Why We Keep Getting the Curse of Canaan Wrong

 

Most interpreters of Genesis 9:18–29 read with a presumption that Noah’s curse must be justified and that Ham, Canaan, or the Canaanites therefore deserve punishment. Examining problems with this pervasive “presumption of Canaanite guilt” opens alternative readings of Noah’s curse as drunken, excessive, misdirected, or unjust and helps resist its continued weaponization.

 

See also The Injustice of Noah’s Curse (Oxford University Press, 2025)

 

By Justin Michael Reed
Louisville Seminary
July 2026

                                                                          Click here for article

         

 

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Article Comments

Submitted by Kenneth Greifer on Wed, 07/29/2026 - 03:12

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I am a little confused. You write a long article about the curse, but you don't have any space in the article to actually include the curse itself fully written out. I had to go look it up on my own. If you wrote a book on this, did you put the full verse in the book? I think it could have fit.

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