God besseth Noe: forbiddeth blood, and promiseth never more to destroy
the world by water. The blessing of Sem and Japheth.
9:1. And God blessed Noe and his sons. And he said to them: Increase,
and multiply, and fill the earth.
9:2. And let the fear and dread of you be upon all the beasts of the
earth, and upon all the fowls of the air, and all that move upon the
earth: all the fishes of the sea are delivered into your hand.
9:3. And every thing that moveth, and liveth shall be meat for you: even
as the green herbs have I delivered them all to you:
9:4. Saving that flesh with blood you shall not eat.
9:5. For I will require the blood of your lives at the hand of every
beast, and at the hand of man, at the hand of every man, and of his
brother, will I require the life of man.
9:6. Whosoever shall shed man's blood, his blood shall be shed: for man
was made to the image of God.
9:7. But increase you and multiply, and go upon the earth and fill it.
9:8. Thus also said God to Noe, and to his sons with him:
9:9. Behold I will establish my covenant with you, and with your seed
after you:
9:10. And with every living soul that is with you, as well in all birds,
as in cattle and beasts of the earth, that are come forth out of the
ark, and in all the beasts of the earth.
9:11. I will establish my covenant with you, and all flesh shall be no
more destroyed with the waters of a flood, neither shall there be from
henceforth a flood to waste the earth.
9:12. And God said: This is the sign of the covenant which I give
between me and you, and to every living soul that is with you, for
perpetual generations.
9:13. I will set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be the sign of a
covenant between me and between the earth.
9:14. And when I shall cover the sky with clouds, my bow shall appear in
the clouds:
9:15. And I will remember my covenant with you, and with every living
soul that beareth flesh: and there shall no more be waters of a flood to
destroy all flesh.
9:16. And the bow shall be in the clouds, and I shall see it, and shall
remember the everlasting covenant, that was made between God and every
living soul of all flesh which is upon the earth.
9:17. And God said to Noe: This shall be the sign of the covenant, which
I have established, between me and all flesh upon the earth.
9:18. And the sons of Noe, who came out of the ark, were Sem, Cham, and
Japheth: and Cham is the father of Chanaan.
9:19. These three are the sons of Noe: and from these was all mankind
spread over the whole earth.
9:20. And Noe a husbandman began to till the ground, and planted a
vineyard.
9:21. And drinking of the wine was made drunk, and was uncovered in his
tent.
Drunk... Noe by the judgment of the fathers was not guilty of sin, in
being overcome by wine: because he knew not the strength of it.
9:22. Which when Cham the father of Chanaan had seen, to wit, that his
father's nakedness was uncovered, he told it to his two brethren
without.
9:23. But Sem and Japheth put a cloak upon their shoulders, and going
backward, covered the nakedness of their father: and their faces were
turned away, and they saw not their father's nakedness.
Covered the nakedness... Thus, as St. Gregory takes notice L. 35; Moral.
c. 22, we ought to cover the nakedness, that is, the sins, of our
spiritual parents and superiors.
9:24. And Noe awaking from the wine, when he had learned what his
younger son had done to him,
9:25. He said: Cursed be Chanaan, a servant of servants shall he be unto
his brethren.
Cursed be Chanaan... The curses, as well as the blessings, of the
partiarchs, were prophetical: And this in particular is here recorded by
Moses, for the children of Israel, who were to possess the land of
Chanaan. But why should Chanaan be cursed for his father's faults? The
Hebrews answer, that he being then a boy, was the first that saw his
grandfather's nakedness, and told his father Cham of it; and joined with
him in laughing at it: which drew upon him, rather than upon the rest of
the children of Cham, this prophetical curse.
9:26. And he said: Blessed be the Lord God of Sem, be Chanaan his
servant.
9:27. May God enlarge Japheth, and may he dwell in the tents of Sem, and
Chanaan be his servant.
9:28. And Noe lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years.
9:29. And all his days were in the whole nine hundred and fifty years:
and he died.