The Tower of Babel

[Rhondazvous]

The story about the Tower of Babel presents us with some interesting questions. In this story, the inhabitants of the Earth move further away from the Garden of Eden after Adam's eviction therefrom. They all speak the same language and pretty much stick together. There is no confusion among them. No misunderstanding. No war. The Bible tells us they were all of one mind (Genesis 11:1-9). The God of the Bible comes down to see this. When he notes that they are united and their unity strengthens them, he is displeased. They plan to build a tower up to heaven. The God of the Bible doesn't merely laugh this off as foolish hubris. Rather, he sees it as a serious threat and takes steps to put a stop to it. He confuses their language so they can’t understand one another. I cannot see the Creator of the universe acting this way. But the creator of an Earth-centered fantasy world which does not exist outside the pages of the Bible did act this way. Let's take a look at this passage and see if any of the following questions seem a tad odd.


Why would an omnipotent God be worried about the achievements of men? If you have a child you want them to go as far and as high as they can in life. You teach them how to avoid the pitfalls of pride and wealth. But you don't undermine their self-esteem and tear up their job applications. You don't sabotage their efforts. If you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, (Matthew 7:11) why paint this dastardly picture of a god who hates to see his creation (children) achieve?

Why would a god who is not the author of confusion be the cause of the most significant factor that separates people? How many wars would not have been fought, lands not stolen, racism not perpetrated, peoples not subjugated if this god had left us alone to flourish in the peace we had before he decided that he did not come to bring peace but a sword (Matthew 10:34)?

Why does a god who is omnipresent have to come down to look at a city? Despite passages which tell us god is everywhere and invisible, we find too many passages that tell us the god of the Bible is corporal, has physical features and has been seen by at least 74 men (Exodus 24:1-15)

Why is the god who created the whole universe so threatened by his own creation that he is only happy when we are confused, broken, contrite, helpless and sorrowful—especially when we were none of those things before he intervened. That's like a doctor giving you poison so that you will need the medicine he wants to sell you,

The tower of Babel represents an attempt by man to explain natural phenomenon (diverse languages) by creating a god whom they could not raise above their own spiritual immaturity.

We could redeem the Tower of Babel story. Instead of looking at it as a historical account of some ancient event, we could look at it through the eyes of Joseph Campbell and see its power as a myth. Imposing modern ideas on an ancient text will not tell us what the ancient writers had in mind. However, the myths studied by Campbell existed long before he was born and the creators of those myths may or may not have been aware of the deeper meanings Campbell saw in their creations. Divining the intentions of the ancient writers is not necessary to harvest what insights into the collective human psyche may be found in their writings. So what does the Tower of Babel have to say to us?

A power struggle between generations—between parent and child—permeates western mythology. Everything from Zeus and his children to Ibsen’s Master Builder. The incumbent generation feels threatened by the generation that comes to take its place. In Greek mythology the god solves this problem by killing his children. Other gods kill their parents so they can reign unrivaled. Is there any value in a story which depicts man at his worst? Only if we read it with the eyes of understanding. In this story, we see that the end result of generation rivalry is confusion and lack of achievement.

We might also see the synergy of people working together. A community where people work toward common goals—where nobody says “that‘s mine” can be imagined. And if we can imagine a thing, we can build it.