Page 12 - Advanced Bible Geography ebook

Eventually Noah and his family were able to exit the ark that sat upon a mountain we know of today as
Ararat. It is over 16,000 feet high, but the ark could
have rested anywhere on the slopes, at a lower
elevation. Noah’s family created homes in the new
plains and began populating the area.

Noah was commanded by God to “Be fruitful and
increase in number and fill the earth.” (Genesis 9:1)
Genesis 11 tells us that Noah’s clan moved eastward
and settled in the plain of Shinar. We do know
geographically where they settled. Shinar is in the
plains between the Tigris and Euphrates river in what
we know today as Iraq (see map to left).

For nearly 100 years, Noah’s sons, Ham, Shem, and
Japheth, increased in number and prospered. They
reproduced according to God’s command to fill the
earth, but they stayed together. Eventually all of
mankind at that time gathered in the Persian Gulf
region at a place called Babel, and it was here that they followed their leader named Nimrod and built a
tower to reach to heaven. It was here that they rebelled against God, seeking their own greatness, and
the Lord miraculously scattered them by changing their languages to forcibly distribute them over the
face of the earth (Genesis 11:1-9).

The Tower of Babel

The tower was a post-flood form of rebellion against God. God told
them to disperse over the earth, but the descendants of Noah
collected together and became powerful as a people. They
attempted to build a tower that reached into the heavens.

It is widely considered that Shinar, where the Bible says the Babel
event took place, was a territory in south Mesopotamia; and that
Babel was located at Babylon. However, an analysis of history,
geography, and geology, shows that Shinar cannot have been in the
south, but rather was a territory in what is northeastern Syria
today; and that the remnants of the Tower must be in the Upper Khabur River triangle, not far from Tell
Brak, which is the missing city of Akkad. i

It is widely believed that the Tower of Babel was a ziggurat. A ziggurat was a series of levels built on top
of one another, each level smaller than the previous. It provided steps and could be several levels high
(most were seven). The Mesopotamians believed that these pyramid temples connected heaven to
earth.

Ancient Babylonian stories describe the god Marduk (also known as Murdock) (chief god of the city of
Babylon and national god of Babylonia) defending the other gods against diabolical monsters from a
ziggurat. Eventually in Babylon, his name was changed to Bel which means Lord. Originally Bel or

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