The Human Family Tree

by Phillip Goodman

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Shem, Ham, & Japheth—The Roots Of Us All!

Your Genealogy Traces to the 3 Sons of Noah

How often have you wondered about your family history, only to find that time and ambiguity have foreclosed on your ability to get a solid lead on your personal lineage? Most of us, to one degree or another, have experienced that frustration. However, there is one sure source of information on “family roots” that applies to every person— a source for which neither the ravages of time, ambiguity, or frustration is a factor. The world’s only perfect history book, the Bible—God’s Word— says,

… Shem and Ham and Japheth… These three were the sons of Noah; and from these the whole earth was populated. (Genesis 9:18-19)

The book of Genesis declares that the earth was inundated with something that could be compared to a worldwide ‘tsunami’ wave, far exceeding in scope and magnitude the destruction of that which recently killed 160,000 people along the shores of southeast Asia. Somewhere around 6,000 years ago an ocean of water suddenly and catastrophically burst forth and covered “all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens… all flesh that moved on the earth perished…” (Genesis 7:19-21) All, that is, except Noah and his three sons, and their wives; eight people in all.

After the flood, the family grew and multiplied, and moved into the land present day Iraq. Generations came as the surviving patriarchs lived to grand old ages. The population expanded and gathered under the leadership of a rebellious great-grandson of Noah named Nimrod. About Nimrod, the Bible says “And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel … in the land of Shinar.” (Genesis 10:10) It was after Nimrod’s rebellious spirit caught on with the population and they began to build a tower. They attempted to challenge the lordship of their Creator. But God changed their single language into many different tongues. The effect was to fragment the population into 70 different groups, by their new languages, causing them to separate and migrate. Over time this led to today’s 200 nations and various languages, ethnicities, and cultures.

Wherever you live, whatever language you speak, whatever your ethnicity, you are a descendant of Shem, Ham, or Japheth, or more likely two of them, or even all three. Your family roots trace to Noah and his three sons—that much is certain!

These are the families of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, by their nations; and out of these the nations were separated on the earth after the flood. (Genesis 10:32)

Today, perhaps 6,000 years later, the secular world of research and academia is finding to its amazement that major lines of scholarly investigation are leading right back to Shem, Ham, and Japheth and the Tower of Babel.

The good news for Bible-believers is that this growing body of evidence lending credence to Shem, Ham, and Japheth as our physical forefathers indirectly points beyond them to a sort of ’genealogical Book of Life’ which the Lord has written. The Bible says that before any of us were born, “…in Thy book they were all written, the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them.“ (Psalms 139:16) This Book of Life is referred to in Exodus 32:32-33 and Psalms 69:28. It is not the same as the “Lamb’s Book of Life” spoken of in the New Testament.

The Book Of Life

The Book Of Life mentioned in the Old Testament (Psa. 69:28) contains the names of every person ever born and their earthly history. When they die, if their name is not recorded in the “Lamb’s Book Of Life,” found in the New Testament (Rev. 21:7), then their name is forever blotted out of the first Book. The names of the saved are recorded in the Lamb’s Book Of Life and can never be blotted out of either book. Did all of the people alive today anywhere on the earth come from a single population generated from the offspring of Shem, Ham, and Japheth?

These three sons of Noah, with their wives, were the lone surviving humans on the planet after the global flood of Genesis 7-9. Here is the growing evidence that supports the truth of the Bible in its every word regarding these ancestors of us all.

1. Hundreds of “flood legends,” found on every continent, attests to a worldwide flood. At their core are these three common claims which attest to a common source account: A worldwide flood destroyed both man and animals. There was a vessel of safety provided. An extremely small remnant of people thus survived.

2. The “first acknowledged civilization” was Sumer (on the site of Babel) says historian J. M. Roberts, echoing the consensus of the majority of historians. Genesis affirms this fact.

3. Archaeologists have found Babel-like “towers” called “ziggurats” unique to this area, and dating to this period.

4. Evolutionary dogma declares that religions evolved right along with the “evolution” of man, from many nature gods to the religions of today. But studies by theologian Robert Brow show that “virtually all so-called primitive tribes have an original memory of a ‘High God’ who is fatherly.” Over time, this monotheistic belief of Noah in the one God of the Bible degenerated into pantheism, and polytheism, with their cult and occult systems. Evolutionists claim religion “evolved into monotheism.

5. Linguist Don Ringe affirms “that all human languages derive from some common source, adding that “most linguist would agree with that.”

The “common source” is referred to as the “Mother Tongue.” Kenneth Katzner, in his book “The Languages Of The World,” writes “…at this stage we must content ourselves with the existence of some 20 important language families and perhaps 50 or more lesser ones.” Add these up, because amazingly when Shem, Ham, and Japheth’s ancestors were split up by God‘s miraculous splitting of their languages, they were divided into 70 families which went their separate ways because they could “not understand one another’s speech.” (Gen. 11:7) From there they eventually populated the entire earth, and divided into the 3,000 languages we have today. But they began with a “Mother Tongue.”

There are many other proofs being rediscovered through modern research methods which verify the Genesis account of our forefathers in-the-flesh, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. For more, get your CD or DVD of Phillip Goodman’s presentation on “The Book Of Life” Call 918-748-1800.

The Sons of Japheth (Gen. 10:1-5)

Are You of European, Russian, or Asian-Subcontinent Ancestry ? The offspring of Japheth left Babel and journeyed north and northwest and settled Russia and Europe. Another faction went into the Asian subcontinent and populated India. Scandanavians, Germans (including Angles-Saxons-English, and French), Czechs, Poles, and Slovakian groups, Afghans, Pakistanis, Italians, Spaniards, Greeks, Russians, and many others trace their roots to Japheth. The major language family for Japheth’s sons is Indo-European. They are of the Indo-Aryan races.

The Sons of Ham (Gen. 10:6-20)

Is Your Ancestry African, Asian, or American Indian ? Ham’s descendants migrated from the Tower of Babel primarily west into the future promised land (the Canaanites) and on into Egypt, Libya, and Ethiopia. Eventually, the progeny of Ham went further south and became the Africans, and certain lines of Ham migrated vast distances and became the Mongol peoples of China and the Far East, ultimately coming across the Bering Straits into Alaska, down to North and South America, and settling as the American Indians we know today. They were the original “Americans.”

The Sons of Shem (Gen. 10:21-31)

Do Your Ancestors Trace to the Jews, the Arabs, or the Middle East? The ancestors of Shem include the Jews born through Isaac, the Arabs born through Ishmael (who are also partly Egyptian and thus Hamitic) and Esau, as well as a host of peoples scattered throughout the Middle East, Asia Minor, and North Africa. These include Iranians, Assyrians and Northern Iraqis, Chaldeans (Babylonians) and Southern Iraqis, Jordanians, Syrians, Lebanese, and others. Abraham, whom the Bible calls “the father of us all,” referring to those who have faith in Jesus Christ, was a Semite. And, of course, so was Jesus Christ.

Below is a secular article which reveals that the Biblical account of the Human Family Tree is true!

We all have the same ancestors, researchers say…Roots of the human family tree are surprisingly shallow Whoever it was probably lived a few thousand years ago, somewhere in East Asia. He—or she—did nothing more remarkable than be born, live, have children and die. Yet this was the ancestor of every person now living on Earth — the last person in history whose family tree branches out to touch all 6.5 billion people on the planet today… It’s a mathematical certainty that that person existed,” said Steve Olson, whose 2002 book “Mapping Human History” traces the history of the species since its origins in Africa more than 100,000 years ago… few people realize just how intricately that web connects them not just to people living on the planet today, but to everyone who ever lived. … Olson and his colleagues have found that if you go back a little farther — about 5,000 to 7,000 years ago — everybody living today has exactly the same set of ancestors. …It also means that all of us have ancestors of every color and creed. © 2006 The Associated Press. Editor’s Note: The “new news” above has always been the testimony of the Book Of Genesis. Genesis 9:19 declares that after all people on the earth were destroyed in the judgment of the great flood of Noah, the earth was repopulated from the offspring of his 3 sons. The tight genealogies of Genesis 5 and 10 allow only about 6,000 years since the flood. That means that every person living today would find a common set of ancestors at that time. How remarkable that modern population statistical studies make such an event “a mathematical certainty.”