City of No Strangers

 

Why did the people of Babel make their city?

Because they feared they would disband across the earth.

 

God descended to see what they had done.

He saw that they had accomplished so much

—now they could achieve whatever they set out to do.

So God dispersed them.

He put an end to their city.

 

God did not want them to achieve whatever they set out to do.

He stopped them before they went too far.

But what did He stop?

 

Perhaps, unchecked, these people would have become

like the people of Sodom.

 

God descended to witness Sodom, as he had descended to witness Babel.

He sends angels.

When the angels come, the people of Sodom encircle them

    to rape them.

When Lot, Abraham’s nephew, tries to protect the angels,

    the townspeople decry him as a foreigner.

 

*

Sodom is a city that will have no visitors.

Babel is a city of people who will stay together.

God puts an end to both cities.

 

Perhaps one—if you take it so far—

gives rise to the next.

 

 

_____

Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

Buy the book: The House at the Center of the World