I was listening to a recent speech that Matt Dillahunty gave in Australia (listen here if you’re interested), and in part of it he brought up the story of the Tower of Babel, found in Genesis 11. It’s a story I’ve thought about several times since leaving Christianity. I don’t recall everything Matt said about it, though I know I’ll be making some of the same points he did. I haven’t been a Christian for about 5 years now, and it’s sometimes hard to imagine that I ever believed stories like this one, though I definitely did. And a number of other conservative Christians do as well.
A few days ago, I asked my wife if she remembered what God was angry about in this story, and she gave the same reason that I thought: God was angry because people were being prideful. In case you’ve forgotten, the crux of the story is that several generations after the flood, mankind was growing numerous, and they all had one common language. They decided to build a tower that would reach Heaven (see how prideful?), so God put a stop to it by confusing their language. This caused the various groups to split up, each person going along with whomever could understand him or her.
However, after looking at the details a bit more, it turns out that my recollection was a bit off. First, the people weren’t actually being prideful at all. Instead of trying to build a tower to Heaven — God’s abode — they were just trying to build a tall one to make it easier to stay in one geographic area:
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.”
— Genesis 11:1-4
The phrase “in the heavens” is just talking about the sky, not the realm of God. For just a moment though, let’s pretend that they really had been trying to reach God with their tower. Why would that be such a bad thing? Doesn’t the Bible repeatedly tell us to seek after God? Furthermore, would they have succeeded? On September 12, 2013, Voyager 1 actually left our solar system. In all those miles, it didn’t bump into Heaven. No earth-based tower would ever run the risk of reaching God’s home. So not only were the people not attempting that, even if they had been it wouldn’t have succeeded, and it actually would have been flattering toward God.
So if God wasn’t angry at them for being prideful, why did he confuse their language and force them apart? The next few verses give us the answer:
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.
— Genesis 11:5-9
Essentially, God was just being a jerk. He was like a kid stirring up an anthill. I mean, God forbid (literally) that people advance technologically, right? Wouldn’t want them discovering things like the germ theory of disease, after all. And why prevent wars by keeping people within the same culture? Much better, I guess, to create different cultures so mistrust and bigotry can form. Furthermore, if this was such a problem at the time, why hasn’t he stopped us again? We’ve figured out ways to overcome language and culture barriers now. We’ve done so much more than just “build a tall tower.” God’s motivation in this story simply makes no sense at all.
However, if you step back for a moment and stop trying to view this as literal history with an actual god, things become clearer. Imagine living thousands of years ago and trying to make sense of the world around you. You think the world is flat and that the sun revolves around it. You don’t understand the cause of thunder storms, earthquakes, or volcanoes. You can’t imagine how animals and humans got here without some kind of creator. And if there’s a creator, why didn’t he make life easier? Why does he allow disease and starvation? There are so many difficult questions that just have no answer. And so people began to formulate answers as best they could. It’s easy to see that one of those questions may have been “why didn’t God (the gods) give us all the same language?” And so they came up with an answer.
Looking at it from that perspective, it’s much easier to understand how a story like this came to be. These people were dealing with the world as they saw it — and to them, the only reason they could think of for God not wanting everyone to have the same language, is that they would accomplish too much. They had no idea that humanity would one day find a way around that problem, rendering their explanation invalid.
Speaking as someone who grew up believing that stories like this were actual history, I know how easy it is to just go along under that assumption without question, especially if those around us believe as we do. It’s not stupidity; it’s either isolation and ignorance, or it’s stubbornness. We can help the isolated and ignorant by just being available to discuss these things when they come up. And with the Bible, there are plenty of examples to be found.
Finding Truth 
Here is what Jews say about the “Jesus prophecies” in Isaiah 53:
The 53rd chapter of Isaiah is a beautiful, poetic song, one of the four “Servant Songs” in which the prophet describes the climactic period of world history when the Messiah will arrive and the Jewish people assume the role as the spiritual leaders of humanity. Isaiah 53 is a prophecy foretelling how the world will react when they witness Israel’s salvation in the Messianic era. The verses are presented from the perspective of world leaders, who contrast their former scornful attitude toward the Jews with their new realization of Israel’s grandeur. After realizing how unfairly they treated the Jewish people, they will be shocked and speechless.
While the original Hebrew text clearly refers to the Jewish people as the “Suffering Servant,” over the centuries Isaiah 53 has become a cornerstone of the Christian claim that Jesus is the Messiah. Unfortunately, this claim is based on widespread mistranslations and distortion of context. In order to properly understand these verses, one must read the original Hebrew text. When the Bible is translated into other languages, it loses much of its essence. The familiar King James translation uses language which is archaic and difficult for the modern reader. Furthermore, it is not rooted in Jewish sources and often goes against traditional Jewish teachings. Modern translations, while more readable, are often even more divorced from the true meaning of the text.
For an accurate Jewish translation of the Bible, read the “ArtScroll English Tanach.”
The Context of Isaiah 53
The key to deciphering any biblical text is to view it in context. Isaiah 53 is the fourth of the four “Servant Songs.” (The others are found in Isaiah chapters 42, 49 and 50.) Though the “servant” in Isaiah 53 is not openly identified – these verses merely refer to “My servant” (52:13, 53:11) – the “servant” in each of the previous Servant Songs is plainly and repeatedly identified as the Jewish nation. Beginning with chapter 41, the equating of God’s Servant with the nation of Israel is made nine times by the prophet Isaiah, and no one other than Israel is identified as the “servant”:
•“You are My servant, O Israel” (41:8)
•“You are My servant, Israel” (49:3)
•see also Isaiah 44:1, 44:2, 44:21, 45:4, 48:20
The Bible is filled with other references to the Jewish people as God’s “servant”; see Jeremiah 30:10, 46:27-28; Psalms 136:22. There is no reason that the “servant” in Isaiah 53 would suddenly switch and refer to someone other than the Jewish people.
One obvious question that needs to be addressed: How can the “Suffering Servant,” which the verses refer to grammatically in the singular, be equated with the entire Jewish nation?
The Jewish people are consistently referred to with the singular pronoun.
This question evaporates when we discover that throughout the Bible, the Jewish people are consistently referred to as a singular entity, using the singular pronoun. For example, when God speaks to the entire Jewish nation at Mount Sinai, all of the Ten Commandments are written as if speaking to an individual (Exodus 20:1-14). This is because the Jewish people are one unit, bound together with a shared national destiny (see Exodus 4:22, Deuteronomy chapter 32). This singular reference is even more common in biblical verses referring to the Messianic era, when the Jewish people will be fully united under the banner of God (see Hosea 14:6-7, Jeremiah 50:19).
As we will see, for numerous reasons this chapter cannot be referring to Jesus. Even in the Christian scriptures, the disciples did not consider the Suffering Servant as referring to Jesus (see Matthew 16:21-22, Mark 9:31-32, Luke 9:44-45). So how did the Suffering Servant come to be associated with Jesus? After his death, the promoters of Christianity retroactively looked into the Bible and “applied” – through mistranslation and distortion of context – these biblical verses as referring to Jesus.
Missionary apologist Walter Riggans candidly admitted:
“There is no self-evident blueprint in the Hebrew Bible which can be said to unambiguously point to Jesus. Only after one has come to believe that Jesus was the Messiah, and more specifically the kind of Messiah that he is, does it all begin to make sense…” (Yehoshua Ben David, Olive Press 1995, p.155)
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The rest of the article goes verse by verse through Isaiah 53 and clearly refutes the Christian claim that this chapter is talking about Jesus as the Suffering Servant. The Suffering Servant in this chapter is clearly shown to be the people of Israel referred to in the singular, as occurs in many other passages in the Jewish Bible. To read the full article, click here:
http://www.aish.com/sp/ph/Isaiah_53_The_Suffering_Servant.html
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Arch, you mention about John being written in Greek. Bart Ehrman in ‘Jesus Interrupted’, mentions that there are some Greek word plays in the interaction between Jesus and Nicodemus in John chapter 3. These word plays would not have worked in Aramaic. This makes very strong circumstantial evidence that the discourse of John 3 is a not a translation of what Jesus actually said, but rather a creation by the evangelist.
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Actually i think I’m only at 2. Blew up on Ark’s blog several months ago and once on NueteredNun when she went Apesh&* on my “About” page… not too shabby in my opinion:)
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Peter, what’s the actual likelihood that an author, writing a full 70+ years after the alleged death of Yeshua, 73 years after the beginning of his alleged ministry, is going to be quoting ANYthing he said?
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Arch, the Christian response is:
But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. (John 14:26)
So you won’t win that argument with a person of faith.
Hence you need to attack the matter indirectly and point out the inconsistencies between the Gospel accounts.
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So, Peter – pseudoJohn, writing his gospel after nearly a century, anticipated criticism and created his on fall-back – can’t say he wasn’t clever.
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Meant to type, “own fallback”
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Hard-core Christians who believe that they always have the fall back of “God poofed it…and it was so” will never see the truth about their superstition-laced ancient folk tale.
Let’s hope that less brainwashed Christians, especially the younger generations, will search the internet to investigate what their pastors and priests are telling them, and will come across skeptics’ blogs where, with an open mind, they will realize how absolutely ridiculous and riddled with errors and discrepancies their belief system really is, and will deconvert.
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Arch, this is why it is so critical in debating the Bible to determine criteria that would objectively whether or not it seemed to be a divine book or a very human book. Because depending upon one’s conclusion in this regard interpretations will vastly differ.
A frustration of mine on these blogs is finding Christians who are prepared to seriously consider this matter. Most just say it is divine. Those who are prepared to argue tend to trot out the apologist standard arguments such as fulfilled prophecy, internal consistency, beauty of composition and moral superiority. However these arguments don’t actually stand up to serious consideration – but they are repeated so often by apologists who imply they are agreed facts.
Nate has some good items on this blog showing that the prophecy argument does not stand up to scrutiny.
In regard to Jesus fulfilling Old Testament prophecy. It is seems likely that Mark actually wrote his passion account to make it accord with prophecy. We can learn this by seeing how the subsequent Gospel writers who were less concerned about this changed crucial aspects (especially John – whose account cannot be reconciled to Mark). It is telling that the earliest parts of the New Testament, Paul’s undisputed letters say very little about the life of Jesus.
Albert Schweitzer probably had it correct all along. Jesus was a failed apocalyptic figure.
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A fundamentalist Baptist pastor (and childhood family friend) is trying to persuade me (and my blog readers) to return to faith in Jesus based on the “overwhelming” accuracy of the Bible including fulfilled prophecies, historical accounts, archeology, and other assertions. He even says that there is evidence for the Tower of Babel! He is a very nice man but seems to be clueless to the mountains of evidence on the internet that refutes each and every one of his “inerrant” beliefs. If anyone is interested in reading what the good pastor is saying, google this (Nate’s blog won’t allow me to post a link):
Escaping Christian Fundamentalism, Fundamentalist Baptist Pastor Bill responds, Part 2
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“This is NOT what I said! As usual you twist and turn things to make YOUR point. YOU had said, …but the entire context of the Bible indicates it would be sinful actions referencing the Tower of Babel discussion.
”
Oh please stop your intellectual dishonesty. That was not my entire quote. Howie Admitted the passage was not clear to intent. I agreed it was not specifically stated and then stated that it (the intent) all throughout the context of the Bible is related to sin not Nate’s silly its about technology but ummmm….not about knowledge. (and they beg Christians twist to suit themselves)
You are either intellectually dishonest not to admit the Bible deals chiefly with sin (which WAS the point you objected to) or you are intellectually dishonest claiming you even read it
Take your pick.
Dave…..two things …. It matters in my book if someone lies about something clearly being in a text when it isn’t in there (especially PURE hypocrisy on a blog chiefly alleging christians twist and read in and read out of things) so its an integrity thing and integrity matters. Second
I got your last response (your blog post didn’t seem to be a direct response so read the one here) and will respond over the weekend on your blog if thats okay.
OH…… P.S. briefly saw Pete’s laugher that Nate showed prophecy doesn’t hold up. 🙂 The most notable thing I have ever seen Nate do is claim a fence was a wall (which even one of his stampers told him was a bit much) in order to make his no prophecy has been fulfilled claim not do the belly flop and beg that an island could have a border with a city a few miles up the coast and on the mainland (talk about contradictions – islands share ground borders with mainlands …lol). Third would be his rebut that Israel is not a righteous nation now which was pretty much a rebuttal to air since no one ever makes the claim that all prophecies are even supposed to be fulfilled. That status would be the last one to be fulfilled but Nate doesn’t know that since most of his research comes from WIkipedia and a guy named Till who is infamous for being uneducated on the things he talked about..
But Pete…….whatever floats your boat……well…and rubber stamps it. Got to do that.
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Here is a list of all the failed prophecies in the Bible:
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/proph/long.html
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Gary, the Archaeological evidence is now so conclusive it is not possible to objectively claim that the Bible is real history. There may be aspects of real history in the Bible, but the majority of the history seems to be re-writing after the event.
One of the best explanations I saw for the old Testament was that the Jews struggled to develop a theology of their god that explained their actual history of humiliation and defeat. As part of this a glorious early history was created in the patriarch’s and Moses, even David and Solomon seemed to have been greatly exaggerated.
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Yes, Peter. I agree. Nothing makes you feel better in your misery and despair as a vanquished people as to suddenly learn that you are descended from a great and powerful ancient people.
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Gary, I should have added the promises that your all powerful God is going to give you a glorious future. Indeed in Isaiah 60 the implication is that the Jews will be in charge and the Gentile nations will come and pay them homage.
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Did everyone see the result of the Irish gay marriage vote yesterday? In one of the most Catholic countries in the world, Irish voters rejected the anti-gay diatribes of their clergymen and approved gay marriage by more than 60%!
Could there be any more striking example of the unrelenting death-spiral of conservative/traditional Christianity in Western culture?
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“It is seems likely that Mark actually wrote his passion account to make it accord with prophecy.” – Exactly, manufactured prophecy fulfillment – note also, how Matthew, much more than Mark, strove to reach back into Isaiah, Jerimiah, and Psalms prophecies to manufacture validity for Yeshua. Then there’s Matthew’s exaggerations – where pseudoMark says Yesua healed a leper outside a city’s gates, pseudoMatthew says he healed two! Etc.
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What I find interesting, Peter and David, is the theme that runs consistently through the OT, from the boy, David, defeating the giant, Goliath, to Abraham leading 300 Ninja/shepherds to the defeat of five battle-seasoned Mesopotamian armies, to all of the other instances of small Jewish forces defeating large armies, because their god is on their side. All of these can easily be seen as half-time pep-talks to a minority surrounded by hostile forces.
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“Oh please stop your intellectual dishonesty.” – ABlacksmanagain
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Gary, reading your post of Isaiah 53 reminded me of just how vague the OT was, and how all the “clear and simple” evidences for Jesus being the messiah were anything but, once I actually went back through the OT to see if the claims of people like Matthew actually matched up.
I know it’s been mentioned here a few times, but that children’s story “the Emperor’s New Clothes” kept coming to mind as i made my way through deconversion. it was a quick journey, and it was extremely easy to see once you opened your eyes.
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Hi Peter,
I’ve seen several others on here present information on this but I’m very curious what resources finally convinced you of this conclusion.
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Howie
I read ‘The Biew from Nebo’
It is not a particularly academic book, but it built on what I had already learnt from Finklestein, Dever and Friedman. From them I had already concluded that Moses and the Exodus had no evidence and David was vastly exaggerated, and Solomon was not even attested to outside of the Bible.
However what really persuaded me was in The View From Nebo was the evidence that The Book of Kings is more theology than history. But the real clincher was the evidence that Nehemiah/Ezra was not even accurate. That is, the land was not deserted in the Babylon exile as portrayed in that book. In fact most of the Jews stayed in the land.
In essence the whole OT is a theological re-writing of history. That is, it is more akin to a modern historical novel than actual history. At the very least it is loose with the truth, but the term ‘fabrication’ would be more what I concluded. The view from Nebo highlights how this applies again and again to the narrative on the Book of Kings.
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William there are some areas where Matthew displays a lack of proper understanding of Hebrew and misapplies OT prophecy. Two are his Palm Sunday account. Firstly he does not understand Hebrew parallelism in poetry and has Jesus riding two animals rather than one, and the second is he does not actually understand what the word ‘Hosanna’ means in Hebrew.
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As I am reading orthodox Jewish author Asher Norman’s book, “Twenty-six reasons why Jews don’t believe in Jesus”, I am shocked at some of the things Jews see as errors in the Christian New Testament, such as this:
Jesus quoted from an Old Testament passage that does not exist!
On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, 38 and let the one who believes in me drink. As[a] the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart[b] shall flow rivers of living water.’”
John 7:37-38
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