the express design of effecting a mimenca? correspond- ence with the Israelitish family eight hundred j-ears after. The names assigned to the third degree, that is, the sons (rather tribes or nations) of Noah's three sons, are, Japhet fourteen. Ham thirty-one, Shem twenty-five, making seventy; and the whole family of Jacob, when it cauie to be domiciliated in Egypt, was seventy (Gen. xlvi, 2G ; Exod. i, 5 ; Deut. x, 22). Some have also fancied a parallel in the seventj' elders (Exod. xxiv, 1, 9 ; Num. xi, IG, 2'i, 25 ; see also Kitto, F'ictorial Palestine, Civil History, Index, " Elders"). These puerilities might have been prevented had mem considered that "iBG?a does not signify merely an arith- metical amount, but is used to denote an exact narra- tion (Judg. vii, 15). The passage is in the highly po- etical style of the magnificent ode in which it occurs, and, reduced to plain terms, simply declares that the Almighty Sovereign, in whose hands of necessity lies the disposal of human birth-places, had so arranged these, in mapping out the world, as best to subserve the future occupancy of Canaan by his chosen people. But the main passage of Scripture usually relied upon to prove the fact of a sudden and violent disrup- tion of primeval society into the germs of the early nations, as well as to explain its circumstances and cause, is the account of the building of the tower of Babel (Gen. xi, 1-9), in which the dispersion of those engaged in that enterprise has been regarded as a part of the disseverance commemorated in the name of Pe- leg. There are, however, some objections to this view of the narrative. In the first place, these two events are not thus connected in the account itself. The spo- radic varieties of language, which is tlie grand distinc- tion between the different tribes that have founded the ancient monarchies and cities, had not j'et appeared ; nor could thej' be accounted for in this manner if the original community had already- begun to separate into the more modern states. The only supposition that would make the two occurrences compatible, if con- nected, is that the whole body of the Noachites, while in process of migration westward (D'liS'a D"C33), with a view to settling in different localities, were arrested by the inviting character of the plain of Shinar, until their purpose of diffusion Cj'^S, the same word in ver. ■1 and 8) was renewed by the divine interference. In the second place, it is not certain that either of the incidents thus associated is of so cosmopolitan a char- acter as this theory assumes. By simply rendering ]''nX, land or region, instead of " earth," the whole af- fau- is reduced to a petty dispute or misunderstanding among the workmen engaged upon a public edifice, and a consequent dissolution of that particular cluster of inhabitants. Certain it is that all the dialects of this poh-glot globe cannot be referred to a single inci- dent or occasion like this. Such, at least, are in sub- stance the arguments that have been offered against interpreting the sacred narrative here as having a general application to the whole race, nor can it be de- nied that they possess a certain degree of plausibility (see Bryant, Ancient Mythology, 3d ed. iv, 23-44, 92 sq.). On the other hand, if, as everything in the con- text seems to require, we conceive the descendants of Noah to have lieen at tliis time (say about the birth of Peleg, i. e. one hundred jears after the Flood) quite limited in numbers and extent (as the longevity of the patriarchs and their pastoral habits both indicate), we shall find no particular difficulty in taking the entire statement in its broadest and most literal sense, as the opening wedge of tliat universal spl'.t, whieli has since widened more and more, in language and abode, among the sons of men. This narrative, then, of the Disper- sion liegins witli the remarkal>le statement: "Now the wliole eartli" was of one language and of one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from [or "in"] the East, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar ; and they dwelt there" (Gen. xi, i, 2). The
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expressions "language" (lip) and "speech" (words) are too precise to be understood (as Vitringa, Ohs. Sa- cra, ch. ix, p. 109) as indicating merelj^ an agreement in jiurpose. The journeying together shows that the time spoken of was before the Noachians had ceased to be a single nation, and perhaps when they formed but a great tribe, and were journeying ("03, to pull up stakes, as a tent or encampment) after the manner of the Arabs across the plains watered by the Tigris and Euphrates. It cannot be doubted that Shinar was Bab- ylonia. The name, indeed, is perhaps traceable in Mes- opotamia in the modern Sinj^r, and it is noticeable that the ancient Egyptian transcription of Shinar ('^"5'Cp) is Sankar.t (this h corresponding to the Hebrew 5, as though the " had been pronounced like the Arabic Gain). But there is no evidence that the Hebrews call- ed any countrj^ except Babylonia "the land of Shi- nar." The direction of the journey, if it be indicated as "from the East," probably would only mark the previous halting-place of the Noachians, not the place at which thej' first began to repeoide the earth. The narrative then relates the attempt to build a city and a tower in order to prevent the scattering of mankind, and the punishment of the builders by the confusion of their language and their being scattered abroad from the unfinished city Babel, or Confusion. Leav- ing the subject of the Confusion of Tongues for later discussion, we must observe the general agreement of profane historians as to the antiquity of Babylon, and the reminiscence of the Tower in the towers of the Babylonian temples. The Pyramids of Egypt and those of Mexico should be compared with these towers; and, in the case of the former, on account of their ex- treme antiquity, the comparison is very important. The exact character of the scattering is difficult to in- fer. The cause, according to the ordinary explana- tion of the narrative, was the Confusion of Tongues, but some have supposed the latter to have been the consequence of the Dispersion. From ver. 4 compai'ed with ver. 9, it would appear to have been but a re- sumption of the original plan of immigration, now that their holding together had become impossilile, for the want of a common medium of vocal communica- tion. Whatever difficulties we may discover in this and the preceding chapter of Genesis, " it is no longer probable only, but it is absolutely certain, that the whole race of man proceeded from h-an [the proper and native name of Persia and some connected re- gions] as from a centre, whence they migrated first in ihrei'drent colonies ; and that those three branches grew from a common stock, which had been miraculously preserved in a general convulsion and inundation of this globe" (Sir William Jones, On the Orif/in and Fam- ilies of Nations, Works, ed. by Lord Teignmouth, 8vo, iii, 19(i). There is, perhaps, no distinct reference to the building of the Tower and the Dispersion in the tradi- tions of any heathen nation. The Greek story of the giants who piled mountains one upon another to reach Olympus is perhaps the most probable trace. Unlike the case of the Flood, there is no clear evidence that the Dispersion made a strong impression upon the minds of those wlio witnessed and shared in it. This would indicate that it was unaccompanied b}'- any great outward manifestation of God's anger, and was the immediate consequence of such difficulties as would arise from the sudden division of mankind into tribes speaking different languages or dialects. See Babel (Tower of).