The Table of Nations’ Staggering Accuracy (The Genesis Series, Part 37)

I don’t have to deal with 250 pounds of evilly-motivated hamburger. Stay tuned.

God is a spirit, and He created all things visible and invisible by the Word of His power.  By necessity, all physical things are spiritually made and motivated. Control the motivating spirit, and you won’t have to deal with the hamburger. 

Jesus meets the madman of Gadarea in Luke 8:27-33:

27 And when he went forth to land, there met him out of the city a certain man, which had devils long time, and ware no clothes, neither abode in any house, but in the tombs.

28 When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God most high? I beseech thee, torment me not.

29 (For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For oftentimes it had caught him: and he was kept bound with chains and in fetters; and he brake the bands, and was driven of the devil into the wilderness.)

30 And Jesus asked him, saying, What is thy name? And he said, Legion: because many devils were entered into him.

31 And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep.

32 And there was there an herd of many swine feeding on the mountain: and they besought him that he would suffer them to enter into them. And he suffered them.

33 Then went the devils out of the man, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the lake, and were choked.

Jesus doesn’t put the madman in a headlock and wrestle him to the ground.  Instead, Jesus commands the unclean spirits possessing and motivating the madman’s 250 pounds of hamburger, and they obey the authority of His spoken Word of faith.

Women and children are often targets of and are harmed by the 250 pounds of hamburger possessed and motivated by damned devils.  Those who look so vulnerable but are walking in complete surrender to Christ are vulnerable no more.  All God’s children have authority over unclean spirits of any variety.  Jesus describes believers in Mark 16:17-18:

17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;

18 They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

I was listening to a sister singing a gospel song the other day, and the lyrics spoke of God making her brave, and that’s totally true.  In the glorious Christ, we are empowered over all the world’s darkness that tempt men’s souls.  Remember, it was never about the hamburger.

Dear visitor, have you yet found this Christ?  Have you been BORN AGAIN as Jesus declares in John 3:3?

Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Today is your day.  In just a few moments, I will invite you to follow me in a simple prompt, and if you follow from your heart, you will be transformed. You will be born a most literal second time, this time of the Spirit of God. Today, all sin and shame will be fully expunged from your record.  You will be a new creature.  Today, all of Satan’s bondages in your life will be broken—EVERY ONE!  Today, you are in the valley of decision. Will you choose life? 

Here is the prompt I promised:  Click onto Further with Jesus for childlike instructions and immediate entry into the Kingdom of God.  NOW FOR TODAY’S SUBJECT.

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:1:

Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:25:

And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother''s name was Joktan.

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:32:

These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations, in their nations: and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood.

MAN SAID: Anyone in the know is aware the Bible is not a reliable account of anything.  It’s a book of make-believe! Everybody knows that!

Now THE RECORD: Welcome to GodSaidManSaid feature 1257 that will once again victoriously contend for the faith.  All of these faith-building features are archived here in text and streaming audio for your edification and to be used by the faithful in the glorious ministry of reconciliation.  Every Thursday eve, God willing, they grow by one.

Thank you for visiting.  God’s grace and peace be multiplied unto you and your home.

You have arrived at the GodSaidManSaid “Genesis Series;” this is Part 37.  Each of these features begins with the following information from the first feature:

According to a 2006 issue of Discover magazine concerning the deceased Carl Sagan: “Sagan approaches religion like any phenomenon.  He isn’t on a quest for life’s meaning, for a comforting philosophy, or even a guide to how we should treat the neighbors.  Sagan seeks truth of a demonstrable kind.  As a puckish example, he wonders why the book of Genesis didn’t include God-inspired truths…” [End of quote]

I recently reviewed an advertisement from a magazine called Free Inquiry that also has a problem with the God of Creation and the first book of the Bible, called Genesis.  Under the heading “Is God Big Enough for the Universe,” Free Inquiry writes:

The authors of Genesis proclaim that God made the heavens and earth in less than a week.  This feat must have amazed these Bronze Age authors, even though they thought the heavens extended only so far as the sky above them.  Of course, they did not know what stars, planets, or galaxies were.  We now know that the universe is so much bigger and so much more complex. [End of quote]

The BORN AGAIN scratch their heads in bewilderment.  Did these folks actually read the book of Genesis? I suppose they did, but God’s revelation is only revealed to the humbled hearts of the children of faith.  This GodSaidManSaid series will be called “The Genesis Series.”  It is our intention to travel through the entire book of Genesis and publish one major God-inspired truth after another.  We will be pulling from previous GodSaidManSaid features and adding the latest information as we go.

Everything in God’s Word is true and righteous altogether—every jot and every tittle.  Satan and his champions have tried to debunk and discredit God’s Holy Bible incessantly for over 6,000 years.  All they have to show for their efforts is one miserable failure after another. The Holy Book remains unscratched, not even a small abrasion.

🕇 It’s history? Perfect.

🕇 It’s miracles?  True as recorded.

🕇 It’s commandments?  Life-laden and inerrant.

🕇 It’s promises? Sure and everlasting.

🕇 It’s Christ? The glorious singularity, the reason for all that is. 

Be of good cheer, child of faith!  Your confidence will not be disappointed.

There is no ancient record of its like on the earth and it is known by scholars as the Table of Nations. This table is found in Genesis Chapters 10 and 11. God’s Word left a very precise and detailed record, by name, of the origin of all the tribes of the peoples of the earth, and ancient non-Biblical records of antiquity confirm it with a resounding YES!   

Searching for God-inspired truths in Genesis? Here we go again!  The following excerpts are from Bill Cooper’s book, After the Flood.  Mr. Cooper, B.A. Hons, comes with considerable academic accolades, including researcher, author, Honours Degree by Kingston University (England), and lecturer of numerous forums including Leeds University.  Mr. Cooper writes:

When I first came across this problem some thirty years ago, I found it most perplexing.  On the one hand, I had the Bible itself claiming to be the very Word of God, and on the other I was presented with numerous commentaries that spoke with one voice in telling me that the Bible was nothing of the kind.  It was merely a hodgepodge collection of middle-eastern myths and fables that sought to explain the world in primitive terms, whose parts had been patched together by a series of later editors.  Modern scientific man need have nothing whatever to do with it. 

Now, it simply was not possible for both these claims to be valid.  Only one of them could be right, and I saw it as my duty, to myself at least, to find out which was the true account and which was the false. So it was then that I decided to select a certain portion of Genesis and submit it to a test which, if applied to any ordinary historical document, would be considered a test of the most unreasonable severity.  And I would continue that test until either the book of Genesis revealed itself to be a false account, or it would be shown to be utterly reliable in its historical statements.

The test I devised was a simple one.  If the names of the individuals, families, peoples, and tribes listed in the Table of Nations were genuine, then those same names should appear also in the records of other nations of the Middle East.  Archaeology should also reveal that those same families and peoples are listed in Genesis (or not as the case may be) in their correct ethnological, geographical, and linguistic relationships.  I allowed for the fact that a good proportion of these names would not appear.  Either the records that once contained them had long since perished, or the diversity of language and dialect had rendered them unrecognizable.  Some would be lost in obscurity.  It simply was not realistic to expect that every name would have been recorded in the annals of the ancient Middle East and would also have survived to the present day.  I therefore would have been content to have found say 40% of the list vindicated.  In fact, that would have been a very high achievement given the sheer antiquity of the Table of Nations itself and the reported sparsity of the surviving extra-biblical records from those ancient times.  But when, over my twenty-five years of research, that confirmatory evidence grew past 40% to 50%, and then 60% and beyond, it soon became apparent that modern wisdom in this matter was wide of the mark.  Very wide of the mark indeed.  Today I can say that the names so far vindicated in the Table of Nations make up over 99% of the list, and I shall make no further comment on that other than to say that no other ancient historical document of purely human authorship could be expected to yield such a level of corroboration as that!  And I will add further that modern biblical commentators must make of it what they will.

But the test didn’t stop there. I had determined at the very beginning that the test was to be one of unreasonable severity, so even the astonishing level of vindication so far achieved did not fully satisfy the requirements of the test.  The reason for this was simple.  The Table of Nations was written in the Middle East.  But all the records consulted by me in investigating that Table were also written in the Middle East.  I therefore decided that the test should continue beyond those geographical bounds, and I carried the search into the records of the early peoples of Europe.  I wanted to see firstly whether the same patriarchs mentioned in Genesis were evident in the most ancient genealogies and chronicles of the peoples of Europe, and I wanted also to assess the level at which these early peoples were aware of other events mentioned in Genesis. The important part of this test was that the documents and records consulted by me had to date from before the time that any given European nation was converted to Christianity.  That was because it is too often alleged by certain scholars that the early Christian church, particularly the monastic community, was given to forgery and invention.  So only documents that pre-dated the coming of Christianity and its forging monks to a particular nation whose records I was consulting would be considered.  This part of the test was crucial and was to yield as great a level of vindication for the tenth and eleventh chapters of Genesis as the first part of the test. 

When applied to the Table of Nations, this healthy historical research yields some surprising facts, surprising that is, in the light of what most commentaries go to such great lengths to assure us of, namely that Genesis is not to be trusted as accurate history.  This became very clear when I first began my researches into the Table of Nations, and the nature of those researches is as follows.  [End of quotes]

The Table of Nations, Genesis 10 and 11, does not have it’s like on the earth. God-inspired truths, anyone?

The following paragraphs are from the GodSaidManSaid feature, “Genesis: Cooper Found Them All (Part 1) and (Part 2) citing Cooper and other historians:

Cooper traces 112 names listed in the Table of Nations and tracks them through ancient history.  It’s shocking to see how they play out in today’s world, and as you’ll see, many in a very deadly way actually moving us to the battle of Armageddon and the end of the world as we know it.  Additional powerful excerpts from After the Flood and GodSaidManSaid follow.

How reliable is the book of Genesis?  The first son of Noah was Shem, of which the Bible lists 64 souls in his lineage, and history shouts yes! After the Flood highlights each of them.  Several noteworthy names and their history follow:

Eber: Known to Josephus as Heber, he gave his name to the Hebrew race. 

Joktan: The progenitor of no less than thirteen southern Arabian tribes, he is remembered amongst modern Arabs as Yaqtan.  Only the purest Arabs, it is still maintained, are those Semitic Arabs descended from Joktan; whilst Hamitic Arabs are referred to somewhat disdainfully as Musta ‘rabs, pretended Arabs.  Joktan’s name is preserved in that of the ancient town of Jectan near present-day Mecca.  Josephus knew him as Joctan.  [End of quote]

Genesis 10:25 records the name of the man Peleg.  Cooper reports:

Peleg: Genesis tells us that in his day the earth was divided.  The meaning of his name, as rendered in Hebrew, corresponds exactly with the Akkadian noun pulukku, which means a dividing up of territory by means of boundaries and borders (the Akkadian verb for ‘to divide’ is palaku).  Likewise, the Assyrian word, palgu, refers to the dividing up of land by canals and irrigation systems.  It is in this sense that the Hebrew word peleg is used in Job 29:6 and 38:5.  The man named Peleg, (whose name appears as Phaleg in Josephus), was so named, however, after the division and scattering of the nations from Babel.  [End of quote]

After the Flood cites M. Hodgen in his historical account titled, Early Anthropology in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries:

Ham: ‘Yt is observed that Cham, and his family, were the only far Travellers, and Straglers into diverse unknowne countries, searching, exploring and sitting downe in the same; as also yt is said of his famely that what country soever the Children of Cham happened to possesse, there beganne both the Ignoraunce of true godliness . . . and that no inhabited countryes cast forth greater multytudes , to raunge and stray into diverse remote Regions.’  Thus far the comments of one William Strachey, who added to these words in 1612 the following damning indictment, accusing Ham’s posterity of instigating: ‘. . . the Ignoraunce of the true worship of God . . . the inventions of Heathenisme, and [the] adoration of falce godes and the Devill . . .’

Cush: Josephus writes: ‘Time has not at all hurt the name of Cush; for the Ethiopians, over whom he reigned, are even at this day, both by themselves and by all men in Asia, called Cushites.’  The name of Cush (originally rendered Chus in Josephus) is preserved in Egypt’s hieroglyphic inscriptions as Kush, these records referring to the country that lay between the second and third cataracts of the Nile.

Nimrod: Writing in 1876, George Smith tell us that: ‘Nearly thirteen hundred years before the Christian era, one of the Egyptian poems likens a hero to the Assyrian chief, Kazartu, a great hunter . . . and it has already been suggested that the reference here is to the fame of Nimrod.  A little later, in the period BC 1100 to 800, we have in Egypt many persons named after Nimrod, showing a knowledge of the mighty hunter there.’  Nimrod was undoubtedly the most notorious man in the ancient world who is credited with instigating the Great Rebellion at Babel, and of founding the very worst features of paganism, including the practice of magical arts, astrology and even human sacrifice.  Moreover, there is much evidence to suggest that he himself was worshipped from the very earliest times.  His name, for example, was perpetuated in those of Nimurda, the Assyrian god of war; Marduk, the Babylonian king of the gods; and the Sumerian deity Amar-utu.  His image was incorporated very early on in the Chaldean zodiac as a child seated on his mother’s lap, and both mother and child were worshipped, she as the Queen of Heaven, and he as her erstwhile sacrificial son, the precursor of today’s worship of Madonna and Child.  Nimrod was also worshipped by the Romans under the name of Bacchus, this name being derived from the Semitic bar-Cush, meaning the son of Cush.  A mountain not far from Ararat, has been called Nimrud Dagh (Mount Nimrod) from the earliest times since the Flood, and the ruins of Birs Nimrud bear the remains of what is commonly reputed to be the original Tower of Babel.  The Caspian Sea was once called the Mar de Bachu, or Sea of Bacchus, as is witnessed by the map appearing in Sir Walter Raleighy’s History of the World, published in 1634.  One of the chief cities of Assyria was named Nimrud, and the Plain of Shinar, known to the Assyrians as Sen’ar and the site of the Great Rebellion, was itself known as the Land of Nimrod.  Iraqi and Iranian Arabs still speak his name with awe, and such was the notoriety of the man that his historical reality is beyond dispute.  [End of quote]

The curse of Noah that he spoke over Ham for his disregard was not upon his first-born son Cush, who was the father of the Ethiopians.  Noah’s curse was spoken over Ham’s last son, Canaan.  Genesis 9:25:

And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.

Cooper writes:

Canaan: The posterity of Canaan settled in the land that was later to be given to Israel.  At the time of the Israelite conquest of Canaan, the population consisted of all the tribes descended from Canaan.  Both Sanchuniathon and Phylo of Byblos confirm the fact that the Canaanites derived their name from their founder.  The Greeks and Phoenicians rendered the name Kna’an; the Egyptians knew it as Kn’nw and Kyn’n.w; the Assyrians rendered the name Kinnahu; and the Hurrians described certain dyed cloths as Kinahne or Canaanite cloth.  In spite of their Hamitic descent, however, the Canaanites spoke a Semitic language.  [End of quote]

Noah’s last son Japheth and his direct lineage of 14 descendants are addressed in After the Flood.  Many of Japheth’s offspring are major players in the dreaded battle of Armageddon.  Mr. Cooper writes concerning Japheth:

Japheth: The father of all the Indo-European peoples, it would be surprising indeed if his name had gone unremembered among them.  As it is, we find that the early Greeks worshipped him as Iapetos, or Iapetus, whom they regarded as the son of heaven and earth, the father of many nations.  Likewise, in the ancient Sanskrit vedas of India he is remembered as Pra-Japati, the son and ostensible Lord of Creation.  As time went by, his name was further corrupted, being assimilated into the Roman pantheon as Iupater, and eventually Jupiter.  None of these names are of Greek, Indian or Latin origin, but are merely corruptions of the original name of Japheth.  Both the early Irish Celts and the early Britons traced their descent of their royal houses from Japheth, as did also the early Saxons who corrupted his name to Sceaf – (pronounced) ‘sheaf’ or ‘shaif’.  [End of quote]

A terrible time is coming when the world’s nations will converge upon Israel to wipe it from the face of the earth.  Two good chapters to read are Zechariah 13 and 14.  The prophet Ezekiel in chapters 38 and 39 speaks of this last battle that appears to culminate at the battle of Armageddon.  Ezekiel 38:1-3:

1  And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

2  Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him,

3  And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:

Ezekiel 39:1-7:

1  Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:

2  And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, and will cause thee to come up from the north parts, and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:

3  And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.

4  Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands, and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.

5  Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.

6  And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.

7  So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.

Cooper writes concerning Magog, Meshech, and Tubal, who will lead the attach against Israel:

Magog: His immediate descendants were known as the Magogites, being later known to the Greeks as the Scythians, according to the testimony of Josephus.  However, given the subsequent history of the peoples of Ashchenaz, who are far more certainly identified as the later Scythians (Gk. Skythai, and Assyr. Askuza), it is more likely that the early Magogites were assimilated into the peoples of Ashchenaz, thus making up merely a part of the Scythian hordes.  The early Irish Celts traced their own lineage from Japheth through the line of Magog.

Meshech: The descendants of Meshech are often spoken of in close association with those of Tubal, the Assyrians for example mentioning Tabal and Musku, whilst Herodotus writes of the Tiberanoi and Moschoi.  A very much earlier reference to the peoples of Meshech, is an inscription of circa 1200 BC which tells us how they overran the Hittite kingdom; and an inscription of Tiglath-pileser I of Assyria from circa 1100 BC, who tells us that, in his own day, the Mus-ka-a-ai were able to put into the field an army of 20,000 men. …  Josephus knew them as the Mosocheni (LXX Mosoch), whom, he says, were known in his own day as the Cappadocians.  Some later writers have pointed out that the name of Meshech is preserved in the old tribal name of the Muscovites of Russia, after whom Moscow is named.

Tubal: The descendants of Tubal first come to our notice in the inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser I, king of Assyria in about 1100 BC.  He refers to them as the Tabali whose original area of settlement (i.e. Tabal) was adjacent to that of Tegarama.  Subsequently, Josephus recorded the name of Tubal’s descendants as the Thobelites, who were later known as the Iberes.  Their land, in Josephus’ day, was called by the Romans Iberia, and covered what is now the (former Soviet) state of Georgia whose capital to this day bears the name Tubal as Tbilisi.  From here, having crossed the Caucasus mountains, this people migrated due north-east, giving their tribal name to the river Tobol, and hence to the famous city of Tobolsk.  [End of quote]

One of the world’s oldest historic documents is Genesis 10 and 11, known by scholars as The Table of Nations, and every jot and tittle is “true and righteous altogether.”  [End of quotes]

The following excerpts are from the GodSaidManSaid feature, “Table of Nations Thumps Minimalists:”

The first five books of the Bible are called the Pentateuch.  The Greek word penta means “five,” and teuchos means “vessel, container.”  Theological minimalists, if they will in fact acknowledge Moses as the writer, claim that the information in the first five books is a hand-me-down, lips-to-ear, oral record and that the account is littered with errors.  Many academics discount it entirely.  Regardless of the skepticism and constant carping, the Word of God stands to the test of all its challengers.  It reigns supreme.  It cannot be broken.  The Pentateuch was penned by Moses, but it was authored by God, who was the hands-on eyewitness of all that occurred, whose recall is impeccably inerrant. 

GodSaidManSaid has published exciting information about one of the world’s oldest historical-geographical documents known as The Table of Nations found in Genesis, chapter 10.  Timothy Osterholm, in his work The Table of Nations and the Origin of Races, writes:

We can also factually claim that wherever its statements can be sufficiently tested, Genesis 10 of the Bible has been found completely accurate; resulting partly from linguistic studies, partly from archaeology, and, more recently still, from the findings of physical anthropologists, who are, to this day, recovering important clues to lines of migration in ancient historical times.  As implied in verse 32 of Genesis 10, this Table includes everybody; meaning that so-called fossil man, primitive peoples (ancient and modern) and modern man are all derived from Noah’s three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. … As archaeologist William Albright noted, “it [the Bible] remains an astonishingly accurate document…and shows such remarkably ‘modern’ understanding of the ethnic and linguistic situation in the modern world, in spite of all its complexity, that scholars never fail to be impressed with its knowledge of the subject.” [End of quote]

God’s Word, found in the majority-text Holy Bible, is true and righteous altogether.  Yes, a place to build a life that will last forever. 

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:1:

Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:25:

And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother''s name was Joktan.

GOD SAID, Genesis 10:32:

These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations, in their nations: and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood.

MAN SAID: Anyone in the know is aware the Bible is not a reliable account of anything.  It’s a book of make-believe! Everybody knows that!

 

Now you have THE RECORD.

 

 

References:

Authorized King James Version

Blumner, R., Free Inquiry

GodSaidManSaid, “Genesis: Cooper Found Them All (Part 1)”

GodSaidManSaid, “Genesis: Cooper Found Them All (Part 2)” 

GodSaidManSaid, “Table of Nations Thumps Minimalists”

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