Holy Moly: Why We Hate Them

I'll take the opportunity to skim Genesis 10 because it's entirely genealogical.  Not that it's not important, but there's no plot.  Before I skip over him, I'd like to point out a passage:

Cush fathered Nimrod, the first great warrior on earth. The Lord saw him as a great hunter, and so it is said, “Like Nimrod, whom the Lord saw as a great hunter.”

Yeah, like I always say, "Like Nimrod, whom the Lord saw as a great hunter."  And at a certain point, possibly Calvin and Hobbes, "Nimrod" became a pejorative.  One can only imagine the stories of Nimrod which got left out of the Bible to make room for more genealogy.  Once again, the Bible was clearly not written by people looking to pitch movies to Hollywood.

But enough of poor Nimrod.

Myths are awesome.  They tell us how people thought about the world when the myth was created, or written down, or whatever.  And much of the early parts of Genesis are myth.  We learn why the rainbow got its... rainbow?  We learn why man is the master of the earth.  We learn why we don't live forever in paradise.  And we learn why it's okay to hate certain people.

Remember Ham and his unfortunate son Canaan?  Well, let's see if we recognize any of Ham's other children.  "Ham’s sons: Cush, Egypt, Put, and Canaan."  Egypt is a gimme.  Cush refers to a region of Africa to the south of Egypt.  Put is probably the legendary Punt, an ever farther portion of Africa that even the Egyptians were pretty vague about.  And Canaan is a region of the Middle East.  Together, we've got all the unpleasant (to the Israelites) peoples of the world to the south.  Cush fathers Nimrod, who goes on to found Babylon (Babel, about which more later) and Nineveh.  From Cush is also descended Sheba (the Queen of Sheba, anyone?).  Egypt even fathers children "from which the Philistines came."  And we really hate the Philistines.

So sure, if you've got a degree in ancient history, you probably recognize the names of some of Noah's other descendants.  You can probably even talk about how it's terribly anachronistic to have them all happen at the same time, when their civilizations weren't contemporaneous.  The Bible is older than dirt.  I get that.  Hopefully you get that.

But notice that Ham, who saw his father's robe serpent, is the father of all the bad guys in what will be our story from here on in.  And we haven't gotten there yet (that will take a bit more genealogy) but Shem is the progenitor of Abram, who grows up to be the first Jew.  And remember what Noah said?

“Bless the Lord,
the God of Shem;
Canaan will be his servant.
May God give space to Japheth;
he will live in Shem’s tents,
and Canaan will be his servant."

 So in other words, this, kids, is why it's okay for us to hate Egyptians, Africans, and Babylonians, and why it's okay for us to subjugate pretty much everyone who isn't us.  Just so.

Now the Israelites have plenty to dislike about Egypt and Babylon.  We'll get there, believe me.  But when you start telling stories about how there's a primal reason, beyond simple grievances, that it's okay for you to hate someone because they're different from you, that's why myths stop being awesome.

Don't tell your kids that it's okay to hate people because it just is.  Because their great great great great great granddaddy saw his father in the alltogether.  Because their great and so on granddaddy stole your great and so on granddaddy's plot of land in a place that doesn't even exist any more because it's older than dirt.  Because of anything that's "just so."