Is Babel Where Nations Began?

Introduction

Stephen Wolfe presented a detailed case for why a nation should point itself to the earthly and heavenly good of its people in his book, The Case for Christian Nationalism. While a nation should be ensuring the earthly good of its people, it has no place directing its people toward heavenly good as we discussed in this past blog post and podcast episode. In the latter, Wolfe was gracious to tune in and provide feedback. Given these two sources, I will not be giving a complete background or critique of Wolfe’s version of Christian Nationalism, but will be focusing on his understanding of the splitting of man at Babel and how this relates to his understanding of nations. I also will not be restating my position on Genesis 11 in relation to Wolfe’s book as the story of Babel was exegeted in the podcast episode linked above. These two sources also provide positive arguments against Wolfe’s position which also means I will not be providing all sources and evidence against his position in this article. Those sources should be referenced for further information on the position. One of the main premises of Wolfe’s argument for Christian Nationalism is that nations are natural in their own right, prelapsarian (meaning before the Fall). In other words, nations are part of the natural order and postlapsarian governments are to bring themselves back to prelapsarian standards.

“Civil governments would have existed in the state of integrity.”¹

The “state of integrity” is referring to the prelapsarian state of man. Government would have existed and since government is a critical part of a nation, nations would have existed. There are multiple reasons he gives for why nations are natural including cultural diversity (see pages 64-65 of the Kindle Edition of The Case for Christian Nationalism). One of the obvious situations biblically that has to be addressed when talking about whether nations are “natural” or not is the story of the Tower of Babel as found in Genesis 11. Wolfe addresses this in a couple of different blog posts, but I want to focus on one from the American Reformer.

Wolfe’s Position

In his article, “National Diversity in an Unfallen World,” Wolfe lays out the basic position that he provided in his book on why nations would exist in a prelapsarian environment. His goal is to expand upon this premise more and address the objection that the Tower of Babel incident undermines his argument.

“No critic (to my knowledge) attempted to refute my arguments directly, which I continue to consider sufficient for my conclusions. However, more can be said on the subject, and this essay will develop my method, confirm my conclusion, and address various questions around it.”²

In Section VII of the article (or essay as he calls it) titled, “Tower of Babel”, he lays out his position on this biblical incident in relation to prelapsarian nations. He basis his argument in three main areas:

1. Those who claim that diversity of nations is unnatural and that the divine action of God is what created this national diversity commit the genetic fallacy.
2. The people of Babel were in apparent violation of Genesis 1:28.
3. There is little evidence that God approved or disapproved of their unity or diversity.

Let us look at each claim.

The Genetic Fallacy and National Diversity

Wolfe argues that the genetic fallacy is being used by those who claim that God’s action in confusing those at Babel is what created national diversity.

“The historical origin of diversity by positive divine action does not negate the proposition that such diversity is natural and would have occurred otherwise.”³

In other words, just because God confused those at Babel with different languages does not mean that nations would not have come about naturally. At the heart of this argumentation are hermeneutical problems. There are two key areas that should be addressed at this point:

1. Scripture reveals that it is sufficient for every good work (2 Timothy 3:16). This would include the story of Babel being it falls within Paul’s primary understanding of what Scripture is (the Old Testament). This means that the historical event of God confusing the people of Babel has direct relevance to the proposition that Wolfe proposes. This does not mean that Scripture is sufficient for every activity specifically but it does provide us with a framework with which every activity and proposition must be judged by. For example, while Scripture does not tell me how to be a doctor it does tell me how to a good doctor (e.g. doing my best to God’s glory, doing honest work, loving my neighbor, etc). Going back to the event of Babel, it is especially relevant given the text in question for our discussion and Wolfe’s proposition have to do with one another directly. Given the nature of Scripture described above, we can reject a proposition because of the origin of something if we can demonstrate from the text that the origin of the thing contradicts the proposition considered. Biblical discussions about the origins of things are just as important for our good works as positive imperatives. Divorcing the text from the proposition is to fail on a basic hermeneutical level as the basis of all exegesis is gone. Why not make any text of Scripture irrelevant to any proposition in that case? This principle that all Scripture is relevant to our good works would also apply to Genesis 10 which does talk about nations being formed. However, the nations were formed on the basis of language, which, of course, did not happen until after Genesis 11. As seen from chapter 10, verses 5, 20, and 31, the people were organized according to their languages, not naturally due to some inherent diversity. John Gill says this in his Bible commentary on chapter 10 verse 5: “this shows, that what is said concerning the division of countries to the sons of Japheth is by way of anticipation; and that, though thus related, was not done till after the confusion of languages, since the partition was made according to the different languages of men; those that were of the same language went and dwelt together, the several nations of them, and the several families in those nations; by which it appears that this was done by consultation, with great care and wisdom, ranging the people according to their tongues; of which nations were formed, and with them were taken the several families they consisted of.” ⁴ Even though nations are mentioned in Genesis 10, the fact the chapter comes before chapter 11 has nothing to do with the historical chronology of this particular biblical history, but happens to be the placement of the narrative. Genesis 10 is a genealogy meant to describe the overall timeline of Noah’s sons and their seed, and as such, all the events do not take place before chapter 11. The same principle can be seen from Matthew 1:16-17, where Christ is said to have been born, yet we know chronologically that event had not yet occurred in Matthew’s gospel. Chapter 11:1 of Genesis is clear that all people on the earth spoke the same language, which contradicts what chapter 10 says if we take the narrative of that chapter as historically antecedent to Babel. However, there are no issues if we let the clearer passage of the Babel narrative inform the genealogy. This leads me to my next point.
2. Building upon the point above, what Scripture does not reveal has as much importance as what it does reveal. The fact Scripture never says explicitly or implicitly that there would have been nations had Adam never sinned has to be considered when addressing this issue. One cannot simply state that government would have existed in the state of integrity while ignoring the positive aspects of Scripture that reveal otherwise. Wolfe dismisses this fact by stating that Genesis 11 has no bearing against or for his argument since this allows him to ignore positive aspects of Scripture that would let the silent passages (e.g., the Genesis narrative prelapsarian) on these issues speak out more. A key aspect of Reformed hermeneutics is using the clearer passages to interpret the less clear, which would include places where Scripture is silent on a particular issue. The 2nd London Baptist Confession of Faith in 1.9 says this, “The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself; and therefore when there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture (which are not many, but one), it must be searched by other places that speak more clearly.”⁵ The wording here is almost identical to that of the 1646 Westminster Confession of Faith and teaches the same doctrine. What this ultimately is referring to is that Scripture has to interpret itself. There will be passages that will not have clear meaning on a particular issue (such as trying to exegete that nations would have existed absent lapsarianism), but this means that we should be going to other places that speak more to the matter (which Scripture does provide in this case). Knowing this, we can conclude that since Scripture does not provide us implicit or explicit guidance to say that prelapsarian man would have formed nations, we can only reference the subject relative to the express passages that speak otherwise.

The People of Babel Were In Apparent Violation of Genesis 1:28

“We are told in Genesis 11 that soon after the great flood the human race had one language and lived together ‘in the land of Shinar.’ Hence, they were one people in one place. They put their linguistic unity to evil use—to build a tower that ‘may reach unto heaven’ (v. 4) to make a name for themselves. They were clearly conscious of the possibility of being ‘scattered abroad,’ which for some reason was undesirable to them and suggests disobedience to God’s command to ‘fill the earth’ (Gen. 1:28). Thus, their unity appears to be a self-conscious choice for an evil purpose.”⁶ In Wolfe’s mind, the people at Babel were apparently disobeying God since they were not going abroad to fill the earth. I find this objection interesting since it conveniently leaves out the purpose of the statement in the first place. If we look at the whole verse:

“Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that [a]moves on the earth.” Genesis 1:28 NKJV

Contextually, the thrust of the text is not about a geographical location per se, but about procreation. As people procreate, there will be a natural expansion of people to other places on the earth. God was not concerned that humans occupied every blade of grass and every patch of dirt on the planet, but that they procreate and subdue the earth for usage to glorify God. The natural result of the human race propagating will be a subduing of the earth and filling it. Wolfe focuses on the latter part of the passage while ignoring its context. Further complicating the matter, this passage has spurred discussion about whether it is an imperative. John Gill points out: “if this is not an express command, as the Jews understand it, for marriage and procreation of children, it seems to be more than a bare permission; at least it is a direction and an advice to what was proper and convenient for the increase of mankind, and for the filling of the earth with inhabitants, which was the end of its being made, ( Isaiah 45:18 ).”⁷ Even Matthew Poole did not see this as a command despite that he saw an implicit command to not let the human race go extinct: “It is here rather a promise or benediction than a command, as appears both from Genesis 2:22 [should be 1:22], where the same words are applied to the brute beasts, who are not subject to a command; and because if this were a command, it would equally oblige every man to exercise dominion over fishes and fowls, &c., which is absurd. It is therefore a permission rather than a command, though it be expressed in the form of a command, as other permissions frequently are, as Genesis 2:16 Deu 14:4.”⁸ It is interesting that Poole references Genesis 1:22 which uses the same statement for the animals which are not under any commands as per their nature. It is also important to point out that the directive is framed as a blessing in both places rather than as a command. The animals and humans were given this gift of procreation rather than being commanded to do it. Given the premise that this is not a command in the context of the created order but rather a directive and advice, then the problem that Wolfe asserts goes away and even if it was a command they would not be in violation as already demonstrated.

There is Little Evidence that God Approved or Disapproved of Their Unity or Diversity

Wolfe goes onto discuss his position relating to the amount of evidence in the text of Genesis 11: “There is little indication from the text that God approved or disapproved of their unity in principle, nor that he approved or disapproved of the subsequent diversity. God’s actions simply disrupted the evil plans of an evil postdiluvian people seeking to be like God.”⁹ Here again we find Wolfe disconnecting Scripture’s nature from his proposition. The fact God disrupted the language of the people of Babel is directly relevant given the nature of nations as we have already discussed from Genesis 10 and the positive narrative about what separated the people’s of the earth (different languages). What Wolfe is doing is not trying to prove that Genesis 11 is in support of his position, but instead he’s acting like a defense lawyer who does not need to prove his position and only seeks to cause reasonable doubt to the jury.

Conclusion

Wolfe has to defend his understanding that nations are natural since that is a core argument for his understanding of Christian Nationalism. Yet, as brother Wolfe himself has stated, he is not taking a theologian’s approach to defending Christian Nationalism which would require a primary focus on the exegeting of Scripture. ¹⁰ We should strive to be consistent with the text of Scripture, not rely on clever arguments.

~ Daniel Vincent

Note: I want to thank The Particular Baptist team for reviewing and editing this article.

Footnotes

1. Wolfe, Stephen. The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 70). Canon Press. Kindle Edition. ↩︎
2. https://americanreformer.org/2023/11/national-diversity-in-an-unfallen-world/ ↩︎
3. Ibid. ↩︎
4. https://www.biblestudytools.com/commentaries/gills-exposition-of-the-bible/genesis-10-5.html ↩︎
5. https://www.the1689confession.com/1689/chapter-1 ↩︎
6. https://americanreformer.org/2023/11/national-diversity-in-an-unfallen-world/ ↩︎
7. https://www.biblestudytools.com/commentaries/gills-exposition-of-the-bible/genesis-1-28.html ↩︎
8. https://biblehub.com/commentaries/poole/genesis/1.htm ↩︎
9. https://americanreformer.org/2023/11/national-diversity-in-an-unfallen-world/ ↩︎
10. Wolfe, Stephen. The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 16). Canon Press. Kindle Edition. ↩︎