They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.
Genesis 11:3 (NIV)
The sages highlighted the bricks of Babel and point us to the bricks of slavery in Egypt. They also point us to the furnaces of Babylon.
There is a rabbinical teaching: “There are no stones in Babylon.” The story of the Tower of Babel is much darker than it first appears.
Now, you might think that this is strange, but it turns out that the rabbis weren’t simply giving us a metaphor or esoteric teaching about stones. In fact, the region of Babylonia simply has such few rocks that even pebbles were considered precious.
From the Wikipedia article on Babylonian ancient art:
In addition, the want of stone in Babylonia made every pebble precious and led to a high perfection of the art of gem-cutting.
So when Israel was told that they could only make altars from uncut stones (Exodus 20:25), this must have created an ache in the heart of God’s faithful during the Babylonian Exile: no temple, and no stones for altars.
All they had was the scriptures.
In land without stones, the Empire of Babylon grew from their invention of kiln-fired bricks – bricks that were “baked thoroughly,” according to Genesis. In Hebrew, they were “לִשְׂרֵפָ֑ה וְנִשְׂרְפָ֖ה.”
“Burned until burnt.” Totally engulfed with flames.
For the student of the scripture, this should make one’s ears perk up. It was meant to.
Where else have we heard about a furnace —in Babylon— with a fire so hot, the Hebrew word for “burning” is used multiple times to give emphasis?
It’s in Daniel. God’s faithful men were thrown into a giant Babylonian furnace for refusing to bow to the King’s statue.
A furnace meant to product the bricks of slavery. A furnace big enough to be fueled by humanity.
Then Nebuchadnezzar was furious with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and his attitude toward them changed. He ordered the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual.
Daniel 3:19 (NIV)
The Tower of Babel, which means “confusion,” provides us with a key to unlock understanding: the bricks of Egypt… the furnaces of Babylon… they both point to slavery. Captivity. And they both provide a starting point.
The darkness of the Egyptian empire. The darkness of the Babylonian empire.
But then God said, “Let there be Light.”
Not the light from the flames of humanity’s furnaces, fueled by our efforts, but the very Light of God, which comes to set His people free.
“There are no stones in Babylon.”
Without a temple and stones to build an altar, God’s people longed for deliverance.
When Abraham was first called away from his Babylonian home, God gave him a Promise, and there he built an altar. With stones.
The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.
Genesis 12:7 (NIV)
Friend, God calls us away from Babylon, from the place without stones of remembrance, away from reliance on Empire, and away from the furnaces built to consume you.
Abraham and his family departed “Ur of the Chaldeans.”
“Ur” means flames.
God is delivering you from this.
Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there.
Genesis 11:31 (NIV)