The term Japhetites (sometimes spelled Japhethites; in adjective form Japhetic or Japhethitic) refers to the descendants of Japheth, one of the three sons of Noah in the Book of Genesis.[Javakhishvili, Ivane (1950), Historical-Ethnological problems of Georgia, the Caucasus and the Near East. Tbilisi, pp. 130–135 (in Georgian).]
The term has been used in modern times as a designation in physical anthropology, ethnography, and comparative linguistics. In anthropology, it was used in a racial sense for White people (the Caucasian race).
Among Muslim historians, Japheth is usually regarded as the ancestor of the Gog and Magog tribes, and, at times, of the Turkic peoples, Khazars, and Slavs.
In the Book of Genesis
Japheth first appears in the
Hebrew Bible as one of the three sons of Noah, saved from the Flood through the Ark.
In the Book of Genesis, they are always in the order "Shem, Ham, and Japheth" when all three are listed.
[, , and .] Genesis 9:24 calls Ham the youngest, and Genesis 10:21 refers ambiguously to Shem as "brother of Japheth the elder", which could mean that either is the eldest. Most modern writers accept Shem–Ham–Japheth as reflecting their birth order, but this is not always the case: Moses and Rachel also appear at the head of such lists despite explicit descriptions of them as younger siblings. However, Japheth is considered to have been the eldest son of Noah in Rabbinic literature.
Following the Flood, Japheth is featured in the story of Noah's drunkenness.[.] Chapter 10 of Genesis, the Table of Nations, describes how earth was populated by the sons of Noah following the Flood, beginning with the descendants of Japheth:
Biblical genealogy
Japheth is mentioned as one of the three sons of Noah in the Book of Genesis. The other two sons of
Noah,
Shem and Ham, are the eponymous ancestors of the
Semites and the
Hamites, respectively. In the Biblical Table of Nations (Genesis ), seven sons and seven grandsons of Japheth are mentioned:
The intended ethnic identity of these "descendants of Japheth" is not certain; however, over history, they have been identified by Biblical studies with various historical nations who were deemed to be descendants of Japheth and his sons — a practice dating back at least to the classical Jewish-Greek encounters. According to the Roman–Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in Antiquities of the Jews, I.VI.122 ( Whiston):
Ancient and medieval ethnography
Ethnogenetic interpretations
Japheth (in
Hebrew language:
Yā́p̄eṯ or
Yép̄eṯ) may be a transliteration of the Greek Iapetos, the ancestor of the
. His sons and grandsons associate him with the geographic area comprising the
Aegean Sea, Greece, the
Caucasus, and
Anatolia:
Ionia/
Javan,
Rhodes/
Rodanim, Cyprus/
Kittim, and other places in the Eastern Mediterranean region. The point of the "blessing of Japheth" seems to be that Japheth (a
Ancient Greeks) and
Shem (the
Israelites) would rule jointly over
Canaan (Palestine).
From the 19th century until the late 20th century, it was usual to see Japheth as a reference to the Philistines, who shared dominion over Canaan during the pre-monarchic and early monarchic period of Israel and Judah. This view accorded with the understanding of the origin of the Book of Genesis, which was seen as having been composed in stages beginning with the time of King Solomon, when the Philistines still existed (they vanished from history after the Assyrian conquest of Canaan). However, Genesis 10:14 identifies their ancestor as Ham rather than Japheth.
Pseudo-Philo
An ancient, relatively obscure text known as
Pseudo-Philo and thought to have been originally written ca. 70 AD, contains an expanded genealogy that is seemingly garbled from that of the Book of Genesis, and also different from the much later one found in the 17th-century Rabbinic text
Sefer haYashar ("Book of Jasher"):
[ Pseudo-Philo]
-
Sons of Japheth: "Gomer, Magog, and Madai, Nidiazech, Tubal, Mocteras, Cenez, Riphath, and Thogorma, Elisa, Dessin, Cethin, Tudant."
-
Sons of Gomer: Thelez, Lud, Deberlet.
-
Sons of Magog: Cesse, Thipha, Pharuta, Ammiel, Phimei, Goloza, Samanach.
-
Sons of Duden: Sallus, Phelucta Phallita.
-
Sons of Tubal: Phanatonova, Eteva.
-
Sons of Tyras: Maac, Tabel, Ballana, Samplameac, Elaz.
-
Sons of Mellech: Amboradat, Urach, Bosara.
-
Sons of Ascenez: Jubal, Zaraddana, Anac.
-
Sons of Heri: Phuddet, Doad, Dephadzeat, Enoc.
-
Sons of Togorma: Abiud, Saphath, Asapli, Zepthir.
-
Sons of Elisa: Etzaac, Zenez, Mastisa, Rira.
-
Sons of Zepti: Macziel, Temna, Aela, Phinon.
-
Sons of Tessis: Meccul, Loon, Zelataban.
-
Sons of Duodennin: Itheb, Beath, Phenech.
Later writers
Some of the nations that various later writers (including
Jerome and Isidore of Seville, as well as other traditional accounts) have attempted to describe as Japhetites are listed below:
-
Gomer: Scythians, Cimmerians, , Turkic peoples (excluding Avars and Tatars), Bulgarians, Armenians (including most of other related peoples in the Caucasus), Welsh people, Picts, Germanic peoples (excluding Norsemen/Scandinavians), , Celts
-
Magog: Goths, Scythians, Norsemen/Scandinavians, Finns, Early Slavs (excluding East Slavs, Bulgarians, and Macedonians), Huns, Magyars (today Hungarians), Irish people, Armenians (including most of other related peoples in the Caucasus)
-
Madai: Mitanni, Mannai, Medes, more generally Iranian peoples
-
Javan: Ancient Greeks, , Tartessians
-
Tubal: Tabali, Circassians, Irish people, Georgians (including most of other related peoples in the Caucasus), Illyrians, Italics (excluding the Latins who are of Etruscan origins), Basque people, Iberians
-
Meshech: Early Slavs (including Russians), (possibly), Mushki, Meskheti, Georgians, Armenians, Illyrians, Irish people
-
Tiras: Thracians, Etruscans, Romanians
Renaissance to Early Modern ethnography
Book of Jasher
The
Sefer haYashar ("Book of Jasher"), written by
in the 17th century (first printed in 1625), ostensibly based on an earlier edition of 1552, provides some new names for Japheth's grandchildren:
Anthropology
The term "
Caucasian race" as a racial label for
European peoples derives in part from the assumption that the tribe of Japheth developed its distinctive racial characteristics in the
Caucasus area, having migrated there from
Mount Ararat before populating the European continent.
The Georgian historian and linguist Ivane Javakhishvili associated Japheth's sons with certain ancient tribes, called
(Tabals, in Greek:
Tibarenoi) and
(Meshekhs/Mosokhs, in Greek:
Moschoi), who claimed to represent non-Indo-European and non-Semitic, possibly "Proto-Iberian" tribes that inhabited
Anatolia during the 3rd-1st millennia BC.
This theory influenced the use of the term
Japhetic in the linguistic theories of
Nikolai Marr (see below).
During the 18th and 19th centuries, the Biblical statement attributed to Noah that "God shall enlarge Japheth" (Genesis 9:27) was used by some Christian preachers[Meagher, James L. "The Bread, Wine, Water, Oil, and Incense in the Temple" How Christ Said The First Mass. New York: Christian Press Association, 1908. 95-96. Internet Archive. Web. 4 Jun. 2017] as a justification for the "enlargement" of European territories through imperialism, which they interpreted as part of God's plan for the world.[John N. Swift and Gigen Mammoser, "'Out of the Realm of Superstition: Chesnutt's 'Dave's Neckliss' and the Curse of Ham'", American Literary Realism, vol. 42 no. 1, Fall 2009, 3] The subjugation of Africans was similarly justified by the curse of Ham.
Linguistics
The term
Japhetic was also applied by philologists such as William Jones,
Rasmus Rask, and others to what is now known as the Indo-European language group. The term was used in a different sense by the
Soviet Union linguist
Nicholas Marr, in his Japhetic theory, which was intended to demonstrate that the languages of the Caucasus formed part of a once-widespread pre-Indo-European language group.
See also
Bibliography
External links
