Great Wickedness in the Earth - Part 4

I view the tower of Babel event as another large event where the purposes of God were at risk if God didn't step in.

The Genesis account doesn't give much detail as to who was involved in building the tower.

Genesis 11:
 1 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.

 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.

 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.

 4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

 5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.

 6 And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

 7 Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.

 8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.

 9 Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.

What is meant by " now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do?"

What great evil were they imagining in their hearts? Who are THEY?

The book of Jasher is helpful in elucidating what went on.

Jasher 9:
20 And king Nimrod reigned securely, and all the earth was under his control, and all the earth was of one tongue and words of union.

21 And all the princes of Nimrod and his great men took counsel together; Phut, Mitzraim, Cush and Canaan with their families, and they said to each other, Come let us build ourselves a city and in it a strong tower, and its top reaching heaven, and we will make ourselves famed, so that we may reign upon the whole world, in order that the evil of our enemies may cease from us, that we may reign mightily over them, and that we may not become scattered over the earth on account of their wars.

22 And they all went before the king, and they told the king these words, and the king agreed with them in this affair, and he did so

So this happened under Nimrod, who was feared in all the earth. It appears they sought for more power and control than they already had.

It continues:
23 And all the families assembled consisting of about six hundred thousand men, and they went to seek an extensive piece of ground to build the city and the tower, and they sought in the whole earth and they found none like one valley at the east of the land of Shinar, about two days' walk, and they journeyed there and they dwelt there.

24 And they began to make bricks and burn fires to build the city and the tower that they had imagined to complete.

25 And the building of the tower was unto them a transgression and a sin, and they began to build it, and whilst they were building against the Lord God of heaven, they imagined in their hearts to war against him and to ascend into heaven.

So their purpose was to war with God. The war in heaven has not ended. However, there were three different groups involved.

26 And all these people and all the families divided themselves in three parts; the first said We will ascend into heaven and fight against him; the second said, We will ascend to heaven and place our own gods there and serve them; and the third part said, We will ascend to heaven and smite him with bows and spears; and God knew all their works and all their evil thoughts, and he saw the city and the tower which they were building.

There appears to be little difference between the three groups, they all want to destroy God. They all practice idolatry. Each group was going to ascend by their own merit, and not by the grace of God.

The book of Jasher continues
27 And when they were building they built themselves a great city and a very high and strong tower; and on account of its height the mortar and bricks did not reach the builders in their ascent to it, until those who went up had completed a full year, and after that, they reached to the builders and gave them the mortar and the bricks; thus was it done daily.

28 And behold these ascended and others descended the whole day; and if a brick should fall from their hands and get broken, they would all weep over it, and if a man fell and died, none of them would look at him.

Their hearts had waxed cold, as they had no love for their fellow man. They had but one goal, ascend and fight God.

They were reaching a point where if God didn't intervene,  then the purification by the flood would have become naught.

29 And the Lord knew their thoughts, and it came to pass when they were building they cast the arrows toward the heavens, and all the arrows fell upon them filled with blood, and when they saw them they said to each other, Surely we have slain all those that are in heaven.

30 For this was from the Lord in order to cause them to err, and in order; to destroy them from off the face of the ground.

31 And they built the tower and the city, and they did this thing daily until many days and years were elapsed.

32 And God said to the seventy angels who stood foremost before him, to those who were near to him, saying, Come let us descend and confuse their tongues, that one man shall not understand the language of his neighbor, and they did so unto them.

33 And from that day following, they forgot each man his neighbor's tongue, and they could not understand to speak in one tongue, and when the builder took from the hands of his neighbor lime or stone which he did not order, the builder would cast it away and throw it upon his neighbor, that he would die.

34 And they did so many days, and they killed many of them in this manner.

35 And the Lord smote the three divisions that were there, and he punished them according to their works and designs; those who said, We will ascend to heaven and serve our gods, became like apes and elephants; and those who said, We will smite the heaven with arrows, the Lord killed them, one man through the hand of his neighbor; and the third division of those who said, We will ascend to heaven and fight against him, the Lord scattered them throughout the earth.

36 And those who were left amongst them, when they knew and understood the evil which was coming upon them, they forsook the building, and they also became scattered upon the face of the whole earth.

The big question to me is: why is this important?

Babel is the origin of Babylon. For when babylon was established, it was established after the pattern of babel. The "spirit" of babel lives on, even today. It is the same influence that led to the need for the flood. It is this same influence that will lead to great tribulation. 

Let's revisit the wording of Genesis. " now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do."

In other words, they were going to accomplish their desires. They were going to ascend to heaven and wage war. Their intent was to kill God. Can God be killed? I won't speculate here about that.

What were some of their other designs? Perhaps they feared another flood event, and built a tower to survive a flood?

The Book of Jasher brings up power over their enemies, as well as fame/glory of the world. They didn't want to be scattered over all the earth by their enemies. The irony is that they sought to make war with God, and He scattered them.

All in all, this was another attempt at corrupting all flesh, to thwart the work of God.

God's work shall not be thwarted.

Great Wickedness in the Earth - Part 3

This post will have more speculation than usual, but my readers will see this speculation as fitting another piece into the puzzle that leads to great wickedness on this earth.

I said this post would be about the tower of Babel, but I wish to further expound on the idea that Nimrod reintroduced the giants into the land.

Previously, we established that the fallen angels shared forbidden knowledge with the descendants of Adam and Eve.  Two dominant lines have been disclosed in scripture: that of Seth (the line of the righteous patriarchs) and that of Cain (the line of unrighteous patriarchs).

I postulate that their society was similar to ours in many ways. One way is the ease of accessing vast amounts of knowledge.  Almost all knowledge can be used in two primary ways: for good, or for evil. It's not much of a stretch to imagine how each of the dominant lines of Adam's descendants would use such knowledge.

However, was this information lost in the flood, or did it make it through for Nimrod to discover?

In the writings of Flavius Josephus, a 1st century Jewish scholar loyal to Rome, we find a discussion about the pillars of one named Enoch (descendant of Cain) that were erected before the flood. One was made of stone such as marble, the other of either brick or a metal alloy whose name has lost meaning over the millennia (or both brick and metal). One of these pillars had much forbidden knowledge on it, while the other contained information on where to find caves containing significant amounts of antediluvian writings. One of the pillars is believed to be in Syria, but knowledge of such things has been buried.

If Nimrod found these pillars, and the caves, he  would have easily become a fearsome man. How else would Nimrod go from being an ordinary man, to being a mighty one, like those of old? With the flood still fresh in their memory, a giant would likely cause great fear to come over people.

Genesis 10:8
And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth.

Thus, we can see how a second "incursion" of giants was accomplished whilst the fallen angels were imprisoned according to the book of Enoch. But then, why did this second time not result in corruption of all the earth? Would Nimrod's unknown methods be equal to the fallen angels procreating with the daughters if men? Likely not. Therefore, this race of giants would be less fearsome, smaller in stature, and cause less corruption than their antescendants.

Furthermore, it is my opinion that the tower of Babel event would not have occurred without the forbidden knowledge written on those pillars.

What happened with this knowledge after the tower of babel? There are many secret societies that claim their knowledge came down from one named Enoch. They profess to have received this information from the righteous Enoch, but then why the need to keep it secret by wicked oaths?

More on the tower of Babel soon.