Genesis 10

Today’s Passage: Genesis 10

This chapter is a map, and the best way to read it is to watch one household become the whole earth. Noah had three sons, Japheth and Ham and Shem, and from those three the world fills up again, spreading out into clans and languages, into lands and nations (גּוֹיִם) goyim, pronounced go-YEEM. Strong's H1471, nations, peoples. At this point in the story the word still takes in everyone. Japheth, Ham, and Shem each close the same way, with the same four notes of clans and languages, lands and nations. The earth was never meant to be one single city. It is many families instead, and every one of them came off the ark together. . Stay close to the three of them as you go. In Ham’s line a hunter rises up and founds cities, Nineveh among them, and in Shem’s line there stands a quiet man named Eber.

As you read, hold this: Every nation on the earth came from one family.

Genesis 10:1-5 (BSB)

1 This is the account of Noah’s sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, who also had sons after the flood. 2 The sons of Japheth: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras. 3 The sons of Gomer: Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. 4 And the sons of Javan: Elishah, Tarshish, the Kittites, and the Rodanites. 5 From these, the maritime peoples separated into their territories, according to their languages, by clans within their nations.

Japheth’s sons go out to settle the coastlands, but the list is far from finished. Two more sons still remain, and from this one house the whole earth will come.

Genesis 10:6-12 (BSB)

6 The sons of Ham: Cush, Mizraim, Put, and Canaan. 7 The sons of Cush: Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca. And the sons of Raamah: Sheba and Dedan. 8 Cush was the father of Nimrod, who began to be a mighty one on the earth. 9 He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; so it is said, “Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the LORD.” 10 His kingdom began in Babylon, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. 11 From that land he went forth into Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah, 12 and Resen, which is between Nineveh and the great city of Calah.

Here is the first mighty man after the flood, and the first to gather a kingdom to himself, with Babylon and Shinar and Nineveh all under his hand. The tower of the next chapter will rise in that same land of Shinar, so keep these names close, for they all belong to this one family.

Ham’s line also runs down through Mizraim, which is Egypt, and through Canaan, and it traces out Canaan’s clans and borders, from Sidon on toward Gaza and toward Sodom. These are real lands with real roads, and all of them came from this one house.

Genesis 10:21-32 (BSB)

21 And sons were also born to Shem, the older brother of Japheth; Shem was the forefather of all the sons of Eber. 22 The sons of Shem: Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram. 24 Arphaxad was the father of Shelah, and Shelah was the father of Eber. 25 Two sons were born to Eber: One was named Peleg, because in his days the earth was divided, and his brother was named Joktan. 31 These are the sons of Shem, according to their clans, languages, lands, and nations. 32 All these are the clans of Noah’s sons, according to their generations and nations. From these the nations of the earth spread out after the flood.

Stay with this last line as it runs from Shem to Eber to Peleg, who was named for the days when the earth was divided, because the next chapter is where you will watch that dividing happen. The nations spread out from this one family, and Eber, remember, is the name that sits under our word Hebrew. Every nation on the earth came out of this house.