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Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
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Matthew Henry |
G E N E S I S
CHAP. X.
This chapter shows more particularly what was said in general
(ch. ix. 19),
concerning the three sons of Noah, that “of them
was the whole earth overspread;” and the fruit of that blessing
(ch. ix. 1, 7),
“replenish the earth.” Is is the only certain
account extant of the origin of nations; and yet perhaps there is no
nation but that of the Jews that can be confident from which of
these seventy fountains (for so many there are here) it derives
its streams. Through the want of early records, the mixtures of
people, the revolutions of nations, and distance of time, the
knowledge of the lineal descent of the present inhabitants of
the earth is lost; nor were any genealogies preserved but those
of the Jews, for the sake of the Messiah, only in this chapter we
have a brief account,
I. Of the posterity of Japheth,
II. The posterity of Ham
(ver. 6-20),
and in this particular notice is taken of Nimrod,
III. The posterity of Shem,
&c.
| The Generations of Noah. | B. C. 2347. |
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1 Now these are the generations
of the sons of Noah, Shem,
Ham, and Japheth: and unto them
were sons born after the flood.
2 The
sons of Japheth; Gomer, and Magog,
and Madai, and Javan, and
Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras.
3 And the sons of Gomer; Ashkenaz,
and Riphath, and Togarmah.
4 And
the sons of Javan; Elishah, and
Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim.
5 By these were the isles of the Gentiles
divided in their lands; every
one after his tongue, after their families,
in their nations.
Moses begins with Japheth’s family, either
because he was the eldest, or because his
family lay remotest from Israel and had least
concern with them at the time when Moses
wrote, and therefore he mentions that race
very briefly, hastening to give an account of
the posterity of Ham, who were Israel’s enemies
and of Shem, who were Israel’s ancestors;
for it is the church that the scripture
is designed to be the history of, and of the
nations of the world only as they were some
way or other related to Israel and interested
in the affairs of Israel. Observe,
1. Notice
is taken that the sons of Noah had sons born
to them after the flood, to repair and rebuild
the world of mankind which the flood had
ruined. He that had killed now makes alive.
2. The posterity of Japheth were allotted to
the isles of the Gentiles
(v. 5),
which were
solemnly, by lot, after a survey, divided
among them, and probably this island of
ours among the rest; all places beyond the
sea from Judea are called isles
(Jer. xxv. 22),
and this directs us to understand that promise
(Isa. xlii. 4),
the isles shall wait for his
law, of the conversion of the Gentiles to the
faith of Christ.
6 And the sons of Ham; Cush,
and Mizraim, and Phut, and Canaan.
7 And the sons of Cush; Seba, and
Havilah, and Sabtah, and Raamah,
and Sabtecha: and the sons of
Raamah; Sheba, and Dedan.
8 And Cush begat Nimrod: he began
to be a mighty one in the earth.
9 He was a mighty hunter before the
LORD: wherefore it is said; Even as
Nimrod the mighty hunter before the
LORD.
10 And the beginning of his
kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and
Accad, and Calneh, in the land of
Shinar.
11 Out of that land went
forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh,
and the city Rehoboth, and Calah,
12 And Resen between Nineveh and
Calah: the same is a great city.
13 And Mizraim begat Ludim, and
Anamim, and Lehabim, and Naphtuhim,
14 And Pathrusim, and Casluhim,
(out of whom came Philistim,)
and Caphtorim.
That which is observable and improvable
in these verses is the account here given of
Nimrod,
He is here
represented as a great man in his day: He began to be a
mighty one in the earth, that is, whereas those
that went before him were content to stand
upon the same level with their neighbours,
and though every man bore rule in his own
house yet no man pretended any further,
Nimrod’s aspiring mind could not rest here;
he was resolved to tower above his neighbours,
not only to be eminent among them,
but to lord it over them. The same spirit
that actuated the giants before the flood
(who became mighty men, and men of renown,
ch. vi. 4),
now revived in him, so soon
was that tremendous judgment which the
pride and tyranny of those mighty men
brought upon the world forgotten. Note,
There are some in whom ambition and affectation
of dominion seem to be bred in the
bone; such there have been and will be,
notwithstanding the wrath of God often revealed
from heaven against them. Nothing
on this side hell will humble and break the
proud spirits of some men, in this like Lucifer,
Now,
I. Nimrod was a great hunter; with this
he began, and for this became famous to a
proverb. Every great hunter is, in remembrance
of him, called a Nimrod.
1. Some
think he did good with his hunting, served
his country by ridding it of the wild beasts
which infested it, and so insinuated himself
into the affections of his neighbours, and
got to be their prince. Those that exercise
authority either are, or at least would be
called, benefactors,
Luke xxii. 25.
2. Others
think that under pretence of hunting he
gathered men under his command, in pursuit
of another game he had to play, which
was to make himself master of the country
and to bring them into subjection. He was
a mighty hunter, that is, he was a violent invader
of his neighbours’ rights and properties,
and a persecutor of innocent men, carrying
all before him, and endeavouring to
make all his own by force and violence. He
thought himself a mighty prince, but before
the Lord (that is, in God’s account) he was
but a mighty hunter. Note, Great conquerors
are but great hunters. Alexander
and Cesar would not make such a figure in
scripture-history as they do in common history;
the former is represented in prophecy
but as a he-goat pushing,
Nimrod
was a mighty hunter against the Lord,
so the LXX; that is, (1.) He set up idolatry,
as Jeroboam did, for the confirming of his
usurped dominion. That he might set up a
new government, he set up a new religion
upon the ruin of the primitive constitution
of both. Babel was the mother of harlots.
Or,
(2.) He carried on his oppression and
violence in defiance of God himself, daring
Heaven with his impieties, as if he and his
huntsmen could out-brave the Almighty,
and were a match for the Lord of hosts
and all his armies. As if it were a small thing to
weary men, he thinks to weary my God also,
Isa. vii. 13.
II. Nimrod was a great ruler: The beginning
of his kingdom was Babel,
v. 10.
Some
way or other, by arts or arms, he got into
power, either being chosen to it or forcing
his way to it; and so laid the foundations of
a monarchy, which was afterwards a head of
gold, and the terror of the mighty, and bade
fair to be universal. It does not appear
that he had any right to rule by birth; but
either his fitness for government recommended
him, as some think, to an election,
or by power and policy he advanced gradually,
and perhaps insensibly, into the
throne. See the antiquity of civil government,
and particularly that form of it which
lodges the sovereignty in a single person.
If Nimrod and his neighbours began, other
nations soon learned to incorporate under
one head for their common safety and welfare,
which, however it began, proved so
great a blessing to the world that things were
reckoned to go ill indeed when there was no
king in Israel.
III. Nimrod was a great builder. Probably
he was architect in the building of Babel, and
there he began his kingdom; but, when his
project to rule all the sons of Noah was
baffled by the confusion of tongues, out of
that land he went forth into Assyria (so the
margin reads it,
and built Nineveh, &c.,
that, having built these cities, he might command
them and rule over them. Observe,
in Nimrod, the nature of ambition.
1. It is
boundless. Much would have more, and still
cries, Give, give.
2. It is restless. Nimrod,
when he had four cities under his command,
could not be content till he had four more.
3. It is expensive. Nimrod will rather be
at the charge of rearing cities than not have
the honour of ruling them. The spirit of
building is the common effect of a spirit of
pride.
4. It is daring, and will stick at nothing.
Nimrod’s name signifies rebellion,
which (if indeed he did abuse his power to
the oppression of his neighbours) teaches us
that tyrants to men are rebels to God, and
their rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.
15 And Canaan begat Sidon his
firstborn, and Heth,
16 And the
Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the
Girgasite,
17 And the Hivite, and
the Arkite, and the Sinite,
18 And
the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and
the Hamathite: and afterward were
the families of the Canaanites spread
abroad.
19 And the border of the
Canaanites was from Sidon, as thou
comest to Gerar, unto Gaza; as thou
goest, unto Sodom, and Gomorrah,
and Admah, and Zeboim, even unto
Lasha.
20 These are the sons of
Ham, after their families, after their
tongues, in their countries, and in
their nations.
Observe here,
1. The account of the posterity
of Canaan, of the families and nations
that descended from him, and of the land
they possessed, is more particular than of any
other in this chapter, because these were the
nations that were to be subdued before Israel,
and their land was in process of time to
become the holy land, Immanuel’s land; and
this God had an eye to when, in the mean
time, he cast the lot of that accursed devoted
race in that spot of ground which he had selected
for his own people; this Moses takes
notice of,
When the Most
High divided to the nations their inheritance,
he set the bounds of the people according
to the number of the children of Israel.
2. By this account it appears that the posterity
of Canaan were numerous, and rich, and
very pleasantly situated; and yet Canaan
was under a curse, a divine curse, and not a
curse causeless. Note, Those that are under
the curse of God may yet perhaps thrive and
prosper greatly in this world; for we cannot
know love or hatred, the blessing or the
curse, by what is before us, but by what is
within us,
The curse of God
always works really and always terribly:
but perhaps it is a secret curse, a curse to
the soul, and does not work visibly, or a
slow curse, and does not work immediately;
but sinners are by it reserved for, and bound
over to, a day of wrath. Canaan here has a
better land than either Shem or Japheth,
and yet they have a better lot, for they inherit
the blessing.
21 Unto Shem also, the father of
all the children of Eber, the brother
of Japheth the elder, even to him
were children born.
22 The children
of Shem; Elam, and Asshur,
and Arphaxad, and Lud, and Aram.
23 And the children of Aram; Uz,
and Hul, and Gether, and Mash.
24 And Arphaxad begat Salah; and
Salah begat Eber.
25 And unto
Eber were born two sons: the name
of one was Peleg; for in his days was
the earth divided; and his brother’s
name was Joktan.
26 And Joktan
begat Almodad, and Sheleph, and
Hazarmaveth, and Jerah,
27 And
Hadoram, and Uzal, and Diklah,
28 And Obal, and Abimael, and
Sheba,
29 And Ophir, and Havilah,
and Jobab: all these were the sons
of Joktan.
30 And their dwelling
was from Mesha, as thou goest unto
Sephar a mount of the east.
31 These are the sons of Shem, after
their families, after their tongues, in
their lands, after their nations.
32 These are the families of the sons of
Noah, after their generations, in their
nations: and by these were the nations
divided in the earth after the flood.
Two things especially are observable in
this account of the posterity of Shem:–
I. The description of Shem, v. 21. We
have not only his name, Shem, which signifies
a name, but two titles to distinguish him by:–
1. He was the father of all the children of
Eber. Eber was his great grandson; but why
should he be called the father of all his children,
rather than of all Arphaxad’s, or Salah’s,
&c.? Probably because Abraham and his
seed, God’s covenant-people, not only descended
from Heber, but from him were called
Hebrews;
ch. xiv. 13,
Abram the Hebrew.
Paul looked upon it as his privilege that he
was a Hebrew of the Hebrews,
Phil. iii. 5.
Eber himself, we may suppose, was a man
eminent for religion in a time of general
apostasy, and a great example of piety to his
family; and, the holy tongue being commonly
called from him the Hebrew, it is
probable that he retained it in his family,
in the confusion of Babel, as a special token
of God’s favour to him; and from him the
professors of religion were called the children
of Eber. Now, when the inspired penman
would give Shem an honourable title,
he calls him the father of the Hebrews.
Though when Moses wrote this, they were
a poor despised people, bond-slaves in Egypt,
yet, being God’s people, it was an honour to
a man to be akin to them. As Ham, though
he had many sons, is disowned by being
called the father of Canaan, on whose seed
the curse was entailed
(ch. ix. 22),
so Shem,
though he had many sons, is dignified with
the title of the father of Eber, on whose seed
the blessing was entailed. Note, a family of
saints is more truly honourable than a family
of nobles, Shem’s holy seed than Ham’s royal
seed, Jacob’s twelve patriarchs than Ishmael’s
twelve princes,
Goodness is true
greatness.
2. He was the brother of Japheth the elder,
by which it appears that, though Shem is commonly
put first, he was not Noah’s first-born,
but Japheth was older. But why should this
also be put as part of Shem’s title and description,
that he was
the brother of Japheth,
since it had been, in effect, said often before?
And was he not as much brother to Ham?
Probably this was intended to signify the
union of the Gentiles with the Jews in the
church. The sacred historian had mentioned
it as Shem’s honour that he was the father
of the Hebrews; but, lest Japheth’s seed
should therefore be looked upon as for ever
shut out from the church, he here reminds
us that he was the brother of Japheth, not
in birth only, but in blessing; for Japheth
was to dwell in the tents of Shem. Note,
(1.) Those are brethren in the best manner that
are so by grace, and that meet in the covenant
of God and in the communion of saints.
(2.) God, in dispensing his grace, does not go
by seniority, but the younger sometimes gets
the start of the elder in coming into the church;
so the last shall be first and the first last.
II. The reason of the name of Peleg
(v. 25):
Because in his days (that is, about the
time of his birth, when his name was given
him), was the earth divided among the children
of men that were to inhabit it; either
when Noah divided it by an orderly distribution
of it, as Joshua divided the land of Canaan
by lot, or when, upon their refusal to
comply with that division, God, in justice,
divided them by the confusion of tongues:
whichsoever of these was the occasion, pious
Heber saw cause to perpetuate the remembrance
of it in the name of his son; and
justly may our sons be called by the same
name, for in our days, in another sense, is the
earth, the church, most wretchedly divided.
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