"Prophecies about Noah's Family"
Okay, interesting series of events, basically involving Noah getting drunk and naked, Ham, Noah's son, seeing him naked, and Shem and Japheth, Noah's other sons, covering him while not looking at their father's nakedness.
If that weren't a strange enough set of occurrences already, Noah then curses Ham and blesses Shem and Japheth.
This is where I want to pick up, in verses 26-27. Noah has just finished cursing the descendants of Ham, proclaiming them to be the lowest of servants for Shem and Japheth's offspring. Noah then bursts into a mixed praise and blessing:
"26 Praise the Lord, the God of Shem;Something caught my eye, Shem's name appeared more often than Japheth's and in such a manner that it appears that the family of Japheth will rely on or be less in stature than Shem's. What's so special about Shem's descendants, though, that they get preferential treatment (aside from Shem being the elder [Gen 10:21])? If you look in 1 Chronicles 1:1-4,17-27, you might just notice that Abraham, the founder of the Israelite nation, was a direct descendant of Shem. This also means, courtesy of Matt 1, that Christ, genealogically speaking, was descended from Shem.
Canaan [Ham's son] will be his slave.
27 God will extend Japheth;
he will dwell in the tents of Shem;
Canaan will be his slave."
It kind of puts "he will dwell in the tents of Shem" in a different light, doesn't it?
Challenge Question:
How, then, does this affect the way in which we relate to God?
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