The Sons of Noah

The names of Noah's three sons were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham is the ancestor of the Canaanites.) From these three sons of Noah came all the nations of the earth.

Noah became a farmer and planted a vineyard, and he made wine. One day as he was drunk and lay naked in his tent, Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father's nakedness and went outside and told his two brothers. Then Shem and Japheth took a robe and held it over their shoulders and, walking backwards into the tent, let it fall across their father to cover his nakedness as they looked the other way. When Noah awoke from his drunken stupor, and learned what had happened and what Ham, his younger son, had done, he cursed Ham's descendants:

  "A curse upon the Canaanites," he swore.
  "May they be the lowest of slaves
   To the descendants of Shem and Japheth."

Then he said:

  "God bless Shem,
   And may Canaan be his slave.
   God bless Japheth,
   And let him share the prosperity of Shem,
   And let Canaan be his slave."

Noah lived another 350 years after the flood, and was 950 years old at his death.

The Table of Nations »

TEXT SOURCE: (Genesis 9:17-29) The Children's Living Bible, ©1970 Tyndale House Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187
TITLE SOURCE: The New Student Bible, ©1992 Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids Michigan 49530