It is argued that this younger son cannot be Canaan, as he was not the son, but the grandson of Noah, and therefore it must be Ham.  We answer, whoever that “younger son” was, or whatever he did, Canaan alone was named in the curse.  Besides, the Hebrew word Ben, signifies son, grandson, great-grandson, or any one of the posterity of an individual.  Gen. xxix. 5, “And he said unto them, Know ye Laban, the SON of Nahor?” Yet Laban was the grandson of Nahor.  Gen. xxiv. 15, 29.  In 2 Sam. xix. 24, it is said, “Mephibosheth, the SON of Saul, came down to meet the king.”  But Mephibosheth was the son of Jonathan, and the grandson of Saul. 2 Sam. ix. 6.  So Ruth iv. 17. “There is a SON born to Naomi.”  This was the son of Ruth, the daughter-in-law of Naomi.  Ruth iv. 13, 15.  So 2 Sam. xxi. 6. “Let seven men of his (Saul’s) SONS be delivered unto us,” &c.  Seven of Saul’s grandsons were delivered up. 2 Sam. xxi. 8, 9.  So Gen. xxi. 28, “And hast not suffered me to kiss my SONS and my daughters;” and in the 55th verse, “And early in the morning Laban rose up and kissed his SONS,” &c.  These were his grandsons.  So 2 Kings ix. 20, “The driving of Jehu, the SON of Nimshi.”  So 1 Kings xix. 16.  But Jehu was the grandson of Nimshi. 2 Kings ix. 2, 14.  Who will forbid the inspired writer to use the same word when speaking of Noah’s grandson?

Further, if Ham were meant what propriety in calling him the younger son?  The order in which Noah’s sons are always mentioned, makes Ham the second, and not the younger son.  If it be said that Bible usage is variable, and that the order of birth is not always preserved in enumerations; the reply is, that, enumeration in the order of birth, is the rule, in any other order the exception.  Besides, if the younger member of a family, takes precedence of older ones in the family record, it is a mark of pre-eminence, either in original endowments, or providential instrumentality.  Abraham, though sixty years younger than his eldest brother, and probably the youngest of Terah’s sons, stands first in the family genealogy.  Nothing in Ham’s history warrants the idea of his pre-eminence; besides, the Hebrew word Hakkaton, rendered younger, means the little, small.  The same word is used in Isaiah xl. 22.  “A LITTLE ONE shall become a thousand.”  Also in Isaiah xxii. 24. “All vessels of SMALL quantity.”  So Psalms cxv. 13. “He will bless them that fear the Lord, both SMALL and great.”  Also Exodus xviii. 22. “But every SMALL matter they shall judge.”  It would be a perfectly literal rendering of Gen. ix. 24, if it were translated thus, “when Noah knew what his little son[A], or grandson (Beno hakkaton) had done unto him, he said, cursed be Canaan,” &c.