And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the
east
That is, the inhabitants of the whole earth; not Ham and his
posterity only, or Nimrod and his company; but as all the sons of
Noah and his posterity for a while dwelt together, or at least
very near each other, and finding the place where they were too
scanty for them, as their several families increased, they set
out in a body from the place where they were, to seek for a more
convenient one: it seems a little difficult how to interpret this
phrase, "from the east", since if they came from Ararat in
Armenia, where the ark rested, as that lay north of Shinar or
Babylon, they might rather be said to come from the north than
from the east, and rather came to it than from it: so some think
the phrase should be rendered, "to the east" F2, or
eastward, as in ( Genesis
13:11 ) . Jarchi thinks this refers to ( Genesis
10:30 ) "and their dwelling was" at "the mountain of the
east"; from whence he supposes they journeyed, to find out a
place that would hold them all, but could find none but Shinar;
but then this restrains it to Joktan's sons, and besides, their
dwelling there was not until after the confusion and dispersion.
But it is very probable the case was this, that when Noah and his
sons came out of the ark, in a little time they betook themselves
to their former habitation, from whence they had entered into the
ark, namely, to the east of the garden of Eden, where was the
appearance of the divine Presence, or Shechinah; and from hence
it was that these now journeyed: and so it was as they were
passing on,
that they found a plain in the land of Shinar;
which the Targum of Jonathan paraphrases the land of Babylon; and
Hestiaeus F3, a Phoenician historian, calls it
Sennaar of Babylon; there are plain traces of this name in the
Singara of Ptolemy F4 and Pliny F5, the
Hebrew letter (e) being
sometimes pronounced as "G", as in Gaza and Gomorrah; the first
of these place a city of this name in Mesopotamia, near the
Tigris, and that of the other is reckoned a capital of the
Rhetavi, a tribe of the Arabs, near Mesopotamia. This plain was
very large, fruitful, and delightful, and therefore judged a fit
place for a settlement, where they might have room enough, and
which promised them a sufficient sustenance:
and they dwelt there;
and provided for their continuance, quickly beginning to build a
city and tower, afterwards called Babylon: and that Babylon was
built in a large plain is not only here asserted, but is
confirmed by Herodotus F6, who says of it, that it lay
(en pediw megalw) , in a
vast plain, and so Strabo F7; which was no other than the
plain of Shinar.