The Story Through the Bible Gen 11

The Tower of Babel

This is the last story of the primeval age. This story completes our first section of Genesis. After this we’ll have Abram/Abraham and follow his descendants. Chapter ten is a list of Noah’s offspring and how they spread out to be many nations. While we could look into some of that it’s not a story and so we aren’t focused on it in this particular study. As the end of a section we should expect to see things knit together in some sense so lets look out for things that follow along with our themes and keywords.

Gen 11 verses 1-9 tells us the story of the tower of Babel. It’s quick so we’ll read it all right away.

Genesis 11:1–9 ESV

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.

Genesis 1–11:26 (2. Tower of Babel (11:1–9))

A “the whole world had one language” (v. 1)

B “there” (v. 2)

C “each other” (v. 3)

D “Come, let’s make bricks” (v. 3)

E “Come, let us build ourselves” (v. 4)

F “a city, with a tower” (v. 4)

G “the LORD came down …” (v. 5)

F′ “the city and the tower” (v. 5)

E′ “that the men were building” (v. 5)

D′ “Come, let us … confuse” (v. 7)

C′ “each other” (v. 7)

B′ “from there” (v. 8)

A′ “the language of the whole world” (v. 9)

We talked about chiastic structure before but we’re going to mention it again because we haven’t diagrammed it with our now larger group. We’ll leave this up and maybe it’ll be helpful seeing the focus of this story or maybe it won’t.

We’ll take some time on sections here. Gen 11:1-2

Genesis 11:1–2 ESV

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.

We start with a unified world in language and where they’re living. We are going to add another theme word to start looking for in stories. Traveling eastward - Lot travels east, (gen 13:10-12) Abraham’s concubine offspring are sent away east (Gen 25:6) - Jacob flees to the east (Gen 29.1) and we might find others as we continue so what happens with the eastward traveler ? trouble.

Eastward is also however where the Garden was that God planted in Eden. (Gen 2:8) So we might be able to say this is Man’s way of setting up his own garden - not a great plan.

Genesis 11:3–4 ESV

And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”

Now they have plans and building materials. What’s their purpose for doing this?

What did God call for them to do?

Genesis 1:28 ESV

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

Genesis 9:1 ESV

And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

They were supposed to fill the earth not concentrate the whole world together.

What did they think they would accomplish with this building project? - What did Eve think she would accomplish by eating the fruit? We’re not explicit here so we have to take the context of all they understand- which is not textually clear to us at this point but further on we see God speaking from heaven Gen 19:24; 21:17; 22:11, 15; Deut 26:15 So being in heaven is tied to some of what it means to be God in a sense. All of which the first readers in Moses’ generation would be well acquainted with this idea. There is another clue we have - the Akkadian name for the city of Babel is Gate of Heaven. This picture is reflected in how Jacob sees Bethel in his vision with the ladder. Gen 28:12, 17 Where he calls the “house of God” Bethel the gateway to heaven.

They’re seeking a “name” for themselves which means power/importance and to not be scattered which means they won’t fill the earth.

However we see this focal point here in vs 5 where everything starting going the other way around

Genesis 11:5 ESV

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built.

Even here God Comes down - because he is “UP”

Then we start working backward from the things man tries to accomplish for his own power and in his attempt to become like God - in the way the serpent decieved Eve “become”

Genesis 11:6–7 ESV

And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.”

What happened last time when humanity was unbounded and accomplished everything they wanted? - utter evil and the destruction of a flood to resolve it -

LET US - This language is also used if i was just talking about Genesis and said finish the phrase and I only started with “Let us...” what would you say?

Genesis 1:26 LSB

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, so that they will have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Genesis 11:9 LSB

Therefore its name was called Babel, because there Yahweh confused the language of the whole earth; and from there Yahweh scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

Babylon which started in Babel existed for long after the scattering but here we see the true story.