Genesis 11  Contemporary English Version

The Tower of Babel

11 At first everyone spoke the same language, ² but after some of them moved from the east^[a] and settled in Babylonia,^{[b] 3-4} they said:

Let's build a city with a tower that reaches to the sky! We'll use hard bricks and tar instead of stone and mortar. We'll become famous, and we won't be scattered all over the world.

⁵ But when the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower, ⁶ he said:

These people are working together because they all speak the same language. This is just the beginning. Soon they will be able to do anything they want. ⁷ Let's go down and confuse them! We'll make them speak different languages, and they won't be able to understand each other.

^8-9 So the people had to stop building the city, because the Lord confused their language and scattered them all over the earth. That's how the city of Babel^[c] got its name.

The Descendants of Shem

^10-11 Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100, he had a son named Arpachshad. He had more children and died at the age of 600. This is a list of his descendants:

¹² When Arpachshad was 35, he had a son named Shelah. ¹³ Arpachshad had more children and died at the age of 438.

¹⁴ When Shelah was 30, he had a son named Eber. ¹⁵ Shelah had more children and died at the age of 433.

¹⁶ When Eber was 34, he had a son named Peleg. ¹⁷ Eber had more children and died at the age of 464.

¹⁸ When Peleg was 30, he had a son named Reu. ¹⁹ Peleg had more children and died at the age of 239.

²⁰ When Reu was 32 he had a son named Serug. ²¹ Reu had more children and died at the age of 239.

²² When Serug was 30, he had a son named Nahor. ²³ Serug had more children and died at the age of 230.

²⁴ When Nahor was 29, he had a son named Terah. ²⁵ Nahor had more children and died at the age of 148.

The Descendants of Terah

^26-28 After Terah was 70 years old, he had three sons: Abram, Nahor, and Haran, who became the father of Lot. Terah's sons were born in the city of Ur in Chaldea,^[d] and Haran died there before the death of his father. The following is the story of Terah's descendants.

^29-30 Abram married Sarai, but she was not able to have children. And Nahor married Milcah, who was the daughter of Haran and the sister of Iscah.

³¹ Terah decided to move from Ur to the land of Canaan. He took along Abram and Sarai and his grandson Lot, the son of Haran. But when they came to the city of Haran,^[e] they settled there instead. ³² Terah lived to be 205 years old and died in Haran.