Tower of Babel
New reading
High mountains hid in the deep ocean along with the last hopes of returning home. For several years, the shaking of water and earth turned villages and cities into dust and dirt; billowing waves carried boats, crops and lives to the ocean. Nothing remained of the great empire, only the memories that survivors will pass on to their children and entrust to descendants to tell again.
And they were only a few hundred, and they did not know if there was anyone else besides them in the whole world. The birds led their large ship, which was badly damaged by storms, into fertile land: on each side of the land great rivers flowed, quenching thirst and yielding food.
A year after the flood, when the first crop was harvested and the second was ripening, the eldest survivor of the flood, Hanoch, proclaimed:
“We mourned our great homeland and the departed. But the Almighty Father loves us for he saved our lives and granted us a beautiful land, the sun and a clear sky. We are gathering a rich harvest and building houses for our families. The time has come to give glory to the Almighty and to erect a temple to heaven in His honor and in His name, so that generations to come will see the greatness of the Creator, and the Almighty will continue to be merciful.”
With rejoicing, the words of Hanoch were received. For he did not even learn the opinion of everyone, before the people leapt from their places and cried out:
“Yes! Verily we will build a temple in the name of our Heavenly Father!”
And all as one they elected to begin from tomorrow’s sunrise. And Hanoch, in addition to his venerable status, became the chief architect of the temple.
The first rays of the sun barely reached over the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, before the entire nation, young and old, were standing at the house of Hanoch in readiness, waiting to hear the first orders for construction of the temple to the Most High.
“Listen to me,” Hanoch began, “we must create a great temple, the highest, higher than those we had before the flood, so our Heavenly Father can see our love for Him and reverence and would not send the flood to our nation again! All will have work: someone will have to extract stone and fire bricks, someone will have to carry them to their place, someone will need to lay walls, someone will need to paint them, and so
