1903.] JASTROW — THE HAMITES AND SEMITES. 199 



introduction of Sodom and Gomorrah that the inhabitants of this 

 district as well as two other peoples particularly obnoxious to the 

 Hebrews, namely, ^Afoab and Ammon, whose origin, according to 

 the libellous tradition recorded in Genesis 19, 30-38, is dis- 

 tinctly connected with Sodom and Gomorrah, also belong to the 

 " accursed " nations. This tale follows immediately upon the story 

 of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, evidently with the 

 intention of associating Moabites and Ammonites, — whose hostile 

 relations to the Hebrews are illustrated in many a page of the Old 

 Testament, — with wickedness and shameful immorality. However 

 this may be, Sodom and Gomorrah are for J, as for the Hebrew 

 prophets, the type of all that is " accursed,"^ and for this reason 

 those who dwelt in this region are singled out as belonging with 

 peculiar appropriateness to the sons of Ham. 



Naturally, there are innumerable details in the early history of the 

 Hebrews, as also in the later periods, which escape us so that it is 

 no longer possible to determine the full extent to which this motive 

 of national dislike influenced the school of writers, the result of 

 whose work is to be seen in J's list as modified by later additions, 

 insertions and glosses, but enough has been shown to justify the 

 proposition that in contradistinction to P, who betrays not only a 

 much broader geographical and ethnographic knowledge but also 

 greater objectivity, J and the school that he represents are largely, 

 if not completely, under the spell of the character given to Ham 

 at the close of the 9th chapter of Genesis. For J, Ham is not 

 an ethnic unit nor a designation for a group of peoples settled in a 

 certain section of the known world, but a kind of ethnological 

 purgatory to which all those nations are assigned, — Babylonians, 

 Assyrians, Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, Sodomites, Gomor- 

 rites, — who have merited this fate in the mind of the writer by their 

 hostility to Jahweh's people, and as the cause of the misfortunes, 

 hardships, struggles and catastrophes in the career of the Hebrews. 

 On a supposition of this kind we can account for the jumble of such 

 heterogeneous groups as Canaanites in Palestine, Egyptians in the 

 South, Babylonians and Assyrians in the East, and Philistines in 

 the West into one category, unless, indeed, we are prepared to 

 commit exegetical suicide by assuming that no principle whatso- 



iCf., e.i;., Isaiah I, lo; 3, 9; 13, I9. Jer. 23, 14. Amos, 4, ii, and Zeph. 

 2, 9, where Moab and Ammon are compared to Sodom and Gomorrah. 



