1 AND THE whole earth was of one language and of one accent and mode of expression. 2 And as they journeyed eastward, they found a plain (valley) in the land of Shinar, and they settled and dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly. So they had brick for stone, and slime (bitumen) for mortar. 4 And they said, Come, let us build us a city and a tower whose top reaches into the sky, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered over the whole earth. 5 And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. 6 And the Lord said, Behold, they are one people and they have 1 all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do, and now nothing they have imagined they can do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let Us go down and there confound (mix up, confuse) their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. 8 So the Lord scattered them abroad from that place upon the face of the whole earth, and they gave up building the city. 9 Therefore the name of it was called Babel--because there the Lord confounded the language of all the earth; and from that place the Lord scattered them abroad upon the face of the whole earth.