Tower of Babel
Notes:
DISCUSSION QUESTION: What was the Tower of Babel?
Genesis chapter 11 tells of how the people stayed together and built a great tower up into the sky. God became angry with the people and confused their language and caused them to scatter throughout the earth. The confusion of language at the Tower of Babel is from where we get the term “babbling” to describe language that makes no sense.
DISCUSSION QUESTION: Why did the people want to build the Tower of Babel?
Genesis 11:4 "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.” Apparently, the people wanted to “make a name for themselves”. This pride was reprehensible to God. They also didn’t want to spread over the earth. But God had twice previously commanded the people to fill the earth and not stay in one place: Genesis 1:28 “God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.” and “9:1 Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.”