The "Curse of Ham" — American Slavery and the Jewish Tradition
Table of Contents
- 1. The American Argument
- 2. The Biblical Text
- 3. What the Rabbis Actually Said
- 3.1. The curse is on Canaan, not Ham — and not Cush
- 3.2. What Ham actually did — a matter of debate
- 3.3. The dark skin connection — and its limits
- 3.4. Ibn Ezra directly refutes the American argument — in the 12th century
- 3.5. The rabbis themselves called the logic "astonishing"
- 3.6. Sforno: it's about moral degradation, not racial hierarchy
- 4. Why the American Argument Makes No Sense in Traditional Jewish Context
- 5. Key Sources
1. The American Argument
The dominant biblical defense of slavery in the antebellum South rested on Genesis 9:25: Noah curses Canaan (son of Ham) to be "a servant of servants." The argument ran:
- Ham sinned against Noah
- Ham's descendants = Africans
- Therefore African slavery is divinely ordained
The most famous statement of this argument is Thornton Stringfellow's 1850 pamphlet, A Brief Examination of Scripture Testimony on the Institution of Slavery:
The first recorded language which was ever uttered in relation to slavery, is the inspired language of Noah. In God's stead he says, "Cursed be Canaan;" "a servant of servants shall he be to his brethren." "Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant." "God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem: and Canaan shall be his servant." Gen. ix. 25, 26, 27. Here language is used, showing the favor which God would exercise to the posterity of Shem and Japheth, while they were holding the posterity of Ham in a state of abject bondage. May it not be said in truth, that God decreed this institution before it existed: and has he not connected its existence, with prophetic tokens of special favor, to those who should be slave owners or masters?… unless they are all dead, as well as the Canaanites or Africans, who descended from Ham, then it is quite possible that his favor may now be found with one class of men, who are holding another class in bondage.
Later in the same pamphlet, Stringfellow adds the missionary gloss:
Under the Gospel, it has brought within the range of Gospel influence, millions of Ham's descendants among ourselves, who, but for this institution, would have sunk down to eternal ruin; knowing not God, and strangers to the Gospel. In their bondage here on earth, they have been much better provided for, and great multitudes of them have been made the freemen of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Rabbi Morris Raphall (New York) made essentially the same argument in a widely-reprinted sermon on January 4, 1861 — the only prominent American rabbi to do so, and widely attacked for it by Rabbi David Einhorn and others.
2. The Biblical Text
Noah, the tiller of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk, and he uncovered himself within his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father's nakedness and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a cloth, placed it against both their backs and, walking backward, they covered their father's nakedness…
When Noah woke up from his wine and learned what his youngest son had done to him, he said, "Cursed be Canaan; the lowest of slaves shall he be to his brothers." And he said, "Blessed be the Eternal, the God of Shem; let Canaan be a slave to them. May God enlarge Japheth, and let him dwell in the tents of Shem; and let Canaan be a slave to them."
3. What the Rabbis Actually Said
3.1. The curse is on Canaan, not Ham — and not Cush
Rashi on Genesis 9:25 (11th c., France):
Cursed be Canaan — You have brought it about that I cannot beget a fourth son to serve me; cursed, therefore, be your fourth son to serve under the descendants of these elder ones upon whom the duty of serving me will devolve from now on.
Rashi explains this as a bounded, specific curse: Ham (by castrating or assaulting Noah) prevented Noah from having a fourth son, so Noah cursed Ham's fourth son. That fourth son is Canaan — ancestor of the Canaanites, not of Africans.
3.2. What Ham actually did — a matter of debate
Rav and Shmuel disagreed: One says that Ham castrated Noah and one says that Ham sodomized him… This Sage holds that both this offense and that offense were committed.
The rabbis understood Ham's act as a violent sexual crime against his father, and Noah's curse as a proportional legal response — not a sweeping racial decree.
3.3. The dark skin connection — and its limits
Three violated that directive [against intercourse in the ark]… Ham, son of Noah. The dog was punished in that it is bound; the raven was punished in that it spits, and Ham was afflicted in that his skin turned black.
This is the one Talmudic passage that links Ham to dark skin. But:
- It is framed as punishment for sexual sin in the ark, not as racial destiny
- It applies to Ham personally, not to all his descendants
- It says nothing about slavery — the slave curse falls specifically on Canaan
Bereishit Rabbah 36 (Midrash, ~500 CE) elaborates:
Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba said: Both Ham and the dog engaged in sexual relations in the ark. That is why Ham emerged darkened, and the dog is exposed when mating.
Rav Huna said in the name of Rav Yosef: [Noah said:] "You prevented me from performing an act that is done in darkness; therefore, that man [Canaan] will be ugly and darkened."
3.4. Ibn Ezra directly refutes the American argument — in the 12th century
Ibn Ezra on Genesis 9:25 (12th c., Spain):
There are some who say that the Cushites are enslaved because Noah cursed Ham. However, they have forgotten that the first king to rule after the flood was a Cushite. Thus it is written, "and Cush begot Nimrod… and the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar" (Gen. 10:8–10). Thus the curse was put on the Canaanites and not on all of Ham's descendants.
Ibn Ezra is already arguing, 700 years before the Civil War, against the same misreading. His refutation is decisive: Nimrod (Cush's grandson) was an empire-builder, the first king after the flood. The idea that Cush's line was destined for slavery is directly contradicted by the very next chapter of Genesis.
3.5. The rabbis themselves called the logic "astonishing"
Ham committed the sin and Canaan was cursed? This is astonishing.
The Midrash poses this as an open problem requiring explanation — the rabbis knew this was not a simple divine decree, and gave multiple answers (Canaan saw and told Ham; God couldn't curse Ham because he'd already blessed Noah's sons). The point is that the traditional reader came to this text knowing it was puzzling and bounded, not a universal racial mandate.
3.6. Sforno: it's about moral degradation, not racial hierarchy
Sforno on Genesis 9:25 (16th c., Italy):
His being in a position of dependence to his senior brothers, i.e. a plain slave, was merely natural, and would not have been a special curse, especially in view of his disgraceful conduct. Solomon paraphrased this in Proverbs 11:29: "a fool is a slave to the wise-hearted."
Sforno spiritualizes the curse almost entirely — it's about moral degradation from disgraceful behavior, not ethnic destiny.
4. Why the American Argument Makes No Sense in Traditional Jewish Context
- Wrong person. The curse is on Canaan, Ham's fourth son — ancestor of the Canaanites (ancient inhabitants of the Land of Israel), not of Africans. Cush (Ethiopia/sub-Saharan Africa) is a different son, explicitly excluded by Ibn Ezra.
- Nimrod demolishes it. Cush's grandson Nimrod was the first king after the flood — builder of Babylon and Nineveh. The very next chapter of Genesis directly contradicts the idea that Cush was destined for slavery.
- Already fulfilled. Traditional Jewish interpretation held the prophecy was fulfilled when the Israelites conquered Canaan. The Gibeonites in Joshua 9 become "hewers of wood and drawers of water" — that's the fulfillment the rabbis pointed to. It was not an open-ended mandate for all time.
- Ham's dark skin is about sin, not race. The Talmudic passage connecting Ham to dark skin frames it as punishment for sexual sin during the ark — not a permanent racial hierarchy for all descendants.
- The rabbis called the logic astonishing. They openly flagged the puzzle that Canaan is cursed for Ham's act, and gave explanations. It was not read as a transparent divine decree about African peoples.
- Jewish slave law is nothing like American chattel slavery. Hebrew slaves were freed after seven years. Even Canaanite slaves could earn freedom if a master struck out a tooth (Exodus 21:27). The permanent, hereditary, race-based chattel slavery of the antebellum South had no parallel in halakhic law.
- The Passover irony. The entire theological framework of Jewish life rests on the Exodus — God liberating slaves from Egypt. "You shall not oppress the stranger because you were strangers in Egypt" (Exodus 22:20) appears 36 times in the Torah. A rabbi making Stringfellow's argument at a Passover Seder would be doing so against the explicit testimony of the text being celebrated.
5. Key Sources
| Source | Date | Link |
|---|---|---|
| Genesis 9:20–27 (the text) | — | Sefaria |
| Rashi on Genesis 9:25 | 11th c. | Sefaria |
| Sanhedrin 70a (what Ham did) | Talmud | Sefaria |
| Sanhedrin 108b (dark skin) | Talmud | Sefaria |
| Bereishit Rabbah 36 (Midrash) | ~500 CE | Sefaria |
| Ibn Ezra on Genesis 9:25 | 12th c. | Sefaria |
| Sforno on Genesis 9:25 | 16th c. | Sefaria |
| Stringfellow, Brief Examination (1850) | 1850 | archive.org |