Re: OT: babel and english

> > So perhaps there was a time when all
> > tribes were in harmony, and maybe even spoke the same
> > language, and then split and were wrenched into war.
>
> The usual secular humanist's explanation of the Babel story is that
> at one period early in the history of Mesopotamia, the economy
> of the citystates had developed to such an extent that it was
> spurring
> the growth of international trading networks, leading as far away as
> Elam and even the Indus Valley.  Thus, for the natives, it might
> seem
> that within one generation, without realizing it, they were becoming
> more cosmopolitan, or rather, were inventing cosmopolitanism, and
> with
> that, more multicultural and multilingual.  Since we know from
> archaeological
> finds that these trading networks were a reality, it is not an
> unreasonable
> historical scenario.
Like most secular humanist explanations for myth origins, this one is
highly unsatisfactory.  I'm not sure how many near eastern mythologies
include a Babel story, but I know that the Sumerian myths also contain
one, and it has many features in common with the Hebrew story.  Just
looking at those features that jump out from memory as common to both and
so probably common to the proto-myth, I see several problems:

 - The dispersal of languages is invariably seen as a bad thing.
However, the increasing urbanization of the cities would have been
associated with increasing prosperity and greater variety of goods
brought in by trade--a good thing.  Why would the presence of foreigners
bringing goods and wealth to the city be seen as a curse?

 - The Biblical story, at least, is closely concerned with dispersal.
The different language groups break up and spread apart after their
languages are split.  There is no trace of that in history--why would
urbanization result in breakup of the cities that had become
multicultural.

 - The 'duh' factor.  Even before multilingualism within the city-states,
the city-states would have been very familiar with the differing
languages of the people around them, and would only have seen the
presence of foreign languages as an increase of an old phenomenon, and
not something entirely new.

I don't need to take the Biblical story literally, but I wonder if there
are any better explanations for the origin of the Babel myth.  Doesn't an
equivalent myth occur in many Native American cultures, too?


Jesse S. Bangs     Pelíran
jaspax @juno.com
"There is enough light for those that desire only to see, and enough
darkness for those of a contrary disposition."  --Blaise Pascal

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