"The word ‘Babel’ – capitalised to show that it has not managed to shake off its origins as a proper name – is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘a confused or disordered medley of sounds, esp. of voices’. But where did the word ‘Babel’ come from?
The Tower of Babel is one of the best-known structures mentioned in the Bible. In many ways, the story of Babel is a kind of ‘just so’ story about how the world came to have many languages. In the Book of Genesis, chapter 11, verses 1-9, following the Great Flood (in which all life on earth was wiped out apart from what Noah took onto his Ark), we are told of how a structure known as the Tower of Babel was created."
The Curious Origins of the Word ‘Babel’ – Interesting Literature
#churchleadership #faith #jesus #Messiah #salvation #SignsOfTheTimes #babel
https://lightforthelastdays.co.uk/articles/hebrew-prophets/the-origins-of-babel-and-our-life-today/
The Tower of Babel is one of the best-known structures mentioned in the Bible. In many ways, the story of Babel is a kind of ‘just so’ story about how the world came to have many languages. In the Book of Genesis, chapter 11, verses 1-9, following the Great Flood (in which all life on earth was wiped out apart from what Noah took onto his Ark), we are told of how a structure known as the Tower of Babel was created."
The Curious Origins of the Word ‘Babel’ – Interesting Literature
#churchleadership #faith #jesus #Messiah #salvation #SignsOfTheTimes #babel
https://lightforthelastdays.co.uk/articles/hebrew-prophets/the-origins-of-babel-and-our-life-today/
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00So this was kind of a pattern for how they should live.
00:05And we see also that in the passage in Genesis it does tell them
00:09they've got to repopulate the earth, they've got to reproduce.
00:12And we know that historically they moved up from the mountains of Ararat
00:18which were somewhere up here in what is now Turkey, the eastern part of Turkey
00:22and that the first humans after the flood came down into this area
00:26which is between the two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates
00:30known as Mesopotamia, the area between the two rivers
00:35which was a very fertile area and they settled around here.
00:41You've got Babel, Tower of Babel here, Babylon, you've got Nineveh up here
00:48and you've got Ur of the Chordes down here where Abraham came from.
00:52This was the cradle of civilization.
00:54This was where people began to practice agriculture, building, writing, literature.
01:01All these things came really out of this area in the beginning.
01:07And we read also that in the scriptures a certain man called Nimrod arose out of this part.
01:13Heard of Nimrod, the mighty hunter.
01:16And Nimrod became a kind of a leader, a power broker.
01:19He was the son of Ham, the son of Cush who was the son of Ham.
01:26And he became a leader of the people.
01:28Read in Genesis chapter 10.
01:30Cush begot Nimrod, he began to be a mighty one in the earth.
01:34He was a mighty hunter before the Lord.
01:36Therefore it said like Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord.
01:41And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Babel, Erech, Akkad, Kalnei in the land of Shinar.
01:48So this is the land of Shinar.
01:49And he was the leader of these nations.
01:52And particularly he mentions here Babel.
01:55And it says here that he was a mighty one on the earth, a mighty hunter before the Lord.
02:02So this was a very powerful man.
02:05And it would appear from this that he actually took over the government.
02:09He took over the ruler.
02:10He was the ruler.
02:11He was the guy who was in control.
02:13He was a mighty one.
02:15The word Hebrew is gibor, which means a strong man, a ruler.
02:19Also described as a mighty hunter.
02:21Gibor Tsaid in Hebrew.
02:24So he was hunting game.
02:26And it would appear from this that the people of the time were threatened by wild animals.
02:30Becoming a danger to humans.
02:32And he fought and killed them.
02:35Became a protector of the people in danger.
02:38And his name, Nimrod, is actually taken from a Hebrew word, marad, which is the root of it.
02:44Marad is the Hebrew word for to rebel.
02:47To rebel against the authority and take over the authority.
02:52Also to rebel against God.
02:54So behind this man, Nimrod, you've got a collection of concepts that he is a mighty ruler.
02:59He's a rebel against God.
03:01And somehow he's protecting people through being a mighty hunter because they're afraid of the wild animals,
03:07which have now been released from the ark and have reproduced and now becoming fierce.
03:11Particularly, we could think of lions and such animals becoming a danger to the people.
03:17And he fights them to defend them against this danger.
03:21And in that time, people begin to look to him as being a kind of savior figure.
03:24He gains power through his action of saving the people from the wild animals.
03:31And it's interesting if you look into history and you look into events that there's a kind of pattern with
03:38this.
03:38You've got a picture here of Nimrod, the mighty hunter.
03:41He's got a lion in his hand here.
03:44So this is a statue taken from the ancient world of Nimrod, a mighty hunter.
03:49And he's a big man.
03:50He's got this lion under his arm.
03:53So he's a mighty hunter who's defending the people against the dangers of the world around him.
04:01Interesting about the lions.
04:03I mentioned that Chris is taking people to the British Museum.
04:07We went the other week.
04:08It was a very interesting tour.
04:10One of the interesting things you can see in the British Museum is in the Assyrian room.
04:18This is a huge wall of carvings called the Royal Hunt of the Lions.
04:24And if you look carefully, you probably can't see it very well, but that's the lion with an arrow in
04:29it.
04:29You've got lions here.
04:31You've got lions falling over here.
04:33And it's a picture of the lion hunt.
04:36And behind it is the king who is fighting the lion and is triumphing over the lion.
04:42And it's a kind of propaganda piece.
04:44Because if you see the king fighting the lion, the wild animals which are a danger to you,
04:48then you're going to look to the king as your protector.
04:50He's going to be the one you're looking to to look after you.
04:53So it's this pattern of the lion and people protecting from the lion.
04:59Interesting, of course, in the Bible you also have certain heroes who are protectors of Israel
05:04who fight with lions.
05:06Do you notice that?
05:07You've got Samson.
05:09Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother and came to the vineyards of Timnah.
05:13Now to his surprise, a young lion came roaring at him, and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon
05:18him,
05:18and he tore the lion apart as one would have torn apart a young goat, though he had nothing in
05:22his hand.
05:25And you've got David as well.
05:26David, when he goes out to fight Goliath, he says to Saul,
05:32Your servant used to keep his father's sheep.
05:34And when a lion or a bear came and took the lamb out of the flock,
05:37I went after it and struck it and delivered the lion from its mouth.
05:41When it arose against me, I caught it by its beard and struck it and killed it.
05:45Your servant has killed both lion and bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them,
05:51seeing he has defied the armies of the living God.
05:54Moreover, David said,
05:56The Lord who delivered me from the poor of the lion and from the poor of the bear,
06:02he will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine.
06:05So Samson and David were both kind of hero figures, if you like, who protected Israel.
06:10And they both have in their credentials killing lions.
06:13And I find this quite interesting because it goes back to this concept of the mighty hunter.
06:18Now, David was certainly the hunter who's fighting on the Lord's side.
06:24But you can see also that this idea of the person who is powerful,
06:27who's able to defeat the lions and protect them,
06:30becomes raised up as the one they're looking to look to for power and authority.
06:35If he uses that in the wrong way, then it's dangerous.
06:39You also do have passages in the Bible which speak about wild animals attacking humans,
06:46putting them in peril,
06:47and that also this can be a sign of God's judgment.
06:52It's interesting, if you look in the passage in Genesis 9 which we started with,
06:57God actually says he's going to protect the people from the wild animals.
07:00Now, if the wild animals are protecting them, it may be that God is actually taking away his protection,
07:04and they need someone to come and protect them.
07:07If you go to Leviticus chapter 26, one of the passages which deals with God's dealings with Israel,
07:12and the blessings which come upon them for obedience,
07:15and the judgments which come upon them for disobedience.
07:18In Leviticus 26 it says,
07:19Then if you walk contrary to me, and are not willing to obey me,
07:23I will bring on you seven more plagues according to your sins.
07:26I will also send wild beasts among you,
07:28which shall rob you of your children, destroy your livestock,
07:31and make you few in number, and your highways shall be desolate.
07:36Interesting about the highways being desolate.
07:38If the highways are desolate, it means you're dangerous to go along the roads.
07:42If you're dangerous to go along the roads, then you can't communicate between parts of your country,
07:47and perhaps the remote parts will become difficult to live in.
07:51If you go to the book of Judges, you find that's exactly what happens.
07:55In the book of Judges chapter 5, this is Deborah's song in Judges 5 verse 6 to 8.
08:02In the days of Shamgar, son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were deserted.
08:08Travelers walked along the byways, and village life ceased, it ceased in Israel.
08:12Until I, Deborah, arose, arose a mother in Israel.
08:16They chose new gods, then there was war in the gates.
08:19So something happened in Israel that they weren't able to go along the roads,
08:24and the villages became remote, and it seems that there was an attack because of wild animals,
08:29perhaps of dangers as well.
08:31And it says here, they chose new gods, then there was war in the gates.
08:35So this is a sign of a people under judgment if they're being attacked, and attacked by these wild animals.
08:44So wild animals are a danger to humans, obviously.
08:49And you have in the Bible also the image of the beast in Daniel chapter 7, and particularly in Revelation
08:55chapter 13.
08:57And the idea that behind the beast there is the devil who is going about like a roaring lion,
09:03seeking whom he may devour according to one of the letters in Peter.
09:09So, coming back to Nimrod, Nimrod as a mighty hunter before the Lord.
09:13To my mind it becomes actually a symbol of the Antichrist.
09:17The Antichrist comes at the end of days to protect people from danger.
09:21They're afraid of the wild animals, afraid of the dangers around them,
09:25and they look to one who is going to protect them,
09:27and he actually turns out to be the beast who would bring difficulty upon them.
09:33And in the end times it is seen as a system referred to as the beast of Revelation chapter 13.
09:41In my article in the latest Light for Last Days,
09:44I mentioned that one of the things that would happen in the last days is you'd have a time of
09:48trouble,
09:50and people would feel threatened by the situation around them.
09:52They'll look to the strong man.
09:54The mighty hunter is going to come and defend them from these troubles, bring them safety.
10:00Whether it's war, economic collapse, dangers of AI and plague,
10:05and all these things which are prophesied for the last days,
10:07people would be insecure, they'll look for someone to come and save them.
10:11I mentioned in this article a man called Peter Thiel,
10:13who is a rich, mega rich billionaire,
10:17owner of a data analytics company called Palantir Technologies,
10:22who just conducted a series of lectures on the Antichrist to selected leaders in Silicon Valley in California.
10:30He sees the Antichrist as a figure who will not be openly evil,
10:33but will rise to power by exploiting people's fears about the state of the world in order to impose global
10:39control.
10:41Okay, so Nimrod came to impose his rule over people who are fearful because of the wild animals.
10:50Peter Thiel goes on to say the Antichrist will offer peace and safety and face a potential catastrophe
10:55caused by war, climate change, economic collapse, or technology gone rogue.
11:00He will achieve global dominance through data integration and surveillance rather than traditional conquest.
11:05He will create AI systems that govern better than current failing political systems
11:10and establish a global surveillance state that knows every human thought and action.
11:14In essence, this will build a global police state in which basic human rights come with a price tag,
11:21absolute loyalty to the system.
11:24No obedience, no food.
11:26The united system against the Lord and against his Messiah as prophesied in the book of Revelation.
11:33Time of the beast.
11:35Time of the beast.
11:35I would say that there are things in these early stories in Genesis, the rise of Nimrod,
11:39and in the account of, which we've just read, of the Tower of Babel,
11:44which speak about something along these lines happening.
11:49A symbol of the Babylon world system which would come against the Lord in the last days.
11:52Let's pray with you inה Zentriãs.�
Comments