Genesis 11 Babylon Babel

^.5And (the) Lord descended to see the city and the tower which the sons of men built; ^.6and (the) Lord said, “Look!, one genus and one lip of all-people and this they began to make; and now it will not fail from them all as-many-things-as ever they may put-on to make. ^.7Come-this-way; even having descended let Us confuse there their tongue in order that they may not hear, each the sound of the neighbor.”

^.8And (the) Lord scattered them throughout from-there on (the) face of all the earth and they stopped building the city and the tower.

^.9Because-of-this the name of it was called Confusion because there (the) Lord confused the lips of all the earth and from-there the Lord God scattered them throughout on (the) face of all the earth.

These verses give God’s explanation of the meaning of what the city was called, even though the people may have understood that name to mean: the gate/court of God.

Human-beings could not understand all of the other human-beings when they spoke from that time forward. The family group spoke among themselves but division of languages caused one group not to understand another group. This was unlike the animals or birds who continued to understand each other within the same genus or species.

Today, which is after the Lord Jesus Christ poured-out the gift of holy spirit on the day of Pentecost recorded in Acts chapter 2, holy-people (true Christians having received the gift of holy spirit) can speak with tongues. We also do not understand the words that we speak in a tongue but we can express agreement with the Christ regarding God’s name by the fruit of our lips, plus interpretation of those tongues is available in certain situations.

[Reference: Genesis 10:10; Acts 2:4; I Corinthians 12:10, 14:2; Hebrews 13:15; Revelation chapters 21 and 22.]