The Seventy Interpreters made no mention or signification of sleep: for thus they rendered this place: “And Noah, being made sober from the wine.” But the Latin, Hebrew, and Chaldaic reading have a manifest mention of the sleep by which, on account of drunkenness, Noah was seized. For to awake or be roused from wine plainly declares that a sleep born of drunkenness had preceded. And indeed drunkenness is wont to bring on a very deep sleep. For from three things sleep happens to man: from excessive labor and weariness of body, from much food, and from much drinking of wine — especially of wine very strong and (so to say) fuming. For by these things many and thick vapors (either created in the stomach from food and drink, or released from the body itself, which is attenuated and worn by immoderate labor) go up into the head, and there oppress and in a way bind the common sense — the origin of the exterior senses and the term and as it were a certain center of their actions: whereby there comes a cessation of the exterior senses from their functions, whence sleep arises. Therefore, for Noah to have awaked from wine is nothing other than to have slept off the wine, and, loosed at once from drunkenness and sleep, to have returned to the entire use of reason and the senses. And what wonder, the father of the family sleeping so deeply, that an enemy man sowed tares in his family?²

“When he had learned what his younger son had done to him.” Whence did Noah know what had been done about him, while he was lulled by sleep and drunkenness? According to the Interlinear Gloss, he knew it by the prophetic spirit and by revelation of God. But for knowing these things there was no need of divine revelation. The opinion of most, therefore, is that the deed of Cham was made known to Noah by the report of Sem and Iaphet. But when I consider the exceeding goodness and gentleness of mind of those brothers, I am scarcely brought to believe that they of their own accord narrated to their father the crime of their brother, fearing namely lest they should affect both their father with great grief and sorrow, and their brother with some huge evil. This, therefore, would be more credible: that Noah, awakening, when he had seen his nakedness uncovered of its own garment and covered with another's cloak, asked the cause of this thing from his sons, and that thus they were compelled to narrate what had happened. But who is he whom in this place he calls the “lesser son,” or as the Septuagint has, the “younger”? There are those who think that not Cham is signified, but his son Chanaan, the grandson of Noah. For it is the custom among almost all that grandfathers call not only their own children, but also those who are procreated from them, their sons: and Chanaan is called the “lesser son,” to distinguish him from Sem, Cham, and Iaphet, who were the greater and nearer sons of Noah.³

But the common opinion is that the “lesser son” is called Cham. But why is he called lesser, since he was greater in birth than Iaphet? where[ever]…⁴

…for wherever these three sons of Noah are named, Cham is always mentioned second. Ambrose interprets that he is called “younger” not in age but in sense and character. But Chrysostom writes that he was indeed greater than Iaphet, but on account of the crime committed against his father was postponed [placed after] all his brothers. The same happened to Esau in respect to Jacob, and to Ruben in respect to Judah. But that exposition seems to me simpler and plainer: that he is called “lesser” comparatively, that is, lesser than Sem. Although the Hebrews think the contrary: for they judge that Sem was the least of all, but was set before the other brothers on account of the excellence of his holiness, and on account of the dignity of the race which was drawn from him — I mean the Patriarchs, Kings, and Prophets, and the whole Hebrew people. Although, since simply and precisely he is called the “lesser son,” it seems it must be understood that he was lesser than the other brothers, and that “lesser” and “least” are here equivalent: especially since the Hebrews lack comparatives. But about the order of generation of Noah's sons, something has been said in the earlier books, and will be disputed in the next following book.⁵

St. Augustine, from the signification of the word Cham — which (as he himself interprets) signifies hot or fervid — shows that Cham was a figure of heretics, writing thus: “Cham, moreover, who is interpreted ‘hot,’ the middle son of Noah — as though distinguishing himself from both and remaining between both, neither in the firstfruits of the Israelites nor in the fullness of the Gentiles — what does he signify but the hot race of heretics, hot not with the spirit of wisdom but with the spirit of a versatile cunning, with which the hearts of heretics are wont to seethe and to disturb the peace of the Saints? But these things turn to the use of those who advance, according to that of the Apostle: There must be heresies, that they who are approved may be made manifest among you. For many things pertaining to the Catholic faith, while they are agitated by the crafty restlessness of heretics — that they may be defended against them — are both considered more diligently, and understood more clearly, and preached more insistently; and the question raised by the adversary becomes an occasion of learning.” So Augustine.⁶

But Berosus Annianus recounts in a few words the manifold and enormous wickedness of this Cham. “But Cham,” he says, “when he publicly corrupted the mortal race, bringing in and teaching by his own example that one must couple (as was done before the flood) with mothers, sisters, daughters, males, and brutes: and on account of this he was cast out by Janus (Noah), a most pious and most chaste man, and got the surname Esen Enua. Now Esen signifies among the Scythian Aramaeans ‘infamous and unchaste’; but Enua, ‘incubus and propagator.’ The pestilent dogmas of this Cham the Egyptians followed, and made him for themselves among the gods the younger Saturn, and built him a city called Chemmin, that is, the city of Cham: whose citizens to this age are called Chemenites. But the later Egyptians cast off those nefarious minglings, retaining what had been of the first custom, that marriages might be entered into between brothers and sisters.” So that Berosus.⁷