Genesis 11:4

Let us build us a city. Cain had built the first city (ch. 4:17), in an attempt, perhaps, to avoid the nomadic life God had marked out for him. God’s original plan called for men to spread over the face of the earth and to cultivate the soil (see ch. 1:28). The building of cities represented opposition to this plan. The concentration of human beings has always encouraged laziness, immorality, and other vices. Cities have ever been hotbeds of crime, for in such an environment Satan finds less resistance to his attacks than in smaller communities where people live in close touch with nature. God had told Noah to replenish, or fill, the earth (ch. 9:1). In fear of unknown or suspected dangers, however, men wanted to build a city, in the hope of finding security through the works of their hands. They chose to forget that true security comes only in trusting and obeying God. The rapidly increasing descendants of Noah must have departed very soon from the worship of the true God. In the fear that their evil ways would again invite catastrophe, they sought protection.

A tower. This would give inhabitants of the city the desired feeling of security. Such a citadel would protect them against attack, and enable them, they believed, to escape another flood — which God had promised should never be. The Flood had covered the highest mountains of the antediluvian world, but had not reached “unto heaven.” If, therefore, a structure higher than the mountains could be erected, men reasoned, they would be safe whatever God might do. Archeological excavations reveal that the earliest inhabitants of Lower Mesopotamia erected many towerlike temples dedicated to the worship of various idol deities.

Let us make us a name. The Tower of Babel was to have been a monument to the superior wisdom and skill of its builders. To establish a “name,” or reputation, for themselves, men have been willing to endure hardship, danger, and privation. The desire for renown was apparently one of the impelling motives for building the tower, and pride in such a structure would, in turn, tend to maintain unity in the accomplishment of other unsanctified schemes. According to the divine purpose, men were to have preserved unity through the bond of true religion. When idolatry and polytheism broke this inner spiritual bond, they lost not only unity of religion but also the spirit of brotherhood. A project such as the tower, to preserve by outward means the inward unity which had been lost, could never succeed. Obviously, only those who had forsaken God took part in these activities.