Gen 10:1-11:32

Read Genesis 10


• Discuss Nations of Gen 10 (
https://www.bible-history.com/old-testament/desc-shem-ham-japheth.html
Error in Philistia. It should be Orange (for Ham) )
• 3 Sons
• Shem: 26
• Ham: 30
• Japheth: 14
• 70 Nations
• Jacob's family will also comprise 70 people, representing Israel as a new beginning
• Jesus' disciples will have a component of 70 representing still another new beginning
• The emphasis is on the nations that play a key role in Israel's future
• Shem: 3rd Arphaxad: Shelah: Eber: Peleg(divided) & Joktan (13 sons)
• Peleg: Reu: Serug: Nahor: Terah (Abram, Nahor, & Haran)
• Note that the two sons of Eber, Peleg and Joktan eventually split with one becoming the promised people (Abram) and the other the people of Babylon
• This chapter contains one of the oldest, if not the oldest, ethnological table in the literature of the ancient world. It reveals a remarkable understanding of the ethnic and linguistic situation following the Flood. Almost all the names in this chapter have been found in archaeological discoveries in the last century and a half. Many of them appear in subsequent books of the Old Testament.
• Table is horizontal not vertical indicating the purpose is not to show a line but to show political, geographical, and ethnic affiliations among the tribes (for various reasons)
• Notice the lifespan decreases (chapter 11) https://www.bible-history.com/old-testament/lifespans.html


Gen 11:1-4 (ESV) Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. 2 And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. 3 And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. 4 Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth."



• How does chapter 11 fit with chapter 10
• Chapter 10 finishes the narrative on Noah's sons
• Chapter 10 even places the event of chapter 11 during the time of Peleg (vs. 25)
• Chapter 11 flashes back to events inside of chapter 10 (both before and after)
• When you read this on the surface, what do you come away with that was happening?
• Progress
• Growth
• See 10:8.  While it is possible Nimrod (or Sagan) was the ruler at the time, it would mean that Nimrod was one of the last of Cush's son (Peleg's birth was only 132 years after the flood) -- that would line it up with Peleg
• Nimrod means "we shall rebel" (Blosser)
• How does the name affect our view of what may have been happening?
• Rebellion against God
• We can ascend to heaven and defeat God (implication of verse 4)
• The establishment of a one world government (since man was now given authority over even a man's life)
• I'm actually not against the concept of a one world government (the millennium will have one)
• What are the dangers of a one world government or the advantages of multiple governments?
• Nimrod was the first megalomaniac. He wanted to rule everything
• Also, how do verses 1-4 relate to God's command in 1:28 and 9:1? (Especially 11:2 and 11:4)?
• Gen 1:28 (ESV) And God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
• Gen 9:1 (ESV) And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
• God said to fill the earth; the attempt here is to keep everyone together
• APPLICATION: What has God told us to do that we are subtly ignoring or replacing with other "good" things?


Gen 11:5-9 (ESV) And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. 6 And the Lord said, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech." 8 So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.



• Why does God use the term "come down"?  He is everywhere and knew what was happening.
• God's soliloquy mimics the language of the tower builders in verses 3 & 4, possibly the tower is so puny, that God has to come down to see it
• Emphasizes the fact that God wants a relationship with people; He wants to help them
• What was God's real concern in verses 6 and 7?
• God was protecting the people from their own rebellion
• In a very short time, they were already considering invading heaven (some commentators)
• I think that is why Nimrod is called a mighty hunter and named a rebel
• The result of God's action is that the people are forced to do what God had commanded them to do earlier
• What does the word "Babel" mean?
• It means confusion in Hebrew
• It means "the gate of gods" in Babylonian
• APPLICATION:  We only think that we are in charge of human destiny


Read Gen 11:10-26 to see how the ages are declining. Why not an immediate decline


Gen 11:27-12:1 (ESV) Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran fathered Lot. 28 Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his kindred, in Ur of the Chaldeans. 29 And Abram and Nahor took wives. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran the father of Milcah and Iscah. 30 Now Sarai was barren; she had no child.

31 Terah took Abram his son and Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and they went forth together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan, but when they came to Haran, they settled there. 32 The days of Terah were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran.

12:1 Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.

                  PATRIARCHAL CHRONOLOGICAL DATA41

2236	Birth of Terah	Gen 11:24
2166	Birth of Abram	Gen 11:27
2091	Abram's departure from Haran	Gen 12:4
2081	Abram's marriage to Hagar	Gen 16:3
2080	Birth of Ishmael	Gen 16:16

• Lineage
• Nahor
• Terah
• Abram (marries Sarai, see Gen 20:12), Haran (dies in Ur), Terah (marries Milcah; have Lot)
• Terah sets out from Ur to go to Caanan with Abram, Lot, and Sarai.  They arrive in Haran and settle there.
• Verse 12:1 immediately follows … what does that make you think?
• Gen 15:7 & Neh 9:7 suggests that it was not Terah's idea but God's
• Gen 15:7 (ESV) And he said to him, "I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess."
• Neh 9:7 (ESV) You are the Lord, the God who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the name Abraham. 8  You found his heart faithful before you, and made with him the covenant to give to his offspring the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite. And you have kept your promise, for you are righteous.
• Acts suggests that God gave the command to Abraham--how do we fit them together?
• Acts 7:2-4 (ESV) And Stephen said:  "Brothers and fathers, hear me. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, 3 and said to him, 'Go out from your land and from your kindred and go into the land that I will show you.' 4  Then he went out from the land of the Chaldeans and lived in Haran. And after his father died, God removed him from there into this land in which you are now living.
• One possibility is that the original command is given to Terah, but he fails to fulfill it and so it then goes to his son
• Another possibility is that both heard the original command and committed themselves to it, but Terah as head of the family stopped short, and Abram finished it
• A third possibility is that the command went to Abram, and he convinced Terah to come with him
• Why Caanan?  Judgment against their sin
• APPLICATION:  What makes one person different from another?  Why does one person follow God and not another?  What is the difference Terah and Abram?  Terah took a step and stop in Haran.  Abram took a step and continue.  Abram, although lived by faith, and believed in the unseen and seen.  Abram obeyed.
• Nahor found life good in Haran. The weeds choked him