Divine Identity and the Hamitic Idea in Historical Perspective
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- Sylvester A. Johnson
Part of the book series: Black Religion / Womanist Thought / Social Justice ((BRWT))
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American Christian ideas about (black) Africans as Hamitic were not recent inventions but had their origin in a long, complex tradition of Judaic, Christian, Islamic, and otherwise biblical thought. This history comprised descriptions of Ham as a great ancestor of early nations, as a moral failure who blighted a portion of humanity because of his sin against Noah, and as one to be distinguished genealogically and morally from the other posterity of Noah. As we shall see, he was regularly (though not exclusively) associated with the African nations of Ethiopia and Egypt. The various narrative productions of early Judaic, Christian, and Islamic traditions about Ham were critical ingredients in an eventual, consummate formula of religious and cultural antiblackness in American Christianity. 1
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Among the best studies of ideas about Ham are Stephen Haynes, Noah’s Curse: The Biblical Justification of American Slavery (New York: Oxford, 2002)
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and David Goldenberg, The Curse of Ham: Race and Slavery in EarlyJudaism, Christianity, and Islam (Princeton/Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2003). Despite his impressive efforts to avoid anachronisms and essentialism, Goldenberg relies upon the troubling concept of “black African.” He uses this, for example, in order to distinguish between Egyptians and Ethiopians (he does not consider Egyptians to be “black Africans”). This concept of the “black African” was developed by racist intellectuals of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in order to avoid attributing examples of cultural prowess or achievement to “blacks.” The concept is in every sense a product of white supremacist strategies to dehumanize Africans by inscribing them as having no history or culture. Unfortunately, Goldenberg is not alone in his use of the concept—most contemporary scholars have uncritically taken up its use. Haynes’ text also provides extensive treatment of American Christian ideas about Nimrod as a villainous ancestor of Negroes. See especially chapters 3 and 6 of Haynes’ study.
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Ephraim Isaac, “Ham,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary , ed. David Noel Freedman (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 3:31–3:32.
Audrey Smedley, Race in North America: Origins and Evolution of a Worldview (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993).
Philip Schaff, Slavery and the Bible: A Tract for the Times (Chambersburg, PA: M. Kieffer and Co.’s Caloric Printing Press, 1861); located at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York City. The tract contains a preface of endorsement, dated March 1861, citing its popular reception and listing as signatories twenty-three people from the Mercersburg Seminary.
Samuel A. Cartwright, “Slavery in the Light of Ethnology,” in Cotton is King, and Other Pro-Slavery Arguments; Comprising the Writings of Hammond, Harper, Christy, Stringfellow, Hodge, Bledsoe, and Cartwright, on this Important Subject , ed. E. N. Elliot (Augusta, GA: Pritchard, GA: 1860), 693, 694.
Thornton Stringfellow, “The Bible Argument: Or, Slavery in the Light of Divine Revelation,” in Cotton is King, and Other Pro-Slavery Arguments; Comprising the Writings of Hammond, Harper, Christy, Stringfellow, Hodge, Bledsoe, and Cartwright, on this Important Subject , ed. E. N. Elliot (Augusta, GA: Pritchard, Abbot & Loomis, 1860).
Lewis S. Gordon, Existentia A fricana: Understanding Africana Existential Thought (New York: Routledge, 2000), 97.
Martin Marty, Righteous Empire: The Protestant Experience in America (New York: Dial Press, 1970).
Eddie S. Glaude, Exodus!: Religion, Race, and Nation in Early Nineteenth-Century Black America (Chicago/London: University of Chicago, 2000), 75.
Reginald Horsman, Race and Manifest Destiny: The Origins of American Racial Anglo-Saxonism (Cambridge/London: Harvard University Press, 1981).
William Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963), 14–18.
Jonathan Edwards, History of the Work of Redemption in The Works of President Edwards (1817; reprint, New York: Burt Franklin, 1968), 5: 246.
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© 2004 Sylvester Johnson
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Johnson, S.A. (2004). Divine Identity and the Hamitic Idea in Historical Perspective. In: The Myth of Ham in Nineteenth-Century American Christianity. Black Religion / Womanist Thought / Social Justice. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-7869-1_2
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- History in Africa
The "Hamitic Hypothesis" in Indigenous West African Historical Thought
- African Studies Association
- Volume 36, 2009
- pp. 293-314
- 10.1353/hia.2010.0004
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Problems in African history : the precolonial centuries
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- Introduction to the fourth edition / by Ruth Iyob
- Problem I. Africa and Egypt
- Introduction
- The Hamitic hypothesis: its origin in time / Edith R. Sanders
- Kingship, archaeology, and historical myth / Merrick Posnansky
- The African origins of Western civilization / Cheikh Anta Diop
- A review of Diop / Raymond Mauny
- Black Athena / Martin Bernal
- Kush and Axum / Stanley Burstein
- Suggestions for further reading
- Problem II. African states and trade
- State formation in Uganda / C.C. Wrigley
- Kingdoms of the savanna / Jan Vansina
- The Luba-Lunda empire / Thomas Reefe
- The rise of the Zimbabwe state / D.N. Beach
- Trading states of the oil rivers / G.I. Jones
- On the African diaspora in the Indian Ocean / Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya and Richard Pankhurst
- Problem III. Islam and Africa
- The history of Islam in Africa / Nehemia Levtzion and Randall L. Pouwels
- From ancient to Islamic cities in Sub-Saharan Africa / Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch
- the sword of truth / Mervyn Hiskett
- The jihad of Shehu dan Fodio / M.G. Smith
- 19th-century reforms in Hausaland / M.O. Junaid
- The jihad in Hausaland as an episode in African history / Peter Waterman
- Problem IV. The role of women in African states and societies
- Queen Nzinga of Angola / Patricia Romero
- Sexual demography / John Thornton
- Female slavery / Claude Meillassoux
- Women in slavery in the Western Sudan / Martin Klein
- The signares : entrepreneurial African women / George E. Brooks, Jr.
- Women as spirit mediums in East Africa / Iris Berger
- Women and state formation in Buganda / Nakanyike Musisi
- Inventing gender : questioning gender in precolonial Yorubaland / Oyeronke Oyewumi
- Problem V. Slavery in Africa and the formation of global African diasporas
- African slavery on the Upper Guinea coast / Walter Rodney
- Slavery in Africa / Suzanne Miers and Igor Kopytoff
- Transformations in slavery / Paul Lovejoy
- Commentary on Paul Lovejoy / Igor Kopytoff
- Islamic law and polemics over race and slavery in North and West Africa (16th-19th century) / John Hunwick
- The Asian slave trade / Robert O. Collins
- Diaspora : struggles and connections / Patrick Manning.
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Article search, the “hamitic hypothesis” in indigenous west african historical thought.
- This paper explores the use of versions of the “Hamitic hypothesis” by West African historians, with principal reference to amateur scholars rather than to academic historiography. Although some reference is made to other areas, the main focus is on the Yoruba, of southwestern Nigeria, among whom an exceptionally prolific literature of local history developed from the 1880s onwards. The most important and influential work in this tradition, which is therefore central to the argument of this paper, is the History of the Yorubas of the Rev. Samuel Johnson, which was written in 1897 although not published until 1921.
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There exists a widely held belief in the Western world that everything of value ever found in Africa was brought there by these Hamites, a people inherently superior to the native populations. This belief, often referred to as the Hamitic hypothesis, is a convenient explanation for all the signs of civilization found in Black Africa.
The Hamitic hypothesis reached its apogee in the work of C. G. Seligman, who argued in his book The Races of Africa (1930) that: Apart from relatively late Semitic influence... the civilizations of Africa are the civilizations of the Hamites, its history is the record of these peoples and of their interaction with the two other African stocks ...
Other articles where Hamitic hypothesis is discussed: western Africa: Muslims in western Africa: …thus evolved the so-called "Hamitic hypothesis," by which it was generally supposed that any progress and development among agricultural Blacks was the result of conquest or infiltration by pastoralists from northern or northeastern Africa. Specifically, it was supposed that many of the ...
THE HAMITIC HYPOTHESIS stressed the punishment suffered by Ham's descendants, thus reinforcing the myth in modern times.6 Some seventeenth-century writers7 acquaint us with notions current in their time by citing European authors, known or unknown today, who wrote, directly or indirectly, about the low position of Negro-Hamites in the world.
The Hamitic hypothesis states that everything of value ever found in Africa was brought there by the Hamites, allegedly a branch of the Caucasian race. This hypothesis was preceded by an earlier theory, in the 16th century, that the Hamites were black savages, 'natural slaves' - and Negroes. This view, which persisted throughout the 18th ...
The Hamitic Hypothesis Revisited \ To many modern scholars who write on these issues the question of the Hamitic theory may never have been of any conscious concern to their objectives; nevertheless one can hardly fail to discern an unconscious, at time surreptitious, acceptance of the Hamitic thesis, given especially the recent African ...
The Hamitic Hypothesis: Its Origin and Function in Time Perspective. Apparatus for augmenting the pressure of a gas stored in a container and for releasing the stored gas on command. First and second ignitable, pressure augmenting compositions are stored within the container, the first composition being ignited under a first predetermined set ...
The anthropological and historical literature dealing with Africa abounds with references to a people called the 'Hamites'. 'Hamite', as used in these writings, designates an African population supposedly distinguished by its race— Caucasian—and its language family, from the Negro inhabitants of the rest of Africa below the Sahara. There exists a widely held belief in the Western ...
the introduction: Hamitic rhetorics and ideas ultimately regarded not the problem of slavery but that of existence. First and foremost, insofar as Americans were concerned, Ham was the ancestor of the Negro race. Discussing the Hamitic presumed as problem the Negro's existence and origin and the contradiction of being Negro in America.
The concept of the "Hamitic hypothesis" appears to have been coined by. the historian St Clair Drake, in 1959.3 In the historiography of Africa, it has. conventionally been employed as a label for the view that important ele- ments in the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, and more especially elaborated.
II. The concept of the "Hamitic hypothesis" appears to have been coined by the historian St Clair Drake, in 1959. 3 In the historiography of Africa, it has conventionally been employed as a label for the view that important elements in the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, and more especially elaborated [End Page 293] state structures, were the creation of people called "Hamites," who were ...
The "Hamitic Hypothesis" in Indigenous West African Historical Thought. This paper explores the use of versions of the "Hamitic hypothesis" by West African historians, with principal reference to amateur scholars rather than to academic historiography. Although some reference is made to other areas, the main focus is on the Yoruba, of ...
The term "Hamitic" comes from the biblical figure Ham. In the Book of Genesis, Noah exited the ark with three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. One day, Noah became drunk and fell asleep naked inside his tent. Ham mistakenly discovered his father's nakedness, and then ran to tell his brothers about it.
Hamitic hypothesis of Tutsi origin. The colonial scholars who found complex societies in sub-Saharan Africa developed the Hamitic hypothesis. The now rejected hypothesis posits that the Tutsi was a Hamitic race originated from the Horn of Africa that conquered Rwanda and brought civilization. [citation needed]
Hamitic hypothesis which was introduced in Rwanda during European rule changed the course of. Rwanda's history as it transformed the Tutsi and Hutu labels into racial and ethnic identities. The. Hamitic hypothesis is a European ideology that posited that every trace of civilization in Africa.
The Hamitic hypothesis: its origin in time / Edith R. Sanders; Kingship, archaeology, and historical myth / Merrick Posnansky; ... Publisher's summary Covering the major problems in the field, this text offers the full spectrum of emotionally charged theories, presenting conflicting arguments that illustrate the ongoing debates on what are ...
Search the for Website expand_more. Articles Find articles in journals, magazines, newspapers, and more; Catalog Explore books, music, movies, and more; Databases Locate databases by title and description; Journals Find journal titles; UWDC Discover digital collections, images, sound recordings, and more; Website Find information on spaces, staff, services, and more ...
The battle over slavery that led to the American Civil War was fought on multiple fronts. For nineteenth-century churchgoers, this included Bible-based pro- ...
A new book has shed more light on how a 19th century Hamitic myth, construed by colonialists and imposed on Rwandans, promoted hatred that led to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Marcel Kabanda. Courtesy. Eugene Kwibuka. Sunday, February 23, 2014.
The Hamitic Hypothesis stated that the wonders of Africa weren't in fact the result of African ingenuity but were instead brought there by The Hamites; a bra...
Contemporary views in Igbo scholarship dismiss completely earlier claims of Jewish or Egyptian origin--that is, "the Hamitic hypothesis"--as "the oriental mirage." Instead, there are two current opinions as a result of evidence derived from several sources that take into account oral history, archaeology, linguistics, and art history.
The Hamitic Hypothesis; Its Origin and Functions in Time Perspective Download; XML; The Trade in African Slaves to Rio de Janeiro, 1795-1811: Estimates of Mortality and Patterns of Voyages Download; XML; Population Density and 'Slave Raiding'-The Case of the Middle Belt of Nigeria Download; XML; Dingane's Attack on Lourenco Marques in 1833 ...