WHEN THE FIRST WORLD-MONARCHY BEGAN

Genesis 10 and 11.

WHEN we reach the ninth chapter of Genesis the flood is past and the deluge over. The first climax of sin has met its fate, and the human race, originally created holy, innocent, and in God's image, has been swept away, with the exception of eight souls.

Noah and his family have come forth from the ark, and God has in them given man another chance. We shall see, before we conclude, what man did with that chance.

GOD BLESSING NOAH.

God is now blessing Noah, and entering into a new covenant with him.

In the blessing man is once more commanded to " be fruitful, and multiply and replenish the earth " an obligation as binding today as then, the doctrinaires of the new social order to the contrary notwithstanding. Ex-president Roosevelt's fulminations against race suicide are quite in harmony with the blessing pronounced on Noah.

Man is again given dominion over the beasts of the earth, only now the " fear " of him and the " dread" of him are the weapons of his power, suggesting that previously he may have ruled by fondness and affection.

A change in man's diet is noted. Whereas previously he was limited to the herb, now he is at liberty to eat flesh. Some regard this as a lightening of the curse since flesh is easier to obtain than the products of the soil, but there is another view to be taken of it. We observe, for example, that in our day spiritists, theosophists and others who claim affinity with evil spirits are prohibited the use of meat on the ground that it hinders such affinity; and may it be that God now commanded it, in order to forestall such affinity on the part of the postdiluvians lest they should fall into the sin of their progenitors?

Finally, certain magisterial functions are now conferred upon man. Whereas the previous dispensation had been one of freedom even unto license, so that men took matters of law into their own hands and slew for revenge as they chose, now God will hold them accountable for human blood, and " whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed."

All these things are mentioned in the first six verses of the ninth chapter.

THE TOKEN OF THE RAINBOW.

The covenant that God enters into with Noah includes as well every living creature; and the terms of it are that flesh shall not again be cut off by the waters of a flood.

God goes even further in grace, giving a token or a sign of His promise for perpetual generations, saying: " I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. * * * * And I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth."

You will recall that at the creation of man, it was stated that " the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth," " but there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground." As Dr. Pember suggests, probably this state of things continued until the flood, when the windows of heaven were for the first time opened. The rainbow he regards as a new phenomenon when it was given as a token to Noah, believing that the words of God imply as much. Had the bow been seen before the flood, its subsequent reappearance could never have suggested security, in his judgment. But if there had been no rainbow, there could scarcely have been rain.

On this supposition, the falling drops, and then the pouring torrents, must have greatly added to the terror of that day. " What scenes of horror must have been presented beneath the ominous rainfall! What affrighted groups! What countenances of dismay! What shrieks of terror! What faintings for fear! What headlong flights to any place which appeared to offer safety for the moment! "

I am inclined to agree with Pember about this matter, and think his idea is strengthened by the declaration that God now sets a bow in the cloud to show that never again will He punish sin in this way.

But how affecting to hear God say, "I will look upon the bow." In other words, the rainbow, in its beauty and glory, is not man's token, but God's token; and man's security does not rest upon his seeing it, but upon God's seeing it.

THE RAINBOW AND THE SPRINKLED BLOOD.

The circumstance recalls that equally touching utterance of Jehovah in the twelfth of Exodus, where in directing the Hebrews as to their deliverance from the death of the first-born, He tells them to slay a lamb and sprinkle its blood upon the door-posts of their houses, adding, " When I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you." Not when they should see the blood, for they were on the inside of the house, but when God Himself saw it He would pass over them.

Think of what this means for those who are in Christ Jesus! He is God's token rather than man's, God looks upon His only-begotten and well-beloved Son, and is satisfied with His finished work, and passes over you and me in all our guilt because of it. How kind God is!

Let us then remember every time we look at the rainbow in the sky, that there is Some One else looking at it, and that it is bringing to His remembrance the promise that means so much to us, and which is as sure as His own throne.

THE ORIGIN OF THE NATIONS.

We pass over hundreds of years now, and come to the tenth chapter, where is an account of the dispersion of the nations throughout the earth, beginning with the words:

"Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood."

In the following verses are given the names of these sons and grandsons, and first, those of Japheth. We are told that " By these " the descendants of Japheth "were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations." The phrase " the isles of the Gentiles " may be rendered " the coastlands of the nations," and we learn from other scriptures and secular research that " the coastlands of the nations " means the proximity of the Persian Gulf on the south, the Caspian and Black Seas on the north, and the Mediterranean and Ægean on the west. These localities, settled by the descendants of Japheth, were chiefly in the north and northwest, and for the most part what we know as the continent of Europe. Most of us in this audience belong to the line of Japheth, which in later days has been called the Aryan race, including the Hindus, the Celts, the Greeks, the Italians, the Germans, and the Slavs.

Next follows the line of Ham, and without reading the verses, let me say that they went in a south and southwestern direction, migrating into northern Arabia, Egypt, and Ethiopia, the modern Abyssinia.

Following the line of Ham we have that of Shem, which remained more closely to the common center, but migrating somewhat towards the south and southeast. From them sprang the Persians, the Assyrians, the Hebrews, and finally the Israelites, of whom was Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour.

THE FIRST WORLD-MONARCH.

There is the record of one individual in this chapter upon which we will especially dwell Nimrod, the founder of the first world-monarchy. Let us read verses 8 to 12:

"And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the LORD: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth, and Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah: the same is a great city."

Notice certain facts about Nimrod. First, he was a descendant of Ham. His father was Cush, the son of Ham, which means that he was an Ethiopian.

Second, he began to be a mighty one in the earth. Mighty he must have been, as men count mightiness, when the divine penman pauses to call attention to the fact. But his mightiness was of the earth.

He was also a " mighty hunter before Jehovah," the meaning of which I do not know. But though he was a mighty hunter of beasts, he soon became a mighty hunter of men, for in the next verse we read about the beginning of his kingdom. Notice that this is the first reference to a " kingdom " we have met in sacred history, and that it is his kingdom, and not God's kingdom that is mentioned.

The beginning of his kingdom was in the great cities of Babel (or Babylon), Erech, Accad, Calnah, and the rest. But not content with founding this kingdom " he went forth into Assyria " which is the rendering of the Revised Version, and builded Nineveh and the following cities named. He was thus the founder of two of the greatest kingdoms the earth has known, Babylon and Assyria.

ANCIENT GREATNESS.

Before leaving this chapter, let me try to make its reality stand out before you by an illustration. One city only will suffice, Accad.

The Accadians were a people whose name, even, was not known fifty years ago, but within that period archaeological research, the work of the pickaxe and spade in Bible lands, has unearthed the palace of a king called Sargon I. He was one of the early kings of Assyria, and lived probably as early as the time of Moses, or earlier. His name is not so much as mentioned in secular history, and only once in the Old Testament, yet when the archaeologists unearthed his palace recently, they brought to light one of the most magnificent in the world, covering no less than twenty-five acres of land.

Nor is that all. In this palace there was a large library, not of books printed or bound like those of today, but clay tablets and cylinders inscribed with wedge-shaped characters. It was shelved and catalogued like our modern libraries, and the person desiring a book presented his card to the librarian and obtained it much as by our present system. We talk about our great libraries today, yet, after all, I suppose our librarians are learning at the feet of those who carried on such work thousands of years ago.

But more than that, in this library there was a number of books written in the Accadian tongue, which even in that day had become a dead language, and was studied by the Assyrians as we study the classics in Greek and Latin in our colleges now.

Gather up these facts, set your imaginations free, and fancy what a kingdom that may have been which Nimrod founded thousands of years before Christ!

THE MOST IMPORTANT DOCUMENT IN THE WORLD.

Here is another illustration to show the reality of these things. Take the genealogy of Nimrod. This chapter shows him to have been an Ethiopian, although the founder of this kingdom in Asia. As recently as 1854, however, a scholar named Baron Bunsen declared that the Ethiopian origin of Nimrod existed only in the imagination of Biblical interpreters, that it was not historical, and could not be true. The ink on his paper had scarcely dried though, when, four years later, another scholar, Sir Henry Rawlinson, the earliest decipherer of the Babylonian monuments, proved conclusively, by a study of the primitive language of Chaldea, that the Biblical record concerning the origin of Nimrod and his people was absolutely correct. Primeval history is thus confirmed again, and most signally, by modern research.

There have been those who laughed at this tenth chapter of Genesis, and passed it over as simply a long list of names hard to pronounce, and without meaning or significance. But these names, with few exceptions, like this of Nimrod, are not names of individuals merely, but races; and if that be so, it makes this chapter the most important historical document in the world!

As corroborating that statement let me quote a sentence from Sir Henry Rawlinson's book, " The Origin of Nations," where he says: " The Christian may with confidence defy his adversary to point out any erroneous or impossible statements in the entire chapter, from its commencement to its close."

Have we not reason to thank God that He has not left Himself without witnesses in all these centuries; and that when the strongest need exists for it their testimony is thus gloriously forthcoming?

HOW THE NATIONS CAME TO BE.

We pass now to the eleventh chapter, where we have explained the reason for the dispersion of the nations. In chapter ten we have the story as to how they were dispersed, but here we are told why it was done. Let us read the first nine verses:

"And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth."

When it says that "the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech " or, as the margin reads, " of one lip, and one set of words " I suppose the reference is to the earth at the time of Nimrod. When it says " they journeyed from the east " it means that they journeyed " in the east," as the margin reads.

There they found the plain of Shinar, which was then and is still noted for its clay pits and asphalt springs. Having the materials for building at hand, and moved by the spirit of iniquity and rebellion against God, they said: " Let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven." It was a challenge to the God of heaven, and a determination on their part through the congregation of themselves together, to make it no longer necessary to put their trust and confidence in that God, but only in themselves.

"Let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth."

God's purpose was the scattering of men throughout the earth, but man's purpose was and still is, the very opposite; and by organization and federation to improve his material prosperity without God. It is the plea for union, but union for godless and selfish ends.

THE LORD CAME DOWN."

" And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower." As Murphy expresses it: " The interposing providence of God is here set forth in a sublime simplicity, suited to the early mind of man. Still there is something here characteristic of the times after the deluge. The presence of the Lord seems not to have been withdrawn from the earth before that event. He walked in the garden when Adam and Eve were there. He placed the ministers and symbols of His presence before it when they were expelled. He expostulated with Cain before and after his awful crime. He said: 1 My Spirit shall not always strive with man/ He saw the wickedness of man; and the land was corrupt before Him. He communicated with Noah in various ways, and finally established His covenant with him. In all this He seems to have been present with man on earth. He lingered in the garden as long as His forbearance could be expected to influence man for good. He at length appointed the limit of a hundred and twenty years. And after watching over Noah during the deluge, He seems to have withdrawn His visible and gracious presence from the earth. Hence the propriety of the phrase, ' the Lord came down.'

"He still deals in mercy with a remnant of the human race, and has visited the earth and manifested His presence in a wondrous way. But He has not yet taken up His abode among men as He did in the garden, and as He intimates that He will sometime do on the renovated earth."

IS THE TOWER OF BABEL HISTORIC?

In corroboration of this chapter let me remind you that all the early nations possessed traditions concerning the building of the tower of Babel, and the confounding of the human tongue.

They had traditions concerning giants who attempted to storm heaven, either to share it with the immortal gods, or to expel the gods from heaven, they do not say which. In some of these traditions the confusion of tongues is represented as the punishment inflicted by the deities for this wickedness. The tower by which the rebellious intended to ascend to heaven is said to have been overthrown by a mighty tempest. The people were scattered into various regions, it is said, and thenceforth spoke different languages. Of course, these traditions testify to an original foundation of fact, whence they took their rise.

Moreover, I would have you know, that in a sense even the tower of Babel still exists. Its ruins existed in the time of Nebuchadnezzar, only six hundred years before Christ, and that great king tells us that the gods urged him to restore it. Its site, however, he did not injure, neither did he change its foundation walls. I quote his words, as found inscribed on two cylinders recently unearthed and deciphered:

"In the month of good fortune, on an auspicious day, I improved the bricks of its buildings and the tiles of its roofings into a compact edifice. I renewed its substructure, and I put the inscription of my name on the cornice of its edifice. To restore it, and set upon its pinnacle, I raised my hand. As it was before, I built it anew; as it was in remote times, I erected its pinnacle."

The ruins of this work of Nebuchadnezzar, built on the original pile, remain today, arid form the most remarkable feature of that country. They are about six miles to the north of Hillah, a suburb of ancient Babylon, and bear the name of Birs Nimrud, or the tower of Nimrod. They cover a square surface of forty-nine thousand feet, and rise nearly three hundred feet high. Travelers describe the mass as towering like a mountain above the plain.

TWO AGITATED COLLEGE GIRLS.

An occasion for mentioning these facts is this: One Sunday morning, two young girls called at my house on their way from church. They had been brought up in an orthodox home, and trained under the teaching of an orthodox pastor, and taught that the Bible was the Word of God, and that the records of these early chapters of Genesis were true.

That morning, however, they had attended divine worship in a strange church, and listened to a sermon upon these chapters in which it was said they contained myths and allegories chiefly, and intimated among others things that the tower of Babel never existed.

The girls had recently entered college and were humiliated by the thought of their ignorance. Could it be that their parents had deceived them? And was their pastor in the conspiracy as well?

As they passed my house on their way home, they paused for information. I was absent, but my wife was able to show them such facts and evidences as in this limited way I am presenting to you now.

Perhaps you say, " How do you account for a minister making false statements?" In one sense I cannot account for it, yet in another I can.

That minister is a good man and was unaware that he was making false statements. He would sooner have lost his right hand than have consciously done so. But I suppose he had been trained in the atmosphere of the rationalistic criticism. All his college and seminary days he had heard and read but one side of the story; and since entering upon the ministry, had neither the time, nor the inclination, it may have been, to listen to or read the other.

The circumstance emphasizes the momentousness of the words of Jesus where He lays on us the obligation to take heed what we hear, not merely how we hear, though that were quite important, but what we hear. Oh, the solemn responsibility that rests upon the pew concerning the preaching and teaching to which it listens! But how can you exercise that responsibility, except as you are familiar with the Word of God and learned in the Holy Scriptures?

"YE SHALL BE AS GOD."

I close this study by a further remark concerning the spirit and motive of these Babylonians in building the cloud-capped tower. I believe that in the last analysis, it can only be explained by the words of Satan in the garden of Eden, " Ye shall be as God," which, as was declared previously, is still the trumpcard in the hand of the arch-fiend. As our first parents were caught in this snare, so have all their Descendants become likewise fascinated by it.

Julius Caesar was the tutelar deity of Rome.

The Greek and Roman mythologies were deifications of human strength, beauty and licentiousness. The Roman Catholic Church claims that she is Christ's vicegerent upon earth. The German philosophers of the 18th century said: " The human race is the Godman, the human race is the incarnate Son, the human race is the true Christ."

To come still nearer home, the literature of the English Carlyle, and the American Emerson whom men and women are worshiping today is of the same kind as the German philosophers and teaching the same deification of humanity.

A RAVEN OR A NIGHTINGALE?

And when we look toward the future what do we see? We see the human race rapidly approaching the culminating period when, as was said previously, under the Antichrist, it will be worshiping itself in worshiping him. Some may call me a pessimist for saying this, but it matters not. As Bishop Nicholson once said, " Pessimism is croaking, and to croak is like the frog, and smells of the swamp. But if a night-hawk be hovering around, then the croaking of a raven were better than the song of a nightingale." He is not a pessimist who gives a true and needed warning, but in the best sense of the word he is an optimist. As John Bigelow says: " No conflagration was ever extinguished by silencing the alarm bell."

This age of ours is wrinkled deep with many lines of character, and one of them, deeper and blacker than the others, deepest and blackest of 'them all, is the design and purpose underlying the declaration: " Ye shall be as God."

The antidote to this is the exaltation of the incarnate Son, " Who was conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried. The third day He rose from the dead, He ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead."