Genesis 10:8 - Exposition

And Cush begat —not necessarily as immediate progenitor, any ancestor being in Hebrew styled a father— Nimrod ; the rebel, from maradh, to rebel; the name of a person, not of a people; —Namuret in ancient Egyptian. Though not one of the great ethnic heads, he is introduced into the register of nations as the founder of imperialism. Under him society passed from the patriarchal condition, in which each separate clan or tribe owns the sway of its natural head, into that (more abject or more civilized according as it is viewed) in which many different clans or tribes recognize the sway of one who is not their natural head, but has acquired his ascendancy and dominion by conquest. This is the principle of monarchism. Eastern tradition has painted Nimrod as a gigantic oppressor of the people's liberties and an impious rebel-against the Divine authority. Josephus credits him with having instigated the building of the tower of Babel. He has been identified with the Orion of the Greeks. Scripture may seem to convey a bad impression of Nimrod, but it does not sanction the absurdities of Oriental legend. He began to be a mighty one — Gibbor ( vide Genesis 6:4 ); what he had been previously being expressed in Genesis 10:5 — in the earth . Not ε ̓ πι τη ͂ ς γη ͂ ς ( LXX .), as if pointing to his gigantic stature, but either among men generally, with reference to his widespread fame, or perhaps better "in the land where he dwelt, which was not Babel, but Arabia (vide Genesis 10:6 ).