Genesis · chapter 11 of 50
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Genesis 11 tells how Noah's descendants, who spoke one language, build a city and a tower in Shinar to make a name for themselves. The Lord comes down, confuses their language and scatters them over the whole earth. Then comes the genealogy of Shem down to Terah, father of Abram, Nahor and Haran, who leaves Ur and settles in Haran, where he dies.
Genesis 11 closes the first part of the book, the story of the origins of humanity, and opens the second, the story of Abraham. After the flood, humanity again rises against God at Babel. Against that collective pride, the end of the chapter prepares the call of a single man, Abram, whom God will use to bless all nations.
The whole earth had one language. As people migrate eastward, they find a plain in the land of Shinar and settle there. They make baked bricks and use bitumen for mortar, and say: let us build a city and a tower whose top reaches the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered over the face of the whole earth.
The Lord comes down to see the city and the tower. He observes that they are one people with one language, and that nothing they plan will be impossible for them. So he confuses their language so that they cannot understand one another and scatters them over the face of all the earth. They stop building the city, and it is called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language.
The rest of the chapter follows the genealogy of Shem, from Arpachshad, born two years after the flood, to Terah, who at seventy begets Abram, Nahor and Haran. Haran, father of Lot, dies in Ur of the Chaldeans before his father. Abram marries Sarai, who is barren, and Nahor marries Milcah. Terah takes Abram, his grandson Lot and Sarai, leaves Ur for Canaan but stops in Haran, where he dies at 205 years old.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The people say they will build a city and a tower and make a name for themselves so as not to be scattered. They want security and fame by their own means, instead of filling the earth as God had commanded.
The Lord observes that they are one people with one language and that, if they continue, nothing will be impossible for them. His judgment is not a whim: it halts the advance of a collective pride turned against God.
The city is called Babel because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth and from there scattered them. The human plan to stay united and powerful ends in confusion, and its name stands as an example for the rest of the Bible.
Terah takes Abram, Lot and Sarai and leaves Ur of the Chaldeans for Canaan, but stops in Haran. It is a quiet step that prepares for God's call to Abram in the next chapter.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: One language and the same words. — Genesis 11:1
Answer: A city with a tower reaching to the heavens, to make a name for themselves and not be scattered. — Genesis 11:4
Answer: He confused their language so they could not understand one another and scattered them over the earth. — Genesis 11:7-8
Answer: Because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. — Genesis 11:9
Answer: She was barren and had no child. — Genesis 11:30
Answer: In Haran, at 205 years old. — Genesis 11:32
Babel shows the desire to make a name without God. In a group you can ask where we seek prestige and security on our own, in our personal lives and in the church. God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble.
The end of the chapter provides a contrast: against a city that wants a name, God will call a childless man in order to give him a name. Ask where in your life there is a barrenness or a wait in which God can work, and how to trust that he fulfills his purposes even when the outlook seems closed.
Genesis 11 ends with Terah dead in Haran and Abram, married to a barren woman, ready to listen. Genesis 12 begins with the voice of God, who calls Abram to leave his land and promises blessing for all the families of the earth.
The text stresses pride: they wanted to make a name for themselves and avoid the command to fill the earth. God does not act out of fear of their work but to halt a collective project of self-reliance, and the scattering fulfills in its own way the command to populate the whole earth.
Many Christians see a contrast between the two. At Babel languages divide humanity; in Acts 2 the Spirit enables the disciples to be understood by people of many languages, and the gospel reaches all nations. The text of Genesis does not make that connection, but the church has seen it since ancient times.
Terah was the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. The text says only that he took his family and left Ur of the Chaldeans for Canaan but settled in Haran. Acts 7:2-4 indicates that God had appeared to Abraham in Mesopotamia, which suggests that the family move had a divine origin.