Gen 10:1–11:9 — The Nations Scattered

In this passage, we are seeing the rise of the city of man under common grace. Remember back in chapter nine at the beginning, God commanded the post-flood sons of Noah to be fruitful and to multiply, and to do so in abundance. Common grace mode. It is the same command that was given to Adam in the garden before the fall, but now it is being renewed in common grace mode. In other words, man is still to have families, to be fruitful, to take dominion over creation. But there is a difference now. After the fall and after the flood, there is no hope of eschatological consummation by doing that work. That will come through not the covenant of common grace, but through the covenant of special grace, through God’s work, through Abraham and his offspring, ultimately through Christ.

What we are witnessing here in our text is the continuation of that be fruitful and multiply command given to the sons of Noah after the flood in its common grace mode. We are seeing the unfolding of that command, as Shem and Ham and Japheth, the three sons of Noah, have children, have sons, and their sons have sons, and families, and their clans disperse throughout the world. The title of the sermon is The Nations Scattered, and that is taken from chapter nine, verse 19, which we did not read, but in chapter nine, verse 19, it says, these three, were the sons of Noah, and from these, the people of the whole earth were dispersed, were scattered. And then again, at the end of chapter 10, these are the clans of the sons of Noah. According to their genealogies in their nations, and from these, the nations spread abroad on the earth after the flood. In addition, we also see the fulfillment of Noah’s oracle.

Remember, Noah’s oracle back in chapter nine, in verses 25 through 27, he pronounced a curse upon Canaan, and we see that in our text. The sons of Canaan are mentioned specifically, all of the Canaanites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, all of the enemies of God’s people that they are going to go into the land and take possession of. We also see the fulfillment of the promise to Shem that he would be blessed of the Lord, And then we see the fulfillment of God enlarging Japheth. Japheth is the first one mentioned in Genesis 10.

The Table of Nations

Genesis 10 is the table of nations. There are 70 nations named in this passage. The 70 nations are representative for the nations of the whole earth. That number 70 is symbolic. It will be picked up later by Jesus himself when he sends out the 70 disciples to show the beginnings of the mission to the nations in Luke chapter 10. Our text, though, focuses on the beginnings of this process. The beginnings of this process of the nations of the earth being spread abroad throughout the earth.

Japheth and the Gentiles

It is divided into three major sections. First, Japheth in chapter 10, verses two through five. Then what happened to Ham and his sons in chapter 10, verses six through 20. And then the descendants of Shem in verses 21 to the end of chapter 10. Briefly, let us look at Japheth. Notice that Japheth has been identified already back in Noah’s oracle as the origin of the Gentiles. The Gentiles who will eventually be brought into the people of God. Notice the language there in Genesis chapter 10.

And verse five, after listing off all of the names of the sons of Japheth, it says, from these, the coastland peoples spread in their lands, each with his own language by their clans in their nations. The coastlands is an important term that is picked up later on in the book of Isaiah.

In fact, it is found 13 times in the prophecy of Isaiah. It is always used in reference to the purpose of God to not only restore Israel, but to make Israel as a light to the nations and to bring them, to bring salvation to the end of the earth. You can see that in Isaiah 49. Isaiah 49 verse six is that famous verse that is quoted by the apostles in the book of Acts.

It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel. I am going to do something even better than that. I will make you as a light for the nations that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Jesus himself alludes to that verse in Acts chapter 1 verse 8 when he says to the disciples that you will be my witnesses in Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. Well, right there in that context, in Isaiah 49 verse one, we have this reference to the coastlands. And the coastlands then are another biblical term for the Gentiles.

Although it is interesting, is it not, that it is a mixed picture, because not only are the sons of Japheth going to be the Gentiles that will come into the kingdom of God in the Messianic age, there are also some interesting references in the list of names of the sons of Japheth, such as Gomer and Magog, Magog is an important symbolic term that is picked up again in the book of Ezekiel and then again in the book of Revelation to refer to the final push of the anti-God movement that will lead to the crisis at the end. So not all the Gentiles will be saved. Some of them will become a part of the offspring of the serpent. So first we have the offspring of Japheth focusing on the Gentiles and looking ahead to the prophecy of Isaiah as the gospel goes to the end of the earth and to the coastlands. But then we have the second son, which is Ham. And this is in verses six through 20. Here we see the rise of empires that will be opponents of God’s people.

Ham and the Rise of Empires

References to nations like Egypt, and Babylon, and even Assyria. It even mentions the Philistines. Did you catch that reference there in verse 14? The Kasluhim, from whom the Philistines came. So as God’s people are reading the book of Genesis, they will go, oh yeah, we know about the Philistines.

We had lots of trouble with them all during the time of King David. This is a persistent enemy that was constantly harassing God’s people. These descendants of Ham then are not limited only to the Canaanites, the Canaanites are a key people that come from Ham, and they are the ones marked out in the curse on Canaan back in Noah’s oracle in chapter nine. But it is not just the Canaanites, it is also the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Philistines.

There is also a reference there to the cities of the plain. Did you see that? In verse 19, the cities of the plain, Sodom and Gomorrah, Adma and Zeboiim, those four cities. Usually we just think of Sodom, that is the main one in our mind, but there were four cities that were destroyed later in the book of Genesis.

In Genesis 19, when God rained down fire and brimstone from heaven and he delivered Lot, This was a foreshadow of the coming judgment upon the Canaanites. The cities of the plain, the Sodomites, the Gomorrites, the Abbaites, and the Zeboiim, they were also Canaanites. All of these references in our text, from our point of view, thousands of years later, we do not really resonate with many of these names, but the people of God the people of Israel, they would have heard many of these names and said, oh yeah, we know that particular name, that is going to become an empire that is going to hurt us in the future and be rising up against God and his people. So the sons of Ham focusing upon the long time enemies of God’s people and these mighty empires that will be cruel oppressors of the people of God but whom God will destroy in the end.

Shem and the Chosen Line

And then finally the line of Shem and his offspring in Genesis chapter 10 verses 21 to 31. The chosen line. The chosen line of Shem. Remember, he is the one in Noah’s oracle who received the blessing of the Lord. Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem.

There is even a reference here to the origin of the title Hebrews. The people of God were called the Hebrews for a time, especially when they were in Egypt. And that is referred to in the one ancestor named Eber. So you can draw a direct line from Shem to Eber. And Eber is the origin of the name Hebrews. The name Hebrew derives from that particular patriarch.

So already we are seeing a little anticipation of what is to come in the story of God’s people beginning with Abraham and his descendants. Another interesting point that is made in our text is in that third paragraph on Shem, is the fact that there is a further division that happens. Not all of the offspring of Shem are part of the godly line that will lead down to Abraham.

There is a further division, a split that happens with the sons of Eber. To Eber were born two sons, verse 25. The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided, and his brother’s name was Joktan. Joktan becomes the non-elect branch, whereas the elect line now goes through Peleg. And you can see that in, if you turn over to Genesis 11, the genealogy from Shem down to Abraham, it mentions Peleg in Genesis 11 verse 18. So Peleg is the ancestor of Abraham.

We have seen this before, have we not? Going all the way back to Genesis chapter four, we had a split between Cain and Abel. Cain splits off and is rejected, and the covenant line continues through Seth. Abel was murdered, and so God raised up Seth to continue the covenant line. We saw it also with Noah and his three sons. Ham was split off, and he becomes the ancestor of the great enemies of God’s people, the offspring of the serpent, especially focused on the Canaanites. But the godly line continues through Shem. And so also here, Eber’s two sons create a split. Between Joktan, the non-elect branch, and Peleg, the elect line that leads down to Abraham. This is God’s way, God’s narrowing things down, bringing it down closer and closer until eventually it is narrowed down to Christ himself as the offspring of the woman.

Now in Genesis chapter 11, verses one through nine, the text, engages in what is called a flashback. This is the story of the Tower of Babel. This is related to the Table of Nations in chapter 10, but it is not related in the sense of a chronological order. It is that not Genesis 10 happened first, and then all the nations spread out, and then in chapter 11, verses one through nine, we have a further development after that.

Rather, this is something that happens often in biblical narrative, where the Bible will present an overview of something first and give us the result, and then it will go back and give us the explanation and the origin of that. For example, in the two creation accounts in Genesis 1 and 2, you have the overview of creation in Genesis 1, God made all things, the six days of creation, and then in Genesis 2, We go back and look in more detail about how God made man. He was already made in Genesis 1. God made man in his own image, male and female, he created them.

Genesis 1:27. But then in Genesis 2, we have a further, going back to some of the details of Genesis 1, and giving us more explanation.

So also here, we have the overall summary of Genesis 10, the table of nations, showing how the nations have been dispersed. But then in Genesis 11, we see the explanation for that. How do we know that this is the case? How do we know that it is chronologically out of order? That actually Genesis 11 is going back before?

Well, we know it because Genesis 11, the story of the Tower of Babel, tells us that this is how all of the different languages of the earth came about. Originally, it says, the whole earth had one language. But then this story of the Tower of Babel explains for us how it came about that God confused the languages of man and dispersed them all over the face of the earth so they had different languages.

In Genesis 10, do you remember when we were reading that, in Genesis 10, after each of those three sons, after Japheth, after Ham, after Shem, it said already that they already had their own languages. In Genesis 10 verse five, the sons of Japheth, these spread in their lands, each with his own language. Genesis 10 verse 20, these are the sons of Ham by their clans and their languages. And then chapter 10 verse 31, these are the sons of Shem by their clans and their languages.

The Antichrist Program

So when 11:1 says, “Now the whole earth had one language,” it is signaling that we are backtracking now. We are doing a flashback to a point earlier, before chapter 10, before the nations were dispersed, in order to answer the question, How did this happen? How did all these different languages and nations arise? And the answer is, it was because all of this development, this cultural development, these important people having children and then building cities and creating cultures and societies and nations, all of this happened because God was judging mankind for its sinful rebellion against God. The text in Genesis 11, one through nine, divides into two main parts, man’s Babylon program, sinful man’s Babylon program, verses one through four, and then the divine response to it in verses five through nine. What is the Babylon program?

I am calling it Babylon because in Hebrew, the word Babel or Babel is the same as the word Babylon. There is no difference at all. You could translate this whole thing as the Tower of Babylon. And the story of the Tower of Babylon. It is the same with the word Babel or Babel in chapter 10 verse 10. The beginning of Nimrod’s kingdom was “Babylon, Erech, Accad, Calneh, in the land of Shinar.” Notice that “the land of Shinar” (10:10) is also picked up here in 11:2: “As people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar.” So Babylon is the location where this is happening.

Man is attempting to make a name for himself. He is attempting to reach to the top of the heavens, it says, verse three, or verse four. 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. Again, another clue that it is backtracking, because they have not yet been dispersed over the face of the whole earth. So we are going back to a moment before Genesis 10 and the table of nations and explaining how this all came about. What is man’s sinful Babylon program?

It is to reach to heaven itself. It is a aspiration out of human pride to ascend into heaven and to become like God. Later in the Bible, in Isaiah, in Isaiah chapter 14, there is a prophecy, or it is called a taunt, against the king of Babylon. And the prophecy or taunt against the King of Babylon is saying, you are going to be judged, King of Babylon. Why?

Because you said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven above the stars of God. I will set my throne on high. I will sit on the Mount of Assembly in the far reaches of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the most high. This is the age old quest for greatness, for divine God-like status.

Goes all the way back to the garden, does it not? When the serpent said to Adam and Eve that God is not telling you the truth. When he says do not eat of this tree, for in the day that you eat of it you will surely die. You are not going to die, just the opposite. You will become like God. And that is why God does not want you to eat of that tree. This is Satan’s age-old quest and he is deceiving the nations of the earth in order to follow that quest and to join in Satan’s rebellion against God and seeking to make a name for himself and seeking to unite together in order to rebel against God.

Another interesting point is that there is an attempt, is there not, to recreate the cosmic mountain that was found in the Garden of Eden. Remember when we talked about that, when we were looking at Genesis chapter 2, that there was a mountain in the garden. Now it does not explicitly say that in Genesis 2, although it does say that in the book of Ezekiel. But it is also implied even in Genesis 2, because you remember that there is a river, there are four rivers. There is one river that breaks up into four, and those four rivers come down the mountain and spread to the entire world, implying that there is a mountain in Eden.

The purpose of a cosmic mountain is to be the connection between heaven and earth so that God could be with his people and so that God’s people could ascend into heaven and dwell with the Lord there and have fellowship with him. Adam and Eve sinned, broke the covenant, they were expelled from the garden, and it seemed like they were exiled from that ability to have fellowship and communion with God at the top of the cosmic mountain where the Garden of Eden was.

But now, God is making a way, God is planning through the offspring of the woman leading down to Abraham and his descendants all the way down to Christ. He is making a way for that cosmic mountain to be rebuilt. And to be restored so that God’s people could dwell with the Lord forever in the new creation. But here, man is attempting to do it by himself. He is attempting to recreate that cosmic mountain by his own might, by building a tower reaching up into heaven. In the Mesopotamian region where the Babylonians and the Assyrians and all these great empires eventually came from, there are many ziggurats.

A ziggurat is an attempt to build a sacred mountain with steps that lead up into heaven. These are supposedly the link between heaven and earth. In fact, in the ancient Babylonian references to their ziggurats, they would call them that. This is the link between heaven and earth. This is the doorway to heaven. This is the way in which heaven and earth are connected. But this is man’s fallen attempt to ascend to heaven by human effort to defy God’s authority and to try to build a mountain that leads to heaven by their own power, to glorify themselves and to seek a great name.

It is also tied into their desire to build a great city and to have a great civilization with authority and power. Because it mentions there not only that they built a tower, it also says they built a city, a city and a tower. It mentions both of those. And the reference to the city takes you back to the reference to Nimrod in chapter 10, who was the one who built all these great cities like Nineveh and Kala.

That is the great city. So this attempt for man to not only build a great tower leading to heaven, but also to build a great civilization and an empire, and to have God-like authority over the world. This is man’s attempt to glorify himself and to seek after divine, godlike status in defiance of the creator God, in defiance of his purpose, which is to build that mountain and that connection between heaven and earth through his work, through his electing grace, through the covenant of grace, leading ultimately to Christ himself. What is God’s response to this? You have man’s sinful Babylon program of attempting to ascend into heaven. What is God’s response in verse five?

The Divine Response

It says, the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of man had built. If God has to come down to see the city, then it must not be a very big tower. It must be a puny little Lego tower that has nothing in God’s eyes. He has to come down to actually inspect it and find out what these humans are up to. Of course, this is anthropomorphic language, meaning it is describing God in human terms. God, of course, knows all things. He does not have to literally come down to see the tower, but it is describing God in that way in order to make fun of, to mock this puny tower that man is trying to build. God comes down to see the city and the tower which the children of man had built, and then 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. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language so that they may not understand one another’s speech.

God’s response is to create a supernatural confusion and dispersion. They were one, they were all there in that one area in the land of Shinar, trying to build this megastructure in order to reach to heaven, but now God is going to scatter them. God is supernaturally scattering the world and creating disunity. Interestingly, they sought unity, but it only resulted in greater scattering and disunity. They sought a name for themselves, but in the end, they no longer have a name because they are dispersed throughout the world. Their name is only one of shame.

What is God doing here? Well, he is judging this attempted program, this Babylon program on the part of sinful man, but he is not judging it in the sense of like the flood, completely wiping it out. Rather, he is restraining it. He is, remember, he is establishing the order of common grace, going back to Genesis 9 and the covenant of common grace. He wants mankind to continue to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth, and he is, preserving the world, even though it is in rebellion against him, but he is preserving it for the purpose of providing the platform and the context, the stage, the world stage, for him to be able to accomplish his redemptive plan, which we will see through Abraham and the offspring of Abraham, who is Christ himself. God is restraining man’s Babylon program. He scatters the nations and causes confusion by giving them all different languages. And yet, we are supposed to recognize, are we not not, that although God is restraining the sin from becoming completely, metastasizing into a total absolute rebellion against God, yet that principle, that desire on the part of fallen man to build the city of man and to build a tower to heaven, it still remains simmering beneath the surface. And it breaks out from time to time.

That is why Genesis 10 has already given us hints of that. The Canaanites, these great empires and kingdoms that are being built in the Mesopotamian area, such as the Babylonians and the Assyrians. So that city of man in its fullest form is not going to be revealed until the very end of history. But prior to that time, it does break forth from time to time in various ways.

And you especially see it in the form of the persecution of God’s people. When the people of God are being oppressed and persecuted by these empires, whether it is Israel and Egypt being persecuted by the Egyptians, or whether it is later on when the Babylonians and the Assyrians take away many of the people into exile. Of course, that was partly because of Israel’s own sin, but also it was part of God’s allowing of this anti-God Babylon principle to break forth in order that he might get great victory over them. God restrains the Babylon program, but the Babylon program is still simmering beneath the surface, and it breaks out from time to time, but there will be one final outburst at the very end of history before the return of Christ.

That is why I mentioned Magog. Remember chapter 10 verse two, one of the sons of Japheth is Magog. And Magog is mentioned in the book of Revelation in that final battle, the battle of Gog and Magog, when the nations are deceived by Satan and gathered again to try to defeat the people of God, but then Christ comes down from heaven and destroys them. That is the final anti-Christ crisis at the end of history, that the Lord is allowing to lurk underneath the surface for now, restraining it so that the gospel can still go forth, but then at the end he will gain a glorious victory over the last outburst of satanic opposition to God and his people.

Two Cities and Two Names

What can we derive from this whole text? There are three theological takeaways from this whole passage. First, the city of man is allowed to continue under common grace. God allows the city of man to have some degree of ability to function. Maybe not in the same degree of one single culture or one single kingdom gathering together against God, but he does allow it to exist, even in a fragmented state. But we must always remember that the city of man is not the city of God. And the city of man contains within it an anti-God Babylon principle within it, lurking like leaven.

All the idolatrous empires, like the ancient Babylonians and the Romans, they are marked out by their one key thing, which is that they persecute the people of God. That is why the book of Revelation calls them beasts, because they are trampling upon God’s people. They are totalitarian regimes who are seeking to harm God’s people and to defeat the kingdom of Christ. But of course, we know that they will not win in the end.

Secondly, a second theological point we can derive from this text is that the variety of languages and cultures that we see in the world is actually God’s judgment. It is God’s restraint upon that anti-God Babylon principle to keep it in check. God is keeping mankind intentionally divided so that the nations would not be deceived and united together against God until the very, very end. Until the appointed climactic battle of God versus Satan that is narrated in the book of Revelation.

Remember in the book of Revelation that it also has this long chapter that we often kind of just sort of glaze over because it does not immediately make sense to us and it just seems so negative. But do you remember Revelation chapter 18? Revelation 18, one of those chapters in Revelation that we do not talk about much, that is the one where it is a lament for Babylon.

It says, fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. And it is this whole long chapter talking about all the sins of Babylon and how the people of God are rejoicing that God has finally destroyed Babylon because Babylon is full of wickedness and sin and the blood of the martyrs and hurting God’s people and corrupting the earth. In Revelation 18 is this wonderful celebration. It sounds negative at first, like just judgment, judgment, judgment, but it is actually the celebration of God’s people rejoicing in the fact that Babylon is finally fallen.

Babylon the great. It is not referring to one specific city, Babylon in Mesopotamia. It is not referring to one specific iteration of Babylon. It is referring to the entire principle of the Babylon program that goes all the way back to Genesis 11. In fact, it even goes back before that to the serpent’s temptation in the garden.

This Babylon principle that has been lurking throughout the history of the world and is finally at the very end of the consummation, the very last book of the Bible, the final prophecy of the wrap-up of history, we finally see that God is going to deal with Babylon the Great.

And the people of God rejoice. They rejoice in God’s victory over the enemies of God’s people and the vindication of God’s truth. This judgment upon all the self-seeking pride of man, his arrogance, seeking to make a name for himself, seeking to become great apart from God, seeking autonomy, seeking to shake his fist at heaven and to place himself upon the throne of the universe. That whole principle. Which is not only found in Satan, but also as Satan works his deceptive work among fallen mankind, it is seen in mankind himself.

That whole principle is now finally dealt with and finally brought to its ultimate conclusion at the end of history, at the return of Christ. And so it is amazing to think about, is it not, that the diversity that we see in the world around us, the diversity of different languages and cultures, which seems like a perfectly innocent thing. And, I enjoy going and having different cuisines from different cultures and learning different languages and meeting people from different cultures. And it seems like a wonderful, innocent thing, but in terms of the big picture of God’s whole purpose of redemptive history, the whole plan of God as described for us from Genesis to Revelation, the variety of languages and cultures is actually God’s judgment to keep that Babylon principle in check, to keep it in check until the day when God will deal with it once and for all.

And then thirdly, the third theological point that we can draw from this text is that it is God’s work, not man’s, to establish that link between heaven and earth. Man in his pride thinks he can do it. He thinks he can reach to heaven. But the truth of the gospel is man cannot do it. Only God in his grace must reach down from heaven to save us and to bring us into fellowship with himself.

We see that with God calling Abraham in Genesis chapter 12. Genesis 12 verses one and three. We are going to look at that next week. The reason why this story of the Tower of Babel or of Babylon is told right here at this point. Is to prepare for the contrast between the Babylon principle and God’s grace in calling Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldeans by his mercy and grace, by his sovereign grace. God is the one who comes down and scoops Abraham out of that sinful mess of the Babylon principle and he brings him to himself in his grace.

Abraham does nothing of himself to build any towers or to do anything great. He simply believes in God’s promises. He simply responds to God’s grace. God is creating the nation of Israel through Abraham so that through that nation of Israel, the Messiah will come.

And one day in the fullness of time, he will come down from heaven. He will become a man. He will accomplish our salvation by going to the cross. Then he will be raised from the dead and he will ascend up to heaven, to the holy hill of the Lord and be our mediator in the heavenly Mount Zion.

And even now, the gospel is being proclaimed. It is interesting when you get to the book of Acts, in Acts chapter two, and you see Pentecost, the ascended Christ, who has finished the work of atonement, is now exalted to that heavenly Mount Zion. What does he do? He pours out his spirit upon the church.

And there on that first, on that day of Pentecost, the people of God speak in different languages so that this problem that was created by the multiplication of languages would now be solved through the preaching of the gospel in every tongue and nation throughout the world. And the apostles are sent to the ends of the earth so that the nations that were once scattered can now be gathered spiritually through the gospel to enter into that heavenly Mount Zion by faith in Christ. What a wonderful picture we have of the gospel itself in an antithetical way. We have the opposite of the gospel, which is man’s pride, but we have the antithesis to that, which is the gospel of grace, which goes against our pride and which shows us that God himself must bring us to heaven by his grace.