Last night I heard an excellent sermon about the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) and the dangers of human progress unrestrained by divine wisdom. The unfettered human progress of the 1800s led to the 1900s, the most destructive century in human history, with two world wars, the rise of Communism, Nazism, fascism, and radical Islam, along with the genocide of abortion.
Viewed through my lens, the Tower was the world’s first United Nations building. After the Flood, as Noah and his descendants spread across the earth, certain men decided they should stay together, building one city with a tower reaching up to heaven, “lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth” (Genesis 11:4). Josephus, in his “Antiquities of the Jews”(c. A.D. 79) expounds upon the Genesis account:
Now it was Nimrod [cf. Genesis 10:8-11; note that Genesis does not specifically associate Nimrod with the Tower but it does say he built Babel in the land of Shinar (Babylon)] who excited them to such an affront and contempt of God. He was the grandson of Ham, the son of Noah, a bold man, and of great strength of hand. He persuaded them not ascribe it to God, as if it was through his means they were happy, but to believe that it was their own courage which procured that happiness. He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his power. He also said he would be revenged on God, if he should have a mind to drown the world again; for that he would build a tower too high for the waters to be able to reach! and that he would avenge himself on God for destroying their forefathers!
What is wrong with building a tower and keeping people together? I’ll just name a few things:
- It violated God’s command to Noah’s descendants to “replenish the earth” (Genesis 9:1). Instead, the builders of the Tower wanted to keep people together under their power.
- It was an attempt to reach heaven by man’s own works, rather than by God’s grace. The Babylonian historian Berossus (c. 290 B.C.) says it was a monument to human power and an affront to the gods in general.
- It was built in defiance of God out of anger toward God.
- It was probably a gigantic ziggurat, a Babylonian tower used for astrology and pagan worship. In “The Two Babylons," Alexander Hislop demonstrates that the Babylonians deified Nimrod into Marduk as the head of their pantheon of gods.
· It was a move toward world government, an early step toward globalism.
What’s wrong with world government? Wouldn’t it foster world peace? Wouldn’t it have unlimited potential for good?
Possibly, if men were good. But they’re not. In the hands of evil men like Nimrod or those who follow him, world government would have unlimited potential for evil. As James Madison warned in Federalist No. 51:
But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
God, therefore, told the people to disperse. As Paul said in Acts 17:26, God “hath made of one blood all nations,” but He has determined “the bounds of their habitation.” God’s plan for the human race is not world government, but separate nations. Why? Because, as Lord Acton said, “Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Most of us know that quote, but we forget his next sentence: “Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority.”
Separate nations serve as checks on each other’s power. If people are abused and persecuted by their government, they can flee to another country, as the Pilgrims did in 1620 when they fled the tyranny of James I, as the Holy Family did when they fled to Egypt to escape Herod’s tyranny, as the thousands did who fled East Germany for West Germany, and as millions throughout history have done in seeking asylum in the United States.
And in extreme circumstances, other nations can intervene to check a tyrant’s cruelty, as the United States did to liberate the Nazi death camps and as the Trump administration is considering to prevent the wholesale slaughter of Nigerian Christians.
I believe it is God’s will that we be loyal and patriotic Americans, just as it is His will that everyone be loyal to his or her own country. That’s why God confounded the building of the Tower by confusing the languages of the people.
Would I ever support world government? Yes! When Jesus Christ comes to establish His millennial rule, “He shall rule them with a rod of iron” (Revelation 2:27). I will gladly bow the knee and trust Jesus Christ with absolute power, because He is utterly without sin and incorruptible.
But until then, no blue beret; only red, white and blue for me!
Colonel Eidsmoe serves as Professor of Constitutional Law for the Oak Brook College of Law & Government Policy (obcl.edu), as Senior Counsel for the Foundation for Moral Law (morallaw.org), and as Pastor of Woodland Presbyterian Church (woodlandpca.org) of Notasulga, Ala. He may be contacted for speaking engagements at [email protected].
