Genesis 10 - the God of many nations
 |
| Credit: Dessie_Designs | Pixabay |
As we reach Chapter 10 we meet another genealogy - this time seeing how Noah's family, having been reissued the mandate to be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it (Genesis 9:7), repopulate the Earth. One may question what relevance this list of names has for us. For the ancient Israelites passing down this knowledge, and eventually committing it to written form, this chapter would have described the origins of the other nations familiar to them.
What the inclusion of this account serves to emphasise, however, is that all these nations came from Noah, can be traced back to the covenant God made with all people (Genesis 9:8-11), and are all made in the image of God (Genesis 9:6). For the original hearers, this would have also served to emphasis the fact that God's promise to Abraham several chapters later, would be that all nations (or peoples) would be blessed through him (Genesis 12:3) - although God started with one family, the plan was global. Even after Jesus had been teaching his disciples after his resurrection, they asked him: “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6) - one of the many things they had failed to understand about Jesus' kingdom was that it was not about political power to the state of Israel - but a new 'Israel' of those of many nations, backgrounds and languages.
I don't know what preconceptions you have or come into contact with regarding the relative status, holiness, or blessedness of different peoples - whether that is nations, races or cultural and religious groups. There are those who overtly believe in the supremacy of certain races, but although one would hope that they are in the minority, all of us must be vigilant against unconscious biases we have and assumptions we may make that cause us to afford less dignity to some than others. We may also think about the way we view those who are very obviously not living according to the way God wants us to (I say 'very obviously' because of course we all fall short of goodness, even though it is sometimes not so conspicuous). Babylon is often used as a motif in the Bible to signify sin and corruption, both when referring to the actual city and also figuratively. And yet, here we see it listed in the context of Noah's descendants (Genesis 10:10). It serves as a reminder that however great the sin, no one is outside of God's common grace and outside of the invitation to come to him.
However, the irony is that whilst most of the world is now generally in agreement that all people are equal and are deserving of some form of basic human dignity (at least in theory - there are often notable exceptions in practice, those yet unborn being one example, along with many other minority or less powerful groups), the biblical idea of that equality and dignity stems from a truth that is hugely unpalatable to the majority. Human beings have dignity because they are made in the image of God, and he has defined their value. And not only does God define the value of human beings, but the very standard of good itself. The surrounding middle eastern culture in which the Old Testament was written was more pluralist, with many different deities, often with control over a particular region. I don't know enough about ancient middle eastern society to say whether our culture is more pluralist or not. But this passage reminds that The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it; (Psalm 24:1). As such, God's perfect truth and standard of good applies to the whole world, and as such:
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
(Romans 1:18-20)
Comments
Post a Comment