The Dispersion of the Nations at Babel

11:1 The whole earth1 had a common language and a common vocabulary.2 11:2 When the people3 moved eastward,4 they found a plain in Shinar5 and settled there. 11:3 Then they said to one another,6 “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.”7 (They had brick instead of stone and tar8 instead of mortar.)9 11:4 Then they said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens10 so that11 we may make a name for ourselves. Otherwise12 we will be scattered13 across the face of the entire earth.”

11:5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the people14 had started15 building. 11:6 And the Lord said, “If as one people all sharing a common language16 they have begun to do this, then17 nothing they plan to do will be beyond them.18 11:7 Come, let’s go down and confuse19 their language so they won’t be able to understand each other.”20

11:8 So the Lord scattered them from there across the face of the entire earth, and they stopped building21 the city. 11:9 That is why its name was called22 Babel23—because there the Lord confused the language of the entire world, and from there the Lord scattered them across the face of the entire earth.