Notice how the literary structure of the story builds the satire:

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• Each man said: "Come, let us make bricks. . . " (ibid 11:3)

 

YHWH said: "Come, let us go down. . . " (ibid 11:7)

 

What does it mean that YHWH "came down"? Is not God everywhere? And why is it that YHWH came down and not Elohim? God coming down appears to be a biblical idiom and is specifically related to YHWH. Hence, YHWH comes down to investigate the outcry from Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18:21). Speaking to Moses at the burning bush, YHWH says: “I shall descend to rescue it [i.e., My people] from the hand of Egypt and to bring it up from that land to a good and spacious land” (Exodus 3:8). To “come down” means to descend from His heavenly spiritual realm and to become intimately involved in the affairs of man, particularly from a moral perspective. Intimate involvement throughout the Torah is always represented by the immanent aspect of God YHWH and not Elohim.3 On the other hand, Elohim may go up — “And when He had finished speaking with him [Abraham], Elohim ascended from upon Abraham (Genesis 17:22). Jacob also saw angels of Elohim ascending and then descending (Genesis 28:12). Could it be that the Torah is intimating that Elohim spends more time on earth arranging the affairs of humanity than YHWH?

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Moreover, the people are about to build the tallest and most impressive tower in Mesopotamia, a tower that reaches up to the heavens. However, from God’s perspective they are accomplishing nothing, and God has to “come down” from the heavens to view their puny efforts.

 

The words "come let us go down. . . " do constitute a theological issue since it is by no means clear whom God is addressing by using the plural. Exegetes such as Rashi assume He is addressing heavenly angels.

 

This is, of course, not the first time God has expressed his intentions in the plural. In Genesis I, God said "Let us make man in Our image" (Genesis 1:26). Cassuto suggests that the Torah uses the royal we as a form of exhortation: "When a person exhorts himself to do a given task, he uses the plural: Let us go! Let us rise up!"2

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• The sentence that follows also has a satirical element: "And the brick served them as stone, and the bitumen served them as mortar".

 

This sentence is written from the perspective of the Land of Israel where stone is the basic building material and it is poking fun at the impermanence of ziggurats made of brick. Stones and mortar have permanence. Bricks fall down and soon create ruins. This may have had particular relevance to Israelite readers at the time the Bible was written who knew that the ziggurat, and in fact all of Babylon, was destroyed (see next section).

 

There could also be a subtle wordplay here. The word for bricks in Hebrew is levanim. When reversed it becomes "we shall confuse" (In Hebrew navla). This was a city that was destined from its beginnings to create confusion.

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• They said ". . . and let us make a name for ourselves" (ibid 11:4).

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They did indeed make a name for themselves, but the name they made was far from the one they intended: "Therefore its name was called Bavel [Babylon], because there YHWH confused the languages of the whole earth" (Genesis 11:9).

 

The word "bavel" in Hebrew has two meanings — the city of Babylon, which had been the capital of southern Mesopotamia, and the word confusion or babble. The Generation of the Dispersion imagined that their city and its tower would establish their reputation throughout the world, but in reality, all they succeeded in creating was a city of babble.

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• Moreover, their purpose in building the city and its tower was ". . . .  lest we be scattered over the face of the whole earth" (ibid 11:4).

 

And the result was:

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". . . . and from there YHWH scattered them over the face of the whole earth" (ibid 11:9).

 

 

The geography and religion of ancient Mesopotamia

 

To further appreciate what the Bible is poking fun at, it is helpful to review some geographical and religious aspects of ancient Mesopotamia. 

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Southern Mesopotamia is an extremely large plain that is bounded to the east by the Zagreb Mountains and to the west by desert; and urban civilization began in this area between about 3,000 to 3,500 BCE. It is a semi-arid country suitable for grazing. There are no forests that could have been used for timber and its geology was not suitable for quarrying. Water for agriculture was obtained from the Euphrates River and was led by channels into the fertile alluvial soil of the desert. By this time, agriculture had become sufficiently advanced to sustain large centers of population (ibid 10:10).

 

The first people to live in this area, from about 4,500 BCE, were the Sumerians. It is unclear where this civilization originated from. The area in which they lived was known as Shumar (hence the name Sumerians), and this is probably the "plain in the land of Shinar" of the Tower of Babel story (Genesis 11:2).

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One of the major innovations of the Mesopotamian world, together with the discovery of the wheel and writing, was the manufacture of clay bricks. The bricks were dried in the sun during the non-rainy season or baked in kilns and they constituted its basic building material.

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The focal point of a Mesopotamian city was its temple. The spirit of a god related to nature was infused into an idol and from its temple the god worked, rested and protected the city. In return, the inhabitants of the city venerated it, clothed it, and fed it sacrifices.

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The ziggurat was a common feature of Mesopotamian cities and about 30 are known. They were large impressive tower-like structures that would have been visible from a distance. On their top story was the temple to a god.

 

After the Sumerians, the Akkadians, a Semitic-speaking people, rose to prominence in this region under Sargon of Akkad, from between about 2270 to 2215 BCE. Babylon was then the capital of southern Mesopotamia. The name Babylon is thought to mean “gateway to the god.” The first ziggurat in Babylon may well have been built during Sargon’s reign, although this is speculative. The Babylonians took over after this, especially around the city of Babylon, during the 2nd millennium BCE. This was followed by the Assyrians. Babylon was sacked by the Hittites in 1954 BCE, and the city was not restored to its former glory until the reign of Nebuchadnezzar in 612 BCE. This is the same Nebuchadnezzar who destroyed the First Temple and exiled the population of Judah to Mesopotamia.

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Much of what we know about the ziggurat of Babylon comes from the time of Nebuchadnezzar. Before he rebuilt it, this ziggurat may have been in ruins for hundreds of years, and this was most likely the case when the Bible was written at the time of Moses (For a full discussion of the dating of the Exodus, see the essay “The Egyptian Exodus – fact or fiction?)

 

During the later reign of Nebuchadnezzar (about 605 to 562 BCE), the ziggurat in Babylon was the tallest building in Mesopotamia. Its structure and function could well have been modelled on earlier versions. Its base was about 300 feet on each side and it was seven stories tall, or about 300 feet in height. It was made of brick, the exterior bricks being baked in furnaces, while those in the interior were baked by the sun. On its top story was the temple of the god Marduk.

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The gods lived in the heavens, and the multistoried ziggurat was an attempt to bring the gods into the confines of the city. The temple complex was called Etemenanki, or "the house of the foundation of heaven and earth." The temple on the top of the ziggurat, on its seventh story, was called the Esagila, literally "the house whose head is lifted up." It is of interest that the biblical description of the construction of the Tower of Babel uses very similar words: "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its head in the heavens" (Genesis 11:4).

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The expression "sons of man" in the sentence “And YHWH descended to look at the city and tower which the sons of man built” is a strange expression for the Torah (ibid 11:5). However, it could be another dig at Mesopotamian tradition. According to their mythology, the Etemenanki was built by the gods at the beginning of time, and not by man, and mortal rulers just continued the project.

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The following is how the construction of Babylon and its Esagila are described in the Epic of Creation myth or Enuma Elish. This may have been written in Babylon between about 1,500 to 1,700 BCE, and therefore predated the Torah by several hundred years.

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Marduk had defeated a coalition of older gods and it was now time for the younger gods he had rescued, called the Anunnaki, to demonstrate their appreciation:

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The Anunnaki made their voices heard

And addressed Marduk their lord,

Now, o lord, that you have set us free,

What are our favors from you?

We would like to make a shrine with its own name

We would like our nights resting place to be in your private quarters, and to rest there.

Let us found a shrine, a sanctuary there.

When we arrive, let us rest within it.

When Marduk heard this,

His face lit up greatly, like daylight.

Create Babylon, whose construction you requested!

Let its mud bricks be molded, and build high the shrine!

The Anunnaki began shoveling.

For a whole year they made bricks for it.

When the second year arrived,

They had raised the top of Esagila in front of (?) the Apsu

They had built a high ziggurat for the Apsu.4

 

 

The error of the Generation of the Dispersion

 

What was this generation’s error that resulted in its dispersion? The text is not clear about this, and this ambiguity has spawned numerous Rabbinic and modern interpretations. We shall look at five representative explanations, looking in particular as to whether they fit in well with the literal meaning of the text.

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The following is from the midrash Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer:

 

The tower had seven steps from the east and seven steps from the west. The bricks were hauled up from one side, the descent was on the other. If a man fell down and died, no attention was paid to him, but if one brick fell down, they would sit and weep and say: Woe betide us, when will another one be hauled up in its place?"5

 

This midrash is a paradigm for all the -isms of history, such as Hellenism, communism, and Nazism, and most recently radical Islam, in which the value of the project is far greater value than that of the individual. Judaism would never agree with this judgment.

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There can be no doubt that this is a meaningful midrash. Nevertheless, it is exegesis, and it is questionable whether it reflects the intent of the Torah.

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The next quotation is from the authoritative Biblical commentator Rashi, who comments on the Hebrew phrase udvarim achadim, which could be translated as “common purpose.” (ibid 11:1):

 

They came up with one plan of action, and they said: [God] does not have the right to select for Himself alone the higher realms. We will go up to the firmament and wage war with Him.6

 

The notion that the people united in order to challenge God can be found in a number of midrashim. God inhabits the heavens, and there is perhaps a certain logic that a tower would be needed to reach up and confront Him.

 

However, this explanation fits poorly into the way of thinking of ancient Babylon. The people were not monotheists, but pagans. When building their tower, the Babylonians had no intent of confronting their gods. Their sole intent was to unite with them.

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A third explanation comes from the modern scholar Rabbi Jonathan Sacks who suggests that the error of that generation was their attempt to eliminate the boundary between heaven and earth:

 

The most fundamental boundary is the one created first: the differentiation between heaven and earth. Never before or since, except among religions or cultures influenced by Judaism, has God been conceived in so radically transcendent a way. God is not to be identified with anything on earth. The heavens are the heavens of the Lord says the Psalmist, but the earth He has given to man (Psalm 115;16). This ontological divide is fundamental. God is God; humanity is humanity. There can be no blurring of the boundaries.7

 

Nevertheless, one can argue with Sacks’ explanation. The Tower of Babel is not a story about Elohim, who represents the transcendent aspect of God, but about YHWH, the name describing the immanent nature of God. YHWH recognizes no boundaries between heaven and earth in his interactions with man, although he does insist on holiness and maintaining distance. Later in the Torah, YHWH will speak to Moses from a burning bush. YHWH will also reside among the Jewish people in the Holy of Holies in His Sanctuary. The people’s attempt to reach towards divinity by building into the heavens was a theological error, a farcical one at that, but whether it was deserving of dispersion can be questioned.

 

A fourth explanation comes from the Talmud:

 

It was taught in a Baraisa: R Nassan says: All of [the members of the generation of the Dispersion] intended to build the tower for the purposes of idolatry. It is written here: Come let us build ourselves a city and let us make a name (shem) for ourselves (Genesis 11:4) and there it is written: The name (shem) of strange gods you shall not mention (Exodus 23:13). Just as over there the word shem refers to idolatry, so here in the story of the Generation of Dispersion the word shem also refers to idolatry."8

 

The people in this story were idolators, as were all other nations at that time. However, whether they warranted consequences for their idolatry more than at any other time in history is another matter.

 

Finally, I would like to suggest an explanation which, distinct from these others, fits well into the text. The error of this generation was their seeking to make a name or reputation for themselves. They said:

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"Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves" (Genesis 11:4).

 

There is biting sarcasm in this verse. The ziggurat was allegedly built for the glory of their god Marduk, but the reality was otherwise. It was built for the glory of the rulers of Babylon. Later in history, Nebuchadnezzar will admit as much: “The fortifications of Esagila and Babylon I strengthened, and made an everlasting name for my reign.”

 

Any communal project allegedly done for the sake of society but that in actuality promotes the shem or name or reputation of human beings runs counter to God’s plan for humanity and will eventually flounder.

 

As R’ Hirsch points out, commenting on the phrase “let us make a name for ourselves:”

 

If they place themselves there, instead of a means, as an end, then the whole moral future of mankind goes to ruin, then what is almost prophetically said here occurs: mankind perceives its own powers, and, the more originality used the more arrogantly comes to believe that the community as such can dispense with God and His laws of morality".9

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A fascinating observation comes from Cassuto. In the nine verses of this passage, the Hebrew letter ש is found many times — twenty-seven times to be precise.10 This letter can be pronounced shin or sin depending on where the top dot is placed to the right or left. The Hebrew word shem שם starts with a shin. It is as if this whole passage is shouting out shem shem shem with its sins and shins!

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א   וַיְהִי כָל-הָאָרֶץ שָֹפָה אֶחָת וּדְבָרִים אֲחָדִים: ב   וַיְהִי בְּנָסְעָם מִקֶּדֶם וַיִּמְצְאוּ בִקְעָה בְּאֶרֶץ שִׁנְעָר וַיֵּשְׁבוּ שָׁם: ג   וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל-רֵעֵהוּ הָבָה נִלְבְּנָה לְבֵנִים וְנִשְֹרְפָה לִשְֹרֵפָה וַתְּהִי לָהֶם הַלְּבֵנָה לְאָבֶן וְהַחֵמָר הָיָה לָהֶם לַחֹמֶר: ד   וַיֹּאמְרוּ הָבָה | נִבְנֶה-לָּנוּ עִיר וּמִגְדָּל וְרֹאשׁוֹ בַשָּׁמַיִם וְנַעֲשֶֹה-לָּנוּ שֵׁם פֶּן-נָפוּץ עַל-פְּנֵי כָל-הָאָרֶץ: ה   וַיֵּרֶד הֹ׳ לִרְאֹת אֶת-הָעִיר וְאֶת-הַמִּגְדָּל אֲשֶׁר בָּנוּ בְּנֵי הָאָדָם: ו   וַיֹּאמֶר הֹ׳ הֵן עַם אֶחָד וְשָֹפָה אַחַת לְכֻלָּם וְזֶה הַחִלָּם לַעֲשֹוֹת וְעַתָּה לֹא-יִבָּצֵר מֵהֶם כֹּל אֲשֶׁר יָזְמוּ לַעֲשֹוֹת: ז   הָבָה נֵרְדָה וְנָבְלָה שָׁם שְֹפָתָם אֲשֶׁר לֹא יִשְׁמְעוּ אִישׁ שְֹפַת רֵעֵהוּ: ח   וַיָּפֶץ הֹ׳ אֹתָם מִשָּׁם עַל-פְּנֵי כָל-הָאָרֶץ וַיַּחְדְּלוּ לִבְנֹת הָעִיר: ט   עַל-כֵּן קָרָא שְׁמָהּ בָּבֶל כִּי-שָׁם בָּלַל ה׳ שְֹפַת כָּל-הָאָרֶץ וּמִשָּׁם הֱפִיצָם ְהֹ׳ עַל-פְּנֵי כָּל-הָאָרֶץ

 

Promoting the name of God

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Rabbi Menachem Leibtag makes the point that the concept of the name (shem) of God is possibly the most important theme in the Book of Genesis.11 The name or shem of God relates to His existence and His attributes. Although the story of the Generation of the Dispersion mentions nothing about the name of God, it is nevertheless setting the stage for an individual, namely Abraham, and then a nation of his descendants, that will promote the name or shem of God to the nations of the world. 

 

The nations of the world have to be created so as to permit a new nation with a new value-system and ethics to be able to establish itself in the world. If there had been but a single nation speaking but a single language, with only one value system, and which promoted only the names of its rulers, there would have been too much resistance to Abraham’s message. The whole world would have been against him!

 

Moreover, for Abraham’s message to spread across the globe, there needs to be a country from which the Jewish nation can spread this message. Cassutto explains:

 

The planned pattern of the dispersal of humanity serves here as proof that the settlement of mankind in the world did not occur haphazardly, according to the chance circumstances of greater or less fecundity in one or another family, but took place according to a preconceived Divine plan, the implementation of which proceeded without humanity’s being aware of it.10

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The very next paragraph after the Generation of the Dispersion story has the following introduction:

 

These are the descendants of Shem. . . (ibid 11:10).

 

One of Noah’s three sons is called Shem, meaning a name. Shem and his descendants will possess a unique perception of YHWH, the God of relationships. 

 

Says Noah earlier in a prophetic vein:  

Blessed is YHWH, the God of Shem. . . .  (ibid 9:26).

 

The first attempt at disseminating knowledge about the name of YHWH to the world at large will be actualized by Abraham, a descendent of Shem. This story about Babylon can, therefore, be considered a major step in the lead up to the Abraham narrative.

 

Abraham was chosen by God as the forefather of the Israelites because he perceived his mission to be the dissemination of the knowledge of God. His preaching was done not inside a city but on its outskirts. In the context of a sacrifice, he would proclaim God’s name, (vayikra beshem YHWH).12 The closest modern analogy would be a revivalist meeting. During this meeting, Abraham would preach about the concept of one God. He also taught that God is the model for righteousness and justice, and one’s personal life, and also societal values, should be based on the way of God, performing righteousness and justice.13

 

Hence, as soon as Abraham reached the Canaanite city of Shechem on arriving from Mesopotamia:

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So, he built an altar there to YHWH Who had appeared to him. From there he relocated to the mountain east of Bethel and pitched his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and he built there an altar to YHWH and he proclaimed the Name (vayikra beshem) of YHWH (ibid 12:7-8).  

Owing to a famine in the land, Abraham soon found it necessary to leave Canaan for Egypt. However, as soon as he returned, he resumed his preaching:

 

He proceeded on his journeys from the south to Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at first between Bethel and Ai, to the site of the altar which he had made there at first; and there Abram proclaimed the name of YHWH (vayikro shom Avrom beshem YHWH) (ibid 13:3).

 

When he relocated to Beersheba:

 

He [Abraham] planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and there he proclaimed the name of YHWH, the everlasting God (ibid 21:33).

 

Since Abraham’s calling out in the name of God was always associated with the name of God YHWH, so too this passage about the name or reputation of the people of the land of Shinar uses only the name YHWH.

 

Shortly before his death, Moses wrote a song that included the following verse:

 

When the Supreme One gave the nations their inheritance, when He separated the children of man, He set the borders of the peoples according to the number of the Children of Israel (Deuteronomy 32:8).

 

Chapter 10 of Genesis indicates that the world was habited by 70 nations.14 We are also told that the number of Jacob’s offspring who went down with him to Egypt was 70 (Genesis 46:27 and Deuteronomy 10:22). Hence, Moses is pointing out that just as these seventy nations had their own territory, so too the Children of Israel also warranted their own land.15

 

The number 70 has meaning in the Torah. It represents completeness by virtue of differences. Hence, Moses appointed 70 elders to represent the twelve tribes, and the number of judges in the Sanhedrin or Supreme Court was 70. The 70 elders were a perfect representative body for the twelve tribes. The 70 individuals from Jacob’s household possessed every attribute needed to form a nation. Similarly, the 70 nations of the world (which included the descendants of Shem) had all the characteristics needed to make up the diversity of global mankind. Each elder, each of Jacob’s offspring, and each nation was unique, but the sum total of their differences was completeness.

 

But what about this extra one nation? Is it not one too many? Does it not disturb the population equilibrium of the world? If Israel was a normal nation, the answer to this question might well be yes. But the Jewish nation is not a regular nation. Its mission is to be an instructor to the rest of the world on moral values and can therefore be considered outside the number 70.

 

Are there jokes in the Torah? There most definitely are, and the Tower of Babel story illustrates this. Nevertheless, the Tower of Babel story is more than just satire. It is a key part of a narrative history leading from the creation of Adam and Eve to the mission of Abraham.

 

References

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1. The Story of the Generation of Division (xi 1-9). Introduction. By U Cassuto in A Commentary on the Book of Genesis, Part Two. From Noah to Abraham, A Commentary on Genesis, C. The Story of the Generation of Division (xi 1-9). Introduction. p225, First English Edition, The Magnes Press, P.O. Box 7695, Jerusalem 91076, Israel and Babel. A Story of Heaven and Earth by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks in Covenant and Conversation. A Weekly Reading of the Jewish Bible, Genesis: the Book of Beginnings, p49, Maggid Books and The Orthodox Union, First Edition 2009.

 

2. First Paragraph. The Theophany on Mount Horeb by Umberto Cassuto in A Commentary on the Book of Exodus, p30, Varda Books, Skokie, Il, USA 2005. Rashi to Genesis 11:5, quoting Tanchuma 18 states that He did this to show that judges have to understand well the evidence against someone who is convicted.

 

3. Sixth Paragraph. The Story of the Sixth Day by U Cassuto in A Commentary on the Book of Genesis, Part Two. From Noah to Abraham, A Commentary on Genesis, p52, First English Edition, The Magnes Press, P.O. Box 7695, Jerusalem91076, Israel.

 

4. The Epic of Creation VI by Stephanie Dalley in Myths from Mesopotamia, Creation, The Flood, Gilgamesh and Others, p260, Oxford University Press, Revised edition 2000.

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5. Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, 24.

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6. Rashi’s Commentary to the Torah on Genesis 11:1.

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7.  Babel. A Story of Heaven and Earth by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks n Covenant and Conversation. A Weekly Reading of the Jewish Bible, Genesis: the Book of Beginnings, p49, Maggid Books and The Orthodox Union, First Edition 2009. 

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8. TB Sanhedrin 109a.

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9. Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch commentary to Genesis 11:4.

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10. The Story of the Generation of Division (xi 1-9). Introduction. By U Cassuto in A Commentary on the Book of Genesis, Part Two. From Noah to Abraham, A Commentary on Genesis, C. The Story of the Generation of Division (xi 1-9). Introduction. p225, First English Edition, The Magnes Press, P.O.Box 7695, Jerusalem 91076, Israel.

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11. Torah in Motion. How to study Chumash – one book at a time – Bereishit class #5. What’s in a name? Possibly the most important theme in Sefer Breishit. R’ Menachem Leibtag. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fcg5jAMYYnE&t=11s

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12. Ibn Ezra and Radak suggest that the phrase vayikra beshem YHWH (he called upon the name of YHWH) means he proclaimed God’s unity and summoned all men to worship him. Nachmanides explains that he publicly proclaimed God’s name before the altar, teaching people to know and recognize God. He quotes the Midrash Rabba (39:16) that he caused the Name of the Holy One blessed be He to be uttered in the mouth of all people (in other words calling out means he encouraged others to call out). Thus, he instructed them regarding the existence and greatness of God. Another midrashic interpretation is that he began making converts.

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13. See Genesis 18:19 where it is mentioned that Abraham will teach his children and his household the way of God about righteousness and justice. My presumption is that this was already part and parcel of his teaching to everyone.

 

14. If one examines chapter 10 of Genesis that includes the 70 nations, one finds there are not 70 names listed but 74. Nevertheless, included in these names are Shem, Ham and Yaphet, the three sons of Noah, who survived the Flood and who are the progenitors of these 70 nations. Also included is Nimrod, who is presumed to be a person and not a nation. Subtract these 4 names and there are indeed 70 nations listed in this chapter.