(Lat. dispersio), the act of scattering, the state of being scattered.
In Optics, it denotes the divergency of the rays of light, or rather the separation of the different coloured rays in refraction. The point of dispersion is the point from which the refracted rays begin to diverge. See Optics.
Dispersion of Mankind, in the history of the world, was occasioned by the confusion of tongues, and took place in consequence of the overthrow of Babel at the birth of Peleg (whence he derived his name); and by the account given of his ancestors (Gen. chap. xi. 10-16), this appears to have happened in the 101st year after the Flood, according to the Hebrew chronology, and by the Samaritan computation in the 401st. However, various difficulties have been suggested by the older chronologists concerning the true era of this event. Sir John Marsham and others, in order to reconcile the Hebrew and Egyptian chronologies, maintain a dispersion of mankind before the birth of Peleg; whilst others, unable to find numbers sufficient for the plantation of colonies in the space of 101 years, according to the Hebrew computation, fix the dispersion towards the end of Peleg's life, thus following the computation of the Jews. Petavius assigns the 153d year after the Flood; Cumberland the 180th; and Usher, though he generally refers it to the time of Peleg's birth, in one place assigns the 131st after the Flood for this event. Mr Shuckford supposes the dispersion to have been gradual, and to have commenced with the separation of some companies at the birth of Peleg, and to have been completed thirty-one According to the calculation of Petavius, the number of inhabitants on the earth at the birth of Peleg amounted to 32,768; but Cumberland makes them 30,000; Mede estimates them at only 7000 men, besides women and children; and Whiston, who supposes that mankind now double themselves in about 400 years, and that they doubled themselves between the deluge and the time of David in sixty years at a medium, when their lives were six or seven times as long as they have been since, by his computation produces about 2389; a number much too inconsiderable for the purposes of separating and forming distinct nations. This difficulty induced Whiston to reject the Hebrew and to adopt the Samaritan chronology, as many others have done; which, by allowing an interval of 401 years between the Flood and the birth of Peleg, furnishes, by the last-mentioned mode of computation, more than 240,000 persons.
The hypothesis of Dr Bryant on this subject is characterized by his usual acuteness and learning. He recognizes two distinct dispersions,—the one universal, regulated and progressive; the other local, sudden, turbulent, and attended with marks of the Divine displeasure. He maintains that the dispersion, as well as the confusion of tongues, was local, and limited to the inhabitants of the province of Babel; that the separation and distribution recorded to have taken place in the days of Peleg (Gen. x. 25, 31, 32), which was the result of Divine appointment, occasioned a general migration; and that all the families amongst the sons of men were concerned in it. The house of Shem, from which the Messiah was to spring, was particularly regarded in this distribution. The portion of his children was near the place of separation; they in general had Asia to their share, as Japheth had Europe, and Ham the large continent of Africa. But the sons of Cush would not submit to the Divine dispensation. They went off under the guidance of Nimrod, and seem to have been for a long time in a roving state. However, at last they arrived at the plain of Shinar; and, having ejected Ashur and his sons, who were placed there by Divine appointment, seized his dominions, and there laid the foundation of a great monarchy. But afterwards fearing lest they should be divided and scattered abroad, they built the tower of Babel as a landmark to which they might repair, and probably to answer the purposes of an idolatrous temple, or high altar dedicated to the host of heaven, from which they were never long to be absent. They only, viz. the sons of Cush, or the Cushites, and their associates from other families, who had been guilty of rebellion against Divine authority, and of wicked ambition and tyranny, were punished with the judgment of confounded speech through a failure in habitual utterance, and by the dispersion recorded in Genesis; in consequence of which they were scattered abroad from this city and tower, without any certain place of destination. The Cushites invaded Egypt, or the land of Mizraim, in its infant state, seized the whole country, and held it for some ages in subjection; and they extended likewise to the Indus and Ganges, and still farther, to China and Japan. From them the province of Cushan or Goshen in Egypt derived its name.
The following enumeration of nations as constituted by the dispersion, is drawn up by Dr Pye Smith, availing himself of the labours of Bochart, J. D. Michaelis, the younger Rossmanuller, Gesenius, Robinson, and Baugarten.
I. Sons of Japheth, the Japetus of the Greeks.
1. Gomer. This name is traced in the Kinneret of Homer and Herodotus; the Gomares (Josephus, Antig. i. 6), whence Kelts, Gauls, Galatians; the Kymry; all the Celtic and Iberian tribes, Welsh, Gaelic, Irish, Breton; the Cimmerian Esparous, Crimea.
Sons of Gomer:—(1.) Ashkenaz. Aexni, inhabitants of the sea-side, near the Euxine Sea, where he had a country Askania and a river Askanian, and a large part of Armenia; the Basques in the north of Spain; the Saxons as the Jews import Ashkenas, in Jer. li. 27, to be Germany. (2.) Riphath. Khilhi, east of the Euxine; Toleata and other parts of Paphlagonia; Croats; the Riphathian mountains, a very obscure name in ancient geography (Strabo, Virgil, Pliny, Mela), referring probably to the great chains of mountains from the north of Asia westwards (Hyperboreans, Steph. Byzant.), and therefore including vague knowledge of the Uralian, Hartz, and Alpine regions. (3.) Togarmah. Peoples of Armenia and other parts of the Caucasian region. The Armenian traditions assign as their ancestor Halk, the son of Torgum and grandson of Noah.
2. Magog. In Ezekiel this seems to be used as the name of a confederation of nations, or of its chieftain. The Mongoles, Moguls; the great Tartar nation.
3. Madai. The Medes; people of Iran, to whom the Sanscrit language belonged; primeval inhabitants of Hindustan.
4. Javan. The Greeks, Asiatic and European. Iaones (Hom. Il. xiii. 685).
Sons of Javan:—(1.) Elisha. Greeks especially of the Peloponnesus; Hellas; Elis, in which is Allium (Il. ii. 617). (2.) Tarshish. The east coast of Spain, where the Phoenician Canaanites afterwards planted their colony. (3.) Kittim. Inhabitants of the isles and many of the coasts of the Mediterranean, particularly the Macedonians and the Romans, and those farther to the west. (4.) Dodoma (Rhom. i. Chaps. i.-7.) Dodona, a town from which probably named as the mouth of the Rhone, Rhodanus. This Javanian (Ionian) branch is attributed the peopling of the "isles of the nations" (ver. 5), a frequent Hebrew denomination of the western countries to which the Israelites, Tyrians, Egyptians, &c., had access by sea.
II. Sons of Ham. The word signifies heat or hot, alluding to the climates which the most of his posterity were to occupy: it was also an indigenous name of Egypt.
1. Cush. The Ethiopians, first on the Arabian side of the Red Sea, then colonizing the African side, and subsequently extending indefinitely to the west, so that Cushites (Jer. xiii. 23) became the appellation of a negro.
Sons of Cush:—(1.) Seba. Joined with Mizraim and Cush (Isa. xliii. 3), evidently denoting contiguity and affinity. This tribe or class is probably referred to Seba, a native name of Meroe upon the Nile, in the farthest south of Egypt, or the beginning of Ethiopia. (2.) Havilah. Of this word vestiges are found in various names of places in Western Arabia, and the adjacent parts of Africa. It is quite distinct from the Havilah (Gen. ii. 11) in or near Armenia, and probably from another (x. 29) in Arabia, unless we suppose a union of tribes, or one succeeded by the other. (3.) Sabota. Sabota or Sabatha is the name of an ancient trading town of Arabia. (4.) Raamah, Sept. Rhamps (Alex. Rhampsinitus), which changed into the name of a port which the Egyptian geographer Claudius Ptolemy places on the Arabian side of the Persian Gulf. To this place Dr Barrow refers (Kiel, 1843) refers the name—others take it to be Reamsa, a town of considerable importance in the south-western part of Arabia the Happy, whose inhabitants are remarkably black, mentioned along with Sheba in Ezek. xxvii. 22, as a place of rich Oriental traffic. Two sons of this Raamah are mentioned, Sheba and Dedan. We find these in the subsequent Scriptures distinguished for trade and opulence. They both lie in the western part of Arabia. The queen of Sheba came to the court of Solomon. Dedan is not improbably considered as the origin of Aden, that ancient seaport and island at the mouth of the Red Sea. (5.) Nimrod, who built, besides Babel, his metropolis, the cities of tower in the great plains of Shinar, called Babel, Accad, and Calneh. There were probably Aracca or Arecha on the Tigris (some think Edessa); Calna, near the confluence of the Lycus and the Tigris; and the third (Calno, Isa. x. 9) Chaloniota of the Greeks, afterwards called Ctesiphon; but much obscurity lies upon these conjectures.
2. Mizraim, literally the two Egypt, the upper and the lower; each was called Mior, a word even now vernacular in that country. Of his descendants seven are specified under several national names, some of which are well ascertained. (1.) Ludim. Ludites, celebrated as soldiers and archers, and in their positions connected with other peoples known to be Africans. The Ludim probably lay to the north of Cushites. The Amuzim may be confounded with the Lydians of Asia Minor (Gen. x. 22). (2.) Ananim. Very uncertain. Bochart supposes them to have been wandering tribes about the temple of Jupiter Ammon, where was an ancient people called Nasamonos. (3.) Lehabim. Perhaps inhabitants of a coast-district immediately west of Egypt. Probably the Labim. (4.) Pathrusim. The people of the Thebaid (Pathros) in Upper Egypt. (5.) Casluhim, out of whom came Philistines. A people on the north-east coast of Egypt, of whom the Philistines were a colony, probably combined with some of the Caphtorim. (6.) Caphtorim. Inhabitants of the island Cyprus.
3. Phut. This word occurs in two or three passages besides, always in connection with Africa. Josephus and Pliny mention an African river, Phutes. The great modern archaeologist and geogra- Dispersed pher, Ritter, says that hordes of peoples have been poured out of Puta, in the interior of Africa.
4. Canaan. His descendants came out of Arabia, planted colonies in Palestine, and gradually possessed themselves of the whole country.
His children or posterity:—(1.) Sidon, his first-born, founded the city of that name; (2.) Heth, the ancestor of the Hittites. The remaining sons are well known, and are here laid down in the simplest form of patronymic, or patrilineal adjective—the Jebusite, the Emorite (Amorite), the Girgashite, the Hivite, the Arkite, the Sinite, the Arvadite, the Zemarite, and the Hamathite. All are assigned to Palestine, and the boundaries of the country are precisely laid down.
III. Shem, though here introduced last, is declared to be the eldest of the three brothers. The reason of this order evidently is the design of the historian to pursue the line of the favoured people which the Divine Sovereign would raise up in the posterity of Shem, and in which, "in whom the blessing of the name should come," "all the families of the earth should be blessed."
Children of Shem:—1. Elam, the ancestor of the Elamites or Elymaeans, who possessed Elymais, a region between Susiana and Media, now called Khuzistan. The Japethian Persians afterwards entered that region and gained the ascendancy, and subsequently they were comprehended under the name of Elam.
2. Ashur, the ancestor of the Assyrians.
3. Arphaxad, a personal name in the Abrahamic line. The word, a remarkable compound, probably denotes Neighbouring to the Chaldeans, i.e., Chaldeans. The name appears in Arachnepatana, a province in Northern Assyria, the primitive seat of the Chaldean, and near which was situated its ancient capital Babylon.
Children of Arphaxad:—These are chiefly personal, and contribute to form the sacred pedigree which leads to the Messiah. In this line are mentioned two grandsons, Peleg, and Eber, from whom is derived the name Hebrew. Joktan is universally acknowledged to be the father of the numerous tribes of Arabia in Yemen, or Arabia the Happy. Of the founders of these tribes thirteen are specified. The first is evidently Modad, with the Arabic article; the second is Shaleph; and Ptolemy mentions a people of interior Arabia, the Salapei. Hatteosmutha is a fruitful district on the south coast, which still bears exactly the same name. This name signifies the End of the Gate, or Door of Death, on account of its inhospitability arising from the great abundance and mixture of powerful colours. Jerach signifies the moon; and on the west of this region is a gold-producing tract, in which are the Mountains of the Moon, which yet must be distinguished from a group in East Africa, very imperfectly known, and called also by Orientals the Backbone of the World. Hadrosa, the Adramites of Ptolemy and Pliny, on the south coast. Uzul, mentioned in Ezek. xxviii. 19, which should be translated "Vedan and Java" [perhaps Yemen] from Uzul." The ancient name of a principal city of Yemen, now San'a. Geal (Ebal in I Chron. xii. 22), unknown. Absolom, unknown; the meaning is, my father Absalom and Becher, it denotes the Hall of Theophrastus or the Mines of Seba, or a tribe or tribes in Arabia, as possibly intended. Sheba, probably indicating an invasion of this tribe upon the Cushite Sheba and Dedan. (Gen. x. 7, and xxv. 3.) From such mixtures much embarrassment often arises in ethnography. Sheba and Seba (x. 7), are often mentioned in the Old Testament as seats of great riches and traffic. Opah, undoubtedly referring to the seaport in South Arabia, so celebrated for its traffic in gold, jewellery, and fine woods. The same name was probably given to places in India and East Africa, to which the mercantile ships of this Arabian Opah resorted. A part of their south coast extends to Oman, and is in a lowland called Es-Safir, with the article, Harash; perhaps the Cushite settlement was invaded by this Joktanite tribe. Jobab, Ptolemy mentions a people, Jobarites, on the east coast of Arabia. The r may be a mistake, or a dialectic variety, for b. These thirteen tribes seem to have formed the confederacy of the independent and unconquerable Arabs, whose peninsular, desert, and mountainous country defended them from invasion: Ishmael and his descendants were united with them.
Our text concludes with describing a boundary line for the country of these tribes "from Mesha to Sephar." The former is probably the country Maishon or Meseene, at the north-west head of the Persian Gulf; and the latter, on the south-west coast of Arabia, where is found a Mount Saber.
4. Lud. From him the Lydians in Asia Minor derived their name.
5. Aram. From him the inhabitants of Syria, Chaldeans, and a considerable part of Mesopotamia.
Children or posterity of Aram:—(1.) Uz. In the northern part of Arabia, bordering upon Chaldea: the land of Job. (2.) Hul. The large flat district in the north of Palestine, through which lies the initial course of the Jordan, even now called the Land of Huleh, and in which is the Lake Huleh, anciently Merom, amply illustrated by Dr Robinson (Researches, iii. 339-357). Displayed (3.) Gether. East of Armenia; Carthara was a city on the Tigris. (4.) Mash. A mountainous region branching eastwards from Distantiper, the great Taurus ridge; the Masain mountains of the Greeks and Romans.