THE POPULAR ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLE PROPHECY

BABYLON Part II

THE TOWER OF BABEL

God’s end-Times program for Babylon is rooted in the Historical account of the Tower of Babel ( Genesis II ). This Section of Scripture records humanity’s first world wide rebellion against God. God commanded mankind to scatter through out the face of the earth following the flood ( Genesis 9:7 ). Under the leadership of Nimrod ( Genesis 10: 8-12 ), mankind instead gathered in the land of Shinar ( Genesis 11:22 ). There they build a city and a tower that was to reach into heaven ( Genesis 11:4 ).

This was a spiritual rebellion. These early settlers probably designed the Ziggurat as a temple for their worship of the stars ( Hitchcock, P. 41). Babel is also the place of the origin of the infamous mother child cult. According to extra biblical tradition, Nimrod’s wife, Semiramis, had a son named Tammuz through an alleged miraculous conception. According to tradition, Tammuz was killed by a wild animal and miraculously restored to life ( Walvoord, P.970 ) The legend of Semiramis and Tammuz eventually spread from Babylon through out the world, but their names were change in different cultures. In Assyria, the mother was Ishtar and the son was Tammuz. In Phoenicia, it was Astarte and Baal. In Egypt, it was Isis and Osirus or Horus. In Greece, it was Aphrodite and Eros. In Rome, it was Venus and Cupid ( Hitchcock, P. 42). Babylon became the mother of harlotries” as the central influence in all following cultures ( Garland).

According to Genesis 11:5-9, God frustrated this worldwide apostasy by confounding the builders’ language, thus inhibiting them from communicating with one another. God’s action had a purpose. Satan could lead humanity away from the truth more easily if only one government existed and this single government happened to fall into the hands of anti-God forces. However with the existence of multiple nations, those nations that reject anti God agendas can work together to restrain evil to some extent. Consequently, since the Tower of Babel incident, God has decreed that humanity be order according to national boundaries rather than global government ( Deuteronomy 32:8; Acts 17:26 ).

However, Satan’s purpose throughout history has been to subvert this divine ordering of nations and bring the world back together so that he once again can have unlimited control of it through one man ( Hitchcock, p.43 ). Thus, Satan’s ambition may have always been to bring man back to Babylon under his authority. The fact that human rebellion could one day cycle back to where it all began comes as no surprise because of numerous parallel themes running through the books of Genesis and Revelation.