Peter Brueghel the Elder, The Tower of Babel. 1563. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria. Oil and Oak Wood.
This article is Part 4 of the FAI Publishing series Seeds and Generations, a Biblical survey of the theology of “Seed” and “Generation” throughout redemptive history to the end of the age.
From the mount to the plain
The scandalous aftermath of the Great Flood proved that while the seed of the serpent had suffered a heavy blow, its head had not yet been crushed.
Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father and told his two brothers outside. When Noah awoke from his wine and knew what his youngest son had done to him, he said, “Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be to his brothers.”[1]
On the slopes of Mout Ararat, the lone surviving family was traumatized by drunkenness, nakedness, exploitation and curses. Even “righteous” and “blameless” Noah still contended with the weakness of the flesh[2], and the seed of the Serpent still infected his bloodline, being imputed to his son Ham and grandson Canaan.
In the following generations, the remnant of humanity migrated over 650 miles (1100 km) southeast from the high mountain range of Eastern Anatolia to the low plains of Shinar between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.[3] It was there that the seed of the Serpent would stake its claim and reach for the heavens.
MIGHTY HUNTERS, TALL TOWERS
More than a century had passed since the family of eight emerged from the ark. By the third generation, Noah’s progeny had begun to thrive on the plains of Shinar.[4] It was during this time that Cush, son of Ham, would father a child whose very name embodied the spirit of the Serpent’s seed. In defiance towards the Seed of the Woman, Cush chose a name for his newborn son meaning “we will rebel.” The Anglicization of the Semitic name is Nimrod.
The Book of Chronicles records Nimrod as the “first on earth to be a mighty man.”[5] He inherits the legacy of the pre-Flood Nephilim, the direct offspring of the serpent’s seed, who were the “the mighty men…of old, the men of renown.”[6] Moses calls him a “mighty hunter before the Lord.”[7] Rising to lead the burgeoning human race, Nimrod established four cities in Shinar before expanding north to build four more in Assyria, inaugurating the world’s first human empire in the place that the Prophet Micah would later refer to as “the Land of Nimrod.”[8]
Two of the cities that the “mighty hunter” founded would endure long after his death to become the symbols of the serpent’s enmity towards the Woman’s Seed and His covenant people. In Assyria he built Nineveh, the city where the people “could not tell their right hand from their left.”[9] Nineveh would become the seat of “The Assyrian,” a nameless king whose violence and oppression of the covenant people prefigured a yet-future king who will embody the seed of the Serpent. In Shinar, Nimrod’s crown jewel was Babel (aka Babylon), the city which took captive the covenant people and threw them to the fire and the lions. Although the ancient city now lays in ruins, Babylon endures as the symbolic city of the Serpent’s enmity, and it looms as a mystery of harlotry and martyrdom to be revealed at the end of this age. It is fitting therefore that Babel would be the stage on which the Serpent’s seed would mount its next affront to the Living God:
Now the whole earth had one language and the same words…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 dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”[10]
Following in the footsteps of Ham, who looked with contempt on his father’s nakedness, Nimrod’s kingdom showed contempt for the covenant of promise made with Noah “and his seed after him...for all future generations.”[11] Unlike Noah, who built an altar to reach heaven with the sweet-smelling aroma of sacrifice, the acolytes of Nimrod built a tower to reach the heavens with the stench of the Serpent’s arrogance.[12] Instead of obeying the Lord’s command to move outward, the denizens of Babel clustered together to climb upwards.[13] Instead of calling on the Name of the Lord, as fits the seed of the woman, the disciples of the Mighty Hunter sought to make a name for themselves.[14] But in the end, it would not be Man who would go up, but the Lord who would come down.
FROM CONSPIRACY TO CONFUSION
As the builders of Babylon clamored towards the top of the heavens, a secret Visitor “came down” to see their works:
And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man 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.”[15]
As in Noah’s day, when the plague of the Nephilim had contaminated the whole Earth with unnatural relations and violence, the Tower of the Serpent’s Seed had once again filled the Cup of Judgment. And once again, the Lord would break into the affairs of men before their conspiracies could succeed. But this time, the inspired writer would employ new language to describe this Divine intervention:
“Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.” So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.[16]
First, the Lord “came down” alone into the heart of Babylon to see the city of the Serpent. But then He mustered all of heaven’s hosts to “go down” with Him a second time, not as a passive observer, but as an active disruptor. His enemies would be confused, dispersed, and their city abandoned.
Therefore, a pattern of climactic confrontation is established between the seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman. The servants of Babylon make a name for themselves, building to the heavens and provoking the One who sits on Heaven’s throne as they seek to “burst the bonds” of gravity and “break the cords” of mortality.[17] It seems as if “nothing will be impossible for them.” But their arrogance is just an illusion of the Serpent’s deception. In reality, “the peoples plot in vain,” for “He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.”[18]
He bowed the heavens and came down;
thick darkness was under his feet.
He rode on a cherub and flew;
he came swiftly on the wings of the wind…
And he sent out his arrows and scattered them;
he flashed forth lightnings and routed them.[19]
The Seed of the Woman came down to traverse Babylon in veiled glory, and He will go down again, accompanied by myriads of His holy ones, to confuse and disperse his enemies. “Lord, confuse the wicked, confound their words, for I see violence and strife in the city.”[20]
And just as the ancient city of Babel was abandoned, so also a future Mystery Babylon will be “thrown down with violence and be found no more.”[21]
Gabe Caligiuri is a regular contributor to THE WIRE publication and podcast, as well as an occasional contributor to other FAI digital content on the subjects of history and geopolitics as they relate to the Great Commission. Gabe and his family live in California.
[1] Genesis 9:21-25
[2] Matthew 26:41
[3] Genesis 11:2.
[4] Eastern Anatolia encompasses most of modern Eastern Turkey, along the border with Armenia. Shinar is in modern Central Iraq.
[5] 1 Chronicles 1:10
[6] Genesis 6:4
[7] Genesis 10:8-12
[8] Micah 5:6
[9] Jonah 4:11
[10] Genesis 11:1,3-4
[11] Genesis 9:8,12
[12] Genesis 8:20
[13] Genesis 9:1
[14] Genesis 4:26
[15] Genesis 11:5-6
[16] Genesis 11:7
[17] Psalm 2:3
[18] Psalm 2:2,4
[19] Psalm 18:9-10, 14
[20] Psalm 55:9 NIV
[21] Revelation 18:21