Discovery BoxGenesis 11:4-6 
Context11:4 Then they said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens 1 so that 2 we may make a name for ourselves. Otherwise 3 we will be scattered 4 across the face of the entire earth.”
11:5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the people 5 had started 6 building. 11:6 And the Lord said, “If as one people all sharing a common language 7 they have begun to do this, then 8 nothing they plan to do will be beyond them. 9
1 tn A translation of “heavens” for שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) fits this context because the Babylonian ziggurats had temples at the top, suggesting they reached to the heavens, the dwelling place of the gods.
2 tn The form וְנַעֲשֶׂה (vÿna’aseh, from the verb עשׂה, “do, make”) could be either the imperfect or the cohortative with a vav (ו) conjunction (“and let us make…”). Coming after the previous cohortative, this form expresses purpose.
3 tn The Hebrew particle פֶּן (pen) expresses a negative purpose; it means “that we be not scattered.”
4 sn The Hebrew verb פָּוָץ (pavats, translated “scatter”) is a key term in this passage. The focal point of the account is the dispersion (“scattering”) of the nations rather than the Tower of Babel. But the passage also forms a polemic against Babylon, the pride of the east and a cosmopolitan center with a huge ziggurat. To the Hebrews it was a monument to the judgment of God on pride.
5 tn Heb “the sons of man.” The phrase is intended in this polemic to portray the builders as mere mortals, not the lesser deities that the Babylonians claimed built the city.
6 tn The Hebrew text simply has בָּנוּ (banu), but since v. 8 says they left off building the city, an ingressive idea (“had started building”) should be understood here.
7 tn Heb “and one lip to all of them.”
8 tn Heb “and now.” The foundational clause beginning with הֵן (hen) expresses the condition, and the second clause the result. It could be rendered “If this…then now.”
9 tn Heb “all that they purpose to do will not be withheld from them.”
