Genesis 11:7

11:7 Come, let’s go down and confuse 1  their language so they won’t be able to understand each other.” 2 

Genesis 31:30

31:30 Now I understand that 3  you have gone away 4  because you longed desperately 5  for your father’s house. Yet why did you steal my gods?” 6 

1 tn The cohortatives mirror the cohortatives of the people. They build to ascend the heavens; God comes down to destroy their language. God speaks here to his angelic assembly. See the notes on the word “make” in 1:26 and “know” in 3:5, as well as Jub. 10:22-23, where an angel recounts this incident and says “And the Lord our God said to us…. And the Lord went down and we went down with him. And we saw the city and the tower which the sons of men built.” On the chiastic structure of the story, see G. J. Wenham, Genesis (WBC), 1:235.

2 tn Heb “they will not hear, a man the lip of his neighbor.”

3 tn Heb “and now.” The words “I understand that” have been supplied in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.

4 tn The infinitive absolute appears before the perfect verbal form to emphasize the certainty of the action.

5 tn The infinitive absolute appears before the perfect verbal form to emphasize the degree of emotion involved.

6 sn Yet why did you steal my gods? This last sentence is dropped into the speech rather suddenly. See C. Mabee, “Jacob and Laban: The Structure of Judicial Proceedings,” VT 30 (1980): 192-207, and G. W. Coats, “Self-Abasement and Insult Formulas,” JBL 91 (1972): 90-92.