphor) Serpent and cast him down for what he had done. Then He went back and told Adam and Eve what was going to happen to them. Seems simple enough to me to see that they were all there together. God was going back and forth between them when He was talking to them.
Still believe “Satan isn’t mentioned in Genesis or any of the Prophets”? That is your right I guess.
The right to be wrong, is not one that should be used. :smack:
Sure I have. It’s in Levitcus 18:16. It’s also repeated in Leviticus 20:21. But that’s a far cry from saying that “and they walked backwards with the garment and covered their father’s nakedness” means that they didn’t have sex with their mother.
Sigh. Now I’ll give you a lesson in why it’s better to use the original than a translation.
The word for “uncovered” in Genesis 9:21 is ya-yisgal. That word is a reflexive word, meaning an action that one does to oneself. If Ham “uncovered his father’s nakedness,” the word used would have been va-nisgal “and he was uncovered” (passive tense). But that’s not the case - the word is reflexive binyan hispael. It’s not that Ham (or anyone else “uncovered” him, he did it himself in his drunken stupor.
Noah wasn’t chosen because he had any special geneaological purity - he was chosen because from among his generation he was the best. He was chosen because he, unlike others in his generation, obeyed God. He was chosen on his personal merit, not his genes.
Actually, I do have one question for you. If it is as you said, that Ham slept with his mother and Canaan was the result of that union, how is it that he was cursed right away when Noah woke up? Why wouldn’t he curse Ham, not Canaan, since there was no guarantee that a child would result from that union anyway?
