Tower of Babel

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Tower of Babel
The biblical Tower of Babel, according to the Old testament and ancient Jewish and Christian scholars was an effort by mankind to reach the heavens with a ladder-like structure and enter the kingdom of God without God's approval. Sometimes it is linked with Jacob, the grandson of Abraham, who "dreamed, and behold a ladder set up to the earth, and the top it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending it."

Candida Moss wrote in the Daily Beast: According to Genesis 11, the postdiluvian inhabitants of the world decided to try and climb up to heaven by building an ancient tower or, you might say, skyscraper. They started with a city built in Shinar (or Babylon) and constructed the city using baked bricks and tar for mortar. Their goal was to make a name for themselves. God, however, who observed this architecturally audacious endeavor, was unimpressed. Rather than destroying the construction like a game of celestial Jenga, God identified human collaboration and unity as the real problem. As a result, he “confuse[d] their language” so that they didn’t understand each other and scattered them over the Earth. [Source: Candida Moss, Daily Beast, June 6, 2021]

Almost every scholar of the Hebrew Bible sees the story as a myth that answers a question about the human condition. If you were wondering why it is that people aren’t united and don’t speak the same language then here is your answer: When people were united they ruined the skyline, tried to trespass on divine property, and became obsessed with fame. God was simply putting them in their place. As a bonus we also learn the origins of the name of the city of Babylon as the name Babel, or Babylon, sounds a great deal like the Hebrew word for “confused.” Despite what you may have seen in artistic depictions of the story, the Book of Genesis never mentions the destruction of the Tower of Babel, only the dispersion of the people. It’s only in later sources like the second century B.C. Book of Jubilees or the writings of the enslaved Greek historian Alexander Polyhistor that the temple is actually destroyed.

Later Chapters of Genesis, see Abraham, Jacob and Joseph

Websites and Resources: Bible and Biblical History: Bible Gateway and the New International Version (NIV) of The Bible biblegateway.com ; King James Version of the Bible gutenberg.org/ebooks ; Bible History Online bible-history.com ; Biblical Archaeology Society biblicalarchaeology.org ; Judaism Virtual Jewish Library jewishvirtuallibrary.org/index ; Judaism101 jewfaq.org ; torah.org torah.org ; Chabad,org chabad.org/library/bible ; Internet Jewish History Sourcebook sourcebooks.fordham.edu Christianity: BBC on Christianity bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity ; Christian Classics Ethereal Library www.ccel.org ; Sacred Texts website sacred-texts.com ; Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Christian Origins sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Biblical Images: Bible in Pictures creationism.org/books ; Bible Blue Letter Images blueletterbible.org/images ; Biblical Images preceptaustin.org

Tower of Babel and Mesopotamian Architecture and Folklore

Candida Moss wrote in the Daily Beast: It’s clear from the story that the original Tower was supposed to be in Babylon. An important element in the Tower of Babel mythology is the architecture of Babylon itself. The Babylonian ruler Nebuchadnezzar II did rebuild a ziggurat (a rectangular steeped tower) temple dedicated to Marduk Bagdad in the sixth century B.C. The temple was called Etemenanki, the temple of the foundation of heaven and earth, and stood about 90 kilometers to the south of Bagdad. Though there are debates about the temple’s age, height, and construction, numerous scholars have speculated that the enormous temple was the inspiration for the Bible story. There’s even an inscribed stone slab that describes Nebuchadnezzar’s ambitious building project and relates how he used workers captured during his military campaigns to accomplish the task. Thousands of enslaved workers speaking different languages working on a complicated building project? You hardly need the God of Israel to explain why no one could understand each other.

In addition to the practicalities of building the tower, there is a similar version of the Tower of Babel story in a much older Sumerian myth called Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta. In this story a huge ziggurat is built by the Sumerians in the hopes that the god Enki will restore linguistic unity to the world so that they can worship the god in the same language. Quite clearly the story in the Bible is a variant on this theme. It’s likely that ancient Israelites first heard this myth of confused languages at the same time as they encountered Etemenanki when they were taken as captives to Babylon in the sixth century B.C. The influence of the massive temple is felt in other religious texts as well: the Qu’ran relates a story in which the Pharaoh commissions a tower that will allow him to climb up to heaven and confront the God of Moses.

Was the Tower of Babel a Ziggurat?

There is no proof or archaeological evidence that the Tower of Babel really existed. Many think it may have referred to a ziggurat in Babylon. Babylon’s name is derived from “Bab-Ilu” meaning “Gateway of the Gods.” The Hebrews called it Babel. Ziggurats’somewhat tower-like stepped pyramids made from mud brick and topped by temples to gods and goddess — were the largest Sumerian and Mesopotamian structures. They first appeared around 3500 B.C. In ancient times, every major Mesopotamian city had at least one.

Describing a ziggurat he saw in Babylon, the Greek historian Herodotus wrote in 460 B.C., "In the topmost tower there is a great temple, and in the temple is a great bed richly appointed, and beside it a golden table. No idol stands there. No one spends the night there save a woman of that country, designated by the god himself, so I was told by the Chaldeans, who are priests of that divinity."

20120504-The_walls_of_Babylon_and_the_temple_of_Bel.jpg
Medieval vision of the walls of Babylon
and the Temple of Bel
Herodotus described the Etemenanki ziggurat, dedicated to Marduk in the city and famously rebuilt by the 6th century B.C. by the Neo-Babylonians under Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar II. Many modern scholars believe the biblical story of the Tower of Babel was likely influenced by Etemenanki during the Babylonian captivity of the Hebrews.

Nebuchadnezzar wrote that the original tower had been built in antiquity: "A former king built the Temple of the Seven Lights of the Earth, but he did not complete its head. Since a remote time, people had abandoned it, without order expressing their words. Since that time earthquakes and lightning had dispersed its sun-dried clay; the bricks of the casing had split, and the earth of the interior had been scattered in heaps."

For a long time a pyramid-shaped pile of rubble in Babylon, 295 feet square and 295 feet high, was thought to be the Tower of Babel. The pile or rubble turned out not even to be a ziggurat but a pile of solid towers.

Tower of Babel: Genesis 11

The phrase "the Tower of Babel" does not actually appear in the Bible; it is always, "the city and its tower." Several generations after the Great Flood of Noah’s time humanity came together, Genesis 11:1-9 reads: “And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 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. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children built. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do; and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.”

From Shem to Abram: 10 This is the account of Shem’s family line. Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father[d] of Arphaxad. 11 And after he became the father of Arphaxad, Shem lived 500 years and had other sons and daughters.12 When Arphaxad had lived 35 years, he became the father of Shelah. 13 And after he became the father of Shelah, Arphaxad lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.... [Source: New International Version (NIV) biblegateway.com -]

“...27 This is the account of Terah’s family line. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot. 28 While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth. 29 Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milkah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milkah and Iskah. 30 Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive. 31 Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there. 32 Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Harran.

Tower of Babel by the School of Tobias Verhaecht

What the Tower of Babel Story Is About

The Tower of Babel story in the Old Testament is about a group people who come up with the ultimate audacious idea — building a tower that could reach heaven: “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the sky, and so make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered all over the earth.” (Genesis 11:4). A highly unhappy Lord answered back to this act of impudence and made all the people speak in different languages so they couldn’t understand each other, thus “scattering them over all the earth.”

According to Art and the Bible: “After the Great Flood, Noah's descendants settled in the lowlands of Sinear, not far from the Euphrates. The spoke a common language and formed a single community. Genesis 11 tells their story: 'And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.' In addition, the tower had to serve as a landmark to keep people together, despite the fact that God had commanded Noah and his sons to 'replenish' the earth (Genesis 9:1). Also, the tower could be used as a safe haven in case of a new flood. [Source: Art and the Bible artbible.info/art/tower /*]

“God looked down upon these industrious souls, and judged that in their ambition they were trying to equal him. So he decided to punish them with the Confusion of Tongues. Since people could no longer understand each other, they were scattered over the earth at last. The site of the event would from that day on be known as Babel, apparently meaning 'confusion'. /*\

Morris Jastrow said: “The narrative of the tower of Babel is told as a protest against such ambitious efforts, but the interesting feature of the narrative for us is, that it correctly interprets the purpose of these towers as aiming to reach up to heaven. The name of the zikkurat of Larsa well illustrates this aim—to serve as a “link,” uniting heaven and earth. To the pious Hebrew writer such an undertaking seemed ungodly. He does not regard the task as impossible, but impious,—a wanton insult to Providence. He, therefore, represents Jahweh as intervening to prevent the plan from being carried out. The simple-hearted story, in picturing Jahweh as coming down to see what his creatures were doing, reveals its origin as a genuine folk-tale, and probably an old one, which a later writer, in sympathy with the opposition of primitive folk to the bolder ambitions of an advanced culture, adopts to emphasise the ungodliness of Babylonia, which represented just the things which the prophets opposed with such vehemence. The “ladder” which Jacob saw in his dream reaching from earth to heaven was likewise suggested by the zikkurat. The “ladder” is pictured as a link uniting earth to heaven, and the term used in the narrative might just as well be rendered “tower.” [Source: Morris Jastrow, Lectures more than ten years after publishing his book “Aspects of Religious Belief and Practice in Babylonia and Assyria” 1911 ]

plan of Babylon

Evidence of the Tower of Babel?

According to Art and the Bible: “There is evidence that the Tower of Babel actually existed. But in all fairness it was not built as Bruegel thought. Ancient clay tables tell of a ziggurat - a temple tower in the form of a terraced pyramid of successively receding stories. The Marduk ziggurat or Etemenanki was 91 meters in height and set on a 91 x 91 meters base and is believed to have had 7 tiers. Marduk was the main Babylonian god. So it is possible that our Biblical story finds its origin in Mesopotamia, as does the story of the Flood. Destroyed by the Assyrian King Sanherib in 689 BC, the Marduk ziggurat was reconstructed and perfected by the likes of Nebukadnezar II. In 478 BC the ziggurat was demolished again, this time by the Xerxes Persians. The Babylonians named their tower Bab-Iloe, Port of God.Jews in the Babylonian captivity must have seen the ziggurat. From cuneiform writings it appears that this tower was built to reach the heavens. To worship an idol in such a monstruous building, and reach for heaven: Jewish priests must have condemned that. Perhaps disgust of the building contributed to the creation of the biblical story of the Tower.” [Source: Art and the Bible /*]

In May 2017, a professor at the University of London said he had compelling evidence that the Tower of Babel actually existed. Zelda Caldwell wrote in aleteia.org: “A stone tablet from the private collection of a Norwegian businessman Martin Schøyen includes the clearest image ever found of the Great Ziggurat of Babylon, according to Andrew George, Professor of Babylonian history at the University of London. The tablet, which has been captured on film for the first time by Smithsonian Magazine, shows an illustration of a pyramid-like structure, with a depiction of King Nebuchadnezzar II, who ruled Babylon from 605-562 BC, standing next to it. [Source: Zelda Caldwell, aleteia.org, May 2, 2017 \=]

“First built around the time of Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC), the ziggurat in Babylon was in a serious state of disrepair by the time Alexander I the Great came along, and was taken down in 331 BC. With no evidence to tell us what it actually looked like, until now we have only had, in the words of the Schøyen Collection’s catalog, “a long series of fanciful paintings to rely on.” This tablet, for the first time, gives us a contemporary illustration of the tower; along with an inscription giving us an account of Nebuchadnezzar II’s building plans and the restoration process. \=\

The Schøyen Collection has documented the translation of the inscription on the tablet, noting that it contains a helpful caption identifying the drawing as: Etemenanki: Zikkurat Babibli: “The House, the Foundation of Heaven and Earth, Ziggurat in Babylon”. The inscription goes on to describe the restoration process: “Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon Am I – in Order to Complete E-temen-anki and E-ur-me-imin-anki I Mobilized All Countries Everywhere, Each and Every Ruler Who Had Been Raised to Prominence over All the People of the World – the Base I Filled in to Make a High Terrace. I Built Their Structures with Bitumen and Baked Brick Throughout. I Completed it Raising its Top to the Heaven, Making it Gleam Bright as the Sun” The illustration of Nebuchadnezzar II shows him “with his royal conical hat, holding a staff in his left hand and a scroll with the rebuilding plans of the Tower (or a foundation nail) in his outstretched right hand.” \=\

ziggurat of Ur

Tower of Babel Discovered?

In June 2021, the British tabloid The Daily Express ran a story saying that the Tower of Babel actually existed and had been discovered. According to statements made by Tom Meyer, a professor of Bible Studies at Shasta Bible College, there is archeological evidence to suggest that it actually existed and became a tourist destination in the ancient world. [Source: Candida Moss, Daily Beast, June 6, 2021]

Meyer claims people in Babylon attempted to rebuild the Tower of Babel. Candida Moss wrote in the Daily Beast:ISpeaking to Express, Meyer — who is best known for his ability to memorize Bible verses — said that work on the Tower of Babel was restarted on two occasions. The first attempt was initiated by the famous law-giver Hammurabi (1792-1750 B.C.) and the second by Nebuchadnezzar II (605-562 B.C.).

Efforts to rebuild the Tower apparently attracted attention. Meyer said, “When the crème de la crème of the international community was wearing fine linen, purple and scarlet and smelling like cinnamon and frankincense, the new vacation hotspot was the rebuilt Tower of Babel in Babylon.” Meyer cited Henry Hampton Halley’s Bible Handbook (first published in 1926) as evidence for the idea that the “original Tower of Babel” incident occurred “around 2000 BCE” roughly “100 years after the Flood of Noah.” Halley is not a resource for scholars today and, like Meyer, was well-known for his ability to memorize the Bible.

There are, as you might imagine, some problems with this theory. Even putting aside the fact that this theory about the Tower of Babel and its building phases is grounded in the assumption that the Earth was created in 4004 B.C., there’s considerable evidence for the use of a variety of different languages prior to 2242 B.C. (when the initial phase of construction allegedly took place). Tamil and hieroglyphics both pre-date the building of the first Tower of Babel. So even if we ignore all of the archeological evidence for prehistoric hominins, the broad dispersion of human beings, and cultural differences that predate 2242 B.C. there is evidence for a variety of different languages being used before this time. To make matters worse, the book of Genesis itself tells a different story about the diversity of languages that takes place immediately before the Tower of Babel story. Something is amiss here.

Text Sources: Internet Jewish History Sourcebook sourcebooks.fordham.edu “World Religions” edited by Geoffrey Parrinder (Facts on File Publications, New York); “ Encyclopedia of the World’s Religions” edited by R.C. Zaehner (Barnes & Noble Books, 1959); “Old Testament Life and Literature” by Gerald A. Larue, New International Version (NIV) of The Bible, biblegateway.com; Wikipedia, National Geographic, BBC, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Smithsonian magazine, Times of London, The New Yorker, Reuters, AP, AFP, Lonely Planet Guides, and various books and other publications.

Last updated March 2024