More on Flood and Babel

Q I

Could the Tower of Babel have actually been part of the early Egyptian civilization and one of it’s very first cities?
https://www.quora.com/Could-the-Tower-of-Babel-have-actually-been-part-of-the-early-Egyptian-civilization-and-one-of-it-s-very-first-cities/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered April 13

Answering:

“Could the Tower of Babel have actually been part of the early Egyptian civilization and one of it’s very first cities?”

I’ll distinguish:

• could theoretically
• could probably.

Could theoretically, yes. It seems that some occasions Alexandria in Egypt has been identified with Babel or even Babylon.

Could probably, not on my view. See below.

I’ll also distinguish:

• tower of Babel
• city of Babel.

Now, the Hebrew and Vulgate text says “they ceased to build the city” but only the LXX says also “and the tower”.

I take Babel to be a city completely abandoned, I take the tower project as being a project not abandoned finally, and very recently actually realised.

Before take-off, what did Apollo five look like? A tower. It was raised vertically.
How much of it reached into space, a k a heaven? Only the top of it, steps 1 and 2 being discarded along the way up.

This brings about the classical question, do I think Nimrod could have built a functioning rocket if God hadn’t stopped him? No, no more than Leonardo could have built a functioning air plane.

Some people are so into progress that if I attribute a rocket project to Nimrod, he must in my view have been a genius who could have pulled off a rocket take-off into space. It doesn’t occur that I take him to be a dunce, a dangerous idiot back then, talented in leadership, having exercised many a successful captaincy over many a mammoth hunt, but absolutely promoted to his level of IN-competence when it came to Babel and the project of a tower moving upward until its top reaches into space.

There is a city that was abandoned with no reversal, where wild beasts would have rested, houses have been filled with serpents, ostriches would have dwelt until it was all covered in sand. When the sand was uncovered recently, some (including Graham Hancock and myself) have found the scenery very like a rocket launching ramp. I have said Göbekli Tepe. It is also in Mesopotamia, since East of Euphrates and West of Tigris.

Q II

Is it possible that the pyramids existed before the Tower of Babel and was built by Noah’s descendants instead of at the time of the tower of Babel?
https://www.quora.com/Is-it-possible-that-the-pyramids-existed-before-the-Tower-of-Babel-and-was-built-by-Noah-s-descendants-instead-of-at-the-time-of-the-tower-of-Babel/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Stef Lynn

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered Sun

I would say they were built some centuries after Babel.

Babel = Göbekli Tepe, carbon dated to beginning 9600 BC for near real 2607 BC and to ending 8600 BC for near real 2556 BC.

Pyramids are in real time after Abraham’s birth 2015 BC. In chapter 12 or 13 he meets the first pharao. Chapters of Genesis, I mean. This means, it carbon dates in 4th millennium BC.

Q III

Why does it appear biblically that the ancient world around the time of the Tower of Babel appeared to be the same as before Noah’s flood?
https://www.quora.com/Why-does-it-appear-biblically-that-the-ancient-world-around-the-time-of-the-Tower-of-Babel-appeared-to-be-the-same-as-before-Noah-s-flood/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Marc Bloemers

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 1h ago

I suppose you refer to Shinar meaning the land between Euphrates and Tigris, while these two rivers are also two rivers of Paradise, mentioned in Genesis 2 for the pre-Flood world.

I would solve the problem by saying the Euphrates and Tigris surrounding post-Flood Shinar are not quite identical to the Frat and Hiddekel of the pre-Flood world. I think they are same riverbeds, but running opposite directions.

So, Frat would have been Euphrates (in opposite direction), running down through what is now Black Sea then Danube (also in opposite direction), running down through what are now Alps into Rhine, Rhône and Seine. And across a stretch of Atlantis, now sunk but only after the Flood, and into St. Lawrence and into Mississippi. Onto the North West corner of the pre-Flood world.

In other words, it does not appear Biblically that the ancient world around the time of the Tower of Babel is the same as that before Noah’s Flood.

Q IV

Where did Cain get the people from to build his city which he named after his son?
https://www.quora.com/Where-did-Cain-get-the-people-from-to-build-his-city-which-he-named-after-his-son/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1?

Answer requested by

Marc Bloemers

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 1:18 pm next day

• 1) Adam and Eve had more children than just three.
• 2) Cain got a sister or niece as wife and children but also some less important siblings than Seth and some of their children from among those other children.

Q V

If Damascus is the world’s oldest city at 5,000 years old, could it have possibly been the first organized civilization built before the Tower of Babel? https://www.quora.com/If-Damascus-is-the-world-s-oldest-city-at-5-000-years-old-could-it-have-possibly-been-the-first-organized-civilization-built-before-the-Tower-of-Babel/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1?

Answer requested by

Stef Lynn

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 2:21 pm

I copy this from wiki on the city:

“Carbon-14 dating at Tell Ramad, on the outskirts of Damascus, suggests that the site may have been occupied since the second half of the seventh millennium BC, possibly around 6300 BC.”

6300 BC in carbon dates would have been in real dates between 2332 BC to 2309 BC, with Babel ending in 2556 BC.

However, we also see:

“However, evidence of settlement in the wider Barada basin dating back to 9000 BC exists, although no large-scale settlement was present within Damascus walls until the second millennium BC.”

9000 BC in carbon dates would be between the carbon dates for Babel / Göbekli Tepe, namely 9600 to 8600 BC. It would be in about mid time of Babel, in 2585 between 2607 and 2556 BC.

Here is the wiki for Damascus:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damascus#Early_settlement

And here is the calibration I have made partly on the equation Babel = Göbekli Tepe:

Creation vs. Evolution : New Tables
https://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2020/08/new-tables.html

That is my stance, and as long as you don’t show a structure that is carbon dated even older than Göbekli Tepe and which also is in between Euphrates and Tigris, I don’t see much need to change it.

The carbon date 9000 BC there was just a small settlement, and that is consistent with the place being populated but sending delegations of workers and deliveries to Babel by getting East to Euphrates and following it upwards to Göbekli Tepe. Tell Qaramel is perhaps older, but West of Euphrates.

I am not and do not pretend to be a prophet, nor do I pretend to be or aspire to become your pastor, I am a writer. If you wish to differ from me, you can do so, insofar as your reasons prompt you honestly, and there is no disobedience, since you don’t owe me obedience in the first place. So, why do you keep trying to find reasons for me to reconsider what you already know to be my stance? If you have what you consider a solid reason against it, why not state it below in comments?

I

Ron Barak

May 8

Jericho
Archaeologists have unearthed the remains of more than 20 successive settlements in Jericho, the first of which dates back 11,000 years (9000 BCE),[12][13] almost to the very beginning of the Holocene epoch of the Earth's history.[14][15]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jericho

a

Hans-Georg Lundahl

May 9

Nice, but you forget that Göbekli Tepe has its layers from 9600 to 8600 BC.

In other words, Göbekli Tepe starts before Damascus does.

Christian Farivar

Sat

It is not a civilization because it did not continue nor is there any Alphabet. You need study bit more.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

4h ago

Continuing and having an alphabet are not criteria needed for Civilisation.

b

Christian Farivar

May 9

Settlements are not cities. We have been making Settlements at least known dating 45000 years.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

May 10

Göbekli Tepe however is a city.

A settlement from carbon dated 45 000 BP would be a pre-Flood one.

II

Christian Farivar

May 9

Wikipedia is a site anyone can add info to, and is not an acceptable reference.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

May 10

I don’t give two pence for what you consider acceptable references.

You didn’t give any such for:

• Damascus being older than Göbekli Tepe
• or Damascus being between Euphrates and Tigris.

Christian Farivar

Sat

Then you are spreading lies and should be banned.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

4h ago

No, your (his*) view of “acceptable references” does not equal “truth”, my rejection of that criterium does not equal spreading lies.

Note *

Christian Farivar disabled comments, so not sure he gets notified of a reply I technically made as reply to my previous.

Christian Farivar

"Popular historian of technology and political philosophy / Master's of Liberal Arts in Management, Harvard University Expected 2022"

Doesn't seem his credentials are very adapted to the question. However, his university matches his prejudices.

Q VI

Do most linguists and historians believe that the “Tower of Babel” allegory has a bit of truth to it, in terms of the whole world having one language at some point, and then the civilizations later being scattered and developing their own languages?
https://www.quora.com/Do-most-linguists-and-historians-believe-that-the-Tower-of-Babel-allegory-has-a-bit-of-truth-to-it-in-terms-of-the-whole-world-having-one-language-at-some-point-and-then-the-civilizations-later-being-scattered-and/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Lance Heffa

Hans-Georg Lundahl

amateur linguist

Answered 30.IV

If you mean most linguists and historians now alive and at work in universities, I would think no.

Most would dismiss it as myth.

I also do not think it “has a bit of truth to it” but that it is literally true. 401 to 529 years (two versions of LXX chronology for birth of Peleg = end of Babel) after the Flood, the one language spoken on the Ark would not naturally have diverged into things as different as Chinese and Japanese or Sumerian and Akkadian. The reason we don’t have languages of just one language family, if not as closely related as Germanic ones, at least no further apart than P-Celtic and Q-Celtic or Baltic and Slavic, is arguably that God made a miracle. A punishment, but one which has its relish to linguists (whether Tolkien believed the story factually true or not, he once said “felix peccatum Babel” - “what a fortunate sin at Babel” - which deserved us such an interesting punishment!).

Now, if there were in the Evolutionist timeline accepted by most Academics today as factual any time when all men spoke one single language, it would have been way before civilisation and therefore way before documentation, and therefore historically speaking unknowable. An alternative theory is, when Homo sapiens had developed (or Homo erectus if they are credited as “first” users of language) the faculty to invent language, the actual invention of language took place in different places and times independently of each other, even if by now all populations not yet having language are long extinct (and could have been so even before the rise of Homo sapiens).

This means, Academics are typically on the edge between accepting monogenesis of language before any division into different languages or accepting polygenesis of language therefore from the start divided into more than one language. Obviously, I think they are WRONG, not because I am smarter than they, but because they belong to the WRONG tradition, namely that of Evolution belief.

There is a little mistake in your wording of it, namely, “civilisations … developing their own languages”. Having a language, having a grammar, having different languages and different grammars definitely does not require having a civilisation. It’s populations that develop the inherited language on own lines, with more or less relating to other populations of same language depending on how intense the contact with them is. Civilisations may develop specific sections of the vocabulary, but they do not overall “develop language” or if anything, by writing, only a certain stability in it.

QVII

Why is there so much mystery surrounding the exact location of Noah’s Ark on Mount Ararat?
https://www.quora.com/Why-is-there-so-much-mystery-surrounding-the-exact-location-of-Noah-s-Ark-on-Mount-Ararat/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Stef Lynn

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered just now

The Bible doesn’t say “on Mount Ararat” but “in the MountainS of Ararat” = of Urartu = of Armenia.

The mystery begins with exact mountain top.

Supposing the tradition of Mt. Judi near Cizre in Turkish Armenia is correct, we get a journey due West (very nearly) to Göbekli Tepe.

ANY placement of landing place so far proposed I have heard of makes the journey NOT to the West into regions like Eridu.