Noah, Ham, and the Oedipus Complex

[Tammuz]

In Gen 9, Noah curses his grandson Canaan for reasons which the author obviously does not want to expose.


20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard. 21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent. 22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without. 23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness. 24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him. 25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. 26 And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

On the surface, this narrative has an etiological function: it provides an explanation and a justification for the oppression of the Canaanitic tribes by the Israelites. However, another more important idea seems to be hold back in a huge narrative gap. This gap is the absence of any plausible reason for Noah´s excessive wrath. That Noah´s shame of being seen naked could be such a one, is no interpretative option. Before I present the most plausible interpretation, that is, Ham´s incestuous intercourse with his mother, some conventional solutions will be discussed which are based on the involvement of homosexuality.

In Midrash commentaries, several rabbis have endeavored to lift the veil by speculating whether Noah has been homosexually violated or even castrated by Ham, what are the mostly accepted interpretations because they seem to sufficiently explain the degree of Noah´s excitement. A more modest psychoanalytical interpretation sustains that it is Noah who feels a homosexual desire and whose sense of guilt, that is, the aggression of his super ego, becomes projected on Ham and, particularly, on Canaan. Of course, a psychoanalysis of the narrative is not based on any historicity of the figures, but intends to reveal the unconscious factors in the development of the legend which is presumably the final written version of an oral tradition.

Surficially, it overcomes a moral conflict by justifying the enslavement of the Canaanites; under the surface, however, it tries to get a handle on a psychological conflict in the Israelite society which was not entirely resolved and which was charged with anxiety to a degree that even its mention seemed to be taboo. The homosexuality interpretations mentioned above suggest an unsolved conflict between homosexual desire (maybe in the form of an unconscious homosexual aspect of prophetic Yahwism, which strictly excluded the veneration of goddesses) and the Israelite prohibition of homosexuality. In contrast to the ´natural´ gender pluralism in polytheism which granted and even promoted a libidinous inclination for goddesses, prophetic Yahwism allowed solely for a religious libido which is directed at a masculine god, what possibly resulted in an unconscious sense of guilt.

While latent homosexuality is most probably intrinsic to Yahwism (Iakov Levi in ´Exodus and Intrauterine Regression´: "The Father imago, as apotropaic means (defense) against the regressive urge, condensed with and resulted in a strengthening of the homosexual libido"), the rationale for Noah´s punishment of Canaan is nevertheless better explained by the mother incest interpretation. Firstly, it should be noted that Noah´s wife, wherever she appears in Genesis, is not worth being mentioned by name, she is referred to only as Noah´s ´wife´, that is, she is practically erased as a person. Considering her state as sort of second Eve, this is most noteworthy. (Though even the original mother of mankind is named only at the end of the Eden narrative.). Secondly, she is not mentioned in the scene which shows Noah lying nakedly in his tent. Even so, her absence in the tent is impossible (where else should she be?), moreover, the drunkenness motif in the narrative clearly indicates Noah´s intention to produce offspring according to the divine command to "be fertile and increase" in Gen 9:1. The following narrative gap could be filled with this reconstruction:

Due to his drunkenness, old Noah is not capable of having intercourse. Young Ham enters the scene and sees his mother lying beside her impotent husband what causes Ham to take over his father´s procreative function. By this, he even adopts Noah´s position as the family´s patriarch. When Noah notices what has happened, Ham cannot be the object of his curse since curses can be put only on subordinated people; Ham, however, is patriarch now. Therefore, the curse passes over to Ham´s son Canaan.

This reconstruction is strongly supported by the definition of "the father´s nakedness" as the mother´s nakedness in Leviticus 18:7a:


Your father’s nakedness, that is, the nakedness of your mother, you shall not uncover; she is your mother – you shall not uncover her nakednessThis ´uncovering of nakedness´ is according to the preceding verse 18:6 a euphemism for incestuous intercourse:


None of you shall approach anyone near of kin to uncover nakedness.

[Pompey Bum]

Thank you for this intelligent critique, Tammuz. There are some problems here and there with the English, but let us focus on your analysis of the text. Yes, the etiological function is apparent. The author/redactor wants to show that it is part of God's plan for the descendants of Canaan to be dominated and enslaved (as difficult a thing as that may be for us). He--I will use a masculine pronoun--does that by inserting a snippet of Prophecy attributed to Noah in which Canaan is cursed to that fate. But the redactor has precious little Noah narrative to work with (there just isn't that much), so he is compelled to add it rather incongruously to the story of Noah's drunkenness. Just to be clear, I am suggesting that two previously unrelated traditions about Noah were conflated (rather awkwardly) to create the Biblical text you are using. That removes the necessity for seeking "any plausible reason for Noah´s excessive wrath." His apparent agitation is merely the result of a change from narrative to prophetic form.

As to what is going on in the strange story of Noah's drunkenness, there is only so much we can know. As you point out, uncovering a father's nakedness could be a euphemism for incest. Another explanation could be that Canaan was offended by his father's drunkenness and sought to shame him by exposing his nakedness (in contrast to Shem and Japeth who approached their father's folly with filial piety). Other parts of Genesis certainly equate nakedness with shame in the post-Edenic world.

As for your suggestion that Noah's wife committed incest with Ham because: "her absence in the tent is impossible (where else should she be?)"--at the well drawing water? In the kitchen making bread? With her daughters-in-law assisting a birth? Or maybe in the tent having incest. The point is that all of all these possibilities (like the explanations for Noah's nakedness) are inherently midrashic: they seek to explain by filling in the blanks. The hazards of this approach, of course, are that meaning will change (sometimes radically) depending on what one fill them with; and that the whole process sidesteps the fact that we don't really know what is missing. One needs to proceed with a degree of caution.

The presumption of historicity is another problem with your approach. You say: "Of course, a psychoanalysis of the narrative is not based on any historicity of the figures..." That's true, but neither is your analysis--at least not in any way that can be demonstrated. Even if Noah existed in history, there is no way to know whether the few stories we have about him are historical or legendary--or what degree of historicity they may contain. We are left with ancestor stories of great antiquity, and we must gain what we can from them (in my experience) through prayerful reflection.

Despite my points of respectful disagreement with you, I am thoroughly impressed by your critical approach to Biblical text. It is rare to find such intellectual integrity in a discussion of religion on the Internet. Thank you.

[Gladys]

As to Genesis ch 9, I prefer the simplest explanation that Ham disobeyed God, in a relatively minor matter, and his disobedience accounts for the enduring ignominy of his descendants, the Canaanites. The authors of the Pentateuch are much in need of a narrative to vilify Canaan as Joshua leads the Israelites into the promised land, displacing and deliberately killing the indigenous Canaanites. This God endorsed, ethnic cleansing continues at least to the era of Samuel and King Saul.

In Leviticus ch 18, I don't see exposed nakedness as a euphemism for incest, homosexuality or adultery although these would, of course, involve exposing nakedness.

[Tammuz]

Hi Gladys.

Thanks for your reply.

You write: "As to Genesis ch 9, I prefer the simplest explanation that Ham disobeyed God, in a relatively minor matter, and his disobedience accounts for the enduring ignominy of his descendants, the Canaanites (...)"

In what respect does Ham disobey the command in 9:1? Just seeing one´s father nakedly is not prohibited by the command. It does also not exclude incest (my favorite interpretation). However, it excludes homosexuality what is the cause of the harsh Jewish prohibition of homosexual intercourse. So you are inclined to the homosexuality interpretation?

Your write: "In Leviticus ch 18, I don't see exposed nakedness as a euphemism for incest, homosexuality or adultery although these would, of course, involve exposing nakedness".

´Undercover nakedness´, appearing 17 times in the Tanach, is generally a Jewish expression for sexual intercourse. With regard to related persons (kinship) it means definitely incest.

Hi Pompey Bum.

Thanks for your reply.

There seems to be a misunderstanding concerning the ´historicity of the figures´: I do in no way presume that the figures of the narrative have ever concretely existed. Basically, Noah is an Isrealite adaption of the legendary Sumerian Atraharsis who had been warned by god Enki about a forthcoming apocalyptical flood, and had been told by this god to build a ship so that Atraharsis and his family as well as the ´seed of all living creatures´ could survive. The incest interpretation favored by me is quite a psychoanalytical one, since it takes the Oedipus complex, that is, the male´s more or less unconscious desire to possess the mother and to boot out the father, as the motivational basis for Ham´s behavior. If the structure of this complex is projected onto the narrative´s plot, the said gap becomes plausibly filled and not only Noah´s wrath makes sense but also his cursing of Canaan instead of Ham.

You write: "Another explanation could be that Canaan (presumably, you mean Ham) was offended by his father's drunkenness and sought to shame him by exposing his nakedness (...)".

Just like the homosexuality interpretations, this could, however, not explain why Noah curses Canaan instead of Ham, the true perpetrator. What else, than Ham´s position as the new patriarch through mother incest (in this position immunized against curses by family members), could this otherwise unlogical procedure make comprehensible?

You write: "The author/redactor wants to show that it is part of God's plan for the descendants of Canaan to be dominated and enslaved (as difficult a thing as that may be for us)."

I do not think that predestination is a means at the disposal of the Genesis god. In Gen 3, 4, 6, and 7, Yahveh is surprised and angered by the humans´ behavior; so he is, subsequently to the Noah-Ham-story, in Gen 11. In Gen 9 Noah says, "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". In my view, this is not a reflection of a divine plan but a petition to Yahveh (similar to several petitions to be found in the Psalter), that is, a request to the Jewish god that he makes sure that Canaan´s offspring will be enslaved by Shem´s and Japhet´s offspring one day.

You write: "As for your suggestion that Noah's wife committed incest with Ham because: ´her absence in the tent is impossible (where else should she be?)´ --at the well drawing water? In the kitchen making bread? With her daughters-in-law assisting a birth?"

In addition to the above cited statement of mine about the wife´s absence, I wrote: "(...) moreover, the drunkenness motif in the narrative clearly indicates Noah´s intention to produce offspring according to the divine command to ´be fertile and increase´ in Gen 9:1. "

It´s for sure that the drunkenness motif is not an incidental element of the narrative, furthermore, its purpose is certainly not to present Noah as a morally deficient alcoholist. The only explanation that avoids these interpretations, is, as I argued, Noah´s wish to fulfil the divine command in the first sentence of Gen 9. In the ´Song of Songs´ the vineyard and wine drinking. both motifs also appearing in Gen 9, are clearly associated with sexual intercourse. So it´s hard to imagine that Noah´s drunkenness could stand in another context than in that of his desire to have sex with his wife. Viewed in this light, it seems to be "impossible" (as I wrote) that his wife is absent while Noah lies in the tent. I write ´impossible´ on the assumption that the Genesis stories do not contain any incidental events but are packed with open or hidden meanings and ´archetypical´ situations (to avoid a misunderstanding: I´m not a Jungian). Seeing his father lying nakedly in his tent while his mother is drawing water at the well - that´s not exactly an archetypical situation for Ham to experience, and surely not a one which should Noah cause to put an enslavement curse on the offspring of Ham´s son. However, to see his mother lying nakedly beside his drunken father would be an ´archetypical´ - that is, Oedipal - challenge par excellence, which is worth constituting the concealed background of the Ham scandal. One should also not forget that Ham´s most important (of course, legendary) descendants - the Canaanites and the Egyptians - are in Jewish texts ill-famed for being morally corrupt and sexually depraved. It is most unlikely that this would originate in a mere voyeuristic disbehavior of the primal progenitor.

[Gladys]

In what respect does Ham disobey the command in 9:1? Just seeing one´s father nakedly is not prohibited by the command. It does also not exclude incest (my favorite interpretation). However, it excludes homosexuality what is the cause of the harsh Jewish prohibition of homosexual intercourse. So you are inclined to the homosexuality interpretation?


Ham's disobedience is to Leviticus ch 18. The same authors likely wrote Genesis and Leviticus, and reference the same God with the same unchanging ordinance. The story in Genesis ch 9 foreshadows the ordinance made explicit in Leviticus ch 18.


´Undercover nakedness´, appearing 17 times in the Tanach, is generally a Jewish expression for sexual intercourse. With regard to related persons (kinship) it means definitely incest.


No doubt this usage is generally true, but not universally so, as suggested by the elaborate and touching discretion of Ham's brothers.


Genesis ch 9 v23: And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.

[Pompey Bum]

Hello again, Tammuz. You seem like a diligent exegete. I'll give you my opinion on your approach. Take what helps you and leave what does not. :)


There seems to be a misunderstanding concerning the ´historicity of the figures´: I do in no way presume that the figures of the narrative have ever concretely existed. Basically, Noah is an Isrealite adaption of the legendary Sumerian Atraharsis who had been warned by god Enki about a forthcoming apocalyptical flood, and had been told by this god to build a ship so that Atraharsis and his family as well as the ´seed of all living creatures´ could survive.

It is not your view on the historicity of Noah that is confounding your analysis, but the inherent presumption that a character in text will act in accordance with Freudian psychology (something geared toward human beings of the 19th and 20th century in any case). You are in effect making a human being out of the Noah who appears this text whether he existed or not. Noah's anger can be accounted for simply because the author/redactor needed him to be angry enough to deliver a curse. And since the function of the story is to justify Israel's historical treatment of the Canaanites (who despite Joshua appear after the conquest in the Biblical narrative and archaeological record), it is not surprising that the curse falls on Canaan. It is not completely logical, but details of folktales frequently are not. To be a little glib (my great failing), why didn't Cinderella's glass slipper turn back to rags a midnight with the rest of her clothing? Answer: because that's the way the narrative goes. In short, we can't put a literary character on the couch--and especially not an ancient one. For once Freudian psychology gets to mind its own business. :)

As for the possibility of a historical Noah, who can say? There could certainly have been a Prophet to whom the story of Atraharsis/Utnapishtim became attached over time. In other words, a historical Noah need not depend on the historical accuracy of the flood story (even though that's the one everybody knows). Likewise, Noah's blessings and curse in the text you are examining may be a surviving scrap of a historical Noah's prophecies. On the other hand, it could have been (and in my opinion probably was) pretext for Israel's later treatment of the Canaanites that was retrojected for the sake of Noahide authority. The paucity of evidence makes it hard to say more. But there is certainly not enough to psychoanalyze.


I do not think that predestination is a means at the disposal of the Genesis god. In Gen 3, 4, 6, and 7, Yahveh is surprised and angered by the humans´ behavior; so he is, subsequently to the Noah-Ham-story, in Gen 11. In Gen 9 Noah says, "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". In my view, this is not a reflection of a divine plan but a petition to Yahveh (similar to several petitions to be found in the Psalter), that is, a request to the Jewish god that he makes sure that Canaan´s offspring will be enslaved by Shem´s and Japhet´s offspring one day.

Ah, like the Pirate's Code, then. More like suggestions. :) Look, we've moved from text criticism to theology. It is my conviction that each of us understands these things only as God gives us Grace to understand. I can respect your views and your right to your views even when I disagree with them. I'll do history and I'll do text criticism. But I don't want to dance any closer than that for now. Maybe Gladys does.


moreover, the drunkenness motif in the narrative clearly indicates Noah´s intention to produce offspring according to the divine command to ´be fertile and increase´ in Gen 9:1.

Yikes! I'm not having a beer with you! :)


It´s for sure that the drunkenness motif is not an incidental element of the narrative, furthermore, its purpose is certainly not to present Noah as a morally deficient alcoholist.

All we know is that this story was told as it was. It may have been something like the tale of Aristotle's sexual indiscretion with Phyllis, which people seem to have loved to tell in the Middle Ages. Perhaps it shows that all humans are subject to sin and folly, or that even Prophets have limitations. Your idea that Noah was preparing to have sex is conceivable (no pun intended :)), but that is an interpretation and far from the only one possible. In the end we have the story and people must make of it what they can.