204 JASTROW — THE HAMITES AND SEMITES. [April 4, 



special circumstances, the Shemltes are for P the groups that live 

 in districts in which, at one time or the other, the Hebrews had 

 settled, or which represent districts adjacent to those settlements. 

 The Shemites are, therefore, the groups that are ''near" to the 

 Hebrews as against the Japhethites and Hamites who are ''remote." 

 Again, while as we have seen P is actuated by large geographical 

 views and displays considerable ethnological knowledge set forth in 

 a scholastic spirit, it is natural that when he comes to the group to 

 which his own people belongs he should show some traces also of a 

 nationalistic spirit. His general point of view in regard to the She- 

 mites as representing those nations which are adjacent to the Hebrews, 

 or " near " them, may be put down to the credit of his nationalistic 

 spirit, while the departure from his scheme in including Canaan 

 among the Hamites instead of placing them with the "near" 

 nations or Shemites may represent a trace of the influence of the 

 spirit of hostility towards Canaanites which controls J, though it 

 is also possible that the addition of Canaan in verse 6 is due to the 

 compiler who combined J with P, and who is actuated by the same 

 spirit as is J. 



X. 



In sharp contrast, both as to geographical views and ethnographi- 

 cal knowledge and general spirit, stands J and the group of writers to 

 which he belongs or who follow in his path. Showing distinct 

 traces of the older view which limits the geographical horizon to 

 three groups, Shem (or perhaps Eber^), Canaan and Japheth, all 

 dwelling within the confines of Hebrew settlements in Palestine, J, 

 though representing an enlarged view in substituting Ham for 

 Canaan (and Shem for Eber), and in extending Japheth to include 

 remote nations with which Hebrew history has nothing to do* 

 arranges his Volkeriafel entirely from the Hebrew point of view. 

 Though apparently agreeing with P in his definition of Japhethites 

 it is doubtful whether J's list of sons and descendants of Japheth 

 was as extensive as P's, and at all events the Japhethites did not 

 represent the geographically remote nations but rather those that 

 were historically remote, toward which a writer interested primarily 



1 In view of the importance which Eber plays as the ancestor of the two 

 groups, Eber-Peleg and Eber-Joktan, it would indeed appear as already suggested 

 (p. 20i) that a tradition was current which made him rather than Shem the an- 

 cestor of the groups allied with the Hebrews, 



