THE TRUTH ABOUT OUR ANCESTORY

[Mark H. Stevens, Th.D]

Black Christianity did not start in America with the slaves that converted to their master's religion. Genesis 10 shows us where all the races originated. The Black lineage is presented by family, languages, locations and nations. The Bible tells us, in Genesis, that everyone began with Adam and Eve. EVERYONE! Genesis 2:7 tells us Adam was made from the earth. Science has proven that we're all made from the same materials as are found in the earth. The Hebrew word for Adam is Adahm, meaning "red" or "from red earth."

Yes, Adam was a person of color!

After the flood, it was Noah and his kids that populated the earth (Acts 17:26; Gen 9:18,19). His sons were named Ham, Shem, and Japheth. These names mean Black, Dusky and Bright, or "fair," respectively. Biblical historians agree that Ham is the ancestral father of the Black races - the Mongoloids, Egyptians, Ethiopians, the Canaanites, and the Indians. From Shem descended the Jews, Arabs and Persians. From Japheth came the Greeks, Caucasians, Russians, the Indo-Europeans.

One Black son out of three? Well, we don't know exactly HOW dark the pigment was of the other two but, is that possible? With God, ALL things are possible. Face it, if YOU were the Supreme Creative Being, wouldn't YOU get creative when making people and animals?

Look around. Look in the mirror... God's been VERY creative. Medical research tells us it IS possible to have children that are very different in color, especially if one or both parents are dark-complexioned, but it's impossible for a fair complexioned person to produce a dark-skinned child. So, for Noah to have fathered a "black" son, he or his wife had to have been dark-skinned, too.

Logically speaking.

Noah's son, Ham, father of African and Black races, had four boys... Cush, Mizraim, Phut and Canaan, Genesis 10:6. Cush was father of the Ethiopians (Gen 2:13; 10:6) and the people living within Asia and Africa. Cush means "black" and Ethiopia means "man witha sunburned face." Jeremiah13:23 says, "Can the Ethiopian changehis skin...?"

Mizraim fathered the Egyptians and his name means "children of the sun." Eventually, they even started worshipping it, but that's another story. Ham is derived from the Egyptian name "Kam," the srongest word in the Egyptian language for "black." The book of Psalms refers to Egypt as "the land of Ham" (Ps 78:51; 105:23, 26. 27; 106:21,22). Phut was father of the nation of Libya, (Ezekiel 27:10; 38:5; Jer 46:9 and Nah 3:9). Libya means "black" also.

Ham's youngest son was Canaan, cursed by Noah in Genesis 9:20-26. Though we've all heard of Ethiopia, Egypt and Libya, strange how there's no Canaan today. Note: Contrary to the teaching of SOME, it was NOT the entire black race that was cursed, only the Canaanites, because of Canaan's sin. They were the original inhabitants of Israel (1 Chr 4:40) but exist no more. My, how they could have been blessed! Yes, there ARE long-term consequences for sin, affecting even our descendants.

Noah's sons migrated, spreading out all over the earth: Japheth's people to modern Europe, Shem's to the Middle East. Ham's descendants went to southern Arabia, Africa, and India. Cush had a son named Nimrod (Gen 10:10) who built the tower of Babel as well as Erech, Accad and Calneh near the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the starting point of all civilization (Gen 10:10; 11:1).

Cush's descendants founded powerful Assyria,builders of Ninevah.

The Bible gives no record of Phut's geneology.

Ham's decendants included Menelik, offspring of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon, to whom Ethiopians trace their historical roots.

Joseph married an Egyptian woman (Gen 41:50-52) so his sons, Manasseh and Ephraim definitely had Hamitic (Black) blood.

Jethro was Ethiopian and converted to Judaism because of Moses' testimony (Ex 18:1-12).

Moses was married to an Ethiopian woman, too, (Numbers 12:1). Was she black? Could have been! In Numbers 12, Miriam and Aaron began opposing Moses because of his Cushite (Ethiopian) wife, showing contempt for her ancestry. This angered the Lord and Miriam was stricken with leprosy (interestingly, this disease would not only make MIRIAM the outcast from the community, but her skin became REALLY white as a result of the disease. Poetic justice? After Moses pleaded on her behalf, God healed her and returned her to the camp). NOTE: It is my contention that Miriam's REAL problem was not so much with Moses' wife as it was with his prophetic gift and his special relationship with God. Perhaps she went for the obvious (Miriam's fleshtone) rather than humbllng herself and admitting to Moses how she envied him.

The Scripture does not indicate any prohibition against Jews marrying Cushites (Ethiopians) and they seemed to have had good relations with them (Amos 9:7; Ps 68:31; Zeph 3:10; Is 11:11).

Jehudi was a secretary in the king's court during Jeremiah's time and was a descendeant of Cushi (Jer 36:14,21,23) as was the prophet Zephaniah.

From Ham's lineage came Joshua, and David'sgrandmother, Rahab, a Canaanite. Bath-sheba means"daughterof Sheba." Sheba is listed in Ham's family registry, Genesis 7.

Bath-sheba was married to Uriah the Hittite, whose roots can be traced to Ham's grandson, Heth (Gen 10:15). King Solomon's complexion and hair are described as black but beautiful (Song of Solomon 5:10,11).

Moving to the New Testament times, scholars believe the wise men who sought the baby Jesus (no biblical record of there being only three) were Ethiopians because the gold, frankincense, and myrrh were plentiful in southern Arabia and east Africa.

The Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8:26-39 undoubtedly brought Christianity to Ethiopia. Simon the Canaanite was considered to be a Black apostle (Matt 10:4).

[Donna Corbitt]

Thank you for the rich history!

[Evangelist Mesfin]

" THE TRUE LIONS OF THE TRIBE OF JUDAH" GOD'S PEACE BISHOP G.E. PATERSON!

[Evangelist Mesfin]

"AND SO AFTER HE HAD PATIENTLY ENDURED, HE OBTAINED THE PROMISE."Heb 6: 15
9Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things—things that belong to salvation. 10For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do. 11And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, 12so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. 13For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, 14saying, “Surely I will bless you and multiply you.” 15And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise. 16For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. 17So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, 18so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. 19We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, 20where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.