Biblical Blackness: Cush, the "Curse of Ham" and the Queen of Sheba

The Bible is largely silent about race. People are identified by their lands of origin and beliefs, not their skin color. Yet centuries of biblical interpreters have read race into the Bible, for good and for ill.

As our guest Stacy Davis explains, the biblical land of Cush (sometimes translated as Ethiopia) has long been associated with Black people, a point of pride for African and African-American Christians. And Josephus believed that the legendary Queen of Sheba was Black.

But the Bible has also been misused for racist purposes. In the 1800s, pro-slavery forces in America cited a convoluted reading of Genesis 9 and 10 to justify the enslavement of Black people under the so-called "Curse of Ham."

To learn more, check out Stacy's excellent book, This Strange Story: Jewish and Christian Interpretation of the Curse of Canaan from Antiquity to 1865.

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Theme music written and performed by Dave Roos