Early Rabbinic Exegesis on Noah's Son Ham and the So-Called ‘Hamitic Myth’

Aaron, David H.

doi:10.1093/jaarel/lxiii.4.721

Cited by 24 publications

(5 citation statements)

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“…Clerical monogenists had long favored the Hamitic myth, rooted in the exegetical distortion of Genesis 9: 18-27, to justify black inferiority and servitude. While forms of the myth had circulated in early Christian, Jewish, and Muslim literature, no coherent or systemic association of Ham with blackness and servitude had developed prior to the late eighteenth century Whitford 2009;Aaron 1995). Kidd (2006) shows that Ham was not primarily associated with skin color in the medieval period, but rather stood as a symbol of idolatry and polytheism (p. 75).…”

Section: The Hamitic Hypothesismentioning

confidence: 99%

Slavery, the Hebrew Bible and the Development of Racial Theories in the Nineteenth Century

Burrell

2021

Religions

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Racial ideas which developed in the modern west were forged with reference to a Christian worldview and informed by the Bible, particularly the Old Testament. Up until Darwin’s scientific reframing of the origins debate, European and American race scientists were fundamentally Christian in their orientation. This paper outlines how interpretations of the Hebrew Bible within this Christian Weltanschauung facilitated the development and articulation of racial theories which burgeoned in western intellectual discourse up to and during the 19th century. The book of Genesis was a particular seedbed for identity politics as the origin stories of the Hebrew Bible were plundered in service of articulating a racial hierarchy which justified both the place of Europeans at the pinnacle of divine creation and the denigration, bestialization, and enslavement of Africans as the worst of human filiation. That the racial ethos of the period dictated both the questions exegetes posed and the conclusions they derived from the text demonstrates that biblical interpretation within this climate was never an innocuous pursuit, but rather reflected the values and beliefs current in the social context of the exegete.

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Section: The Hamitic Hypothesismentioning

confidence: 99%

Slavery, the Hebrew Bible and the Development of Racial Theories in the Nineteenth Century

Burrell

2021

Religions

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“…The Babylonian Talmud in the 6th century C.E. claimed that the result of the curse Noah placed on his son Ham resulted in the darkening of his descendant’s skin (Aaron, 1995; Graves, 2005a). There was no scriptural support for this claim, however, as other medieval authors associated different sons with fathering different races (Braude, 1997).…”

Section: Race and Racismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why the Nonexistence of Biological Races Does Not Mean the Nonexistence of Racism

Graves

2015

American Behavioral Scientist

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Color-blind racism is an ideology that allows persons of the dominant socially defined race (European Americans) to claim that racism is no longer the central factor determining the life chances of persons of non-European descent (particularly dark-skinned individuals of African descent). They argue that instead of the ongoing institutional and individual racism of American society, nonracial factors such as market dynamics, naturally occurring phenomena, and the cultural attitudes of minorities themselves are the main causal factors of their social subordination. Concurrent with the rise of this ideology has been the scientific determination that the human species does not really contain biological races. Thus, many color-blind racists have co-opted this fact to further argue that racism can no longer exist, since we have no biological races. This article will not only outline the nature of human biological variation, why that variation does not justify the classification of biological races within the species, but also why this fact has absolutely nothing to do with the ongoing racial discrimination faced by persons with dark skins in the United States. Furthermore, it will explain why membership in a socially defined race has real biological consequences including reducing the mental and physical well-being of the socially subordinated.

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“…Along with , also refer to David Aaron's article entitled 'Early Rabbinic Exegesis on Noah's Son Ham and the So-Called "Hamitic Myth"' (Aaron 1995). Contrary to early modern narratives rationalising the trans-Atlantic trade in slaves with the supposed "Ham's curse", there is no such curse in Noah's narrative.…”

Section: E Nissanmentioning

confidence: 99%