That Strange Tower Of Babel Story

By James Donahue

“Now the whole earth had one language and few words. And as men migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth."

“And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the sons of men had built. And the Lord said, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's speech."

“So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of the earth.” - Genesis 11.

This ancient tale from the pages of the Book of Genesis has perplexed many Bible scholars because it doesn’t seem to make sense.

It appears to be myth designed to explain why humans were spread all over the world, and evolved into so many different cultures, languages and races after allegedly springing from the same root.

The story leaves us with more questions than answers. For example, what would make a people think it was important to build a tower that would reach the heavens? Was it an effort to get closer to their god? And why would this god become so angered by such a tower that as punishment, the people would be scattered all over the earth and given such a variety of skin colors, bodily appearances and languages?

That humans have found themselves so varied has led to bigotry, mistrust and centuries of war. This racial, ethnic and religious difference has led to conflicts and obstructed our natural evolution.

This event occurred in the heart of Mesopotamia, and according to the text, was at or very near the great City of Babylon not far from Baghdad, Iraq. The ruins of that ancient place can still be found there today. And in the midst of the ruins archaeologists have located what they say appears to be the foundation of a tower. It is a square of earthen embankments measuring about three hundred feet on each side.

There wasn’t just one tower. As the area developed and other cities founded, they too contained towers, or stepped pyramids called ziggurats. To date the remains of nearly 30 of these structures have been uncovered. They are found in various sizes with bases ranging from 20 meters on a side to over 90 meters. Some cities had two ziggurats, and the City of Kish was found to have three of them.

The very oldest ziggurat is not the one in Babylon, but rather at Eridu. This ruin is estimated to have been started at its earliest time between 4,300 and 3,500 BC. Ziggurats were on-going projects, or staged towers, with new levels added as the years passed. Thus they were built in steps, or terraces. It is believed that each level was a temple, or shrine, built on top of the ruins of the last.

The ziggurat at Babylon is believed to have been the largest structure in the region. Since Marduk, either the emperor Nimrod or his son, was considered the god of the people, some historians suggest that the towers were built to honor or worship him. Yet the final work on this tower is believed to have been ordered by King Nebuchadnezzar II, at around 600 BC. It was said to have stood 295 feet high, and was constructed of baked brick enameled in brilliant blue. The terraces may have been planted with flowers and even trees.

Obviously, the archaeological evidence does not support the Genesis story of the Tower of Babel. So was that merely mythology or a story based upon a real event?

That people gathered at one place and established a city is true. The tower then was constructed because the people wanted to “make a name for ourselves.” This is a natural thing for humans to do. Many great cities stand today with unique structures that mark them as a special place in the world. The Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Empire State Building in New York, and the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco are examples.

Yet we sense here that there was something unique and special about this particular tower. It went beyond pride of the citizenry and making the City of Babel a showplace of the known world.

Also there is a final part to this verse that seems to reflect a warning. “Let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.” Was this a real fear that some kind of judgment awaited? And what kind of god would make this kind threat? Is it just a fabricated story?

And lo-and-behold, according to the story, this god did just what the people feared. He came down to see what they were building and said: “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.”

This sounds very much like the same lament this god had after Adam and Eve ate of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. He said “behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil.” At this time man was expelled from the Garden. Now, after building a city and a tower to heaven, the punishment was to be scattered all over the world and the language confused in a variety of tongues.

Something obviously astounding occurred at Babel, but the Genesis story only gives us a twisted version of the real event. In doing some research on ley and grid lines, I ran into some information that may shed some light on what was happening there and perhaps all over the Earth in those ancient times.

John Michell, in his book The View Over Atlantis, looks at the complex system of giant stones, pyramids, pillars, mounds, earthworks, underground tunnels, circles of erect pillars and lines of enormous blocks of stone that all form alignments. Michell believes they were built on what are called ley lines, or ancient lines of power that once circled the planet.

Rene Noorbergen, in his book: Secrets of the Lost Races, carries Michell’s idea farther. He writes: “…just as local sections of the ley lines had a specific center or even several modes where the energies converged, so it is likely that the single authority operated from a world center where the energies of the entire global line were gathered.”

Could this have been the purpose of the Tower of Babel? The great tower at Babel was located in the center of the known world at that time. Could it have been a point where the energy of the world ley line system linked not to the stars, but to the core of the Earth?

Noorbergen believes “the system appears to have operated for a period of time, but then something happened, something significant enough to mark a break in world conditions and to bring the world line system to an end. Before the event, the construction of the system had necessitated a unified world. At some specific point in time that unity was decisively broken. The single directing authority lost its power, and its world center ceased to operate.

“Following the event, new conditions prevailed, and the people of the world were fragmented into factions, making unity of effort and the coordinated working of the ley lines no longer possible,” Noorbergen wrote.

Michell adds: “All we can suppose is that some overwhelming disaster, whether or not of natural origin, destroyed a system whose maintenance depended upon its control of certain natural forces across the entire earth.”

What is astounding is that Noorbergen also suggests that the City of Babel and its great tower was a mighty political center in its day for a world government. He wrote that the tower, “intended to be a great structure reaching to the skies, may have represented something even more significant.”

He suggests that the tower was a type of receiving station for the ley line currents of the earth. “By their possession of such a center of the world’s energies, the ruling authorities at Babel literally controlled the world, for everyone who desired to benefit from the ley line system would have had to serve the rulers of Babel.”

And in this we see where the very seeds of corruption may have been planted. Remember that in spite of the existing spiritual and occult knowledge of that day, the powers of darkness are always waiting in the wings for a chance to disrupt the path mankind is on. There appears to be a need for balance in all things. Without this constant ebb and flow of energies, described as good vs. bad, or light vs. dark, the best laid plans of mankind can quickly fall into ruin.

Noorbergen writes that the post flood ley line system may well have been a reconstruction of a system used before the flood. “The antediluvians thus developed a sophisticated form of technology that incorporated the use of both material and occult energies as its power base, and the ley line system was simply a further extension of this occult technology.”

Supposing Michell and Noorbergen are offering a correct version of ancient events. After all, the man-made stone structures exist and it has been established that they follow some form of grid or energy lines once held sacred to indigenous people who practiced the ancient occult crafts.

Thus is is possible that it was the people, themselves, who were the cause of the downfall of the Tower of Babel and the breakup of the one-world government system. Every attempt to return to that level of perfect unity has failed ever since.

We can only guess at the cause of that original collapse; a misuse of power, a revolution or perhaps a natural disaster caused a complete breakdown of the existing government. It may even have been warfare that involved the use of nuclear weapons. It had to have been an event of such magnitude that the perfect system that existed in Babel was wrecked forever.

What remained was a fragmentized world filled with small clusters of people that went their own way, eventually developing their own cultures and governments, and becoming societies unto themselves.

Thus the myth of god’s wrath causing the destruction of Babel and bringing about world chaos emerged in an attempt to explain what happened.

A lot can happen over a period of thousands of years. The very fabric of recorded history can be altered and changed by rulers for obvious political reasons.

That Nimrod and Semiramis declared themselves gods, with Semiramis making herself the first “mother of god,” suggests that spiritual deception was born at the very start of the Mesopotamian Empire.

The tragedy of all of this has been that humans became so involved in their own religious belief systems, their distrust and hatred for neighboring tribes and nations, they stepped away from the spiritual path on which they were directed to follow. Thus they failed to find the gods within, and properly evolve mentally and spiritually. In the process they succeeded in making the world a more difficult place for humans to live.

Why would we have done this to ourselves? Was it spiritual possession? Have we been duped by alien or spiritual forces that would prevent us from achieving a perfect world where we all can live in harmony without suffering? Remember that the so-called “gods” looked down at the people of Babel and lamented: this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.”

To stop what was happening, the plan was hatched to “go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's speech." And after this the people were scattered over the world. Division is always the best way to stir trouble, and it was done very effectively at Babel.

No matter how you look at this story, the destruction of Babel and the scattering of the people was not the work of a loving god.

The one-world government and one-world language concept was replaced by something more complex. It has since kept humans so busy fighting among themselves and struggling for survival they have had little chance to grow mentally and spiritually.

Thus there is a suspicion that the people submitted to authority even at Babel and followed demonic-driven men out of heaven and into a world of chaos.