Genesis 11

So I am going to do a brief analysis on Genesis chapter 11 for all your viewing pleasure.

To start off I think I should probably throw the chapter in so that you can read it (assuming you don’t have a bible right next to your computer)

[The Tower of Babel]

[11:1] Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. [2] And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. [3] And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. [4] Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” [5] And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. [6] And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. [7] Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.” [8] So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. [9] Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth. And from there the LORD dispersed them over the face of all the earth.

[Shem's Descendants]

[10] These are the generations of Shem. When Shem was 100 years old, he fathered Arpachshad two years after the flood. [11] And Shem lived after he fathered Arpachshad 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

[12] When Arpachshad had lived 35 years, he fathered Shelah. [13] And Arpachshad lived after he fathered Shelah 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

[14] When Shelah had lived 30 years, he fathered Eber. [15] And Shelah lived after he fathered Eber 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

[16] When Eber had lived 34 years, he fathered Peleg. [17] And Eber lived after he fathered Peleg 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

[18] When Peleg had lived 30 years, he fathered Reu. [19] And Peleg lived after he fathered Reu 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

[20] When Reu had lived 32 years, he fathered Serug. [21] And Reu lived after he fathered Serug 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

[22] When Serug had lived 30 years, he fathered Nahor. [23] And Serug lived after he fathered Nahor 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

[24] When Nahor had lived 29 years, he fathered Terah. [25] And Nahor lived after he fathered Terah 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

[26] When Terah had lived 70 years, he fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

[Terah's Descendants]

[27] Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran fathered Lot. [28] Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his kindred, in Ur of the Chaldeans. [29] And Abram and Nahor took wives. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran the father of Milcah and Iscah. [30] Now Sarai was barren; she had no child.

[31] Terah took Abram his son and Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and they went forth together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan, but when they came to Haran, they settled there. [32] The days of Terah were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran.

So to start off I am going to talk about verses 1-9, the “Tower of Babel”.

It is assumed that these verses are not chronologically after chapter 10 because it speaks about one earth having one language, but these events may have taken place during Genesis 10:25

“To Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided”

So it makes sense...ya know, the earth being divided and all, but the bible never clarifies it so it’s still just an assumption.

Anyway back to the story. The story of the tower of babel is actually rather important, and I think it’s actually kind of funny. It is almost directly after the flood and it shows humanity once again defying God, right after he wiped out humanity (well... most of it) for being wicked, they get another chance and BAM their already against God. They are defying God’s command to disperse across the world (Gen 1:9) and they are also attempting to glorify themselves and determine their own destiny without acknowledging the LORD. I think this short story is a great example of how depraved and wicked we are.

This brings us to verse 5, when God decides to intervene. The ESV study bible notes make a funny point saying that it is ironic that God had to come down to see the city. Even after the humans tried so hard to make a massive tower so that they could feel special it was still incredibly small in comparison to God. I think that’s a bit of a fail on humanity’s part.

Yay! Epic fail!

And this bring us to the next section where God uses his almighty almightyness and disperses them by mixing up their languages and thus resulting in the city being named Babel (which means “to confuse” to mix” to mingle”). Babel is also the name used to symbolise the city Babylon, which as a city represents the human ambition to dethrone God and make the earth it’s own.

…am I the only person who giggle’s at the fact that Babylon has “Baby” in it. It’s like God knew they would be a foolish bunch of people so predestined them to be named something that relates them to an infant just for the lols. Hehe, it gets me every time...

Ok that’s enough of the first 9 verses, now onto 10-26… “Shem’s descendants”

So there isn’t much in these verses, it simply shows the timeline between Shem and Terah, telling us the name of their first born and then telling us that they all had several other children.

One thing that would be interesting to note is that this appears to be when lifespans started to decrease. Shem lives 600 years (Gen 11:10) which is nothing compared to his daddy Noah who lived a whopping 950 years (Gen 9:29) but it continues to gradually decrease until it gets to Terah who only lives for 205 years (Gen 11:32). So that’s nice to know, the flood may have possibly had something to do with our diminished lifespans.

Ok, now to talk about verses 27-32… Terah’s Descendants!

So Terah fathered Abram, Nahor and Haran. These verses sort of set the scene for Abram’s story and it’s pretty helpful to read this before reading Abram’s story (I’m sure you all know Abram as the patriarch who would eventually change his name to Abraham.. if you didn’t then now you do). For example, it tells us that Haran fathers Lot. I read the bit later on when Abraham wanted to take Lot out of Sodom so that he wouldn’t get killed and it seemed kind of random to me, if only I had read these chapters…then it would have all made sense!

So the point is these verses set the scene well, so it’s handy to read them :)