Transcript

A San Diego bank hired a private investigator to track down a bank robber and retrieve stolen funds. The search led to Mexico. The investigator crossed the border and then, realizing he would need a Spanish interpreter, opened up the telephone book and hired the first interpreter listed in the Yellow Pages.

After many days, he finally captured the bandit and, through the interpreter, asked him, “Where did you hide the money?” In Spanish, the thief replied, “What money? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

With that, the investigator drew his pistol and said to the interpreter, “Tell him that if he doesn’t tell me where the money is, I will shoot him where he stands.”

Upon receiving this message, the bank robber said to the interpreter, “I have hidden the money in a coffee can, under the fourth floorboard, in the second-floor men’s room of the Palacio Hotel on Via Del Rio in La Paz.”

The investigator asked the interpreter, “What did he say?” “The interpreter thought for a moment and then he said, “Senor, he says he is prepared to die like a man!”

Speaking of languages and not understanding one another, the next major event of the Bible that we will look at is the Tower of Babel.

Genesis 11:1: “And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.”

After the flood, the descendants of Noah’s sons repopulated the earth. Chapter 10 then chronicles the development of their families.

Noah, as you remember, had three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japehth, and out of those sons came various sons and grandsons and then families, people groups, and nations.

As you read Genesis 10 and 11, you may wonder how the whole world could speak one language in Genesis 11 when Genesis 10 specifies that the whole earth was divided “after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations.”

The answer is that Moses flip-flopped the narrative. Chronologically, the Tower of Babel comes before the scattering of the nations in Genesis 10. But Moses, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, reversed the order.

When we come to the last verse of chapter 10 and we read, “These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations, in their nations: and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood” we are supposed to ask, “How did the world become divided and separated into nations and different languages?”

Genesis 11:1-9 answers that question. The Tower of Babel is the event that launched the scattering. In the flood, we find God’s judgment by destruction. At Babel, we find God’s judgment by dispersion.

We can time the event of the Tower of Babel by Genesis 10:25: “And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.”

The earth being divided here does not refer to the splitting apart of the continents but rather the dispersion of peoples at the Tower of Babel. There was a linguistic and geographic division of mankind at Babel.

Chapter 10, verse 5 teaches of this division: “By these were the isles of the Gentiles DIVIDED in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations.”

The name “Peleg” means division and he was named for the division of people at Babel.

Peleg was the great-great-great-grandson of Noah. Thus, the Tower of Babel took place five generations after the flood or about 100-150 years following it.

So, it isn’t a lot of time. And in 100-150 years, the population had once again turned away from God and sunk into rebellion and sin.

Also, from the explanation of the generations of Noah in chapter 10, we read this, “And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the LORD: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel…” (10:8-9).

This is important for understanding what takes place in chapter 11. Nimrod was Noah’s great-grandson through Ham. It seems clear that this powerful leader was the force behind the building of Babel.

Out of all the names in the record of chapter 10, he’s the only one of whom more is said in this genealogy. Nimrod was “a mighty one on the earth,” but not in a good way.

It is said that after Cush begat Nimrod, that Nimrod began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was trained by Cush from childhood to be a leader and a mighty one. The word “mighty” refers to a champion, someone who is superior in strength and courage.

And the name “Nimrod” means, “let us rebel” or “let us revolt.” This man was a mighty leader of men, who led the revolt against God at Babel.

Nimrod is described as “a mighty hunter before the Lord.” Again, this is not a compliment of Nimrod. What he did as a mighty hunter was an offense before the Lord. He was a man mighty in wickedness.

Nimrod was not a hunter of game and wild animals. Rather, he was a warrior who was a hunter of men. Through his ability to fight and kill, by ruthlessness, he brought many under his influence and leadership and rose to a position as a world leader.

He rose to power, not by political means, but by might and intimidation. He was a powerful, deadly tyrant who conquered men and established a kingdom. He is the first individual in Scripture to whom a kingdom was attributed, which began by building four cities: Babel, Erech, Accad, Calneh, in the land of Shinar.

His activities centered first in Shinar and included leading the building of the Tower of Babel, the first organized rebellion of humans against God.

Nimrod’s hunting and show of force was done in rebellion against God and in open and brazen arrogance “before the Lord.” What he did was significant before the face of the Lord and was done against Him. As the Anti-Christ will be in the future, Nimrod was just a tool of Satan, used by him to carry out Satan’s rage against God.

Verse one of chapter 11 highlights a condition of mankind which in and of itself is not wrong: the whole earth used the same language and the same words.

Since mankind had all recently come from a common ancestor, Noah and his three sons, all men still spoke a common language and had one vocabulary. But this sets the stage for how God would judge mankind at Babel.

Genesis 11:2-4: “And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.

“And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.”

The post-flood generations migrated from Ararat in modern-day Turkey. When verse 2 says that “they journeyed from the east,” this verse needs to be compared with Genesis 13:11: “Then Lot chose him all the plain of Jordan; and Lot JOURNEYED EAST…”

The Hebrew words translated as “journeyed east” are the exact same words translated as “they journeyed from the east.” Journeying east is how we are to understand Genesis 11:2.

When God drove Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden, He sent them east and placed Cherubims “at the east of the garden of Eden” (3:24).

When Cain was removed from God’s presence after killing his brother, Abel, Genesis 4:16 says he went east of Eden. And Lot’s journey to the east brought him to Sodom and that wicked city. In Genesis, “east” represents a direction away from God.

And as the people journeyed east from Ararat to a plain in the land of Shinar, we see humanity moving away from God.

Abraham’s father, Terah, was the first to reverse the eastward direction in Scripture, when he set out to go west toward Canaan, which symbolized a drawing closer to God and blessing in the land that would be promised to Abraham and his seed.

Coming from the region of Ararat, the people journeyed east, and they “found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.” The land of Shinar is the region of ancient Babylon in Mesopotamia, part of modern-day Iraq.

Here the multiplied descendants from the ark found a well-watered plain near the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and they decided to settle down and dwell there.

However, as the people of this generation settled in the plain of Shinar, this was an act of disobedience. That’s exactly what God told them not to do. God had commanded that man spread out and fill the earth after the flood.

As Genesis 9:1 tells us, “And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish [or fill] the earth.”

Instead of dispersing over the earth, as God, intended, mankind congregated in one place. This was a rebellion against God’s clear command. They refused to scatter, and they defiantly decided to dwell together in one place.

Their goal was a self-sufficient society and civilization, integrated under a powerful leader, with no dependence on God. They were making a declaration of independence, not from another nation, but from God.

As they settled in the plain of Shinar, the people said, “let us make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.”

When man rebels against God, there is unity and agreement. You see man’s agreement on everything in this account. Everything is “Go to, let us,” and “Come, let us.” In this, you see their collective desire and one voice of agreement.

After deciding to settle in Shinar, their first decision together was to create a brick-making and asphalt industry.

The common way of construction of buildings and walls in that time was to use stone with clay mortar. However, the people decided to make something stronger and longer lasting.

Furnace-treated, baked, hardened, durable “bricks” were used instead of stone or even sun-dried bricks as the building material. And “slime”, or tar, or asphalt, was used for mortar instead of clay.

By these things, it shows they intended to build a permanent community with strong, stable, waterproof buildings.

As a side note, and something to think about, the waterproof nature and the strength of the tower from these bricks and asphalt, along with its height reaching into heaven, may have been done so in disbelief of God’s promise to never again flood the earth.

It may have been created to protect man against a future worldwide flood. Mankind has always doubted and disbelieved God’s Word.

The people again take counsel and make an official declaration, stating their three-fold goal for their civilization: “let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name.”

The threefold plan was a city, a tower, and a name. They wanted to create a carefully planned urban center, with each part designed for permanence and utility, strategically created for the optimum benefit of the whole city.

They said, “let us build US a city,” or build a city for OURSELVES. The city was about self and pride. Their purpose was to establish a city as a monument to their pride and for their reputation. It was not made for the glory or honor of God, but for “us.”

Secondly, as the chief part of their glorious city, they wanted to build “a tower.”

Henry Morris wrote this about the tower: “The great tower would dominate the city, both architecturally and culturally. It would serve as the focal point of the political and religious life of the population, and would be a symbol of their unity and strength.”

The tower was not to be built to actually attempt to reach the abode of God in heaven.

Rather they wanted it to be a high tower as a monument to their abilities. As that high tower stood high and prominent on that open plain, it would’ve enhanced their fame as it stood for years and decades to come.

The tower’s top reaching into heaven referring primarily to its great high can be verified by how Moses explained Israel’s perception of the cities and walls of Canaan:

“Whither shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart, saying, The people is greater and taller than we; the cities are great and walled UP TO HEAVEN…” (1:28).

It’s possible that the tower was also built for religious purposes, but the text doesn’t make that clear. Some see that the tower might have been a ziggurat, such as has been found in ancient cities of Mesopotamia.

A ziggurat was like a pyramid, but the successive levels were recessed, and you could walk and work your way to the top on steps. At the top, they often would have a temple or a place to worship and offer sacrifices to their false gods.

They were also seen as a stairway between the gods and earth, for the gods they worshiped to descend and come down to meet with men and then ascend back to the heavens.

But if the tower was built for religious reasons, I think Tony Evans put it well: “To build a city was to build a civilization. To build a tower was to build a religious order. Both would be man-centered, not God-centered, efforts. They were adopting a form of humanism.”

Humanism and glorying in man and his accomplishments and abilities in defiance of the true God, robbing God of His glory, are clearly taught in this account.

It’s also been said that “This passage is a ‘mirror of the modern world.’ It reveals to us what we might call the power game….The tower was meant to make a statement: ‘We’re the greatest city on earth. No one is like us. No one can touch us.’ How modern that sounds.

“We live in a world that exalts the superlative. Big, bigger, biggest. Fast, faster, fastest. Smart, smarter, smartest. Tall, taller, tallest. Rich, richer, richest.”

Those in Babel wanted their city and tower to be the greatest the world had ever seen. And by it, they wanted to make a famous “name” for themselves.

Their ambition was not to make for God a name by their city and tower, but only a name that promoted themselves. The real motive therefore was the desire for renown.

By the construction of the city with its great tower, this Babel generation was seeking to establish a testimony and a memorial to their supposed greatness, to make their reputation and fame great and widely known for years to come, in exclusion from God.

And they acknowledged that their purpose in making this city and high tower and to make a name for themselves was to go against God’s command: “lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.”

Their pride and rebellion against God, as well as their unbelief, were the strong, unifying, and binding influences that tied them together in this one location.

And the object of building the great tower was to establish a noted central point which would serve to maintain their unity and keep them all together as they gloried in their shared achievement.

These people could not conceive of blessing and security coming as a result of scattering and filling the earth, as God commanded. They felt most secure when they stayed together. So along with pride and rebellion bringing them together, it was unbelief and fear that led them to the plain of Shinar to build the city and the great tower.

They did not believe God’s Word, so they put their faith in bricks and asphalt.

Genesis 11:5-9: “And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

“Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.

“So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.”

The expression that “the Lord came down” doesn’t suggest that God was not always fully aware of what was going on, but just to portray God’s intervention, that He at that point came down with the intention to act and judge what was taking place.

Moses is further telling us that man’s thoughts and massive efforts, no matter how lofty and big, are so small to God. While the top of that tower, from the vantage point of earth, might have seemed to pierce the clouds because it was so great and so high, to the infinite, almighty God it was nothing, just a barely visible dot on the earth.

And so God had to come down. It was as though God had to stoop to view it. God had to descend to scrutinize this city and tower which seemed so great and glorious to man.

While verse 5 describes the “investigation,” as it were, of God, verse 6 informs us of God’s appraisal of the situation.

The Lord observed the city and the tower of Babel as it was being built. And the Lord, in His perfect wisdom, stated that the problem was in the unity of the people, “Behold the people is one,” a unity which was made possible by a common language, “and they have all one language.”

And they were so united that they would do all they desired and imagined to do, “now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.”

The completion of this city would in no way threaten God or His rule. The problem was what the completion of the city would do to mankind. This would only be the start. A self-willed, God-defying spirit of ambition had now budded in the imagination of man.

Left unchecked, a unified sinful humanity with a unified language would only make it easier for evil to proliferate and spread on the earth, and become much stronger and lead to even greater wickedness.

Thus, the construction of this man-centered city, tower, and civilization in arrogant revolt against God’s clear command to fill the earth, had to be dealt with.

God would not allow them to succeed in establishing a memorial city to their collective rejection of Him.

Thus, God said, “Go to, let us go down.” God uses what mankind had been saying as they joined together in rebellion against Him.

They arrogantly said, “Come let us, build up.” And then God, in the High Counsel and unity of the Godhead, said, “Come, let us, go down.”

“Let us,” of course, reminds us of the Trinity, that God is One God in three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The decision of the Godhead was to “confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” God’s wise decision was to confound or confuse man’s language. He prevented communication, and thereby thwarted their unity.

As all these descendants of Noah were building this city, baking bricks, mixing asphalt, putting the bricks in place, communicating and giving and taking orders for the construction, suddenly and surprisingly no one had a clue what each other was saying.

It wasn’t a hearing problem; it was a speech issue. All of a sudden, out of your mouth came words you’ve never said before in a way you’ve never spoken before.

There was an immediate cacophony of unintelligible speech all over the city. Everyone seemed to be talking nonsense. Loud, incoherent arguments erupt all over the city. All looked at each other with confusion as people tried to communicate.

This resulted in panic, and people running around trying to find someone, anyone who could understand their words and who talked like them. Anger, frustration, and fear spread among all the people.

The people became fragmented and divided. And they realized that they had to pull away from each other. They had to join into units of people with a common, understood language. There was nothing to do but separate into groups.

And then ultimately, they had to move away from the city, leaving it unfinished. They departed in all directions and those who spoke the same language clustered into areas and regions around the world.

The result was that “the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.” The Lord stopped the rebellion, shattered their unity, halted the building of the city, and scattered them all over the earth.

And they became “families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations” (10:31). The scattering that man had bonded together to prevent, now came to pass. What man would not do willingly; God forced them to do as a result of His judgment.

Like the flood, and the fall of man, Genesis reveals that where mankind disobeys God, the Lord judges sin.

And we need to remember that, like the flood was the judgment of God due to man’s failure in the dispensation of conscience, the Tower of Babel was the judgment of God due to man’s failure in the dispensation of human government.

This failure was due man’s desire to create a corrupt, godless, humanistic one world government in defiance to God.

Finally, we have a summary statement in verse 9: “Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.”

The name Babel is linked with a Hebrew word which means “to confuse.” Moses authored Genesis many, many years after these events.

And Genesis was written TO Israel. It is FOR us, and for our learning and instruction in righteousness, but it is written directly TO Israel.

And by the Holy Spirit, Moses recorded Genesis for the Jews to understand how all the nations, peoples, and languages around her came to be.

And Genesis was written to teach her that she was to be a witness nation of the true and living God to all these other nations that came to be because of the Tower of Babel.

We have here the only true, factual record of the origin of nations and the origin of languages that we find all around us in the world. By Genesis, we learn how the world came to be and why the world is the way it is with languages and nations.

Babel was the beginning of the many different languages which we have in the world today. Currently, there are around 7000 distinct languages in the world.

And the many nations and different languages of man came into existence by a single act of God at the Tower of Babel.