Tower of Babel and the space race

Not too long ago I came across a post on discussion board by an Atheist that caused me to pause. A picture was shown of the Tower of Babel and it was captioned something to the effect of 'God judged these people for building to the heavens'. Another picture showed what appeared to be a satellite over the Earth. It was captioned 'God decided not to judge man for getting into space.'

Why do you suppose these 2 scenarios seem to be so separate? After all, Scientists are the ones who got man into space and are using it for the ' betterment' of mankind yet you will find most of them don't have a belief in God at all. When asked they will refer to the Big Bang and the evidence for it if it exists at all.

How does a Christian approach this scenario?

John

The heavens declare the glory of God, so lets go check them out. Outer space is pretty awesome in my opinion. I've fead a lot about the Apollo program and its fascinating.

Don't you think God placed in man a desire to explore? I sure do. We have nothing to be afraid of. It can only lead to the truth about the universe.

Babel was an issue because the men said they wanted to be like gods. I havent heard any astronauts say that. They just want to check things out.

Did men back then do it as a religious belief experience whereas men now do it for mere exploration? Is this the difference?

I never heard of the book of jashar. Something else to look at.

The article Greg posted is a good summary.

Along the same lines, Jude quoted from the Book of Enoch which also did not make it into scripture. It is interesting however.

I think it is a misunderstanding of what happened at Babel. God's issue with mankind at Babel was not about man reaching into the atmosphere or even beyond. It was about obedience. God had commanded man to spread out over the earth after the flood. They said, "lest we be scattered" There was surely idolatry and pride involved, but the ultimate purpose of building the structure was so they would gather around it and not be scattered. So God confused their languages, forcing them to disperse as they could no longer communicate.

Our desire to expand into space may have once been driven by a quest for scientific discovery, but now seems to be driven by other motives entirely. It seems that godlessness has led men to believe that we may soon need space in order to expand into as well as believing there may be other inhabited worlds.

Hey twayneb

Can you expand a little on your last sentence? I am not sure what godlessness has to do with either point. I agree it might but that applies to any endeavor. you seem to be saying it is godless to explore other planets etc.

I think it is a misunderstanding of what happened at Babel. God's issue with mankind at Babel was not about man reaching into the atmosphere or even beyond. It was about obedience. God had commanded man to spread out over the earth after the flood. They said, "lest we be scattered" There was surely idolatry and pride involved, but the ultimate purpose of building the structure was so they would gather around it and not be scattered. So God confused their languages, forcing them to disperse as they could no longer communicate.

Your comments confuse me about why you think they were scattered. The ultimate purpose was to gather around the tower but then for what reason? The bible says they wanted it to reach into the heavens. In this sense they wanted to be as God?
In modern times science is using the space race to develop technology but they are also looking for origins to the Universe but it is hard to find any notion of God in their thesis of explanation. Were people more religious back then then they are now and is this the explanation back then?

Does this make sense?

I misspoke in my earlier post. The builders of the tower did not say they wanted to be like Gods.

My dad would say that they got too big for their britches which is why God put a stop to it.

In my view honest space exploration can only lead to the Creator.

I misspoke in my earlier post. The builders of the tower did not say they wanted to be like Gods.

My dad would say that they got too big for their britches which is why God put a stop to it.

In my view honest space exploration can only lead to the Creator.

Is the difference between Babel and space exploration the difference of religious belief and secular exploration?

Are these instances apples and oranges or are they 2 sides of the same coin?

I tend to wonder about the specifics of the tower of Babel and what actually look like if I were there in person vs. reading it from a book.

Hi john

Travis is correct. The builders of the tower were being disobedient. Of course everyone else on the planet was as well which is why the flood was necessary. I think there was an element of pride in their endeavor.

I don't think space exploration is a prideful thing but folks may disagree about the merits of it.

I am hoping that Travis will elucidate further on what he thinks of this because he seems to be against it on moral grounds and I am curious about that.

It is hard to say all you want to say when you are trying to post from your phone. Let me elaborate.

I don't see any real connection between the tower of Babel and the modern day space race. It seems to me that the Atheist is not understanding what happened at Babel. The people were not trying to get into space or to somehow build a tower so high that they could reach the abode of God physically. The original post seemed to me to imply that the Atheist believed that God would be very strange indeed to have disallowed and judged those at Babel for what He is freely allowing in modern times. This perspective would show a misunderstanding of Babel. The people wanted to make a name for themselves lest they be scattered. No doubt there was idolatry in the mix, the worship of false gods, but the great city they sought to build and the tower were, in my understanding, meant to be the center of civilization. Remember, we are not very far from the flood at this point in time. Shem was alive at the same time as Abraham, so we are dealing with a relatively short time frame here. God has commanded man to scatter, to spread out over the earth and populate the earth. They did not obey Him, and so he confounded the languages. This effectively separated the people who naturally, due to language barrier and probably a GREAT deal of new-found fear of God, put geographical distance between themselves.

I was not implying that space exploration was somehow inherently ungodly. What I meant was this. In the beginning of the space program, the driving force behind space exploration seemed to me to be a real quest for scientific knowledge and for ways to utilize space. Without satellites and the space program, I would not be able to post my thoughts on Sermonindex. Because of space technology we are reaching more people with the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ than ever.

However, now it seems that the motivation to explore is based in assumptions that come from a Godless view of the universe. They are trying very hard to find life on other planets, any kind of life, because they have a core belief that life came from somewhere...anywhere...but the creator God. They are searching hard for signs that Mars could have once supported life. They are searching hard for planets in other solar systems that they think could harbor life. The SETI program is listening intently for any kind of ordered signals that could be interpreted as communication from other life in other solar systems. They hope in some way to find out how we can live on another planet, primarily because they think that this one will go on forever but will reach a point of being either too heavily populated to support us all, or that it will become too polluted to support us. I remember the movie called Wally that, though whimsical, was based on just that scenario. So what I am saying is that the motivation behind the things we are trying to do in space has shifted so that it is based on a Godless worldview.

Hope that clarifies a bit.

Thanks Travis that helps. I agree with you for the most part.

What will you think when they finally confirm that there is indeed life somewhere else? ;)

Well, if the Bible is the true history of the universe, I think I they are going to search on vain.

I am not sure what to think of that statement. Obviously the bible doesn't tell us everything there is possibly to know.

I am not sure what to think of that statement. Obviously the bible doesn't tell us everything there is possibly to know.

Yes, this can be a problem and it results in endless fighting amongst Christians and non Christians about certain topics.

RE: /// Obviously the bible doesn't tell us everything there is possibly to know.///

This may well be true, but if we dig beyound the surface of Scripture we will find that it reveales much more than we relieze.

I agree PP that principles certainly go deeper than the words on the page but certain facts about the universe are simply not mentioned. It would not be possible to mention everything.

Some Christians might state that Gen 1 rules out extraterrestrial life; I certainly don't but that is just my opinion. It doesn't tell us about the meteor strike that wiped out the dinos or the cataclysmic Yellowstone volcanic eruptions.

**deleted double post

The idea of extraterrestrial life is problematic from a scriptural point of view for a couple reasons. First, the earth is, according to scripture, a very special place with a very special purpose. God created the earth and all of its flora on day three. It was after this that God created all of the other celestial bodies including the sun, the moon, the planets in our solar system, and all of the stars and galaxies in the universe. These things were created for service to the inhabitants of earth for signs and seasons. So creation was geocentric in the sense that God had a special purpose for a special place created in a special way in which would dwell His special creation, mankind. See Isaiah 45:8 and Psalm 115:16.

Second is the problem of sin. There is a realm that we, confined to our physical reality, are not able to clearly see. That is the spiritual realm. Yet the spiritual realm is no less real than the physical. Actually, since God is spirit and since He created the physical, the spiritual realm should be thought of as more "real" than the physical just as a creator is more "real" than his creation. Satan dwells in that spiritual realm just as God does. He tempted man to sin. God knew this would happen, and had prepared a way by which mankind could be redeemed to God. Jesus Christ, slain from the foundation of the world. That being the case, we are told that there is no other name in heaven or in earth whereby men might be saved. If there were other men in other places in the universe, and I am making a speculation outside of the Bible here, it stands to reason that they too would have sinned and that they too would have needed a savior. This creates a conundrum. Would Christ have to have been slain many times?

I think we can, from scripture, conclude that we are indeed special in the universe.

As to the dinosaurs, the idea of a meteor strike is at best an extremely shaky attempt at making an explanation of why we do not see these animals represented on earth now, and has its basis in an the timeline of an evolutionary world-view. We have no reason, other than the fancy of evolution, to believe that the Bible would treat a "dinosaur" as anything other than what it is...just another animal that is now extinct. Just 80 miles east of me I once toured a cave in which was found the skeleton of a saber toothed tiger. That creature is now extinct. Recent history (the past 2000 years) is replete with accounts of creatures that match exactly the description of dinosaurs that agrees with the skeletal remains that we find. In the last 20 years, the only partially fossilized remains of a t-rex were found in Montana I believe, in which the bone marrow still contained red blood cells, pointing to relatively recent death, definitely post flood. If "dinosaurs" were extant after the flood, then these animals must have been on the ark and must have been seen by Noah as no different in significance than any other animal.

Obviously there are those who disagree with this perspective. And Deadn is right, it would be sad indeed for brothers in Christ to become angry with one another over these things. But I do think that our thinking has been heavily influenced by the evolutionary perspective that has been so heavily promulgated among society in the past 200 years.