Like the first section of Genesis, this second section ends with a genealogy. However, unlike Adam’s genealogy in chapter 5, this is not a straightforward list of descendants.

It is not a complete list, but a representative one, focusing on those tribes and peoples of most interest to the Israelites. It does not give the ages of any of the people mentioned, and it lists places and tribes as well as individuals.

This table of nations focuses mostly on the tribes and nations that settled in the area where the Israelites would later live. Japheth’s descendants were coastal peoples, probably spread from Turkey westwards to Spain, so they are not given as much attention as Ham or Shem’s descendants who settled more locally.

However, like Adam’s genealogy, this list gives us a glimpse into the way God operates. Mankind continues to reproduce, generation after generation, just as God had ordained it. From each initial family, God would go on to build nations. Just look how many of the names and nations listed here will become very familiar to us later in Israel’s history – Jebusites, Amorites, Girgashites, Hivites, to name a few. We will see God building a nation out of a family again through Abraham and Sarah.

This genealogy follows hard on the heels of God’s covenant with Noah, and before the tale of the Tower of Babel, which happens well before the end of the genealogy. Why place it here and not later? Because the genealogy confirms that God’s covenant with Noah was a covenant with all people, since all people were to be descendants of Noah and his sons.

We return again and again to the theme of God’s order throughout Genesis. Although chaos threatens so often, the essential order of things that God put in place at creation remains. Despite everything, the fruitfulness that God spoke over mankind becomes a reality. Praise God, who holds the threads of the complex tapestry of the history and future of mankind firmly in his hands.

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NEWBOLD COMMUNITY CHURCH