The Truth About the Curse of Ham and Racism

Today I saw this post from JD Hall.

Hall claims he is not a Christian Nationalist, so we will have to accept that. Yet he is defending a post Joel Webbon, a Christian Nationalist and racist, made the other day.

Webbon and Hall are claiming those of European descent claim special privilege from God based on ethnic status. So let’s explain why this white supremacist claim is false.

First Hall makes a historical claim, that Europeans took to Christianity “like a duck to water” and was “thoroughly Christianized”. Well both of these claims are false. Europe wasn’t even nominally Christianized until 1000AD. And as for thoroughly well when the king of the Franks was baptized he and his army reportedly marched through the river with their sword hands above the water indicating that they were not baptized completely and still bent on war. These are simply a couple examples but I think they demonstrate Hall’s claim is severely overblown.

But let’s assume Hall is correct, then we should ask why this remarkable blessing didn’t fall on the Middle East and Africa. Middle Eastern kingdoms adopted Christianity earlier than any others (and arguably more thoroughly). And Africa produced some of the finest early defenders and promoters of the faith despite being a Roman colony.

At this point Hall would respond with his appeal to Scripture, so let’s look at Scripture. And since Hall uses a very plain and literal reading of the text of Genesis let’s do the same.

Let’s ask does God ever curse Ham or Canaan-No. So right off the bat Hall (and Webbon who he is referencing) are wrong. God never cursed Ham Noah did in his anger and God is not required to honor that curse.

Did Noah curse Canaan’s descendants- No. Noah’s curse stops at Canaan. He does not curse the entire line in perpetuity. He curses two individuals. So even if you could manage to argue that God listened to this curse you still could not argue that the entire line of this individual is cursed.

Third is the idea of a perpetual curse opposed in Scripture- YES! numerous times God says that children are not held accountable for the sins of their parents. And even on the most literal reading of the text and giving this white supremacist lie of the Curse of Ham the greatest chance of a biblical grounding God holds people accountable ONLY to the third or fourth generation.

To sum it up there is absolutely no possible grounding for this white supremacist lie in the Bible. There is no grounding for this lie in history. And yet we are seeing a resurgence of this racism. And it is being pushed by Christian Nationalists and others who simply want a justification for eliminating immigration in America.