Tracing African Roots From Genesis Through Egypt

The version of the Bible most of us grew up with had a quiet message baked into the pictures, the movies, and even the way history got taught: Black people were missing from the sacred story. That claim doesn’t hold up when you read with a map open and the text taken seriously, so we invited Dr. Antonio Black, pastor of Green Hill Baptist Church, to walk with us through what scripture actually says about Black presence in the Bible. 

We start with the foundation, Genesis and the family of Noah, then follow the lineage tied to African nations and the names that keep showing up across the Old Testament: Cush, Mizraim, Put, Canaan. From there we connect the dots through biblical geography, intermarriage, and the ancient world surrounding Egypt and North Africa. We also dig into major figures people think they already know: Moses and Zipporah, Joseph’s life in Egypt, Judah’s Canaanite marriage, and what those details imply about the look of the people at the center of biblical history. 

Then we bring it home. We talk honestly about why so many young Black minds feel pushed away from Christianity, especially when the Bible was weaponized to defend slavery and dehumanization. We explore what changes when representation is truthful, when teaching tools match history, and when we rebuild connection through study, research, and better visuals, including graphic novels and modern technology. 

If you care about Black history, biblical scholarship, Christian faith, and reclaiming identity through truth, press play, then share this with someone who’s ready to read deeper. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us what passage you want us to unpack next.

Transcript

Welcome And The Central Question

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Hello, everyone. Welcome to Native Drums. I'm Jocelia Williams, your host for today. And here I have with me this evening a son of the Grove. That's right, Dr. Antonio Black. Hello, Dr. Black. Hello, hello. How are you? All is well. Good to be here. Oh, it's great to have you here. Welcome home. Absolutely. Absolutely. Oh, yes. And so uh Antonio is the pastor of Green Hill Baptist Church, and he has a passion for um history, research, and we're going to be talking about the about black presence in the Bible. Um, Antonio has done a couple of segments for me on the radio, uh, and which I will be um utilizing during this Black History Month. And as as not only Black History Month, I'm going to begin to uh tug on him a little bit. Let's get some more going so maybe we'll be able to develop a uh a segment and get a sponsor for that. And that would be uh to help us to um understand our role um in in the days of um Jesus Christ and and biblical days, of the days of the Old Testament and the New. So um tell me, how did you begin to um get involved or get interested? What piqued your interest when it comes to this subject matter?

Miseducation And A Search For Truth

SPEAKER_03 1:36

It's been quite a journey actually over several years, you know, of growing interest, of questions. Um, as with most, you know, of your listening audience, you know, being educated in, you know, America's public school systems. Um it's kind of like Carter G. Woodson says, it's just a miseducation of who we are. And uh when you go through your life learning a different narrative of who they say you are, um, believe it or not, a lot of those things they stick. They stick to you. And it gets in your conscience, and you find yourself making decisions. Even though we live in black skin, we find ourselves thinking like our oppressors about us. And so some things just really, you know, the math wasn't mathing, you know. The more I studied the Bible, the more I read. You know, just some things just wasn't mathing. And so just a series of questions and experiences just got me on the path to, you know, to really find out, you know, what does the Bible say about our people? Who are we? You know, um, what is God's plan for us? It can't just be this. Yeah. So that's kind of it's been a journey.

Genesis And The Line Of Ham

SPEAKER_00 2:48

Uh um, you know, if you go on YouTube now, you'll see all these different, you know, um uh videos about um blackness and uh and the Bible and um in biblical days. And so uh just to know that we have you who we can touch you right here, and you can just educate us and um because definitely we need to be educated about who we are as a people. So, because you can open the Bible and look, you can see, you know, and and if you uh look at the maps, you study the maps, uh then you it's plain, you know, open book. So let's talk about um some of the um some of the uh people who are who we can consider, who we who are not can consider, um uh the blackness that represent the black presence in the Bible.

SPEAKER_03 3:56

Um there's uh a few angles you can come from. Um I like to start in the book of Genesis, of course, uh in the beginning. Um, you know, the Noah story, the story of the flood.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Right.

SPEAKER_03 4:08

Um after you know, God hit the reset button. Um it was Noah and his family that had the responsibility of repopulating the earth. Um, according to that biblical narrative, Noah and Mrs. Noah had three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth. And so it would have been that family that would have repopulated the earth with humans. And so if we look at it from that perspective, then all of us are related. Right. Uh but here's the thing, and most Bible scholars, they agree that out of those three sons, Ham is the father or the progenitor of, you know, the black or African peoples. Um so let's let's let's take that. You know, Ham is the father of African nations, uh, you know, your black nations, uh, Ham and excuse me, J Feth and Shem, you know, Sham, of course, uh what they call Mid Eastern, J Feth, European nations. Uh, but they have the same DNA, the exact same DNA from the same father, and we assume from the same mother. So, with that, how can they be three different races if they're three brothers with the same father, same mother? Um, so that that's one thing. But then in Genesis uh, is it chapter nine uh and ten tell us that um, you know, the descendants that let's use Ham since we're talking about black people, the descendants of Ham, you know, are put or foot, P-H-U-T is sometimes rendered Mizraim, which is the nation of Egypt. Um you got uh Put, who is Sudan, I believe, and then you know, Libya, those descendants are belong belong to Ham, African nations. Um but when you go through the Bible and you see how these nations intermarried with one another. So you would have had the descendants of Ham, who would be presumably black, and so his descendants of Marion, descendants of Japheth, descendants of Shem, and so blackness is in there from the beginning. From the beginning. And actually, if you look at the way we uh or they do uh uh you know DNA testing and all of that, um, you know, sometimes it's those black genes that's that's kind of more dominant when it comes to skin color. And so how would they have looked in those days during those times? They would look like darker people. Um and so even from the beginning, we see a huge population of of blackness in the scriptures. Um I want to go to this a little bit further. Um, if you know, because it's like I said, it's it's just so so much um, so many angles we can come from in dealing with it. Okay, so again, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Ham, Cush, Mizraam, Put, and Canaan. Um now, when you go through the Bible, you often see this word Cush. Right. And so when you see any Cush or son of Cush, or sometimes it's mentioned as Kish, like um uh uh King Saul, the first king of Israel, right? He was a son of Kish, which would have mean Cush. So the first king of Israel. I gotcha. Black guy. So um, and then we look at these things, and of course, Mizraim, if Mizraim is the ancient word for Egypt, then Egypt, the son of Ham, and of course, we know Egypt is on the African continent. Yeah. They try to say other things, but it's on the African continent.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

Yes, it is.

SPEAKER_03 8:02

This is a black nation. Egypt is a black nation. And Canaan. Now, how many pages can you go through in the Bible without running into a Canaanite?

SPEAKER_00 8:11

Right.

SPEAKER_03 8:12

You know, so when you put those things together and these people's descendants, the sons of Ham's descendants, blackness is all over the scriptures. In large numbers. We're not just talking about a few characters, we're talking about it and a lot of times I like to lean on uh a more liberal side because, again, we were taught that you know our people were nothing, and and you know, they use our blackness as meaning deficient or even demonic. And so I like to err on the side of you know, in order to try to self-correct this thing, I like to err and say pretty much everybody in the scripture is dark-skinned.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:56

You know, and so I know that may be challenged, you know, but but again, we've been taught the other side of the narrative so long.

SPEAKER_00 9:02

Yeah, because you look at the locations, like I said, you look at the maps.

SPEAKER_03 9:06

Yes, yes, you can't leave that out. I mean, uh, most of the Bible events happen on or very near on that North African continent in that region. So, yes, uh, blackness is all over the scripture.

Cush, Canaan, And Biblical Geography

SPEAKER_00 9:18

Now, um, can we look at Moses and his wife? What's it Zipporah? Zipporah.

SPEAKER_03 9:27

Yeah, let's um Zaporah. We'll start with Zipporah. Okay. Uh, because we know the story, uh, one of the stories that immediately jumps to mind is when uh Moses' sister, uh Miriam and Aaron, you know, kind of, you know, had they had beef. They had something to say about you know his wife. And basically God, you know, came down on her real hard. Yes, he did. And uh she was a daughter of Midian. She was a Midianite, which of course Midianites again come from that Canaanite people, which comes from Ham. Right. Dark skinned black people. Um, Jethro the Midianite, which would be her father. Right. Um, black guy. You know, um, so yes, uh, they had two sons. So let's just assume, we're gonna get to Moses. Let's assume Moses was light-skinned. You know, I'm not gonna use Malcolm X term. But let's just assume he was, you know, light-skinned. He marries a Midianite, uh, a black woman, they have two sons. Under America's one-drop rule, one drop of African blood makes you African makes you black. Yes, yes. So they would have had two black sons. Remember when God got so upset with those children of Israel, and he tells Moses, I'm gonna destroy all of them, and I'm gonna raise up a nation from you and your sons. Now, if God would have done that, there would be no question at all of what color the nation of Israel would have been. Right. It would be black. It would have been black. Um, Moses, uh, you know, he's interesting. Of course, born a Hebrew, um, but by divine, you know, you know, sovereign who's a God, grew up in Egypt. Um, and Egypt is an African nation. It's a black nation. Um, in Acts chapter 7, it says this that Moses was learned in all the ways of Egypt. That this was not just some, you know, he was educated, he was smart. He was educated in law, he was educated in government, he was educated in the arts and scientists he was educated in the crafts, you know, and the mystic arts and all of that. So he knew Egypt. And it's a Egypt is an African nation. These are black people that he grew up around. He was educated by black people. Right. Um, what better nation to incubate the nation that God wanted to create than the nation who was at that time the greatest civilization on earth? Yeah. It was Egypt. So, what great, what better place to kind of incubate all that Israel would become? And God made sure that the leader to lead this new nation was a person who knew all the ways of Egypt, who knew how to govern, who knew how to set laws. Um, something interesting about that, Moses is called a lawgiver. Yes. But that's the that was a term or title that Egypt gave Pharaoh, lawgiver. So, I mean, we could press that and say, you know, was Moses being trained to be the next Pharaoh? We could, you know, we could push that. I would. Right. Um, but Moses is interesting. He grew up within the, even if he wasn't, you know, black or dark-skinned, I believe he was, of course. But he grew up around blackness. And he was educated from that culture, and God used that. He used those skills, um, being educated around black people to help lead this new nation of Israel.

Moses, Zipporah, And Egypt’s Influence

SPEAKER_00 13:08

Mm-hmm. Awesome, awesome. So, what are some, um, who are some other characters that you would um educate us on?

SPEAKER_03 13:17

Um, I like talking about Joseph. He's an interesting character. Um, especially his uh, well, you know, all that Joseph went through. Yeah, yeah. Okay, let's assume again, let's just say that maybe he's light-skinned. Uh, but what kind of, you know, starts giving us a glimpse of how he must have looked is when the Bible says that when he gets to Egypt and when his brothers, you know, come to Egypt, they didn't recognize him.

SPEAKER_02 13:47

They didn't. He just blended in with the people.

SPEAKER_03 13:50

And I think it's more than just how he was dressed. I think it was he looked like Egyptians. He had a tan. He had a tan. Another interesting thing that that gives us a glimpse of how the ancient Israelites look is when Jacob died. Remember, um, after everything was revealed and Joseph, you know, telling to bring his father to him and all that. Right. Um, when Jacob dies, the funeral or funeral possession was so huge, and the Bible is clear to point out that during that, what we would call a funeral procession in honor of Jacob, that the people couldn't tell who were the Egyptians and who were the Canaanites. Oh, wow. Why did it, why did it say state that? Because the people looked alike. So, you know, um, there's a lot the Bible says about how these people look, and when you really get into it, they look like us. They don't look like the storybooks that we and the Sunday school books they gave us growing up, um, and what the movie characters try to portray. It's very different. Uh, we really look at, like you said, the maps and the arch uh archaeology um and all of that. It's just it's a different narrative that they give. But but back to Joseph, um when he interprets the Black Pharaoh's dream, one of the rewards was that he was given the wife of one of the Egyptian priests. Clear to say Egyptian priests, African priests, black, he was given a black woman. Now let's assume, let's just assume that Joseph was light-skinned. He marries a black African woman. They have two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. Uh-huh. Now we know they end up being tribal heads of the 12 nations of Israel. So at this point, at least two of the 12 tribes are headed by black guys, little black boys. And the story goes on and on. You know, um, you know, as I've, and I'm still going through this is this information that we're still learning. Right. I'm pretty much convinced, again, that most of the people in the scriptures um happen to be dark-skinned. Um, and we can go through through other characters. Um, let's take Judah, because a lot of times this, you know, um, that's the main one. What about Judah?

SPEAKER_00 16:16

Because that's the tribe that's the Jesus comes from.

Joseph, Judah, And Israel’s Family Tree

SPEAKER_03 16:22

Okay, again. Let's assume that Judah, the son of Jacob, fourth son of Jacob, let's assume he was light-skinned. Let's assume he had the complexion of former vice president Mike Pence. He's a very, you know, black-skinned guy. Let's just assume he had that. I don't, I think he was dark, but let's just assume. The Bible is clear to mention in the book of Genesis that he marries a Canaanite woman. Canaanite, Canaan, son of Ham. Yes, black. Clearly, his first wife was a Canaanite, was a black person. And of course, they have a whole lot of children. And what we call these children, tribe of Judah. So, what do you do with this? You know, what do you do with all this? And again, employing the one-drop rule that America did, then these people would have been black. In our time, under our laws, they would have been considered black. So, again, you got so many um characters, um, you know, that uh that gives a different narrative than what many of us were taught. And I think it's important for us to know this because uh during the time when you got so many young black minds that are being led astray, they are, you know, they have no interest in church and they can't embrace Christianity largely because they they can't reconcile how Christianity was used, you know, to endorse slavery and all the negative things that came with it. Yes. And uh, you know, they say things like, well, you know, Christianity is a white man's religion and the Bible is a black, is a white man's book. And it's because they haven't been taught this side of it. They haven't gone deep enough, you know, to see the truth.

SPEAKER_00 18:14

Right.

SPEAKER_03 18:14

And that's why I believe it's important that we keep saying these things over and over, not just um, you know, on black history, like you've mentioned, because, you know, for me at this point, it's not just a cute little lesson. It's a premise which we have to learn that when we talk about these Bible characters, we're talking about people that look like us. Right. We have to know that, understand it, and in these days and time, make sure that we say that when we're preaching about these characters or teaching about these biblical characters, mention how they would have looked.

SPEAKER_00 18:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 18:49

And I think it would give our people another kind of connection, a deeper connection to the scriptures and ultimately to the God of the scriptures.

SPEAKER_00 18:56

Yeah, yeah. And um as you mentioned with young people not knowing and how they somewhat rebel, uh maybe, and I'm planting this seed, you know, um these young people love graphic novels now. Yes. They love graphic novels. And maybe through a graphic novel, yeah, the lesson can be taught about the presence of blackness in the Bible.

SPEAKER_03 19:28

Yes. Um, I have a nephew that draws, and um that's one of the things that um I mentioned to him that I wanted to work on with him.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:35

And um, I mean, thank God that there are, you know, some companies that's coming and flourishing with this new AI technology that are able to render, you know, uh uh, you know, different kinds of you know, portrait and images.

SPEAKER_00 19:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:49

But yes, we need that. We need to catch up because again, um most of us were educated that there are no, you know, har or hardly any people of color in the scriptures. And so we really need to, you know, undo that miseducation.

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:04

Um and you know, get that dignity back to our people.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

Because I'm telling you, when I was growing up, uh well, you know, my mom used to buy me these children's Bibles and kids' Bibles and ever. And definitely, if there was even a comic book Bible, you know, have the comic book, and the characters were light-skinned. Yeah, yeah. You know, um, so uh and it's time to make a change. It really is. To bring out truth.

Why Representation Shapes Black Faith

SPEAKER_03 20:31

Absolutely. And one reason why is it's it's again, it's I believe it's so necessary um, you know, for our people, because even now with what we're dealing with in the nation, um, you know, the recent, you know, uh video of you know, depicting President or former President Barack Obama, his wife as apes. Right, right. Um, it's in the fabric of this nation, and it's in the fabric of pretty much all the Western civilization, that, you know, black people are they're not real fully human. They're subhuman, uh, they're almost animals, you know, they have no souls, and so we can treat them, you know, any kind of way. And it when a nation is built with that ingrained in them, and it's been passed on. Um That's sad. There's just so much work, you know, for us to do. For instance, um it's amazing. Even let me use my own journey. I haven't been to the motherland. I I really want to go, I am going. However, I know whenever, you know, like Africa is mentioned, or Ignacious in Africa, it's always presented or has been presented that the people over there are just poor, they're you know the places are run down, they're uncivilized, they're barbaric. You know, the people that they would show would be naked with pot bellies, dusty.

SPEAKER_02 21:59

Yeah, yeah. And it's nothing like that.

SPEAKER_03 22:02

No, it's not. And literally, it hasn't been. I'm going to give it 15 years. It hasn't been 15 years. Well, it's probably closer to 10. That even I began to look at Africa different because of all the images that they educated us on. That's right. We talked to our people. Where do you want to go? One of your places that you want to visit. We always say Europe, Paris, London. Nobody, we would never say Africa. Because of what they told us. And now every day I get shocked as to what Africa has to offer. You know, who they are, the riches of the people, the culture, the land.

SPEAKER_02 22:48

It's just amazing. You could go on Netflix and see what really. Imagine if we didn't have TikTok.

SPEAKER_03 22:56

Imagine if TikTok, now it's it's kind of owned by America a little bit now, but we still would be woefully uneducated. Yes, in the dark. In the dark, yes, absolutely.

Jerusalem’s Origins Before David

SPEAKER_00 23:10

This is so interesting and it's so good. It's so good. Is there any um other little tidbits, little nuggets you need to give us before we've we've got a great discussion going?

SPEAKER_03 23:21

It's it's it's so so much. Um actually, um here's one I like to use. Um the whole world pretty much stops when anything happens in Jerusalem. Right. I mean, that's just all where it stops because that's pretty much the capital city of the world. You know, multiple religions, especially the, you know, Abrahamic religions, right, you know, use Jerusalem as pretty much their, you know, their capital. Um but we learn that in the scriptures that uh the city of Jerusalem, before it was the city of Jerusalem, uh, was of course the city of Jeru or Jebud. Um and one of the Canaanites' descendants are the Jebusites. Right. So again, if you have Jebusites who are grandchildren of Canaanites, and Canaan is a son of Ham, then before it was Jerusalem, Jebu was a black city. I like to call it the first chocolate city, you know. That was, you know, so everybody's fighting over the Muslims, fight over Jerusalem, Christians fight over Jerusalem, the Jews fight over Jerusalem. And before it was, it was any of y'all's, it was, it belonged to black people. The Bible's clear to say, you know, that, you know, uh, when David, you know, conquered that place, they already had citizens. Right. People that's been there for centuries. And these people would have looked dark-skinned about it.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:02

Even there's some there's some footage that you can find on the internet, um, early 1900s, of citizens in Jerusalem. And guess how they look?

SPEAKER_00 25:14

Dark color.

SPEAKER_03 25:15

Yes. Yes, yes. Um, now this part will get, you know, um, maybe it's kind of good we don't have image. In 1967, 1969, Time Magazine did a president with the Prime Minister of Egypt at the time. Okay, whose name was Gamel Abdel Nasser. He was the Prime Minister of Egypt 1967, 69. Um, during an interview, the Time Magazine asked him a question about peace in the Middle East. And, you know, why it couldn't be peace.

SPEAKER_00 25:51

Right.

SPEAKER_03 25:51

And he said the reason why there can't be peace in the Middle East. And this is what the Prime Minister of Egypt said now. He said, because the Jews left here black and came back white. Now, Time magazine printed this now. Okay. So uh that says a lot. And one of the sad things is that we can't have a real discussion about it unless they call you anti-Semitic. So I won't get you in trouble. I just but I want to ask you this.

SPEAKER_00 26:37

Um last year, this article or came out about Russia and the the black history. You recall that? It was something about uh it was in a vault.

SPEAKER_03 26:56

Now, Russia does have a lot of I'm thinking about a portrait they had, and it it's probably on one of these slides. Of Jesus? Of David, actually. Of David? Uh of King David, an early portrait. This was in 1620.

SPEAKER_00 27:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 27:11

If if I'm not mistaken. And the portrait that they have, you know, has a you know dark skin depicting person that was King David. Okay. Um, you know, uh Black Madonna. You know, portraits of Black Madonna, of who that you know really is. Now it's amazing that the Catholic popes think that, you know, the mother of Jesus was a dark-skinned woman. And often they would pull it out and they would do obeisance and, you know, prayers to the image or whatever. Um, because they know. I mean, they they know, they have the history, they have the evidence. And so, again, there's there's a whole lot more black presence in the Bible than than many of us, you know, may have realized.

Evidence, Artifacts, And Final Challenge

SPEAKER_00 28:01

Right, right, right, right. Ah, this is great. This is great. Uh, you have to come on back with some more. I'll be happy to come back again with some more interesting uh information like this. This is um because you know, the more you dig and the more you look and look between the scriptures, you can it's there. It's there, you know, we read, but then a lot of times we read and we don't know what we're reading. Right. We just know that it's the word. And um we need to be able to dig a little deeper with intelligence. Yes. To know and be able to recognize um those different facts that are that are or that are hidden between the lines, you know, because uh you can read, like like sometimes you have to read uh you have to read the Bible more than once or read passages more than once in order to because you when you go back again, there'll be something that you didn't see the first time. Always. You know? So um this is great. This is great. Oh, thank you, Antonio, ever so much for this, for this time. Um, I'm sure that our um viewers have been um educated on the black presence in the Bible, and um so as um Dr. Black has explained all of the different um scenarios uh that are in the Bible, get your Bible and go back and read it. Go back and read it and and research. Right. And um get your map as well, you know, and then some of it, like you said, is um how do you say it, ancient present day and ancient names that are different. Right, right. Um so um that's why you need to be able to um know how to research it and to find out, you know, and you can Google anything. Yes. You can Google it at AI now will really give it to you. So um not uh so take what he has um given us today and um utilize it and study it. And um, like the word says, study to show thyself approved. Absolutely, yeah. Amen. Thank you again for coming. And we doors swing over for you to always come back. Yes. Come back home, son. All right, well, everyone, thank you ever so much for um sitting with us on today. And uh as Dr. Black talked about the black presence, black presence in the Bible, as I said earlier. Go on and um take what he has given us and um read it, educate yourself, dig a little deeper. You may find some other um scenarios in that Bible that um shows where we as a people are present and present in a mighty and strong way. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. So thanks again, and um continue to um come and spend time with us each Sunday evening, 6 o'clock for Native Drummonds. I'm Cecilia Williams, and uh see you next week.