Historical race concepts Classical ideas with the notion that humanity as a whole was descended from Shem, Ham and Japheth, the three sons of Noah, producing distinct Semitic (Asiatic), Hamitic (African), and Japhetic (Indo-European) peoples. This theory dates back to the Babylonian "Talmud", which states, "the descendants of Ham are cursed by being black, and [it] depicts Ham as a sinful man and his progeny as degenerates." In the 9th century, Al-Jahiz, an Afro-Arab Islamic philosopher, attempted to explain the origins of different human skin colors, particularly black skin, which he believed to be the result of the environment. He cited a stony
Levi ben Japheth of which, covering the first ten chapters of Joshua, still exists (Brit. Mus. Or. No. 308). Steinschneider believes it possible that Levi was also the author of the short commentary on Psalms found in the British Museum (No. 336). According to Ali ben Sulaiman, Levi made a compendium of the lexicon "Agron" of David ben Abraham; however, this is contested by Abu al-Faraj, who asserts that the compendium was prepared by David himself. Levi ben Japheth Levi ben Japheth (Heb. Levi ben Yafet ha-Levi; Arab. Abu Sa'id Levi ibn Yafat was a Karaite Jewish scholar who flourished, probably at Jerusalem,