After the Tower of Babel: Which People Went Where?

 

 

After the flood of Noah's time - the Great Flood - there was only Noah and his wife, and then Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and their wives. Only 8 humans survived that flood.

They probably lived together for a couple of hundred years. New children had to be born. And I have not read of Noah and his wife ever having more than the three sons.

Ham, Shem, and Japheth, through their wives, began to produce the offspring who became the founders of those nations which arose in the post-flood world.

Who were these early peoples, and which particular ones may still exist today in nations we are familiar with in our modern world.

Today we humans have certain looks which we are all familiar with. A Chinese, an Irishman, an Argentinian, an Angolan...they usually look different than each other, but all those four looks are normal for their area. There is much variety in our appearance. But before the flood, there should have been a very great deal more variety than we see today.

It is almost a certainty that the tallest 'tribe' of people before the flood were a great deal taller than our tallest ethnic group of modern times. And the shortest, it is reasonable to assume, were just as much shorter than today's shortest.

How their skulls varied, how their musculature varied, who were the most beautiful of the women, the most athletic of the men.... we will never know those things.

But since the DNA of Noah and his wife was present in their three sons, it is the wives of those three sons which would have perhaps had the best chance of making Japheth's children look quite different than Ham's, for instance. (Assuming the sons of Noah married women who were a few divisions of the human family tree outside of their own family.)

And those three ladies, the wives of Ham, Shem, and Japheth, could only have carried a sliver of the physiological options for variability that went along with being human before the flood. Are there lots of sorts of hair now? There were more then! Does skin color vary widely now? It must have varied more then. Skull shape? More then. Arm and leg length in comparison to torso? It probably varied more then. Facial features? There must have been some that would almost startle us today.

Imagine if there had been horse racing and also professional basketball before the flood. Now imagine that Noah's son's had all been horse racing jockeys; what if they were - like Jockeys today - considered to be small, strong, wiry men in their pre-flood world? How long then would it be after the flood before they produced a son as tall as the tallest pre-flood basketball player? The chances are good that they might not do it in a thousand years, right? So, we can imagine how much variability might have been lost from the appearance of the human species because of the Great Flood.

What if a skeleton of a pre-flood man is found: will it be misidentified as some sort of caveman? Will it be declared to be our most remote evolutionary ancestor? Who can say, but those misidentifications are possible.

But despite that, our world today has many peoples, and they have a great variety of appearances, at least from our perspective. But here's a question: can we know which ethnic groups descended from which of Noah's three sons? And by which paths? Obviously, this is a big enough subject for a book of several volumes, but taking kind of a brief look into the subject can be worthwhile.

Without delving into DNA, which could tell us much and which is being used as a tool to find this answer (not often by God believers, unfortunately) there are also the surviving writings of the more ancient authors and chroniclers of history. Some of those writings have survived, and some were on the subject of descendancy. What do they say?

The Bible illuminated the subject to a degree, but apparently it was not a great concern to the Holy Spirit that we would be told so very much on that subject. The line of one of Noah's sons - Shem - is discussed quite a lot more than Ham's and Japheth's because the Jews descended through it, as did Jesus's parents. But there wasn't too much time spent on tracing the other lines of descent.

Much of what the Bible does say is found in Genesis Chapter 10. This chapter is commonly called 'The Table of Nations' because it provides quite a lot of insight into which of the ancient world's peoples came from which of Noah's sons and Noah's son's wives. Here is the majority of what it tells us:

This information was probably correct concerning the period from about 2400 B.C (if that is when the Great Flood occurred) to about the 1400 B.C. time frame, since that is about the time of Moses's writing it down. After the Books of Moses were written, there was about 1,500 years that went by before Josephus wrote to the Romans about this subject, based on his education and knowledge as an Israelite from the tribe of Levi in the late 1st century A.D. So, Josephus is by far the more recent discussion on the subject. :

Noah's Son JAPHETH

Japheth's sons were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech and Tiras. These seven sons are named in Genesis 10:2.

Gomer's descendants: Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. Gomer had these three sons who are mentioned in Genesis 10:3.

Javan's descendants: Elishah, Tarshish, the Kittim, and the Rodanim (or Dodanim). It says that from these brothers the 'maritime peoples' descended and spread out, each with their own language. Gen 10:4 So, these brothers were the founders of 'sailing nations', at least in part. This also tells us that sailing has been around since shortly after the flood (and no doubt before the flood).

Magog's children are not mentioned here.

Madai's children are not mentioned here.

Tubal's children are not mentioned here.

Meshech's children are not mentioned here.

Tiras's children are not mentioned here.

(Hey, not every son is a nation builder, right. And in some cases, the nation may have been founded far away, or perhaps the information was lost, or else not deemed necessary for inclusion in the scriptures given to Moses through the Holy Spirit. :) )

HAM

Ham's sons were Cush, Mizraim, Put, and Canaan. From Gen 10:6 and onward.

Cush's sons: Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca.

The sons of Raamah: Sheba and Dedan.

***It is interesting that the names of the chief Hindu Gods (Braham, Cush, Shiva, and Raama) have a 'sounds alike' match from among the family line of Ham, including Ham himself, if you can allow that the name Ham constitutes a portion of the name Braham. And Braham is the most honored of all these 'gods' of Hinduism. That is not surprising if he is merely Ham, mis-identified as a god due to the passing of time. Can it be that hundreds of millions of people worship their ancestor Ham, and a few of his sons, and do not even realize it? To me it seems a hard circumstance to explain by any other means. Four chief Hindu gods having 4 successive phonetic matches within the brief number of names we are informed of from among the immediate descendants of Ham....chance? Not likely at all. ***

Mizraim was the founder of Egypt, and Mizraim's son's descendants included the Ludites, the Anamites, the Lahabites, the Naphtuhites, the Pathrusites, the Casluhites (from whom the Philistines came), and the Caphtorites.

Canaan (who was cursed by Noah because of a thing that Canaan's father Ham had done) had the following sons and descendants: Sidon, and Canaan's other sons were the founders of the Hittites, Jebusites, Amorites, Girgashites, Hivites, Arkites, Sinites, Arvadites, Zemarites, and Hamathites. Many of these groups once occupied their various parts of what is called Israel today. The Jebusites were living in Jerusalem when King David finally took the city. They were allowed to continue living there at that time, as they were never quite fully conquered as a people (during King David's time.)

SHEM

Shem's sons were Arphaxad, Elam, Asshur, Lud, and Aram.

**Concerning Arphaxad, he was the ancestor, many generations later, of Abraham through the following path, most of the information gathered from Genesis 11:10: (Noah had Shem when he was 501 or 502 years old, which was 98 years before the Great Flood. Shem had Arphaxad two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old. When Arphaxad was 35 (so this is about 37 years after the flood), he had a son that he named Shelah. At 30 years of age, (so this was about 67 years after the flood) Shelah had a son that he named Eber. When Eber was about 34 years old (so that was about 101 years after the flood) he became the father of the boy named Peleg, in who's time 'the Earth was divided'. When Peleg had lived about 30 years (so that was about 131 years after the flood), he became the father of a son named Reu. When Reu was 32 years old (so that was about 163 years after the flood), he had a son named Serug. When Serug was about 30 years old (so that was about 193 years after the flood) he became the father of Nahor. When Nahor was about 29 years old (so that was about 222 years after the flood), he had a son named Terah. And when Terah was 70 years old (so that was about 292 years after the great flood) he became the father of Abram (who later was named Abraham, and who is the Father of Isaac), Nahor, and Haran.

(Josephus also believed that Abraham was born 292 years after the great flood, as it says in the Nelson Books, Whiston translation, of Josephus's work entitled 'The Antiquities of the Jews' Book 1, Chap 6, v. 5)

Abram was about 75 years old when the Lord called him to leave his people, bring Sarah, and his nephew Lot and Lot's wife and their servants and herders, and to follow him. (Gen 12:4) It sounds pretty old, but it is the exact fractional numerical equivalent of a 30-year-old doing something, and then going on to live to be 70 years old. (There is a place in the Bible that says the lifespan of a man will be 70 years.) It is also said in the Bible that Jesus was about 30 when He began to preach - when He began his mission on this Earth.

That means that this Biblical chronology, from the NIV Bible, has Abram beginning his journey of faith at the age of 75, approximately 367 years after the Great Flood. Abraham died at 175 years old (Gen 25:7), so that was 467 years after the great flood.

Noah himself continued to live about 350 years after the Great Flood (Gen 9:28), so Noah had passed away only 12 years before Abraham began his journey of faith.

Terah, the father of Abram, had his son Abram when he was 70 years old, and he died at 205 years of age. So, Abraham was 135 years old when his father died.

Abram set out to follow God at 75 years of age, and Abram was 135 years old when his father Terah died, so Abraham had journeyed 60 years before his father died.

Terah was therefore 145 years old when his son Abraham began his journey of faith.

Arphaxad's sons: Shelah (Josephus translators call him Sala), who was the father of Eber (Josephus translators say 'Heber' . Josephus says that the Hebrews derived their name from this Great grandson of Shem, named 'Heber'). Eber (Heber) had two sons, who were Peleg and Joktan.

Peleg means 'division', and he was named this because during his time 'the Earth was divided'. (Does that mean that during Peleg's time the languages were divided? Or does that mean that there was just one continent, and during this man Peleg''s lifetime it divided into the land masses we have today? Josephus tells us that Phaleg was born at the time of the dispersion of the nations to their various countries. That occurred after God had divided the languages.

God had commanded them to go out and form colonies, but they liked to live close to each other, Josephus says. But God wanted them to disperse and occupy the Earth. Josephus believed that one of the reasons was because there was a lot of land, and so why should they congregate together and fight over resources and have wars and such.

So dispersing was God's command at that time, but they had resisted that. Nimrod led them in this resistance. Nimrod had convinced them to build a tower - the famous tower of Babel. It would be tall and made of baked bricks coated with a waterproof coating of tar.

According to Josephus (Book 1, Chaps 4 thru 6 of the Nelson Books William Whiston translation of 'The Antiquities of the Jews') the tower was built to escape any second flood which God might send. God was telling people to disperse and form colonies. Nimrod, the grandson of Ham, was rebelling against God, and encouraging the people to do the same. So, retaliation from God seemed a possibility. But the Bible said it the tower was built in order to 'reach the heavens', and the Bible is always the better authority. Besides, Josephus says that one of Nimrod's wacky plans was to reach heaven and take vengeance upon heaven for sending the first flood.....so that means he was trying to 'reach the heavens'.

But here is a key point: Josephus says that the birth of Peleg (Josephus translators say 'Phaleg') was at the time that people dispersed to form colonies. That occurred when God confused the languages, and people saw that opposing God was both evil and hopeless. So, we can determine when the Bible's chronology would say that the division of language occurred. Peleg was born 131 years after the flood. So, if Josephus is correct, that is also about when they quit working on the tower of Babylon and about when the languages were divided.

But supposing that Josephus was speaking a little carelessly, and it happened sometime in Peleg's life, then we look at Genesis 11:18, and 19 and find out that Peleg died at age 239. At age 30 he had his son Reu and 209 years later he died. Add 30 +209 and you have 239. So if Peleg was born 131 years after the flood, and died 239 years later, then he died 370 years after the flood.

So, if Josephus is right about the confusing of the languages and the dispersal to form colonies all occurring at Peleg's birth, (and if it at least happened before Peleg's death), then it happened between 131 years and 370 years after the flood.

Now, getting back to Shem's sons... his first son named Arphaxad was followed by Asher, Lud, and Aram.

Aram's sons: Uz, Hul, Gether, and Mashech.

Joktan's sons were Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, Obal, Abimael, Sheba, Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab. The area that they lived stretched from Mesha toward Sephar, in the Eastern hill country.

That is about what the Bible lets us know (with a little of Josephus's opinions supplied here and there, concerning that time frame.

But what did Josephus's writings basically say?? He was telling the Romans of the 1st century A.D. where the various peoples that they knew of in their world - the world of the 1st century A.D. - had come from. That is nearly the same world that the gospel was presented to by the Apostles. So, who did Josephus say that these ethnic groups and nations had sprang from.

*******************************************************************

Josephus's knowledge of the ancestry of the worlds inhabitants, which he shared with the Romans in Book 1, Chapter 6, verse 1 (actually it's the 'Loeb' numbering system. Whether not it's 'chapter and verse' I don't know.):

What I hope to draw to the attention of anyone reading this is basically this: the Mediterranean region is considered the area of origin for a great many of the world's greatest and most ancient civilizations. But Josephus had been taught where nearly every one of them came from, step by step by step.

So, to him, the history of man and of the world was neither particularly ancient, nor at all mysterious. From his point of view, as a truthful Jewish historian, the great civilizations were all pretty easily traced back to Noah, and for the most part, he could enumerate the path of descendancy of their founder.

So for us, who have been taught by a Godless

education system, mankind is a couple of million years old, we came from apes, and we don't know too much about how the various peoples came to occupy their present locations. That would have sounded - as you will see - like a pack of absolute lies to a person like Josephus. The Jews had kept pretty good track of where people had come from, and so had some of their fellow civilizations. And those civilizations, 2,000 years ago, were often in pretty close agreement concerning the origins of ancient nations.

I think that history has been purposely confused and made to sound mysterious so that the Godless precepts of evolution could be built in to a religion to replace the truth. But you can make your own mind up about that.

Japhet had seven sons.

Beginning at the Mountains 'Taurus' and 'Amanus' they inhabited along 'Asia' as far as the river Tanais. And they proceeded along Europe to Cadiz.

Japhet's son Gomer was the founder of the people called the Gomerites, but the Greeks came along later and called them the Galatians. These people were also known as the Galls). The Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the Galatians which is included in the Bible. Since Paul and Josephus were contemporaries, we can most likely deduce that the Galatians Paul wrote to were these same Galatians, and wer descendents of Japheth. In Paul's time, Galatia was a land which started on the northern banks of the Mediterranean, due north of the island of Cyprus. It went north to not quite so far as the Black Sea, and extended East to not quite the Caspian Sea. Derbe was a chief city there in Galatia, and was a few miles off the Mediterranean coast.

Gomer had 3 sons.

Aschanax founded the Aschenaxians, but the Greeks renamed them the Rheginians.

Riphath had the Ripheans, who were called Paphlagonians in Josephus's day.

Thrugramma founded the Thrugrammeans, but the Greeks wisely renamed them the Phrygians.

Japhet's son Magog founded the people that were called the Magogites. But the Greeks came along later and began referring to them as the Scythians.

(One thing you find out quickly when you're reading Josephus is that he didn't think much of the Greek habit of renaming nations to names that sounded better in their language, or which somehow relected Greek culture or mythology. He felt it made it more difficult to interpret the origins of the various peoples of the ancient world. I guess I'd agree with that.)

In a word, the Scythians were just plain warrior born. They were a tough tough tough race of people, tremendous archers, and for the most part not a bit scared of anyone. I've read that some of the ancients considered them the most just and righteous of men. I've read that for a Scythian boy to become a Scythian man (to be considered a warrior) he had to be able to ride by the water shooting birds out of the air with a bow and arrow. I've seen Scythian goldwork in the National Geographic magazine that was just amazing in the quality of the scenes worked into the gold.

Scythians affirmed the 'griffin' to be a real animal, and they killed them at times because the griffin preyed on their horses. Scythians were great lovers of horses. The griffin was considered inferior to the lion, but otherwise a dangerous beast.

Some people believe that Scotts and Scyths are of the same strain of people. It appears that the Del Riad family of the Irish travelled from Ireland to begin colonizing Scotland, but they did share the Scottish land with the Picts. Picts were big on tatooing themselves. The Scythians are also said to have liked their tatoos. It's hard to say if there's really a connection or not. I haven't looked too far into that one.

Japhet's son Madai founded the Madeans, whom the (you guessed it) Greeks renamed 'Medes'. The Medes conquered Babylon, as it says in the Book of Daniel, and that happened in the 6th century B.C. King Cyrus was of the Medes. He had a run in with his cousins the Scythians once, and it was the one time I know of that he got royally defeated.

Babylon was an empire founded by Ham's sons, and it was propheseyed through Noah that Japhet's sons would, for the greater part, dominate Ham's sons (the Canaanites, at least), so as for the Medes and Persians beating Babylon, that's no big surprise.:

From Gen 9:25 (Noah speaking):

" "Cursed be Canaan. The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers."

He also said,

"Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend the territory of Japheth, may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be his slave." "

End quote.

It was not a lucky thing to be from Canaan's Hamitic line!! But in a later day, yet even before Jesus came, God allowed that he would no longer visit the sins of the father upon the son. But....back to the subject....

How about those Greeks, anyway? From where did they originate? Well, from Japheth's son named Javan, Josephus says. Josephus said that the Ionians, and all the Grecians were derived from Javan.

And Javan had sons that formed peoples:

Elisa formed the Eliseans, but those were called the Aeolians iin Josephus's day.

Tharsus formed the Tharsians, which was called Cilicia in Josephus's day. But Josephus points to the Cilician city of Tarsus as one proof of thier former identity. We all know that the Apostle Paul was from the city of Tarsus, but from a Jewish family that happened to live there, of the Israelite tribe of Benjamin. And Paul was also born a Roman citizen, as were a fair number of people in the extensive Roman Empire of Paul's time.

Cethimas took possession of an island that was called Cethima, but which was named Cyprus in Josephus's time, just as it still is today. Josephus said that the Hebrews of his day still called the island Cethim. He also pointed out that one city on the island was still called Citius because of this son of Javan, Cethimas, who was the island nation's founding father.

That wraps up a lot of what Josephus says about the descendents of Japhet, who was one of Noah's three sons.

Noah's next son:

Ham.

Japheth's son Thobel was the founder of the Iberes. We've all heard of the Iberian Peninsula, right? Spain! Spain is part of the Iberian peninsula, and so is Portugal, though the Portugese are a different people than the Spanish for the most part.

So, so far as Josephus understood history, the man Iberes, after whom the Peninsula was named, was the descendent of Japheth's son named Thobel. Much of South America, Central America,Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and California, plus a great number of other areas - especially Islands - which were once part of the Spanish Colonial Empire, all these people probably hold a good share of Japhet's blood in their veins. But the peoples of the world have mixed a great deal.

Japheth's son Mosoch founded a people called the Mosocheni, who had come to be called Cappadocians by the time Josephus wrote. And as proof of this, Josephus gives his Roman reading audience the information that you could find, even in Josephus's day, a city which was called Mazaca.

Thiras called the people that he led the Thirasians, but his came to be changed to Thracians.