Is the Tower of Babel a valid explanation for languages?

[Justin108]

Is there any historic linguistic evidence that all of humanity once spoke the same language? Is the Tower of Babel story a valid explanation for the variety of human languages?

How does the Tower of Babel account for the ethnic basis of most languages (i.e Africans speaking Zulu, Asians speaking Mandarin, etc.). Did racial diversity come into play after these various languages? In other words, did the Tower of Babel result in Mandarin existing, after which point everyone who spoke Mandarin eventually became Asian? Or did God specifically choose to give Mandarin to the Asians during the Tower of Babel story?

Is the story of Genesis 11 utter nonsense? Is it not more likely that various cultures simply developed several different languages over the years? Does that better explain why most languages have an ethnic basis?

[Kenisaw]

[Replying to post 1 by Justin108]

I remember reading something by a linguistic guy at Stanford University that proposed that all languages come from a common proto-language in Africa before humans migrated out of there. I would call it a hypothesis as it is not a widely accepted idea.

Part of the problem is that some old languages are lost to time, so it may not be possible to figure out if they all link together or not.

Perhaps this is just my bias peeking through here, but if some god creature really did create a bunch of languages to confuse the masses, then why would so many of them be related to each other? Seems to me if you are going to sow discord and confusion, then don't make so many of the words for something like water sound so close to one another....

[polonius]

[Replying to post 1 by Justin108]

I remember reading something by a linguistic guy at Stanford University that proposed that all languages come from a common proto-language in Africa before humans migrated out of there. I would call it a hypothesis as it is not a widely accepted idea.

Part of the problem is that some old languages are lost to time, so it may not be possible to figure out if they all link together or not.

Perhaps this is just my bias peeking through here, but if some god creature really did create a bunch of languages to confuse the masses, then why would so many of them be related to each other? Seems to me if you are going to sow discord and confusion, then don't make so many of the words for something like water sound so close to one another....

RESPONSE. The Old Testament is a folk-tale written about 800-700 BC. The Jews were never in Egypt as modern archaeology has demonstrated. Just think, 400 years, and 2 million involved in the Exodus. But not a grave, no Egyptian writings, not even a broken piece of pottery!

Read The Bible Unearthed written by two Jewish archaeologists one a professor at Tel Aviv University the other an editor of the magazine Archaeology.

[bluethread]

Again, we have an extreme requirement for specificity. The passage says, "Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth:" Pretty much the exact same thing is stated two verses earlier, but that is it. From one statement about confounding language, people draw all kinds of conclusions, like groups of people getting distinct languages and those languages being totally unrelated. What I really interesting is that these are the same people who will say a deity had nothing to do with it, if one can come up with a plausible natural explanation. So, if one has no plausible natural explanation, the situation is deemed to be ridiculous, and, if one has a plausible natural explanation, a deity could not have had anything to do with it. That sounds to me like presumption bias.

[amortalman]

[Replying to post 1 by Justin108]

Highly unlikely that "God" confounded the languages or anything else. The tower of Babel story is just one of many ridiculous stories in the OT grounded in myth and legend.

More likely, however, this interesting little tale took root many thousands of years ago when some curious and speculative gent was entertaining the youngsters around the campfire.

[Willum]

[Replying to post 4 by bluethread]

No not interesting at all, expected.
Babel is nothing but jealous and petty mockery of Babylon, a great nation.
Mockery of the people who wrote the fairy tale originally,by the way.
The original story makes sense by the way:
Not a punishment for trying to reach heaven, but about when walls in building collapsed, they didn't mourn the poor workers whom died, but invested all their time in rebuilding the wall. The gods, seeing how terribly man treated each other, deemed them unworthy of heaven, and dispersed their languages, so that in learning them, they would also learn compassion.

[marco]

Again, we have an extreme requirement for specificity. The passage says, "Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth:"

Myths attempt to explain natural phenomena. Persephone stays in the underworld and winter persists; spring comes when she arrives. The sea is salty because of a magic salt cellar that grinds salt eternally. People speak different languages because a deity confused their tongues.

The study of language, similarities and differences, is interesting and doesn't involve the silliness of God's interference. It is fascinating to determine how the Roman word caballum (used in the accusative) descended on France as cheval. It was once believed that if a child wasn't taught to speak it would naturally speak Latin. That is no sillier than the Tower of Babel.

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 1 by Justin108]

Valid? Do you mean historical?


No. Scholars have long since noticed the stylistic differences between Genesis 1-10 and the call of Abram. The mythical features are obvious, and typical of ancient near eastern histories

[bluethread]

The original story makes sense by the way:
Not a punishment for trying to reach heaven, but about when walls in building collapsed, they didn't mourn the poor workers whom died, but invested all their time in rebuilding the wall. The gods, seeing how terribly man treated each other, deemed them unworthy of heaven, and dispersed their languages, so that in learning them, they would also learn compassion.

The OP specifically references Gen. 11. Where does one find this "original story" anywhere in the Scriptures, let alone in Gen. 11?

Marco:
It was once believed that if a child wasn't taught to speak it would naturally speak Latin. That is no sillier than the Tower of Babel.

I understand that the nature of mythology is the explanation of something without significant verifiable evidence. However, how is a gathering of a large number of people for the purpose of performing a complicated task having communication problems that cause them to break down into factions and establish their own communities similar to the presumption that people are born with the ability to speak a specific language? It is my understanding that the first is rather common human behavior, while the latter is demonstrably false.

[marco]

However, how is a gathering of a large number of people for the purpose of performing a complicated task having communication problems that cause them to break down into factions and establish their own communities similar to the presumption that people are born with the ability to speak a specific language? It is my understanding that the first is rather common human behavior, while the latter is demonstrably false.

I assumed we were dealing with the Biblical account of people, with one language, being confounded by God. Your translation into scientists busily engaged in some complex experiment, finding communication problems, is a novelty. Here is a bit of the silly tale:

"But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.�

8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city."


Idiocies: The Lord CAME DOWN to see
The Lord speaks to himself
His verbatim speech was recorded.
Lunatic conclusion: if they can build a high tower, they will do miracles and I cannot have that!
Invitation to himself in the polite imperative: "Let us go down..."
He "scattered them over the earth, causing them to speak in Russian, Urdu, Swahili, Chinese, Japanese and a form of English.

Kings and emperors experimented on infants to see what language they would naturally speak, if any.


You think this experimentation is stupid while the rubbish about God scratching his divine head is plausible, if forced into metaphor. There are beautiful, meaningful renderings of metaphor. This isn't one of them. It is embarrassing to read it.