1 Now Noah’s three sons, Shem, Japhet, and Ham, born a hundred years before the Flood, were the first to descend from the mountains into the plains, settling there and persuading others, who feared the lower lands because of the Flood, to join them. The plain where they initially lived was called Shinar. God then told them to disperse and send out colonies, so the earth would be fully populated and to prevent internal strife, with many people crowded in one place. But they didn’t listen, and so encountered trouble, learning firsthand they had sinned by disobeying. When they prospered in youth, God commanded them again to form colonies, but they imagined their success was due to their own power rather than to God’s grace, and so again disobeyed, suspecting the call to disperse was so they could be more readily oppressed. 2 It was Nimrod, Ham’s grandson through Noah, a bold man of great physical strength, who convinced them to rebel against God, urging them to attribute their happiness to their own courage rather than to God. Gradually he converted their government into tyranny, the only way he could turn men from reverence for God, bringing them into constant dependence on his power.⁠a He also said he would seek revenge on God if He tried again to flood the world; by building a tower too high for the waters to reach and thus avenging their ancestors. 3 The masses were eager to follow Nimrod’s plan, viewing it as cowardly to submit to God. They began constructing a tower, devoting great effort without any slack, and because so many hands were employed, it rose to an incredible height quickly. Its width was enormous, its construction solid, so that to the eye its height seemed less than it truly was. They used burnt brick bonded with bitumen mortar, making it waterproof. When God saw their irrational behavior, He did not choose to destroy them entirely, for they hadn’t become wiser from the punishment of the previous sinners, but caused chaos among them by creating many different languages so they could no longer understand one another. The site of the tower is now called Babylon, which in Hebrew means Confusion, since they confused a previously common language. The Sibyll speaks of this tower and the chaos of language: “When all men spoke one language, some began a giant tower, as if they would reach heaven. But the gods sent storms and toppled it, gifting each person a separate language, and the city took the name Babylon.” Hestiæus, speaking of Shinar in Babylonia, says, “Certain priests who survived carried off the sacred vessels of Jupiter Enyalius, going to Shinar of Babylonia.”