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1 Now the whole earth had one language and one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. 3 Then they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. 4 And they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth." 5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. ~ Genesis 11:1-5
Today, we transition into Genesis 11. Within just a short 100 year period of time after the Flood, the world had walked away from the knowledge of what happened and had not only rejected the God of the Bible and the lessons learned from their recent history. They had actually come together to work against God and establish their own society and religion apart from Him.
In v.1 of today's passage we read, "Now the whole earth had one language and one speech."
There are two key words used here that are used to describe the communicate the people of the world had at that time. The first word is "language" which is the Hebrew word that literally means "lip." They had the same lip. The second word is "speech" which means "words." The whole earth had one language and one speech that enabled them to be unified apart from God. They did not understand that communal living is not doable apart from God.
In v.2 of today's passage we read, "And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there."
The people moved east. That is a way of saying that they went away from God and His presence. Just as man was cast out east of Eden, just as Cain moved further east of Eden to the Land of Nod, they all wandered away from God. The land of Shinar was the same area that Cain dwelt before the Flood and it is the same area which has been in complete spiritual opposition to God to this day. It was in Shinar that false religion got its foothold through Cain.
In v.3-4 of today's passage we read, "3 Then they said to one another, 'Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.' They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. 4 And they said, 'Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.'"
The Tower of Babel was a religious building, intended to expose man to the mystery of the heavens and to God. That, perhaps, is what is meant here by the statement that they intended to build a tower with its top in the heavens. They were impressed by its greatness architecturally, that is, it was a large undertaking for the men of that day to build and they thought of it as reaching into heaven. But they also unquestionably were thinking of it as a means of communication with God, of maintaining contact with Him.
These two verses point to us every false religion that has ever existed. The first six words of v.3, "Then they said to one another," reveals the guts of false religion, the worship of self. These people had rejected God’s way of approaching Him and decided that they could make up their own way to get to Godlike status.
From the day they decided to build the tower onward, the motto of humanity has been, "let us make a name for ourselves." This motto reveals one of the basic philosophies of humanism which says, "Glory to man in the highest, for man is the master of all things." That is the central thought of humanism, glory to mankind.
The saying, "All paths lead to God," finds its origin here at the Tower of Babel. But God has and always will reject this notion. The biblical model reveals man doesn’t work his way back to God; the biblical model reveals that God must come to man otherwise man is doomed in his sin. In the land of Shinar which was away from God, the people had determined that their way to God was the right way, so they built their tower to heaven. This is exactly what every false religion on earth has in common; works-based salvation.
Not only were they defying God by attempting to work their way to Him, but they were also attempting to defy Him should He ever presume to go back on His word about flooding the earth again. The problem with religion is that the people of the world are really motivated by their own glory, not God's glory. They thought that if they built this tower, they would somehow be able to be like God. And, they succeeded through uniting their efforts. The only problem was that it didn't work.
In v.5 of today's passage we read, "But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built."
When the Lord came down before the flood, a different type of terminology was used. Before the flood there was still a place where the Garden of Eden was located. Before the flood, the Lord talked with Adam and Eve, and with Cain. Before the flood there were cherubim who guarded the Garden of Eden. Before the flood, God spoke with Noah in several different ways and He established a covenant with him. And before the flood, the Lord was the one who shut the door to the ark.
After the flood, Noah built an altar at the top of the mountain of Ararat and the smoke of the offering soared even higher to reach the Lord. His presence since the time of the flood has been symbolically on high. So now, with the building of the tower, the Lord descended to bring about judgment and to deliver unwanted discipline on those who had so quickly and so shamefully had been disobedient to the commands they were given from God through Noah.
God told them to fill the earth, to populate the earth. Sinful man's response was one of defiance. They congregated together to build a city that was supposed to reach all the way up to God. It wasn't that building a city was wrong, it was that they built a city for themselves exclusive of God. There have been many archaeological discoveries that revealed these seven level towers made out of mud bricks called ziggurats. These towers were used to worship the zodiac and they used them to look to the stars for direction. Instead of looking to the God of creation, instead of trusting Him for their future, they looked to creation for direction. "But the Lord came down to see the city." And, in so doing, man was held accountable.
