To rebuild Ê-sagila
my heart urged me—
constantly did I set myself,” etc., etc.
According to the plan of Babylon drawn up by Weissbach, one of the German explorers, Ê-temen-ana-kia was situated to the north of Ê-sagila, which latter was evidently the temple connected with it. As both were dedicated to Merodach (Bel), they practically formed one centre of worship, and it is possibly on this account that the Tower is called “the Temple of Belus” in Herodotus. The description, from a Babylonian tablet probably in private hands, published by the late George Smith, agrees well with that given by Herodotus, but has some noteworthy differences—the great height of the lowest stage, the sloping (?) sides of the second stage, and the buildings grouped near it. Unfortunately, the baked brickwork of Ê-temen-ana-kia has been cleared away, practically destroying the remains.
Concerning the miracle of the confusion of tongues, there is, of course, no historical reference. The Babylonian inscriptions know nothing of it. Yet the stranger visiting Babylon could not have been otherwise than struck by the number of languages spoken there. There was the religious tongue, which is called by modern scholars Akkadian or Šumerian, and its dialect, together with the language known as Assyrian, or, more correctly, Semitic Babylonian. [pg 140] Besides this, there were various Aramaic dialects—Chaldee, Aramean (Syriac), and the language of the dockets on the trade-documents, which is also found in Assyria. In addition to these, the Elamite and Kassite conquerors of Babylonia brought with them large numbers of people, and each of these nations naturally introduced, in larger measure than before, the use of their respective languages. Speakers of other tongues long since dead must also have visited the city for the purposes of trade, and of this the so-called Hittite is in all probability an example (in the researches of Profs. Sayce and Jensen we shall, perhaps, see the beginnings of the recovery of this tongue), and a docket in an unknown script implies that yet another language heard there in later times has to be discovered, though this may simply be some other way of writing one of the tongues spoken there that is already known to scholars. With regard to the oneness of the language of the rest of the earth, in all probability this expression referred, as has been already remarked, to the tract enclosed between the mountains of Persia on the east, the Mediterranean on the west, Asia Minor and Armenia on the north, and Arabia on the south—a tract in which the lingua franca of diplomacy was, as is proved by the Tel-el-Amarna tablets, the tongue now called Assyrian, which could easily have been regarded as the proofs and the remains of the thing that had been.
To recapitulate: The story of the Tower of Babel is a break in the narrative of the genealogies, so striking that any thinking man must have been able to recognize it easily. It is a narrative that practically glorifies Babylonia, making it the centre of the human race, and the spot from which they all migrated after the dispersion caused by the confusion of tongues. It was probably given for, and recognized as, the legend current in Babylonia at the time, and must, [pg 141] therefore, have been recognized and valued by the people of the time at its true worth.
The Patriarchs To Abraham.
Little information is unfortunately to be obtained from Assyro-Babylonian sources concerning the patriarchs from Shem to Abraham. It is true that certain comparisons can be made in the matter of the names, but these, when more precise information comes to light, may be found to be more or less erroneous. As a matter of fact, with one or two exceptions, it is probable that we have nothing from Babylonian sources bearing on the patriarchs who preceded Abraham at all.
Nevertheless, there are one or two things that may be put forward in a more or less tentative way, and these may well be discussed with this reservation in this place.