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From: Genesis 11:1-9

Babel: the confusion of language

[1] Now the whole earth had one language and few words. [2] And as men mi-
grated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.
[3] And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them
thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. [4] Then they
said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens,
and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face
of the whole earth.” [5] And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower,
which the sons of men had built. [6] And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one
people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what
they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.
[7] Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not
understand one another’s speech.” [8] So the Lord scattered them abroad from
there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. [9] Therefore
its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all
the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the
earth.

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Commentary:

11:1-9. The text goes on to describe the growth of evil (cf. 8:21; 9:20-27), and,
as one of its results, the fact that mankind is scattered and its God-given unity
is fragmented. Thus, the text begins by talking about mankind when it was still
together; it came from the east, where it originated and settled in the plains of
Mesopotamia (in Shinar; cf. 10:10). But the people are filled with pride, and want
to make a name for themselves, and to guarantee their own security by reaching
heaven by their own efforts. This attitude is epitomized by the project of building
a massive tower (we can get some idea of it from the tower-temples of Mesopota-
mia, the ziggurats, on whose high terraces the Babylonians thought they could
gain access to the godhead and thus dominate God).

The text also offers an explanation for why there are so many languages; it sees
language as a sign of division and misunderstanding between individuals and na-
tions. It is based on the popular meaning of the word “babel”, connecting it with
the Hebrew balbalah, confusion; but in fact Babel means “gate of God”. We have
here an instance of literary devices being used to expound deep convictions – in
this case the view that disunion in mankind is the outcome of men’s pride and
sinfulness.

Babel thus becomes the opposite of Jerusalem, the city to which, the prophets
say, all the nations will flock (cf. Is 2:2-3). And it will be in the Church, the new
Jerusalem, that men of all nations, races and tongues will join in faith and love,
as will be seen in the Pentecost event (cf. Acts 2:1-13). There the phenomenon
of Babel will be reversed: all will understand the same language. In the history
of mankind, in effect, the Church is a kind of sign or sacrament of the union of
God and men, and of the unity of the whole human race (cf. Vatican II, Lumen
Gentium, 1).

11:4. St Augustine explains the frustration of man’s designs against God in
this way: “Where would man’s vain presumption have ended if it succeeded in
rearing a building of such size and height, even to the sky in the face of God –
since they would have been higher than any mountain and would have reached
beyond the limits of our atmosphere? In any case, no harm could have come
to God from any straining after spiritual or physical elevation” (De civitate Dei,
16, 4).

This new sin of mankind is basically the same sort of sin as was committed in
paradise; it is a kind of continuation of it. It is the sin of pride to which man is
always prone and it has been well described in the following words of Blessed
Josemaria Escriva when he comments on 1 John 2:16: “They eyes of our soul
grow dull. Reason proclaims itself sufficient to understand everything, without
the aid of God. This is a subtle temptation, which hides behind the power of our
intellect, given by our Father God to man so that he might know and love him
freely. Seduced by this temptation, the human mind appoints itself the centre of
the universe, being thrilled with the prospect that ‘you shall be like gods’ (cf. Gen
3:5). So, filled with love for itself, it turns its back on the love of God. In this way
does our existence fall prey unconditionally to the third enemy: pride of life. It’s
not merely a question of passing thoughts of vanity or self-love, it’s a state of
general conceit. Let’s not deceive ourselves, for this is the worst of all evils, the
root of every false step. The fight against pride has to be a constant battle, to
such an extent that someone once said that pride only disappears twenty-four
hours after a person dies. It is the arrogance of the Pharisee whom God cannot
transform because he finds in him the obstacle of self-sufficiency. It is the
haughtiness which leads to despising other people, to lording it over them, and
so mistreating them. For ‘when pride comes, then comes disgrace’ (Prov 11:2)”
(Christ Is Passing By, 6).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

From: Mark 8:34-9:1

Christian Renunciation (Continuation)

[34] And He (Jesus) called to Him the multitude with His disciples, and said to
them, “If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his
cross and follow Me. [35] For whoever would save his life will lose it; and who-
ever loses his life for My sake and the Gospel’s will save it. [36] For what does it
profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? [37] For what can a man
give in return for his life? [38] For whoever is ashamed of Me and of My words in
this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed,
when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels”.

[1] And He said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who
will not taste death before they see the Kingdom of God come with power.”

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Commentary:

35. “Life”: in the original text and the New Vulgate the word literally means “soul.”
But here, as in many other cases, “soul” and “life” are equivalent. The word “life”
is used, clearly, in a double sense: earthly life and eternal life, the life of man here-
on earth and man’s eternal happiness in Heaven. Death can put an end to earthly
life, but it cannot destroy eternal life (cf. Matthew 10:28), the life which can only
be given by Him who brings the dead back to life.

Understood in this way, we can grasp the paradoxical meaning of our Lord’s
phrase: whoever wishes to save his (earthly) life will lose his (eternal) life. But
whoever loses his (earthly) life for Me and the Gospel, will save his (eternal) life.
What, then, does saving one’s (earthly) life mean? It means living this life as if
there were no other — letting oneself be controlled by the lust of the flesh and the
lust of the eyes and the pride of life (cf. 1 John 2:16). And losing one’s (earthly)
life means mortifying, by continuous ascetical effort, this triple concupiscence —
that is, taking up one’s cross (verse 34)—and consequently seeking and savoring
the things that are God’s and not the things of the earth (cf. Colossians 3:1-2).

36-37. Jesus promises eternal life to those who are willing to lose earthly life for
His sake. He has given us example: He is the Good Shepherd who lays down
His life for His sheep (John 10:15); and He fulfilled in His own case what He said
to the Apostles on the night before He died: “Greater love has no man than this
that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

38. Each person’s eternal destiny will be decided by Christ. He is the Judge who
will come to judge the living and the dead (Matthew 16:27). The sentence will de-
pend on how faithful each has been in keeping the Lord’s commandments — to
love God and to love one’s neighbor, for God’s sake. On that day Christ will not
recognize as His disciple anyone who is ashamed to imitate Jesus’ humility and
example and follow the precepts of the Gospel for fear of displeasing the world or
worldly people: he has failed to confess by his life the faith which he claims to
hold. A Christian, then, should never be ashamed of the Gospel (Romans 1:16);
he should never let himself be drawn away by the worldliness around him; rather
he should exercise a decisive influence on his environment, counting on the help
of God’s grace. The first Christians changed the ancient pagan world. God’s arm
has not grown shorter since their time (cf. Isaiah 59:1). Cf. Matthew 10:32-33 and
note on same.

9:1. The coming o the Kingdom of God with power does not seem to refer to the
second, glorious coming of Jesus at the end of time (the Parousia); it may, rather,
indicate the amazing spread of the Church in the lifetime of the Apostles. Many
of those present here will witness this. The growth and spread of the Church in
the world can be explained only by the divine power God gives to the mystical bo-
dy of Christ. The Transfiguration of our Lord, which is recounted in the next pas-
sage, is a sign, given to the Apostles, of Jesus’ divinity and of the divine powers
which He will give His Church.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.