“And the sons of Noe who came out of the ark, were Sem, Cham, and Japheth: and Cham is the father of Chanaan. These three are the sons of Noe: and from these was all mankind spread over the whole earth. And Noe, a husbandman, began to till the ground, and planted a vineyard, and drinking of the wine was made drunk, and was uncovered in his tent. Which when Cham the father of Chanaan had seen, to wit, that his father’s nakedness was uncovered, he told it to his two brethren without. But Sem and Japheth put a cloak upon their shoulders, and going backward, covered the nakedness of their father: and their faces were turned away, and they saw not their father’s nakedness.”
The three sons come from the ark, and attention is immediately drawn to the person of Ham, who fathered Canaan, who is mentioned five times in this passage and in the one following. From the line of Ham come Israel’s greatest enemies: (Genesis 10:6-20), including Babylon, Egypt, Canaan, and Egypt, an indication that one is stepping into dark territory in the narrative: “For though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils, for thou art with me” (Psalm 22:4). When someone brings forth the enemies of Israel, it is a look into what is contrary to love, with some moral depravity being the foundation of an entire people: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do” (John 8:44). Noah is then described as a husbandman, a tiller of the soil, for hard work done with joy is a sweet offering to God, who does not desire to see you labor so much as flourish in the trade you were made for: “Let every man abide in the same calling in which he was called” (1 Corinthians 7:20), that you may put your heart into your work and improve the world: “They shall strengthen the state of the world, and their prayer shall be in the work of their craft, applying their soul, and searching in the law of the most High” (Ecclesiasticus 38:39), even if it is the smallest corner of the divine vineyard. Noah then gets drunk on the wine, it being years since he had drunk wine, due to the time it would take for the grapes to mature. Therefore, in what had been a moderate pleasure: “Sober drinking is health to soul and body” (Ecclesiasticus 31:37), the amount he was used to overwhelms him, and he falls into sleep. In this is a type of Jesus, who labored in life, remaining quietly in Nazareth, loving those around Him: “Use your endeavour to be quiet, and that you do your business, and work with your own hands, as we commanded you” (1 Thessalonians 4:11), before drinking the cup of the suffering of love, letting love intoxicate Him even to the shameful death of the cross: “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from me” (Matthew 26:39). What follows is of particular insidiousness. Seeing the incapacity of his father, Ham “looks upon his father’s nakedness,” which is a Jewish idiom for laying with your father’s wife: “Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father, or the nakedness of thy mother: she is thy mother, thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s wife: for it is the nakedness of thy father” (Leviticus 18:7-8). Rather than gross perversion, this was rather a reach for power, for in pagan mythologies, gods prove their power as leader of the pantheon by having sexual relations with the previous leader’s wives, which is seen later in Israel’s history: “And Achitophel said to Absalom: “Go in to the concubines of thy father whom he hath left to keep the house: that when all Israel shall hear that thou hast disgraced thy father, their hands may be strengthened with thee.’ So they spread a tent for Absalom on the top of the house, and he went in to his father’s concubines before all Israel” (2 Kings 16:21-22). It’s an attempt to usurp the birthright of Shem, the firstborn, by way of sexual assault. From this union, entirely depraved and deprived of love, comes Canaan, and thus is he mentioned several times in these passages and why he is so highlighted. Thus, Ham boasts to his brothers about this perverted conquest, who then cover their poor, violated mother without looking upon her. Now, the lessons here are many, but two that relate to love will be touched upon here. The first is a look into a grotesque use of the gift of free will, in which God seems absent: “And I saw, when he had opened the sixth seal… and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair” (Apocalypse 6:12), but even when the darkest nights wrap around you, the ones you love, or the world, it is a call to always believe in love, to trust in the merciful love of God even when He seems painfully absent: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46), for those that bear the brutality of human violence need the consolation and help of those that love, even if it can amount to no more than the covering of a blanket, or simply being present: “And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no man spoke to him a word: for they saw that his grief was very great” (Job 2:13). “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14), Theophila, and people need the light of love to brighten their darkness, or at least keep it from overwhelming them: “Let not the tempest of water drown me, nor the deep swallow me up: and let not the pit shut her mouth upon me” (Psalm 68:16). The second lesson is, in looking backwards and covering “the nakedness of their father,” Shem and Japheth demonstrate the Christian attitude to seeing the faults of others. To look on the ugliness of another’s soul is to take the ugly into yourself, whereas Wisdom teaches: “The learning of a man is known by patience: and his glory is to pass over wrongs” (Proverbs 19:11); and to cover the sight of another’s fault with a compliment of their character or a beautiful attribute of theirs is to cultivate the beautiful, for which your soul was made: “For the rest, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever modest, whatsoever just, whatsoever holy, whatsoever lovely, whatsoever of good fame, if there be any virtue, if any praise of discipline, think on these things” (Philippians 4:8). Finally, trust in the gift of the Lord. Just as Ham was blessed by God, yet reached for more by doing a grave evil, so too does God desire to fill your soul with love and clothe you in beauty: “For he hath satisfied the empty soul, and hath filled the hungry soul with good things” (Psalm 106:9); “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice: for they shall have their fill” (Matthew 5:6); “He hath filled the hungry with good things” (Luke 1:53), but to refuse your portion for something else, at the very least, twists your soul in a way that it is not supposed to bend: “Neither shall he approach to minister to him: If he be blind, if he be lame, if he have a little, or a great, or a crooked nose, if his foot, or if his hand be broken, if he be crookbacked, or blear eyed, or have a pearl in his eye, or a continual scab, or a dry scurf in his body, or a rupture” (Leviticus 21:18-20), draws you away from the one thing necessary: “If thou pursue after thou shalt not overtake: and if thou run before thou shalt not escape” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10), or, worst of all, tempts you into action that is sinful: “Be not delighted in the paths of the wicked, neither let the way of evil men please thee. Flee from it, pass not by it: go aside and forsake it” (Proverbs 4:14-15).