NOTES for Gen 11:4

As seen, for the "achievements" of their ancestors living before the deluge, the Sumerians of the biblical parable on the tower of Babel do not stay in peace. They were " the giants ", about whom the author of the biblical book speaks as " strong famous people of the antiquity" (in the English translation they are called "glorious", but the Jewish corresponding word means exactly "famous", which is "known", " people renowned"). And the inhabitants of the Sumerian valley mentioned in the parable (under which obviously means the Mesopotamian plain) want "also to make a name for themselves", "become famous" in order not to scatter abroad upon the face of the whole earth".

And begin "a great construction ", the first one, but certainly not the last in the history of the fallen humanity, which will end so ignominiously, as all the following ones (the irony of the parable, among others, still consists and of the fact that, when it was getting written, and this was according to the available data today, in Babylon in the years of captivity, there in Babylon, those who read it could see another tower like the one described in the parable. As seen, the builders were not guided simply by the desire to be famous; they wanted to build something which could unite them, which could become the symbol of the national unity and the power of the State.

It is not accidentally if the condition of a "great construction" had become particularly the unity of the inhabitants of that land: "one nation and one language" in the Akkadian word usage (and we have here in front of us, obviously, a copy of the akkadian) indicated the absolutism. And here, in order to strengthen the unity and therefore strengthen the power of the State, ambitious project is undertaken, which finally fails successfully.

Why is it so? Only or because a strong power, carrying out similar projects, always becomes repressive, violating all the laws given by God? Probably, and for that also. But, perhaps, and not just because of that.

In the existence of every nation, quite as in the life of every person, there is its meaning associated with the plan of God for this people or this person. But can one see and understand this plan, if the purpose becomes not Him, but greatness, power and celebrity? The answer is obvious. And a repressive power generated by the society, not seeking for meaning, is only a consequence. It is not surprising, that such a society and such a power are condemned. We can only ask God here to minimize the impact of the inevitable collapse.

The historical basis of the parable of the Tower of Babel is obvious: Semitic tribes, among whom were the ancestors of the Hebrews, then still living a nomadic life, first saw stepped pyramidal temples--ziggurats--in Mesopotamia, where they first came around the middle of the third millennium BC. Meanwhile, the builders of the ziggurats themselves perceived them as a ladder linking heaven and earth. It is no surprise that in the historical memory of recent nomads, gradually settling on the land in Mesopotamia and joining the civilization of the Sumerians--the builders of sacred towers--traditions arose about builders of ladders leading to heaven.

But on the basis of these traditions, the sacred writer creates his own parable, in which he places his own emphases. First of all, he draws readers' attention to the fact that the builders of the tower want to become famous, "people of name," so that they will not be scattered over the earth. The same kind of "men with a name" as the pre-flood "giants." And in order to carry out the grandiose project, they create a strong state, so that all the builders became "one people" with "one language" (these Hebrew expressions are calques from Akkadian, the language of ancient Babylon, in which they denoted unity of power over a certain territory and over certain peoples).

Indeed, how else could fallen humanity assert itself on earth except through a demonstration of its own strength and significance? And for this, great projects carried out by great powers fit perfectly. Only, as we see, God has no need of either these projects or these powers. He "comes down," draws near to the builders, and from His nearness the great power collapses and the great project stops. When God is close, when He is near, those who feel His nearness no longer have time for imperial greatness or "great construction projects."

And meanwhile the story did not end in antiquity: even the contemporaries of the author of the parable, written in Babylon during the exile, could see the same tower. Ziggurats were built not only by the Sumerians, but also by the Babylonians. The history of fallen humanity continued. The history of collapsing great powers and unfinished great construction projects falling into desolation.

The parable of the Tower of Babel resembles a parable less than the other parables of the Prologue of Genesis. This is understandable: it is a parable built on historical realities, not on mythological traditions, as in the case, for example, of the parable of Noah. Yet history is history, and we are still dealing with a parable, not because the realities are unreliable, but because history here becomes only the starting material for a generalization. That generalization is connected with the image of the Tower of Babel precisely as a historical reality. Today no historian doubts that the parable is speaking of ziggurats, stepped pyramidal temple structures that existed in the cities of Sumer as early as the third millennium B.C.

They could not fail to make an absolutely indelible impression on the Semitic nomads who first appeared in Mesopotamia around the twenty-fifth century B.C. From this came traditions about towers "up to heaven" that entered legends, and the legends about towers that had existed in complete reality became the basis of the parable. To complete the picture, it remains only to add that the chief ziggurat of Ur, the capital of the confederation of Sumerian city-states that existed in those times, was called Etemenanki, which translated literally from Sumerian means "foundation of heaven and earth."

This image of the Sumerian ziggurat, which entered legend, became the basis of the parable. Its meaning would be incomplete if we did not take into account that ziggurats were built not only in Sumerian cities, but also in the cities of Babylonia, which succeeded Sumer, and in particular in its capital, Babylon. A ziggurat existed there during the writing of the Book of Genesis; its first readers could see the Tower of Babel with their own eyes. Yet another tower. The parable of the Tower of Babel is a parable about a tower that constantly collapses and that people rebuild again and again with a persistence worthy of a better use. They rebuild it in order to "make a name for themselves," in order "not to be scattered over the earth."

So there would be something to hold together "one people of one language." The matter here is not linguistics, but politics: in Akkadian, the language of ancient Babylon, "to make one language" means to subject people to a single authority, while "to confuse languages" means to destroy such single rule. It is not God who destroys it, as it may appear at first glance. God merely comes near, and the languages are confused, and the tower is simply abandoned unfinished. This is understandable: a great construction project requires a great idea and presupposes a great empire, a strong state, and firm authority.

But God does not need empires; He needs a human being with whom He can communicate. When He is near, all the "great ideas" invented by human beings lose their value, great empires stagger and fall apart, and "great construction projects" remain unfinished. But fallen humanity cannot live without "great ideas" and "great construction projects"; for their sake, people are ready to endure the rule of great empires over them. That is why ever new towers of Babel are built. They are built and they collapse; this is how the history of fallen humanity flows.

People very often feel sympathy for the figures in this passage. Look, people tried hard, worked, and an unkind God suddenly ruined everything. Was He really begrudging them something?... The real question, however, is for what purpose the tower is being built. The Tower of Babel symbolizes a civilization built as a challenge to God.

For some reason it seems that God's intervention here is quite conditional. The undertaking was apparently doomed to failure from the beginning because of mutual incomprehension among the builders. Even if at first they did speak one language, acting solely in order to prove what fine fellows they were, each of them was thinking about himself, not about the others. In that situation incomprehension was bound to arise, and it turned out that everyone was already speaking different languages.

This is what any activity apart from God is doomed to. Later, on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit will heal this wound and make understanding possible even among people who speak different languages.