Gênesis 11
Augustine of Hippo · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
Gênesis 11:4
This city named "Confusion" was none other than Babylon, to whose marvelous construction pagan history brings testimonies. For Babylon means "confusion." It would seem that the founder of the city was the giant Nimrod, as was noticed above. In mentioning him, the Scripture tells us that Babylon was the head of his kingdom, meaning at the head of all the other cities, the capital where the government of the kingdom had its seat. However, the city never reached the kind of completion that the pride of impious men had dreamed. The actual plan called for an immense height—it was meant to reach the sky. This perhaps refers to one of its towers, which was to be higher than all the others, or perhaps the word tower may mean all the towers much as "horse" can mean thousands of horsemen. — City of God 16.4
Gênesis 11:4
After the flood, as if striving to fortify themselves against God, as if there could be anything high for God or anything secure for pride, certain proud men built a tower, ostensibly so that they might not be destroyed by a flood if one came later. For they had heard and recalled that all iniquity had been destroyed by the flood. They were unwilling to abstain from iniquity. They sought the height of a tower against a flood; they built a lofty tower. God saw their pride, and he caused this disorder to be sent upon them, that they might speak but not understand one another, and tongues became different through pride. — TRACTATES ON THE GOSPEL OF JOHN 6.10.2
Gênesis 11:7
It is conceivable that here there may have been an allusion to the Trinity, if we suppose that the Father said to the Son and the Holy Spirit, "Come, let us descend and confound their tongue." The supposition is sound. But if so, we must rule out the possibility that angels were meant. And surely it is more proper for the angels to come to God unbidden, moved by grace, that is, by the thoughts that make them devoutly submissive to unchanging truth, as to the eternal law that rules their heavenly court. The angels are not their own criterion of truth, but, depending on creative truth, they move unbidden toward it as toward a fountain of life from which they must imbibe what they do not have of themselves. And their motion is without change, since they keep coming, never to depart. — City of God 16.6
Gênesis 11:10
When, therefore, we look for the city of God in these seventy-two nations, we cannot affirm that while they had but one tongue, that is, one language, the human race had departed from the worship of the true God. Nor can we conclude that genuine godliness had survived only in those generations that descend from Shem through Arpachshad and reach to Abraham. But from the time when they proudly built a tower to heaven, a symbol of godless exaltation, the city or society of the wicked becomes apparent. Whether it was only disguised before or nonexistent, whether both cities remained after the flood—the godly in the two sons of Noah who were blessed and in their posterity, and the ungodly in the cursed son and his descendants, from whom sprang that mighty hunter against the Lord—is not easily determined. — City of God 16.10
Gênesis 11:10
It is necessary, therefore, to preserve the series of generations descending from Shem, for the sake of exhibiting the city of God after the flood. As before the flood it was exhibited in the series of generations descending from Seth, now it is descending from Shem. And therefore does divine Scripture, after exhibiting the earthly city as Babylon or "Confusion," revert to the patriarch Shem and recapitulate the generations from him to Abraham, specifying the year in which each father gave birth to the son that belonged to this line and how long he lived. And unquestionably it is this that fulfills the promise I made, that it should appear why it is said of the sons of Eber, "The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided." For what can we understand by the division of the earth, if not the diversity of languages? And, therefore, omitting the other sons of Shem, who are not concerned in this matter, Scripture gives the genealogy of those by whom the line runs on to Abraham, as before the flood those are given who carried on the line to Noah from Seth. Accordingly this series of generations begins thus: "These are the generations of Shem: Shem was a hundred years old and begat Arpachshad two years after the flood. And Shem lived after he begat Arpachshad five hundred years and begat sons and daughters." In like manner it registers the rest, naming the year of his life in which each begat the son who belonged to that line that extends to Abraham. It specifies, too, how many years he lived thereafter, begetting sons and daughters, that we may not childishly suppose that the men named were the only men, but that we may understand how the population increased and how regions and kingdoms so vast could be populated by the descendants of Shem. Especially this is true of the kingdom of Assyria, from which Ninus subdued the surrounding nations, reigning with brilliant prosperity and bequeathing to his descendants a vast but thoroughly consolidated empire, which held together for many centuries. — City of God 16.10
Gênesis 11:10
But to avoid needless prolixity, we shall mention not the number of years each member of this series lived but only the year of his life in which he gave birth to his heir, that we may thus reckon the number of years from the flood to Abraham and may at the same time leave room to touch briefly and cursorily upon some other matters necessary to our argument. In the second year, then, after the flood, Shem when he was 100 years old begat Arpachshad; Arpachshad when he was 135 years old begat Cainan; Cainan when he was 130 years begat Salah. Salah himself, too, was the same age when he begat Eber. Eber lived 134 years and begat Peleg, in whose days the earth was divided. Peleg himself lived 130 years and begat Reu; and Reu lived 132 years and begat Serug; Serug 130, and begat Nahor; and Nahor 79, and begat Terah; and Terah 70, and begat Abram, whose name God afterwards changed into Abraham. There are thus from the flood to Abraham 1, years, according to the common or Septuagint versions. In the Hebrew copies far fewer years are given, and for this either no reason or a not very credible one is given. — City of God 16.10
Gênesis 11:29
"And Abram and Nahor took them wives: the name of Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah." This Iscah is supposed to be the same as Sarai, Abraham's wife. — City of God 16.12
Gênesis 11:31
Next it is related how Terah with his family left the region of the Chaldeans and came into Mesopotamia and dwelt in Haran. But nothing is said about one of his sons called Nahor, as if Abram had not taken him along with him. For the narrative runs thus: "And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son's son, and Sarah his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and led them forth out of the region of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan; and he came into Haran, and dwelt there." Nahor and Milcah his wife are nowhere named here. — City of God 16.13
Gênesis 11:31
But afterwards, when Abraham sent his servant to take a wife for his son Isaac, we find it thus written: "And the servant took ten camels of the camels of his lord, and of all the goods of his lord, with him; and arose, and went into Mesopotamia, into the city of Nahor." This and other testimonies of this sacred history show that Nahor, Abraham's brother, had also left the region of the Chaldeans and fixed his abode in Mesopotamia, where Abraham dwelt with his father. Why, then, did the Scripture not mention him when Terah with his family went forth out of the Chaldean nation and dwelt in Haran, since it mentions that he took with him not only Abraham his son but also Sarah his daughter-in-law and Lot his grandson? The only reason we can think of is that perhaps he had lapsed from the piety of his father and brother, and adhered to the superstition of the Chaldeans and had afterwards emigrated there, either through penitence or because he was persecuted as a suspected person. — City of God 16.13
Gênesis 11:32
On Terah's death in Mesopotamia, where he is said to have lived two hundred and five years, the promises of God made to Abraham now begin to be clarified. So it is written, "And the days of Terah in Haran were two hundred and five years, and he died in Haran." This is not to be taken as if he had spent all his days there but that he there completed the days of his life, which were two hundred and five years. Otherwise it would not be known how many years Terah lived, since it is not said in what year of his life he came into Haran. And it is absurd to suppose that in this series of generations, where it is carefully recorded how many years each one lived, his age was the only one not put on record. For although some whom the same Scripture mentions do not have their age recorded, they are not in this series, in which the reckoning of time is continuously indicated by the death of the parents and the succession of the children. For this series, which is given in order from Adam to Noah and from him down to Abraham, contains no one without the number of the years of his life. — City of God 16.14