What is the significance of Cush in the Bible?

Eldest son of Ham and grandson of Noah. Gen. 10:6-8; 1 Chr. 1:8-10. His descendants are called in the A.V. Ethiopians, though the Hebrew is the same: Cush. The district also occupied by the above people, Isa. 11:11, is mostly called in A.V. Ethiopia, q.v. It will be seen by the genealogy that the descendants of Cush were numerous:-

All these cannot be confined to Africa. Some were probably located in Arabia, and Nimrod is clearly associated with the East; so that though as a district Cush may usually refer to Africa, the Cushites must have had a much wider range. It seems clear too from Gen. 2:13 that even geographically the name Cush: or Ethiopia, was also applied to a region in Asia.

Of Ham's sons Cush has the first place. According to scripture that stock settled in lands the most remote. There is without doubt an Asiatic as well as an African Cush. Gen. 2:13 presents its difficulty, but it would seem to be anticipative like Havilah and Assyria; for it is certain that till the flood there was no actual settlement of lands in their nations. But we know from our chapter that a notable departure was first taken by one of the Cushite descent to possess himself of power by usurpation, and this not in Africa but in the plain of Shinar, of which there are details to follow. It was certainly not after their arrival in Africa that this ambitious movement took place, but early in that day of change; and in fact not a few traces exist, philological and historical, of early connection between Ethiopia, Southern Arabia, and the cities on the lower Euphrates, as may be seen in Rawlinson's Herod. i. 442, 443. No one doubts that in general Cush as a country lies beyond higher Egypt; but as a race they settled far more widely, as already pointed out. And this explains more than one passage, which is commonly and altogether misunderstood from not taking the facts into account no less than from holding fast the strict wording of scripture. Thus, Isaiah (Isa. 18:1) says, "Ho! land shadowing with wings, which art beyond the rivers of Cush." It is absurd to infer that this means either Egypt or Ethiopia, any more than Babylonia. The object of the phrase is on the contrary to distinguish the land in question from either those lands or from any within those limits, which had in the past interfered with Israel. It is the prediction, not yet accomplished, of a land beyond the Nile in the south and the Euphrates in the north, which are the rivers of Cush. That unnamed land, described in striking terms as distinctly outside the Gentile powers which had hitherto acted on the chosen people, is to espouse their cause at a future day; but to no good effect, for the nations will oppose, jealous and hostile as of old, just before Jehovah takes up the matter and restores Israel to the place of His name, to Mount Zion. So in Zeph. 3:10 we read, "From beyond the river of Cush my suppliants, the daughter of my dispersed, shall bring my oblation." Egypt or Ethiopia might be described as on one side of Cush, and Babylonia on the other; but Jehovah shall bring His dispersed from lands expressly beyond both.

There is no question as to the identification of Mizraim, and the great magnificence of its civilisation as of the Asiatic Cush in the remotest antiquity. The form of the word in Hebrew is the dual, which some would refer to higher and lower Egypt. However this may be, the context decides that both Cush and Mizraim mean men, and sons of Ham. Ephraim, born in Egypt, has also the dual form, but is none the less surely the name of a man.

Phut or Put exemplifies the more degraded stock of Ham's descendants in Africa, contiguous to Egypt and Ethiopia, and named with one or other at times. But Phut can hardly be the Libyan as A.V. makes out of Jer. 46:9, or Libya as from Ezek. 30:5, and Ezek. 38:5 where it should be Phut as in Ezek. 27:10. The Lubim as in Nahum 3:9 point rather to the Lybians. The very obscurity which covers this African branch of Ham's sons serves to show how low they had fallen.

But Canaan, last named, has the most unenviable place of all, as the early object of curse, and the direst adversary of Israel in the land assigned according to promise: a highly civilised race, but steeped in shameless idolatry and every moral abomination, and therefore given up according to earthly righteousness to extermination, both because they deserved it, and as a safeguard lest Israel should be drawn into like iniquities; as indeed, failing to execute His sentence, they proved to their own sin, shame, and cost. More details we hope to have in due course.

The posterity of Cush we have next, as being Ham's eldest son. "And the sons of Cush, Seba and Havilah and Sabtah and Raamah and Sabtecha. And the sons of Raamah, Sheba and Dedan" (ver. 7; see also 1 Chron. 1:9).

Much more detail is assigned to Ham, who occupies verses 6 to 20. And with that holy boldness and candour which characterises the truth, this chapter hides not but sets before us plainly the early rise of kingly power in that race. The beginning of Nimrod's kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar; Nimrod was of Cush, Ham's eldest son. He and he alone is here described in terms so strong, even if we conceive that Asshur went out from that land, though of Shem's stock, and emulated Nimrod's ambitious example by building Nineveh and three cities more in Assyria. The sons of Cush include much beyond Ethiopia, but are distinct from Mizraim and Phut as well as Canaan, minutely enumerated, though none so much as that race accursed of God which Israel was responsible to blot out.

The prominent fact that strikes one here is that this is the branch of mankind which after the deluge distinguished itself by the earliest and most vigorous civilization; and this not in an isolated instance, but alike in Asia and in Africa. Scripture attests the truth; and even rationalism, though ever hostile, cannot dispute it. But along with material progress another characteristic is no less marked: the degradation of the race, their fall into ways and habits of savagery. Phut illustrates this as distinctly as Cush and Mizraim and Canaan showed themselves in different respects pioneers of earthly progress.

Sabtecha is the last-named of Cush's sons, of which scripture makes no mention beyond the genealogical list here and in 1 Chron. 1. Hence we cannot say anything sure, and need not repeat more than Bochart's conjecture that they found their way to Carmania on the Persian shore of the Gulf, and that the name seems changed to the Samydace of Steph. Byzant. In his Thes. Gesenius suggests a yet less probable idea.

Of Sheba and Dedan, sons of Raamah, we may say more when we come to compare them with the same names in the Shemitic line. This only may be noticed that in Ezek. 27 Sheba occurs twice; first, with Raamah in ver. 22, which fixes him as the Cushite in the same part of Arabia; secondly, with Asshur, etc., in ver, 23, which points to the Shemitic line, confirmed by the distinct merchandise of each. In like manner the men of Dedan in Ezek. 27:15 appear to be Cushites on the Persian gulf (where the isle of Dadan perpetuates the name) and with imports and exports accordingly; whereas we have Dedan distinguished in ver. 20, who seem to be Shemitic through Keturah. Compare Ezek. 25:13.

The Jews therefore did not err in assigning to Cush, not only Ethiopia and the contiguous parts in Africa, but the opposite coast of Arabia and the southern shore of Asia generally unto India. But Arabia received also a large Shemitic population, as we shall see, which gave character to their language; and this not only from Joktan, Eber's son early, but from Ishmael's twelve sons, and from Jokshan, Abraham's son still later, with some of Esau's descendants. Even Homer (Od. i. 23, 24) speaks of Ethiopians divided into two parts, the most distant of men, some at the setting sun, and some at the rising. We shall find a Cushite element active early in Babylonia and Africa. It was a Turanian race which included the Turks, but not the Armenians whom they rightly gave to Japhet. But they seem never to have realised that the ancient Persian (Zend) language, and that of northern and central India (Sanskrit), disclose the same Japhetic source.

From the manner in which Nimrod is introduced, it would appear that he was a descendant of Cush rather than son in the strict sense. Why else should he be named after not only the five sons of Cush, but his two grandsons through Raamah?

The Ethiopia of verse 13 is really Cush, of whom we read in Genesis 10:6. There appears to have been a district bearing his name between Mesopotamia and India, as well as the better known land we now call Abyssinia.

This is the Greek and Roman name for CUSH, a kingdom in Africa to the south of Egypt. The boundary between the two kingdoms is not well defined, indeed, it may have varied at different times. The first cataract, 24 N, 32 52' E is generally taken as its northern boundary: its extent southward is altogether unknown. Gen. 2:13; Esther 1:1; Ezek. 29:10. At times Ethiopia conquered Egypt: two of the kings mentioned in scripture were Ethiopians. 2 Chr. 14:9; Isa. 37:9. In some of the prophecies they are mentioned as separate kingdoms. Nahum 3:9. See EGYPT, LAND OF.

The Delta, and as far south as Noph (Memphis, 29 51' N, 31 20' E), is Lower Egypt: and from Noph southward to the first Cataract (24 N) is Upper Egypt. The emblematic crowns representing the two districts were not the same; but the two were united in one crown when a king reigned over all Egypt. As there were many changes by different dynasties the same boundaries may not always have been preserved. CUSH, or ETHIOPIA, extended much farther south, but is often mentioned in scripture along with Egypt: Ps. 68:31; Isa. 11:11; Isa. 20:4; Isa. 43:3; Isa. 45:14; Nahum 3:9. Ethiopian kings appear to have reigned in Egypt, and are included in their list of kings.

The children of Ham are pointed out in Genesis 10:6. Of these, Canaan has been destroyed, and his country turned over to Israel; Cush (Ethiopia) and Phut are also found (Ezek. 38:5; see margin) under Gog; those of Cush only in part, and for the reason that one part of the family of Cush established itself on the Euphrates, the other on the Nile, that is, north and south of Israel. Those of the north are then, by their position, in direct relation with the partisans of Gog. Mizraim, or Egypt (for Mizraim is none other than the Hebrew name for Egypt), and the remainder of Cush and the Libyans, you will find in the scenes of the last day; Daniel 11:43.