Another thought on the Tower of Babel.
I’m considering taking a break from the weekly Torah reading to focus on this story for the foreseeable future--a new perspective on the Tower of Babel each week.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on/interest in taking that path. I'm at amezrich@gmail.com.
Talking, not talking
i
Cain is violently jealous of his brother.
He tries to speak to him
he meets him in the field
he kills him instead of speaking.
Later, Cain builds a city
which he names for his son.
Which is a new kind of family name,
a new language of family—
a language of cities:
structured, neat
enclosing the open field
of family emotions.
ii
Between genealogies
—families birthing families,
naming them—
we meet the people of Bavel.
They are beyond family.
They are nameless.
We know nothing of their parents,
their children.
Of one language,
they communicate directly enough
to build a city.
Which they will build so as not to be dispersed,
to give themselves a name,
to unite.
iv
They structure a new city
a new name
a new family
through uncomplicated language,
through technology and work.
They are Cain’s disciples.
v
Perhaps God does not want more Cains.
He wants us
to connect through the depths.
So He scatters language back into chaos.
So humanity can begin to learn
what it needs to:
not how to hide behind ordered words
but how, finally, to face each other
how to connect.
__
Shabbat shalom,
Abe
__
Please pray for Yechiel ben Michal
__