Shem
Biblical figure, son of Noah, ancestor of the Semites
Shem (; Hebrew: שֵׁם, romanized: Šēm; Arabic: سَام, romanized: Sām) is one of the sons of Noah in the Bible (Genesis 5–11 and 1 Chronicles 1:4).
The children of Shem are Elam, Ashur, Arpachshad (or Arphaxad), Lud and Aram, in addition to his unnamed daughters. Abraham, the patriarch of Jews, Christians, and Muslims, is one of the descendants of Arphaxad.
In Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions, Shem is regarded as the ancestor of various peoples of the Near East, including groups traditionally associated with Arabs, Elamites/Persians, Assyrians, and others.
In medieval and early modern European tradition he was considered to be the ancestor of the peoples of Asia, and he gives his name to the title "Semites" formerly given to West Asian peoples.
Islamic literature describes Shem as one of the believing sons of Noah. Some Islamic sources even identify Shem as a prophet in his own right and state that he was the next prophet after his father.
In the Bible
Genesis 10
Genesis 10:21 refers to relative ages of Shem and his brother Japheth, but with sufficient ambiguity to have yielded different English translations. The verse is translated in the King James Version as: "Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber, the brother of Japheth the elder, even to him were children born." However, the New American Standard Bible gives: "Also to Shem, the father of all the children of Eber, and the older brother of Japheth, children were born".
According to Genesis 10:22–31 (Jewish Publication Society translation of 1917):
22 The sons of Shem: Elam, and Asshur, and Arpachshad, and Lud, and Aram.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Shem” as biblical figure, son of Noah, ancestor of the Semites. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as biblical figure, son of Noah, ancestor of the Semites. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q200902. VIAF identifies the subject as 308279421. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1917.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Shem” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.