Discovery BoxGenesis 11:7 
Context11:7 Come, let’s go down and confuse 1 their language so they won’t be able to understand each other.” 2
Genesis 31:30
Context31:30 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
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.
