ובני גומר וגו, “and the descendants of Gomer, etc;” the reason why the Torah does not mention by name the sons of Magog, Modai, Tuval Kayin, etc., is because none of them became founders of nations, so that only a single one of them became a founder of a nation. The same pattern is applied by the Torah when describing the offspring of Put son of Cham.

כתים ודודנים; elsewhere the דדנים are called רודנים. (Compare Chronicles I 1,7) This is to teach us that at times in history when the fortunes of the Jewish people as r ascending, these people treat us a “cousins,” in order to benefit from this biological relationship. When the fortunes of the Jewish people’s fortunes are on the decline, these “cousins,” are the first to join those who persecute us.

וכוש ילד את נמרוד, “and Cush sired Nimrod.” The reason why Nimrod has not been enumerated together with his other brothers is to draw attention to his accomplishments.

,הוא החל להיות גבור “he began to be outstanding amongst the people who had survived the deluge."

גבור ציד לפני ה, “a great hunter before the Lord, i.e. throughout the earth. “ We find a similar use of the expression when in the Book of Jonah (Jonah 3,3) the city of Nineveh is described as עיר גדולה לאלוקים, “a great city before G-d,” where the expression means that on the whole globe there was no city comparable in size of population. A different interpretation of the expression: 'לפני ה“as predicted in the name of the Lord.” Compare: Joshua 6,26 where Joshua predicts that anyone who would dare to rebuild the city of Jericho would pay the price in the eyes of G-d by losing his oldest son when commencing that enterprise, and that he would wind up by losing his last son by the time he would affix the gates to the city wall. His prediction came true in the time of the prophet Elijah when a man by the name of Chiel son of Eli, did exactly this, and wound up by losing all his sons in that order. (Kings I 16,34.) The Torah tells us that G-d decreed that a person of the type of Nimrod had to arise in order for Avraham to demonstrate that one could prevail even against such mighty warriors who defied the Lord.

על כן יאמר כנמרוד, “this is why people would use Nimrod as an example, saying: ‘just like Nimrod, a mighty hunter by the grace of the Lord.’” According to tradition no ferocious beast ever escaped alive in an encounter with Nimrod. He was aided by G-d in attaining such a reputation so that G-d could demonstrate in due course that such apparently invincible warriors could not prevail against Him.

ותהי ראשית ממלכתו וגו, “at the beginning his kingdom extended only to Babylonia and Accadia, extending eventually throughout the whole region of Shinor. Eventually he even conquered the region of Ashur. (northeast) Ashur had emigrated as he could not stand Nimrod’s antiG-d attitude.

אשור, as if the Torah had written: לאשור, “to Ashur.” [According to this interpretation Ashur here was not the name of a person but of the city he had founded. Ed.]

ואת רסן בין נינוה , “and the great city of Nineveh situated between Ressen and Kolach”. He linked all three cities into one great metropolis. This is the reason why subsequently we find Nineveh referred to as: “the great city.”A different interpretation of the phrase: “and from this land Ashur emigrated.” The word Ashur is the name of a man, as suggested by Rashi, who described Ashur as being disgusted with his own children acclaiming Nimrod as deity, so much so that he decided to move far north east. In a Midrash, the source of which our author does not quote, the question is raised why G-d appointed a special prophet to warn the city of Nineveh of impending destruction if its people did not mend its ways. The answer given is that that this was in recognition of the courageous conduct of its founder Ashur, who had dissociated himself from Nimrod’s pantheistic kingdom. That Midrash cites our verse as the source for G-d’s special consideration for Nineveh’s people. The Midrash interprets the words: מן הארץ ההיא יצא אשור, as if the Torah had written: ‘the plan that prompted Ashur to move far away from the domain of Ni rod, eventually paid dividends by the inhabitants of their capital being given 40 days during which to reform heir lifestyle.” In Psalms 83,9, we are told that eventually also the Kingdom of Ashur turned anti Israel, as when they conquered the territories of the northern kingdom of the ten tribes and exiled its inhabitants in 722 B. C and that is why the Babylonians not long afterwards conquered the Kingdom of Ashur that had been predominant in that region. Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish explains that the error made by the people of Ashur was that they thought the family of Put (verse 7) had become extinct, until we find in the Book of Ezekiel 30,5 that “both Put, Lud, and a mixed multitude of non pure ancestry,” is mentioned by the prophet as among the nations falling victim to conquerors together with the Egyptians whom they had supported. The reason that these details have not been spelled out in the Torah is that if you enumerate all these tribes we would think that there had been more than the 70 nations of which the Torah speaks after the fall of the Tower.

וכנען ילד את צידון, “Canaan sired Tzidon;” Canaan sired a total of 11 sons. After having listed all their names, the Torah continues with describing how they dispersed over different regions, and that one of them split into two nations, thus making a total of 12 Canaanite tribes. This is comparable in Jewish history to the tribe of Joseph being made up of Menashe and Ephrayim, who on most occasions appear independently whenever the tribe of Levi is not included in the count of the Jewish tribes. Moses refers only to seven Canaanite tribes; the six which were historically significant he names separately, attributing their genealogy to their founding father Canaan. The reason why they deserved this honorable mention is that when the brotherstook their father Yaakov to be buried in the cave of Machpelah, these Canaanite kings all paid honour to Yaakov the descendant of Avraham. (Genesis 50,11)

ויהי גבול הכנעני וגו, “and the boundaries of the territory ruled over by the Canaanite were, etc.” The details by the Torah provided here are exceptional, and are listed only because in the future the Israelites would inherit the lands owned by the Canaanites.

ולשם יולד וגו, “and for Shem were born, etc.” In these verses (221) the three sons are listed in the order of their ages. As to the reference to Yephet as the הגדול, “the big one,” this adjective was used here to ensure that we realise that he was the oldest. If his other brothers were sometimes mentioned ahead of Yephet, this was only in order to underline an important act performed by the one concerned.

פלג, כי בימיו נפלגה הארץ, “Peleg,” so called as during his lifetime the population of the earth was split up. According to Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel, Bereshit Rabbah 37,7, states that former generations who had been endowed with holy spirit were able to name their children in a manner that reflected important acts that they would perform in the future, whereas we who have not been enabled to “make use of holy spirit” and who did not know i.e. we did not witness the deeds which made our forefathers famous, (as the lifespan had been so drastically curtailed) must name our children after our ancestors in order to keep alive at least some knowledge of their importance during their lifetime. [This is how this editor understands the commentary by maharzu on this passage of the Midrash. Ed.]

נפלגה הארץ, literally: “the earth was divided;” a reference to people’s lifespans having been halved. Careful analysis of the text will show that up until the birth of Peleg, people appear to have lived for 400 years, whereas starting with him they did not live to be much more than 200 year old.

אלה משפחות בני נח, “these are the families of Noach’s sons;” in this paragraph we find 70 descendants; 14 descendants of Yephet; 30 of Cham, and 26 of Shem. These are the founding fathers of the famous “70 nations” of the earth. All the nations that stem from them bear the names of these founding fathers. For instance: We read already in Genesis 4,17 when the first city was built by Kayin for his son, that he named the city after his son. Compare Psalms: 49,12 בשמותם עלי אדמות, “after the names of those who had been famous on earth.”