3. Of the BABYLONIANS we have already had occasion to speak. In the Euphrates Valley, like- wise, a mixture of races appears to have taken place at a remote period ; but here the situation is just the reverse of what we have found in Egypt, inasmuch as it is the Semitic element which obtains the
* See Erman’s article in ZDMG xlvi. pp. 93-129, and Hommel in the Beitrige zur Assyriologie, ti. 342-358.
RACES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT 79
supremacy to such an extent as to give to the Baby- lonian culture, from the earliest period revealed to us by historical inscriptions, a purely Semitic character. But the Egyptians and Babylonians (and subsequently the Assyrians) agree in this respect, that their relations to the Hebrews con- tinue, with but few interruptions, throughout the period of the political existence of the latter. Before the counter movement of Hebrew tribes and other Semitic groups* from Egypt back to the Arabian peninsula takes place, Egyptian rulers enter into close relationship with Palestine, Phoenicia, and Syria. The Tel el-Amarna tablets, so frequently mentioned in the course of this article, are the evidence of this uninterrupted intercourse in the 15th cent. before our era. The establishment of a Hebrew confederacy in Palestine exposes the Hebrews to constant danger of being absorbed either by the rulers of the Nile or by the ambitious lords of the Euphrates Valley and the Tigris. The olitical history of the two Hebrew kingdoms is argely taken up with the endeavour to steer clear of this danger—an endeavour that ends in failure.
iv. THE TENTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS. —The races hitherto discussed are the ones which play a part in the historical events unfolded in the OT narra- tives, but they are far from exhausting the races whose existence is recorded in the pages of the OT. The geographical horizon of the OT is re- markable for its wide extent, and indeed there are but few races—e.g. the Chinese and Japanese —which are left out of account in the famous tenth chapter of Genesis, which forms our principal source for a survey of the races of the OT in the wider sense, as including all those known to the Hebrews, or, more correctly speaking, to Hebrew writers, whether these races had anything to do with Hebrew history or not. The chapter itself in its present form is the result of considerable editing, involving more particularly the dovetailing of two documents, one of which is commonly assigned by modern scholars to the Jahwistic history, the other to the Priestly Code. The composition of the former of these documents is placed in the 9th cent., the latter shortly after the end of the exilic period; but how much earlier the traditions are, and the knowledge upon which the chapter is based, it is quite impossible to say. Apart from some additions in the list of the descendants of Shem, the chapter may be viewed as representing the geographical knowledge of a group of Hebrew writers in the 8th and 7th cent. B.c. The absence of any direct reference to Persia is an indication that even the post-exilic compiler took as his point of view conditions existing previous to his own day. In forming an estimate of the chapter, it should, however, be borne in mind that the tradi- tions embodied therein are of a scholastic and not a popular character, and that, while there are no sub- stantial reasons for assuming that the writers had before them geographical lists written in cuneiform or Egyptian characters from which they transcribed their data, the grouping of the races and nations of the world is distinctly the work of Hebrew school- men who are guided by learned and not by popular tradition. This is manifest already in Gn 9, the closing verses of which beginning with v.?® should be studied in connexion with ch. 10.
The three groups into which the human race is divided do not represent a popular point of view. A people’s geographical horizon—its tout le monde—is limited by its political and social interests. The three sons of Noah in the popular form of the tradition are not the broad subdivisions of mankind, but three subdivisions within the groups in which the Hebrews were more particu-
* Ex 1238 speaks of the ‘mixed multitude’ which left Egypt at the same time as the Hebrews.
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RACES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
larly interested : (#2) Shem, by which the Hebrews themselves are meant; (0) Canaan, the predecessors and hated rivals of the Hebrews in Palestine ; (c) Japheth, originally designating probably the people of Pheenicia,* with perhaps the adjacent island of Cyprus. These are the three sons of Noah in the original form of the famous blessing and curse (Gn 9%-*8), In the scholastic recasting of the popular tradition, the three sons of Noah become the progenitors of the human race. SHEM is taken as an extensive term to include a ue of peoples who were regarded as ethnically close to the Hebrews, JAPHETH is similarly extended to em- brace a large group of races to the north of the Hebrews, while Canaan is replaced by HAM, who is viewed as the progenitor of the group of races to the south of Israel as well as of others who were particularly hostile to the Hebrews. Interpreted in this way, it is manifest that we must not seek for a purely scientific division of the races known to the OT writers, but one in which science is linked to national prejudices and preferences. With these preliminary remarks we may pass to an analysis of this remarkable document, so far as scholarship has succeeded in interpreting it. The suggestion has already been thrown out that the grouping of peoples in the chapter in question is geographical rather than ethnic or linguistic, though it may at once be added that the geographical principle is not consistently carried out. The clearest section is that referring to the sons of Japheth (vv.2"), the core of which belongs to the post-exilic writers.