Genesis 11 :: New International Version (NIV)

The Tower of Babel

Gen 11:1Now the whole world had one language and a common speech.

Gen 11:2As people moved eastward,[fn] they found a plain in Shinar[fn] and settled there.

Gen 11:3They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

Gen 11:4

Gen 11:4Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

Gen 11:5

Gen 11:5But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower the people were building.

Gen 11:6

Gen 11:6The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

Gen 11:7

Gen 11:7Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

Gen 11:8

Gen 11:8So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

Gen 11:9

Gen 11:9That is why it was called Babel[fn]—because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

From Shem to Abram

(1Ch 1:17–27; Luk 3:34–36 )

Gen 11:10

Gen 11:10This is the account of Shem’s family line. Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father[fn] of Arphaxad.

Gen 11:11

Gen 11:11And after he became the father of Arphaxad, Shem lived 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:12

Gen 11:12When Arphaxad had lived 35 years, he became the father of Shelah.

Gen 11:13

Gen 11:13And after he became the father of Shelah, Arphaxad lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.[fn]

Gen 11:14

Gen 11:14When Shelah had lived 30 years, he became the father of Eber.

Gen 11:15

Gen 11:15And after he became the father of Eber, Shelah lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:16

Gen 11:16When Eber had lived 34 years, he became the father of Peleg.

Gen 11:17

Gen 11:17And after he became the father of Peleg, Eber lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:18

Gen 11:18When Peleg had lived 30 years, he became the father of Reu.

Gen 11:19

Gen 11:19And after he became the father of Reu, Peleg lived 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:20

Gen 11:20When Reu had lived 32 years, he became the father of Serug.

Gen 11:21

Gen 11:21And after he became the father of Serug, Reu lived 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:22

Gen 11:22When Serug had lived 30 years, he became the father of Nahor.

Gen 11:23

Gen 11:23And after he became the father of Nahor, Serug lived 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:24

Gen 11:24When Nahor had lived 29 years, he became the father of Terah.

Gen 11:25

Gen 11:25And after he became the father of Terah, Nahor lived 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

Gen 11:26

Gen 11:26After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran.

Abram’s Family

Gen 11:27

Gen 11:27This is the account of Terah’s family line. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot.

Gen 11:28

Gen 11:28While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth.

Gen 11:29

Gen 11:29Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milkah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milkah and Iskah.

Gen 11:30

Gen 11:30Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive.

Gen 11:31

Gen 11:31Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there.

Gen 11:32

Gen 11:32Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Harran.

See the NIV Preface (Especially for Parenthesis, Brackets, & Asterisks).

NIV Footnotes

(11:2)

Or from the east; or in the east

(11:2)

That is, Babylonia

(11:9)

That is, Babylon; Babel sounds like the Hebrew for confused.

(11:10)

Father may mean ancestor; also in verses 11-25.

(11:12)

Hebrew; Septuagint (see also Luke 3:35, 36 and note at Gen. 10:24) 35 years, he became the father of Cainan. 13 And after he became the father of Cainan, Arphaxad lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters, and then he died. When Cainan had lived 130 years, he became the father of Shelah. And after he became the father of Shelah, Cainan lived 330 years and had other sons and daughters

(11:13)

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