This pride was demonstrated in a huge tower they built in the middle of the city. 11:4), in other words, let’s make ourselves famous. The motivation of the builders of Babel is clear: Let us make a name for ourselves (Gen. But it’s exactly what we would expect if there really was a Flood: that very soon after the Flood, people would return to the kind of advanced civilization they had known before the Flood. Why? Because there’s no evidence of any small, gradual cultural steps leading up to it. For archeologists, the sudden full-blown appearance of civilization at Sumer is a real puzzle. Here is the first evidence of writing and literature, of law, of city-states, of the potter’s wheel, the sailboat, the plow, metalworking with bronze, and of advanced musical and architectural forms of weaving, leatherwork, and masonry. Irrigation of the land produced vast amounts of grain and a centralization of wealth. Shinar, which the archeologists call Sumer (the lower Euphrates River Valley in central Iraq), is where, both in the view of the Bible and modern archeology, civilization began. Archeologists agree that people moved down from the hilly highlands, though their evolutionary assumptions lead them to assign to this process a much longer period of time. This is assuming that Peleg ( Division) was named for the division of the people at Babel (Gen. According to the Old Greek Bible (the Septuagint) it was about 530 years. ** According to the Hebrew Bible, this migration took about 100 years. * The same memory of a peaceful age with a shared language is preserved in Egypt and in the ancient Hindu (Vedic) literature of India, as well as in Buddhism. 11:1).* In the Bible, this is the time after the Flood and before the construction of Babel, when many migrated from Ararat (ancient Urartu), where the ark had landed, down to the plain of Shinar (Gen. This was considered by many a Golden Age, when everyone spoke the same language (Gen. * In what archeologists identify as the Early Bronze Age.īoth the Bible and ancient Mesopotamian documents, as well as modern archeology, identify the time before the advent of civilization as peaceful. Was this really a step forward, as many assume, or was it a giant step backward in man’s moral development? Bronze Age Gate at Mycenae, Greece But city walls and some of the other marks of civilization, like bronze weapons, appeared only for the purpose of defense from the violent attacks of other civilized societies. The first appearance of walled cities marks an important turning point in history.* Historians consider this the beginning of civilization-a word based on the Latin civitas ( city). If there was no wall, it wasn’t considered a city at all, only a town or a village. * The cities mentioned in the genealogy of Genesis 10 were probably built later, after the destruction of Babel.Īn essential characteristic of an ancient city was its city wall. The second was Babel with its infamous tower (Gen. The first city was built by Cain after he was cast out from the presence of the Lord for murdering his brother (Gen. The Tower of Babel and the Division of the NationsĬities don’t get very positive reviews in the early pages of the Bible. Principles Employedģ: Seeing the bigger picture helped us to recognize that the two statements don’t actually contradict each other.The Jewish Roots of Christianity Amazon Affiliate Link All subsequent prophets would be "contradicting" Moses if we judged them this way. Ellen White in no way denies or contradicts what the Bible says she is just giving more information. It is not a contradiction to give more information or details than the previous account (that is one of the purposes of prophets). “Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth’” (Genesis 11:4). And as they would be able to ascend to the region of the clouds, they hoped to ascertain the cause of the Flood” ( Patriarchs and Prophets, p. By carrying the structure to a much greater height than was reached by the waters of the Flood, they thought to place themselves beyond all possibility of danger. One object before them in the erection of the tower was to secure their own safety in case of another deluge. Many of them denied the existence of God and attributed the Flood to the operation of natural causes. “The dwellers on the plain of Shinar disbelieved God's covenant that He would not again bring a flood upon the earth.
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