An atheist riffs on the Bible (New International Version): Genesis 11

Regular paragraphs are the verses as written in the Bible.
Indented italicized paragraphs feature my comments on the previous paragraph.
Note that I might appear especially nitpicky and I know that some of these verses are not taken literally by everybody; I'm just having some fun basically.
Why the New International Version or NIV? Why not? The Bible has already been translated countless times before and I can't read or speak the original languages in which it was written, which is why it is stupid in the first place to assume that a divine being would communicate with us through a book.

New International Version

Genesis 11

The Tower of Babel

¹ Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. ² As men moved eastward, ^[a] they found a plain in Shinar ^[b] and settled there.

Hey! I'm certainly not going to let that one go without saying anything. You just spent the whole previous chapter explaining to me how each clan separated and different languages were spoken. You can't tell me there's only one language just after that. Though I'd say that if there were only a couple of humans left and not many generations had passed, yes there would only be one language at this point.

³ They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. ⁴ Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth."

"They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.": OK, I don't see why it's so important to point that out here, but I'll go with it. And I guess humans are still fascinated with building high towers as we have skyscrapers in huge cities, so that's one point for realism there.

⁵ But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. ⁶ The LORD said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. ⁷ Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."

"But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building.": well of course he did, he's omnipotent. He even knew from the beginning that they would build it, didn't he? "The LORD said, 'If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.'": is God speaking to himself (themselves)? He must feel lonely up there. I'll now repeat that the previous chapter talked about different languages being already there and furthermore, languages are still in evolution today. It's not by a magical process that we speak different languages, it's just that over time words lose their meaning, people speak with a slightly different accent and transmit that to their children, etc., but certainly not intervention from God. And that's God's master plan? To change everyone's language so they won't be able to work together. We have dictionaries and interpreters nowadays. And it's not true that humans could do everything together, at least not anything that a God should fear! Why isn't he doing that today, I mean men have built so many things now, they've even went to the moon, which is farther than any humans at the time could've imagined possible (especially since they didn't even know there were other planets besides the earth). The main point is: why is God so evil? Humans make some progress and he immediately destroys their efforts. I know it's probably meant to be taken as humans wanting to become gods, but if that's the case, it's poorly written and so what when we see what we have today with God doing nothing about it.

⁸ So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. ⁹ That is why it was called Babel ^[c] —because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

"So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.": then they built tons of different cities and conquered the planet over the years. What has God accomplished here? That's basically how I play myself in games where godlike, but that's the point, I know I'm acting like a douchebag and a jerk when I do that. At least, I'm playing with virtual characters, not flesh and blood human beings.

From Shem to Abram

¹⁰ This is the account of Shem.
Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father ^[d] of Arphaxad. ¹¹ And after he became the father of Arphaxad, Shem lived 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

Nice to know that people have daughters now, but why start back at Shem, whom we already know had many sons from the PREVIOUS CHAPTER. And when does that 120 years lifespan stated in Genesis 6 starts to count?

¹² When Arphaxad had lived 35 years, he became the father of Shelah. ¹³ And after he became the father of Shelah, Arphaxad lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters. ^[e]

Please no, I can't support it any longer.

¹⁴ When Shelah had lived 30 years, he became the father of Eber. ¹⁵ And after he became the father of Eber, Shelah lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

I mean, it was OK the first time. It could pass the second time and maybe a third time but... NO! It wasn't even OK the first time. Nobody wants that or needs that!

¹⁶ When Eber had lived 34 years, he became the father of Peleg. ¹⁷ And after he became the father of Peleg, Eber lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

Eber, the great Eber, which is not so great after all. They're still giving me the same damn fucking genealogy than they did before, I mean just before, not 10 chapters ago.

¹⁸ When Peleg had lived 30 years, he became the father of Reu. ¹⁹ And after he became the father of Reu, Peleg lived 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

Hey, notice that people are beginning to live less long? Maybe it's beginning to take effect now (as if God needed time to make it take effect). This further supports the theory that the Bible means literally that people were living that long in the old days, not some kind of alternate calendar. (I've already said that it doesn't make sense that people lived longer in the older days, mainly because of their limited knowledge about health and hygiene, so I don't know what more could I say.)

²⁰ When Reu had lived 32 years, he became the father of Serug. ²¹ And after he became the father of Serug, Reu lived 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

Not quite 120, but we're getting there.

²² When Serug had lived 30 years, he became the father of Nahor. ²³ And after he became the father of Nahor, Serug lived 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

OK, still a small step to go, just 80 years less and you'll reach it. 80 years old is close to our average lifespan today!

²⁴ When Nahor had lived 29 years, he became the father of Terah. ²⁵ And after he became the father of Terah, Nahor lived 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

There we go, 119, so that man did not live up to be over 120 years old. I guess now we can confirm that God's rule has taken effect (except for the rare people today who go over that limit by a bit.)

²⁶ After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran.

Terah sure was waiting for a long time before making any children (unless there were others they didn't talk about). I mean, his ancestors started having children at around 30 years old, probably because they started living less long.

²⁷ This is the account of Terah.
Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot. ²⁸ While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth. ²⁹ Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milcah and Iscah. ³⁰ Now Sarai was barren; she had no children.

Once again, stuff happens to people I don't know (I mean, it's good for historical purposes, if only the Bible was an accurate historical account of what really happened). It seems Nahor, Abram's brother, has married his niece. "Now Sarai was barren; she had no children.": ouch! That's not a pretty thing to say, I think. I mean I'm not an English speaker from birth, but that's taken as an insult today, right?

³¹ 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 Haran, they settled there.

They were kind of lazy that way!

³² Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Haran.

WHAT!? I thought we were setting a 120 years limit, why suddenly go back to 80 years over that limit? It just doesn't make any sense? I mean, OK I'm ready to accept that there's a slight variation in each human and maybe, just maybe, people who go slightly over 120 years old today could still be under the limit set by that God. But 205 is a lot more than 120. I'd be happy to live that long, you don't spit on 85 more years than 120, which is already 40 years more than we live.

Footnotes:

a. Genesis 11:2 Or from the east ; or in the east
b. Genesis 11:2 That is, Babylonia
c. Genesis 11:9 That is, Babylon; Babel sounds like the Hebrew for confused .
d. Genesis 11:10 Father may mean ancestor ; also in verses 11-25.
e. Genesis 11:13 Hebrew; Septuagint (see also Luke 3:35, 36 and note at Gen. 10:24) 35 years, he became the father of Cainan. 13 And after he became the father of Cainan, Arphaxad lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters, and then he died. When Cainan had lived 130 years, he became the father of Shelah. And after he became the father of Shelah, Cainan lived 330 years and had other sons and daughters