TANAKH SOURCES:
(1) Everyone on earth had the same language and the same words. (2) And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. (3) They said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and burn them hard.”—Brick served them as stone, and bitumen served them as mortar.— (4) And they said, “Come, let us build us a city, and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for ourselves; else we shall be scattered all over the world.” (5) יהוה came down to look at the city and tower that humanity had built, (6) and יהוה said, “If, as one people with one language for all, this is how they have begun to act, then nothing that they may propose to do will be out of their reach. (7) Let us, then, go down and confound their speech there, so that they shall not understand one another’s speech.” (8) Thus יהוה scattered them from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. (9) That is why it was called Babel, because there יהוה confounded the speech of the whole earth; and from there יהוה scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
- What exactly did the people do wrong in building this tower?
GEMARA SOURCES:
- What do you think the significance of axe, water, and valley part is?
- Why do you think dividing into three factions is significant here?
- What do you think about these specific three factions?
תניא רבי נתן אומר: כולם לשם עבודת כוכבים נתכוונו. כתיב הכא: (בראשית יא, ד) "נעשה לנו שם" וכתיב התם (שמות כג, יג) "ושם אלהים אחרים לא תזכירו" - מה להלן עבודת כוכבים, אף כאן עבודת כוכבים.
It is taught in a baraita: Rabbi Natan says: All of those factions intended to build the tower for the sake of idol worship. It is written here: “And let us make a name for us” (Genesis 11:4), and it is written there: “And make no mention of the name of the other gods” (Exodus 23:13). Just as there, the connotation of “name” is idol worship, so too here, the connotation of “name” is idol worship.
- What do you think about the connection between the Tower of Babel and idol worship?
The Tower of Babel and Nimrod:
אבל עובדי כוכבים אינן כן נתתי גדולה לנמרוד אמר (בראשית יא, ד) הבה נבנה לנו עיר
But the gentile nations of the world are not so. I granted greatness to Nimrod, yet he said: “Come, let us build a city and a tower, with its top in heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name” (Genesis 11:4).
(ח) וְכ֖וּשׁ יָלַ֣ד אֶת־נִמְרֹ֑ד ה֣וּא הֵחֵ֔ל לִֽהְי֥וֹת גִּבֹּ֖ר בָּאָֽרֶץ׃ (ט) הֽוּא־הָיָ֥ה גִבֹּֽר־צַ֖יִד לִפְנֵ֣י יְהֹוָ֑ה עַל־כֵּן֙ יֵֽאָמַ֔ר כְּנִמְרֹ֛ד גִּבּ֥וֹר צַ֖יִד לִפְנֵ֥י יְהֹוָֽה׃
(8) Cush also begot Nimrod, who was the first mighty figure on earth. (9) He was a mighty hunter by the grace of יהוה; hence the saying, “Like Nimrod a mighty hunter by the grace of יהוה.”
בֶּן בְּנוֹ שֶׁל נִמְרוֹד הָרָשָׁע, שֶׁהִמְרִיד אֶת כָּל הָעוֹלָם כּוּלּוֹ עָלַי בְּמַלְכוּתוֹ.
...the disciple in corruption of Nimrod the wicked, who caused the entire world to rebel against Me during his reign by advising the generation of the dispersion to build a tower in order to fight the Hosts of Heaven...
THE TAKEAWAY - What are we worshipping?
Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, Abraham's Journey, pg. 37
This pagan gives reference to doctrine over living souls, to the figment of some utopian idea over human reality. This society is ruled by power-hungry men who want to possess and own the individual -- or rather to deprive the individual of his soul, to depersonalize him and convert him into a machine, into an object. It is out to organize and convert mankind into an army and to introduce uniformity. It does not believe that each individual has his own approach to life and his own unique talents. It tells people how to write, how to paint, how to engage in sculpture, how to think scientifically. It believes in the primacy of machine over man, the primacy of dead matter over the living soul. This approach is represented by the generation of the dispersion, who defied the Almighty and sought to build "a tower with its top in the heavens" (Gen. 11:4). They rejected the transcendental form and substituted their own law for the transcendental law. The builders of the Tower of Babel depersonalized man so thoroughly that they would ignore a man who fell off the building, but would cry when a stone or a brick fell (Pirkey de-Rabbi Eliezer 24).