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- Herausgeber: WS
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
Zionism & the Black Church: Why Standing with Israel will be a Defining Issue for Christians of Color in the 21st Century is a discussion of Africa’s ancient connection to Israel and the Jewish people, and the historic Black-Jewish synergy in America. It explains the foundation of spiritual Zionism among Black people, and why that foundation will always inform Black support for Israel. It uncovers the origins of an anti-Israel ideology that targeted the Black and African communities beginning in the 1960s, and how that strategy became a mainstay in school curriculum and political policy. Finally, Zionism & the Black Church gives reasons why there is a bright future in the Africa-Israel, Black-Jewish relationship, and charts a clear path forward.
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Seitenzahl: 331
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
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Published by
Umndeni Press
Charlotte, North Carolina
© 2021 by Dumisani Washington. All rights reserved.
Originally published by Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel (IBSI), 2014
ISBN (978-0-578-24569-0)
To the remnant
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I wish to thank my wife of 32 years, mother of our six children, for her unwavering support since we were teenagers. I also wish to thank the Congregation of Zion in Stockton, California. Finally, special thanks to Melva L. Henderson, Wendy Cruz, Leah Washington, Gerri Pinkston, and Yasha Washington for your tireless help in making this second edition a reality.
INTRODUCTION
There is one universal Church. The Body of Christ is not Black or White. It is one Body. This book is not an effort to further divide Christians by race or ethnicity. The termBlack Churchin the title does not refer exclusively to a specific group of Christians, be they Baptist, Church of God in Christ, African Methodist Episcopal (AME), Hebrew Roots, Messianic any other denomination. From the birth of the Church at Pentecost in First Century Jerusalem, there have been multiethnic congregations.Black Churchsymbolizes Black Christians or other Christians of color, whatever their theological leaning may be. Also, Christian Zionism is a discussion that is paramount for all Christians regardless of ethnicity and for our Jewish brothers and sisters who may want to know more.
Zionism and the Black Church attempts to speak to the cause of Israel and the Jewish people to a community purposefully targeted with an anti-Zionist message. Once the lowest caste of any people in the Western world, chattel slavery, Black Americans generally have a sought-after perspective on issues of humanity. This is especially true of the Black Church. The Black, legendary struggle for justice has historically given the Black Church an air of validity and authority. Though a smaller portion of the U.S. population, Black people have influenced everything from music and art to theology, politics, education, and, of course, civil rights.
I started the Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel (IBSI) in July 2013, responding to what I can only explain as a divine call. In September 2014, I became the Diversity Outreach Coordinator for the now nearly ten million member Christians United for Israel (CUFI). My son, Joshua, currently serves as IBSI’s Director. By profession, I am a musician, a piano performance graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. I am a pastor, a husband of 32 years, and a father of six extraordinary children, just like their mother. I am also a Christian Zionist, meaning I believe the Jews are God’s chosen people, and the land of Israel belongs to them. But, Israel’s right to live in peace goes well-beyond scriptural interpretation. When I advocate for the Jewish State outside of religious circles, I rarely quote the Bible. However, this book is a combination of history, politics, and preaching. There will be scriptures quoted in both English and Hebrew.
I was born Dennis Ray Washington on February 17, 1967, in Little Rock, Arkansas, the segregated South. I am the youngest of seven children. We moved to California when I was about one, so I have no early memories of Arkansas. I legally changed my first name to Dumisani in the early 1990s to embrace my African heritage. Dumisani meanspraisefrom the Zulu phrasedumisaniuYehovah(praise the Lord). My dear friend andsisterNomathemba Sithole, a South African national of the Zulu tribe, helped me choose my new name. Nomathemba is affectionately known to our family asMalume- Aunty.
My parents, David and Lillian Washington, were both from the Little Rock area born in the early 1940s and were part of a vibrant Black community. My mother was a seamstress from a young age. My father’s father was a sharecropper, so my father grew up on a large farm complete with cows, chickens, pigs, horses, cats, and dogs. They grew all sorts of crops, including cotton. My father did not graduate from high school in large part because he had to run the entire farm by himself when both his brother and father fell ill.
My mother often spoke about Little Rock and the life of the community she loved. We were active members of King Solomon Baptist Church, where Reverend Thomas was the pastor. As my mother told me, I loved music so much as a baby that I would rock and sway as the choir sang. Unfortunately for Reverend Thomas, I was not fond of preaching. I would cry at the top of my lungs whenever he took the podium. My mother had to take me out of the sanctuary virtually every week after the music ended. Perhaps I just wanted the music to continue. Either way, Mama said I gave our pastor a complex. She was not joking.
My father was a gifted singer, a leader of the men’s chorus, and served on the deacon board. My mother was a deaconess and worked with the youth ministry, among many other things. She graduated from the only high school for Black children in Arkansas, Scipio Africanus Jones High School in Little Rock. S. A. Jones High School was the pride of Arkansas. Like many Black schools during segregation, there was a deep sense of connectedness among the teachers, administrators, and students. Throughout the history of Black people in America, education was the primary means of freedom and upward mobility. Black students from S. A. Jones graduated and went on to become doctors, lawyers, politicians, athletes, clergy . . . anything they aspired to be. My uncle, Dr. Levi Adams class of ’51, had a long and illustrious career with the medical school administration at Brown University in Rhode Island. There is an award at Brown that bears my uncle’s name.12
Though I never directly experienced it, hearing my parents describe life in North Little Rock gave me a great sense of pride as well. I learned of the Little RockNine3 from my parents, who knew the families involved. I learned of the internal debate over integration. Many Black people knew that it would mean the end of their beloved S. A. Jones and other Black institutions in Little Rock. S. A. Jones closed in 1970 because of integration. The teachers and administrators were released and not allowed to work in the now “integrated” schools. For this reason and many others, my mother explained to me at a very young age; she was vehemently against forced integration.
My parents did not teach us hatred and contempt for White people. They taught us what racism was so that we would be prepared to face it. They taught us not to ascribe virtue or wickedness to someone simply based on their ethnicity. One’s character was who one was, not one’s race. They also taught us to speak our minds and not be afraid of anyone’s disapproval, a lesson they demonstrated as much as they articulated. It was always in their blood. One of the most vivid stories my father told me was when he was about ten years old. The White landowner had come to the farm to check on my grandfather’s work. As my father and grandfather were busy in the field, the landowner pulled up in his pickup truck and began berating my grandfather. My grandfather stood silently, avoiding eye contact as the man disrespected him in front of his young son. After a few moments, my father had all he could take. He abruptly climbed up the driver’s side door of the pickup, got directly in the White man’s face, and said, “Hey, mister! I don’t like the way you talkin’ to my daddy!” At ten years old, my father did not fully understand that what he had just done could have gotten both he and his father killed. My grandfather gently removed my father from the man’s truck, saying, “Junior, get down.”
No more than ten at the time, I asked, “What did the man do, Daddy?”
“Nothing,” my father replied. “He was stunned. He just looked at my father, then looked at me, then looked back at my father, and drove away.”
I read the Bible as a child and was intrigued by all things Israelite. Though I loved reading the gospels and “walking with Jesus” through the scriptures, I was even more drawn to the Old Testament. I knew the stories of David and Goliath, the Patriarchs, and the Exodus by heart. As a young adult, I wanted to learn more about the Hebrew roots of my faith and met Jewish musicians who introduced me to the feasts (Passover, Tabernacles, etc.). They shared songs and prayers in Hebrew that began to transform my worship and my songwriting. Around the mid-1990s, I began researching the Israelite Diaspora, as I was captivated by news of Beta Israel, the Jews of Ethiopia. I began to follow current events regarding Israel and Africa and learned about the absorption process of the Ethiopian Jews. All of these seemingly disparate strands of my life would become woven together years later.
My good friend Victor Styrsky was the Eastern Region Coordinator for Christians United for Israel (CUFI). Like me, Victor is a musician and leads a band called Wild Branches. Based on Romans 11 (wild branches grafted into Israel), Wild Branches sings a unique style of the SongsofZion and the Jewish people. They provided music for CUFI’s Night to Honor Israel and Victor invited me to play the keyboard. At the CUFI events, I began learning more about modern-day Israel, the people, the culture, its global charitable work, its breakthroughs in innovation and technology, and Israel’s defense and military concerns. I also began to learn of the Palestinian refugee crisis and the nature of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Black American history was something I first learned in my home as a child at the dining room table, in my mother’s sewing room, and kitchen. As a young adult, I learned of the Black African fight against apartheid from Malume (Nomathemba), who lived it. Knowing the atrocities of apartheid, laid bear the false claims of Israeli apartheid. When I understood how the historic Black struggle for justice was used by Israel’s enemies to demonize her, I was personally offended. I discovered Black Americans in the 1970s who were also offended at the falsehood that ZionismisRacism and voiced their loud and eloquent opposition. Knowing this gave me great comfort.
The first time I spoke publicly on the subject of Israel was at a Sacramento City Council meeting in 2012. The leaders were considering a measure to become a sister city with Ashkelon, Israel, and there was an open hearing. In a packed room divided along ideological lines, I experienced my first virulently hostile, anti-Israel crowd. I heard the false accusations of Israeli apartheid, Jim Crow racism and segregation, the genocide of the Arab Palestinians—the attacks were relentless and baseless. When it was my turn to take the podium, I refuted the claims of Israel’s racism and discrimination. I explained that while no nation is perfect, Israel was nothing like what my parents experienced in Little Rock, or Malume experienced in Durban. Israel is a free, pluralistic society forced to defend herself against an untold number of enemies bent on her annihilation. Comparing the Jewish State to what my family endured was beyond egregious, and I let everyone in the chamber know I was there to defend my legacy. I quickly learned that people who opposed Israel did not respond well to Black people defending Israel. It was interesting hearing the racist comments directed at me by people who were there to “combat” racism. The combination of shamelessly abusing my people’s heritage and lying about Israel, Africa’s most significant regional partner, lit a fire in me that has not dimmed.
In the many Israel events where I’ve spoken since 2012, I’ve heard even more outlandish terms like a sort of apartheid and a type of Jim Crow, even a symbolicgenocide. There is no sortof apartheid. There is no typeof Jim Crow. And genocide is real killing, not symbolic. I also quickly learned that when it came to slandering the Jewish State, no people’s history or legacy was off-limits. Anyone’s story, no matter how sacred or painful, would be exploited to attack the Jews and their homeland. Today, there is virtually no topic concerning Israel, which will not be controversial. There is just too much disinformation and anti-Israel propaganda to even expect anything less.
Unbeknownst to me at the time, my advocacy for the State of Israel had officially begun. After my first trip to Israel during Hanukkah of 2012, I returned and started the Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel (IBSI). During my first speaking tour in which I met diverse anti-Zionists, I would often reflect on the words of my friend, Yaffa Tegegne. Yaffa is an Ethiopian Jew and daughter of the late Baruch Tegegne, a pioneer in the movement that saw the Jews of Ethiopia finally return to Israel. As a Black Jew and vocal Zionist during her college years in Canada, Yaffa’s antagonists did not understand her.
I studied politics at Concordia University . . . probably one of the biggest Arab student populations in North America. In 2002-2003 [Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu was supposed to come and there was a riot, and we had a huge solidarity for Palestinian rights movement, and there were terrible incidents. I used to literally argue on campus all the time, and I think I was the only Ethiopian Jew and the only Ethiopian they had ever met, and it was very difficult for them. They didn’t know how to deal with it, because it went fundamentally against their entire notion. Like, “here’s a contemporary story of why we still need Israel. It’s not just the Holocaust. This [ Jewish persecution] has been continuously happening in recent times.” So they would have a really hard time dealing with me because I didn’t fit the mold of what their argument was.4
My experience in Sacramento that night was similar to what Yaffa described. For many anti-Zionists, a Black person standing with Israel is offensive. They are unaware of or don’t care about the long tradition of Black-Jewish cooperation in this nation. As it has not been as visible over the past fifty years, I could not say I blamed them. During the void of Black vocal support for Israel and the Jewish people, many falsehoods and deceptions have been put in place. It has become quite common to meet Black people, especially on college campuses, who have a negative view of Israel, if not Jews in general. As Jamie Kirchick noted in his 2018 Commentary articleTheRiseofBlackAnti-Semitism:
Attitudinal surveys conducted by the ADL [Anti-Defamation League] consistently show that African Americans harbor “anti-Semitic proclivities” at a rate significantly higher than the general population (23 percent and 14 percent respectively in 2016).5
Much of this is the effect of the anti-Israel miseducation directed towards the Black community. In 1992, that same ADL survey found antisemitism in the Black community as high as 37%.6
In the 1960s, Dr. King completely understood the factors that were adversely affecting the Black-Jewish relationship and the antisemitic feeling fomenting in some circles. He offered a partial explanation in Where Do We Go From Here:ChaosorCommunity.
Negroes nurture a persistent myth that the Jews of America attained social mobility and status solely because they had money. It is unwise to ignore the error for many reasons. In a negative sense it encourages anti-Semitism and overestimates money as a value. In a positive sense the full truth reveals a useful lesson. Jews progressed because they possessed a tradition of education combined with social and political action.7
Some of Dr. King’s most impassioned pleas for Black-Jewish continued cooperation came towards the end of his life. This was also when Israel’s enemies were attempting to drive a wedge between Blacks and Jews, between Israel and the African nations.
Mark Twain once said, “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.” I believe we live in a time similar to the transitional period of the late 60s and 70s. Christians are called to stand with and be a blessing to Israel and the Jewish people. Black Americans have a long history of shared struggle with the Jewish people. What’s more, the issue of Black civil rights took center stage once again with the 2020 police killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmad Arbery, and others. Israel’s enemies are using those tragedies and other challenges within the Black community to manipulate people into blaming and hating Israel and the Jews. The exploitation is worse now than it was since its beginning in the 1960s. Black Christians will be pivotal in this renewed fight for the direction of our community, the Church in general, and our country.
I am humbled to do the work of strengthening the Black-Jewish, Africa-Israel alliance. Not only that, I am extremely optimistic about the future. As Dr. King said, “We’ve got some difficult days ahead,”8 but we will reach the Promised Land. Church, we will see God move on behalf of those who stand with His firstborn— the Jewish people.
I pray that the reader of this book will receive the true message of Zionism and solidarity with Israel. I also pray that fellow pastors and ministry leaders will exhort their people to walk in the blessing and not the curse.
Genesis 12.3
AndIwillblessthosewhoblessyou,andtheonewhocursesyouIwillcurse,andallthefamiliesoftheearthshallbeblessedinyou.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 12.3)
_______________
1 The Levi C. Adams Citation honors a senior undergraduate for distinction in service in a religious organization, project or initiative at Brown University. The honor was inaugurated in 2001, 7 years following Adams’ retirement.
2 See also the Levi C. Adams Medical Scholarship introduced in 2018, which offers financial support to African American physicians working to earn M.D.s at Brown’s Warren Alpert Medical School.
3 Group of nine African Americans who enrolled at and participated in the desegregation of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957. See “Little Rock Nine,” by Encyclopedia of Arkansas (2010) for more information.
4 Y. Tegegne during an interview with Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel (IBSI) (2013).
5 From “The Rise of Black Anti-Semitism,” by J. Kirchick, 2018, CommentaryMagazine.
6 From “Black-Jewish relations: ADL survey finds anti-Semitism high in black community,” by Jewish Virtual Library, 1998, JewishVirtualLibrary.
7 From “Where Are We Going?” by M. L. King, Jr., 2010, WhereDoWeGoFromHere:ChaosorCommunity?, p. 163. Copyright 1968 by Martin Luther King, Jr. Copyright.
8 See “I’ve been to the mountaintop,” by M. L. King, 1968.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1 THE AFRICAN BIBLICAL TIE TO ISRAEL
CHAPTER 2 THE JEWISH DIASPORA AND PROPHETIC RETURN TO ISRAEL
CHAPTER 3 ZIONISM AND THE HISTORIC BLACK STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM
CHAPTER 4 THE PRO-ISRAEL LEGACY OF THE REVEREND DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
CHAPTER 5 ANTI-ZIONISM: HATRED FOR ISRAEL
CHAPTER 6 WHAT WE MUST DO NOW
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CHAPTER 1
THEAFRICANBIBLICALTIETOISRAEL
Exodus 2.5-6
5 Pharaoh’sdaughterwentdowntobathe,totheNile,andhermaidenswerewalkingalong theNile, andshe sawthe basketin themidst ofthemarsh,andshesenthermaidservant,andshetookit.
6 Sheopened[it],andshesawhimthechild,andbehold,hewasaweepinglad,andshehadcompassiononhim,andshesaid,“Thisis[one]ofthechildrenoftheHebrews.”
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Exodus 2.5-6)
Genesis chapter 10 is known as the TableofNations, where the Bible tells us how the three sons of Noah repopulated the earth after the Flood. Few passages of scripture are more controversial than Genesis 10 as it has caused endless debates regarding ethnicity and race. However, to understand the African connection to Israel, we must start at the beginning. This is not an attempt to solve any deep anthropological mysteries, but rather point to the line connecting Israel and the continent of Africa, to clarify words as well as their meaning.
We begin with the word Africa, which has no biblical origin but today is used to denote an immense land and category of people. The origin of the name Africa has been in dispute for centuries. In the article,IdeaofAfrica-OriginsoftheNameAfrica, the Science Encyclopedia states:
At least seven origins have been suggested: (1) it is a Roman name for what the Greeks called “Libya,” itself perhaps a Latinization of the name of the Berber tribe Aourigha (perhaps pronounced “Afarika”); (2) it is derived from two Phoenician terms either referring to corn or fruit (pharika), meaning land of corn or fruit; (3) it comes from a Phoenician root faraqa, meaning separation or diaspora; a similar root is apparently found in some African languages such as Bambara; (4) it is drawn from the Latin adjective apricē (sunny) or the Greek aprikē (free from cold); (5) it might even stem from Sanskrit and Hindi in which the root Apara or Africa denotes that which, in geographical terms, comes “after”—to the west—in which case Africa is the western continent; (6) it is the name of a Yemenite chief named Africus who invaded North Africa in the second millennium B.C.E. and founded a town called Afrikyah; or (7) it springs from “Afer” who was a grandson of Abraham and a companion of Hercules (Ki-Zerbo; Spivak).1
In the Bible, the African nations of Egypt and Ethiopia (Cush) were sometimes referred to as dual kingdoms and were also called the LandofHam.
Psalm 68.31 (verse 32 in Jewish Tanakh or Christian Old Testament) GiftswillbebroughtfromEgypt;CushwillcausehishandstoruntoGod.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Psalm 68.31)
Psalm 105.23
IsraelcametoEgypt,andJacobsojournedinthelandofHam.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Psalm 105.23)
Isaiah 20.5
Andtheyshallbebrokenandashamedbecause ofCush,theirexpectation,andbecauseofEgypt,theirboasting.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Isaiah 20.5)
As is the case with language, the word Africa morphed and was eventually used to refer to the entire continent. The Bible names lands after their human progenitors. What is known today as Africa and parts of the Middle East were originally territories named after Noah’s grandsons, the sons of Ham.
Genesis 10.1
AndthesearethegenerationsofthesonsofNoah:Shem,Ham,andJapheth,andsonswereborntothemaftertheFlood.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 10.1)
We learn that Japheth, the youngest of Noah’s three sons, is the father of those who settled on the coastal lands of the Mediterranean spreading north into Europe and parts of Asia. We also learn that Shem, from whom we get the term Shemite or Semite, is the father of many tribes in the Afro-Asiatic region, including Eber, from whom we get the word Ivrit or Hebrew.
Genesis 10.22
ThesonsofShemwereElamandAsshurandArpachshadandLudandAram.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 10.22)
Genesis 10.24
AndArpachshadbegotShelah,andShelahbegotEber.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 10.24)
In Genesis 11.10–26, we learn that six generations separate Eber from Abram, whose name God changed to Abraham, the chief patriarch of the children of Israel. The line of succession from Abraham to Israel is as follows: Abraham and his wife Sarah had a son named Isaac. Isaac and his wife Rebekah had a son named Jacob. God changed Jacob’s name to Israel (Genesis 32). Jacob fathered twelve sons with his two wives, Leah and Rachel, and their maidservants. Those sons became the heads of the twelve tribes of the Israelite nation. The Israelites have many titles including, childrenofIsrael,childrenofJacob,childrenofAbraham,Jewish people, and Jews, from the word Judah. The term Israeli is a general word used for a citizen of the modern Jewish State, whether they are ethnically Jewish or not.
Though Abraham established no organized religion, Abraham is known as the father of the world’s three largest and most influential religious faiths: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
Genesis 10.6
AndthesonsofHamwereCushandMizraimandPutandCanaan.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 10.6)
It is interesting to note that, of Noah’s three sons, it is only Ham that receives the group designation LandofHam in the Bible. There does not seem to be a similar title, LandofShem or LandofJapeth. According to scripture, the descendants of all three sons populated the entire earth, and as such, covered vast regions of the globe. Yet, Land of Ham seems to have a dual meaning of both land (Egypt, Ethiopia) and people (referred to as Africans today).
As Genesis chapter 10 unfolds, we learn that the descendants of each of the four sons of Ham settle the regions of Ethiopia (Cush or Kush), Egypt (Mizraim), Libya (Put or Phut), and Canaan. The descendants of these four sons of Ham inhabited virtually all of the continent we call Africa and portions of present-day Saudi Arabia. So the biblical land of Ham can, in one sense, refer to Africa and parts of Southwest Asia (Middle East). However, based on Western teaching,
both biblical and secular, Hamite is generally used to describe sub-Saharan Africans. While referring to sub-Saharan Africans as Hamites is not entirely inaccurate, it is somewhat misleading for three fundamental reasons:
1. Ham had four sons representing four distinct branches of the Hamitic tree stretching throughout Africa (including east, west, and north) and the Middle East.
2. Throughout biblical history, Hamites and Semites intermingled. For example, Ishmael is the son of Abram—a Semite, and Hagar—a Hamite (Egyptian).
3. The misapplication or manipulation of race/ethnicity, or modern notions of race and anti-Black bias read into the scriptures.
It is difficult to overstate the issue of race/color in American or Western society. If the reader of this book is not from the United States or is unaware of our history with Black versus White relationships, they may not fully appreciate the complexity of this topic. In 1883, Frederick Douglass, a former slave and abolitionist described the “color line,” a term used to reference racial segregation in the United States after the abolition of slavery. The color line still haunts us in various forms today as racial strife persists, especially when used by those in power to divide. To remain focused and on topic, we will concern ourselves with race and the Church. To that end, we must address the centuries-old false teaching of the Curse of Ham. It is arguably the faux proof text of biblically-based racism and the biblical justification for hatred and discrimination against black Africans.
THE CURSE OF HAM
In Genesis chapter nine, the Bible tells of Noah becoming drunk, and his son, Ham, saw his father naked in his tent and left without covering his body. Noah’s other sons, Shem and Japheth, entered their father’s tent, walking backward so as not to see his nakedness, and covered him. After he awoke, Noah uttered these words:
Genesis 9.25–26
26“...CursedbeCanaan;heshallbeaslaveamongslavestohisbrethren.”25Andhesaid,“BlessedbetheLord,theGodofShem,andmayCanaanbeaslavetothem.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Genesis 9.25-26)
As previously mentioned, this story is often referred to as the Curse of Ham. For generations, this text was used to justify, even celebrate the enslavement and subjugation of African people. The curse was defined as blackskin and was a sign of perpetual servitude. Of the many things incorrect about this teaching, two are most glaring:
1. Nowhere in Genesis nine is hue or skin color mentioned.
2. Ham was not cursed. His son, Canaan, was.
Most people believe Ham was cursed and, therefore, so were all black people of African/Hamitic descent. However, careful study of the Scriptures reveals that the curse was placed upon Canaan (Gen 9.25), a son of Ham. However, Ham’s other sons, Mizraim, Phut, and Cush . . . were not cursed. This particular curse justified Abraham’s inheritance of the land of Canaan as his blessing because Shem and his descendants (Gen 9.26) received the blessing of his father Noah due to his strong desire to be in his father’s image and his love for God.2
In his book Africa and the Bible, Edwin M. Yamauchi also affirms that Ham was not cursed and dispels that somehow Hamitic blackness is undesirable.
Rabbinic literature in general, following the Bible, holds that Canaan, not Ham, is cursed. According to [Ephraim] Isaac [a scholar from Ethiopia], for the Rabbi‘s, “Canaan’s dark complexion, which was not unlike that of the Israelites, was said to be ugly; Cush’s blackness, on the other hand, which was deep and distinguished, had no such stigma attached to it.” This was the view also of the main medieval commentators, such as Rashi (d. 1105), Abraham Ibn Ezra (d. 1167), Rambam (d. 1274), and Sforno (d. 1550).3
Why did God punish Ham’s son for his father’s offense? That is a mystery we will not attempt to unravel in this book. Our goal is simply to set the record straight. God never cursed Ham or the African people. He showed neither disdain for people of dark skin nor preference for people with light skin. As the scriptures teach, “God is not a respecter of persons.” Further, the physical sign of God’s curse on Canaan was not black skin. We do not know exactly what hue Canaan was before or after the curse, and the Bible does not mention a visible sign, unlike the mark God put on Cain after he killed his brother, Abel (Gen 4.15).
Again, the term Hamite generically referring to Africans is not wholly accurate because Ham had four sons. Here the purveyors of racist biblical teaching are hard-pressed to explain how Ham was indeed cursed with black skin but was also the father of the Egyptians (Mizraim), whom they often claim were White, not Black. In his foreword to Diop’s CivilizationorBarbarism:AnAuthenticAnthropology, Dr. John Henrik Clarke addresses the Western race-bias that has obscured the identity of the children of Mizraim.
If Egypt is a dilemma in Western historiography, it is a created dilemma. The Western historians, in most cases, have rested the foundation of what is called “Western Civilization” on the false assumption, or claim, that the Egyptians were white people. To do this they had to ignore great masterpieces of Egyptian history written by other white historians who did not support this point of view, such as Gerald Massey’s great classic, AncientEgypt,TheLightoftheWorld (1907), and his subsequent works, TheBookoftheBeginningsandTheNaturalGenesis. Other neglected works by white writers are Politics,Intercourse,andTradeoftheCarthaginians and Ethiopians by A. H. L. Heeren (1833) and The RuinsofEmpires by Count C. F. Volney (1787).4
The people of Canaan and Phut are also from the line of Ham. Dark or light, all of the tribes would be considered peopleofcolor today, all originating from Africa and the Middle East.
Hamites, or the sons of Ham, have come to mean African, but the term is rarely used to describe the people of ancient Libya, Canaan, or Egypt. Today, the entire area of North Africa (Libya, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria) is Arabic.
Though these nations are a part of the African continent, they were conquered and resettled after the death of the Arab Islamic prophet, Muhammad.
When Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam, died in 632 the new religion had already gathered a number of impressive victories on the battlefield. The armies of Islam quickly and easily conquered the Arabian peninsula before moving on to take the homelands of their various neighbours. Marching out of Arabia in 639 they entered non-Arab Egypt; 43 years later they reached the shores of the Atlantic; and in 711 they invaded Spain. In just 70 years they had subdued the whole of North Africa, instituting a new order. This conquest, from the Nile to the Atlantic, was more complete than anything achieved by previous invaders and the changes it wrought proved permanent.5
Generally, the Arab people who now inhabit North Africa do not consider themselves African in the genealogical sense. In biblical times, Arabs were located in the region of present-day Saudi Arabia. Again, this area in antiquity was part of the Cushite/Ethiopian territory—thehornofAfrica.
Third, the children of Ham and Shem, like all tribes, experienced some intermingling. Within the narrative of the Israelite people (descendants of Shem), we often read of Hamites being included, further complicating who indeed is a biological son or daughter of Abraham.
Though it is speculated that Moses ultimately had two wives, at least one was a Cushite (Ethiopian).
Numbers 12.1
MiriamandAaronspokeagainstMosesregardingtheCushitewomanhehadmarried,forhehadmarriedaCushitewoman.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Numbers 12.1)
Rahab, the Canaanite of Jericho from the line of Ham, married an Israelite man, and became part of the genealogical line of King David, the Messianic line of Jesus.
Joshua 6.25
ButRahabtheharlot,andherfather’shousehold,andallthatshehad,Joshua saved alive; and she dwelt in the midst of Israel to this day; becauseshehidthemessengers,whomJoshuasenttospyoutJericho.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Joshua 6.25)
Matthew 1.1–6a
1 The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son ofAbraham.2AbrahamwasthefatherofIsaac,andIsaacthefatherofJacob,and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, 3 and Judah the father ofPerez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and HezronthefatherofRam4andRamthefatherofAmminadab,andAmminadabthe father of Nahshon, and Nahshon the father of Salmon, 5 and Salmonthe father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, andObedthefatherofJesse,6andJessethefatherofDavidtheking.(English Standard Version, Matthew 1.1-6a)
Both Hamites and Semites, the “mixed multitude,” left Egypt during the Exodus of the children of Israel.
Exodus 12.37–38
37 The children of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about sixhundredthousandonfoot,themen,besidestheyoungchildren.38Andalso,a great mixed multitude went up with them, and flocks and cattle, verymuchlivestock.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary,
Exodus 12.37-38)
In the book of Nehemiah, we learn that all of the people who returned to Israel after 70 years of exile were not Israelite, inferring interbreeding with their Babylonian (Hamite) and Persian captors.
Nehemiah 7.63–64
63Andofthepriests:thechildrenofHobaiah,thechildrenofHakkoz,thechildren of Barzillai, who took [a wife] from the daughters of Barzillai theGileaditeandwascalledbytheirname.64Thesewhotracedtheirgenealogysoughttheirrecords,buttheywerenotfound,andtheyweredisqualifiedfromthepriesthood.
(The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi Commentary, Nehemiah 7.63-64)
We reiterate that Hamite and Semite do not denote Black versus White or Black versus non-Black. We are very narrowly focusing on tribal affiliation or genealogy. The descendants of Ham, son of Noah, were the people who settled in whatis called Africa and parts of the Middle East. The descendants of Shem, son of Noah and brother of Ham, were people who settled in much of the Middle East, including Arabs. Both groups share common physical features, though the people of Cush and Mizraim were known for their darker complexion. We will say more about the descendants of Japheth, Noah’s third son, in the next chapter.
As we stated, the initial challenge to understanding Africa’s place in scripture is language. One will not find the word Africa in virtually any Bible translation. However, few nations appear more frequently in the Bible than Egypt (Mizraim) and Ethiopia (Cush). Also, no other nation is more prominent in the story of Israel’s beginning than Egypt. It is important to note that the regions of Egypt and Ethiopia are much different than the borders of those countries today. Some historians believe biblical Egypt and Ethiopia were much larger than the modern states. Ancient Cush could well have included modern-day Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, Kenya, Zimbabwe, and a large portion of what is known today as sub-Saharan Africa. Again, other possible evidence of the larger size of biblical Egypt and Ethiopia is that they are often referred to as dual kingdoms (Isaiah 20, Psalm 105). Today, the African continent is made up of 54 states and provinces. Much of that land division occurred during the relatively recent European colonial era (late 19th century to mid-20th century). By 1900, a handful of European nations controlled 90% of Africa’s lands after the signing of the “Treaty of Berlin.” It is crucial to know the biblical names and geography of African lands.
For now, we return to the African lands most often mentioned in the Bible: Egypt and Ethiopia—the land of Ham. Their significance cannot be overstated as the people and their nations are mentioned prominently in all three sections of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), what Christians call the “Old Testament.”
It was to Egypt that Abraham and Sarah (then Abram and Sarai) sojourned because of a famine (Genesis 12). Generations later, Abraham’s great-grandson, Joseph, would be sold into slavery by his brothers and taken into Egypt (Genesis 37). It was in Egypt that Joseph rose from slave to prime minister, second in command only to Pharaoh. Joseph’s brothers and his father, Jacob, were reunited in Egypt, and their descendants remained for 430 years (Genesis 46). It was Moses, the deliverer, who led the children of Israel out from bondage, infanticide, and the oppression of Pharaoh, who “knew not Joseph” (Exodus 1-12).
Underscoring the lack of physical distinction between the two, Jethro’s daughters mistook Moses, a Semite, for an Egyptian, a Hamite (Exodus 2). It was to Egypt that the Israelites were accustomed to fleeing when they felt threatened (Isaiah 31). It is from Egypt and Ethiopia that Psalm 68 declares dignitaries will come to Zion or Jerusalem. In the New Testament, it was to Egypt that Joseph was instructed by an angel to take Mary and the child Jesus until Herod died (Matthew 2). Similarly to Moses, the Apostle Paul, a Semite, was thought to be an Egyptian, a Hamite (Acts 21.37-39). These are but a few references that illustrate the long and complicated relationship that Israel had (and still has) with the land and people of Mizraim, son of Ham.
If Mizraim/Egypt has a close relationship with Israel in the Bible, then Cush/ Ethiopia’s is even more significant. Again, Moses’ wife, Zipporah, was a Cushite or Ethiopian (Numbers 12). Moses and Zipporah had at least two children together, and these sons may very well represent the very first “Ethiopian Israelites.”
