Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confuse the language of all the earth: and from there did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.
All Commentaries on Genesis 11:9 Go To Genesis 11
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Babel, that is, confusion. This is one of the greatest miracles recorded in the Old Testament; men forgot, in a moment, the language which they had hitherto spoken, and found themselves enabled to speak another, known only to a few of the same family (Calmet); for we must not suppose, that there were as many new languages as there were men at Babel. (Menochius)
The precise number of languages which were then heard, cannot be determined. The learned commonly acknowledge the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Teutonic, Sclavonian, Tartar Ian, and Chinese languages, to be original. The rest are only dialects from these. English is chiefly taken from the Teutonic, (Calmet) with many words borrowed from the Greek and other languages. (Haydock) Ver. 12. Sale, or Cainan. See Chap. x. 24; Chronicles i. 18, in the Septuagint. The variation in the years of the Patriarchs, between this ancient version and the Hebrew, is here again very considerable, and perhaps unaccountable. (Haydock)
