Читать книгу Had Eve Come First and Jonah Been a Woman - Nancy Werking Poling - Страница 8

Genesis 11:1–9

Humankind shares a common language—until a group decides to build a great city and a great tower, an action God views as arrogant. God decides to confuse their communication. The story of the Tower of Babel has sometimes been used to explain why the earth is inhabited by people who speak different languages.

Women, too, once spoke a common language.

There was a time when women understood each other, for sorrow was the language that connected them. Some held the hands of sisters and friends as they died at childbirth. Many wept at the graves of their children taken by disease or hunger. Those who did not lose sisters or friends or children still grasped the horror and mourned with women who did.

Wars claimed the lives of husbands, brothers, sons. Women’s homes were invaded, their bodies raped. Those who did not witness war still grasped its horror and mourned with women who did.

Yes, it used to be that women everywhere understood the language of sorrow.

Then some migrated, found a place to the west. There they said to one another, “Come, let us build ourselves a great city, and towers that extend to the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves so that our wealth will be recognized over all the earth.”

When they had built the city and the towers, the women said among themselves, “See what great feats we are able to do.”

But God looked down upon the city and its towers and said, “Look, those women have built this grand city and think they have made a name for themselves. But they have forgotten the language of sorrow that used to connect them to others. They are too intent upon accumulating wealth to recognize the suffering of those in distant lands who lose sisters and friends at childbirth. They are too busy to pay attention to the agony of women in distant lands who weep at the graves of children who have died of disease or hunger. They no longer listen to the voices of women whose homes are invaded, their bodies raped when war spreads over their land.”

So God turned from the women who had built a city and towers that reached the heavens, choosing instead to accompany those who lived with sadness and oppression. God named the city with the tall towers Babel, which means confused. Because the women who lived there no longer understood what mattered in God’s sight.