I suppose it really started in 1977 when the door bell chimed. There, clutching bags and Bibles, stood two ladies from the local group of Jehovah's Witnesses. We all know the joyful feeling we get when we open the door to see two silver haired, smiling faces, holding books and leaflets. I was no different. On that occasion I decided to argue, though it was so long ago I do not remember the details. Only one detail sticks in my mind, something one of them said. 'Why not read it for yourself ?' That seemed to me to be quite a reasonable suggestion, so I did.

I didn't get very far into it before I came across the story of the tower of Babel. It caught my interest because it seemed to be out of place in the narrative. It is placed smack in the middle of a genealogy and sticks out like a sore thumb, as if some scribe had dropped his papers and picked them up in the wrong order. It was already known to me that the chapter and verse divisions in the Bible are a modern convention, so I allowed myself to view the context of chapters ten and eleven of the book of Genesis as one continuous story. In fact it is all genealogy, apart from verses one through nine of chapter eleven, and these relate the Babel story. Again, I noticed the story was apparently misplaced in time as well, since, going back to chapter ten, verse ten, we see that Babel was part of Nimrod's kingdom. 'The beginning of his kingdom was Babel...' (Ch 10 v 10) I had to ask myself why had the ancient scribe misplaced the story of the construction of Babel. Was it an accident? Perhaps not. Perhaps it was a deliberate ploy to attract attention? Certainly it had that effect, it attracted mine. It seemed to me to be saying 'Please take notice, here is something important.' I experienced that feeling, though logic, and the view of experts, told me otherwise. The experts all said that Babel was a Babylonian ziggurat, though they never give their reasoning. Perhaps they think that any rational answer is better than confessing ignorance. There were many Babylonian ziggurats built, long after the time context of the Biblical Babel. Why would a Bible writer include mention of just one such ziggurat, when there were many built ? In the context of the Bible, the tower was built before the confusion of tongues and the scattering of the people. It follows that it was built before the time of Nimrod, who founded his kingdom on it. Nimrod was second generation after Noah stepped out of the famous ark onto the slopes of mount Ararat. If we accept the context of the story, Nimrod was the son of Cush, who was the son of Ham, who was one of Noah's three sons who took passage on the ark. (Gen. 10, verses 6 & 8 ) It follows that the tower was built within two generations, and even if we allow for longevity, the construction was started, at most, within one century of the famous flood. In the context of the narrative, it was long before the rise of Babylon. The experts place Babel in Babylon, despite the contextual anachronism, because of the similarity in phonetics of the two words. But the word 'Babel' has no linguistic or etymological connection to the word 'Babylon'. The Witnesses seemed to think it was a pagan temple. As it turned out, it seems that both were wrong.

Another problem area was found in chapter eleven, verse two, where the authorized version says :- "...as they journeyed From the East." The sequence of the narrative is quite easy to follow, there should be no cause for great dispute. When Noah and his family stepped from the ark, they were the only living souls on Earth. They stayed in the area of Ararat for a while, and then set out in a westerly direction, to explore their new world. Mount Ararat is in Turkey, so traveling from the east would mean they were moving towards the west. That is to say they would be moving towards Europe, not towards Babylon, which was in the other direction. (actually it wasn't, Babylon did not exist as a nation at that time. All the Earth was of one speech and the people one, according to the text) I concluded that Babel was not a Babylonian ziggurat, and must therefore be something else.

By this time I was well and truly hooked. It was more than enough to cause me to read with closer interest. Soon other anomalies presented themselves, and I found myself drawn into a fascinating Biblical world. My initial curiosity soon led to a full investigation. I followed clues which led me to discover the maths reported in detail on the other pages. ("An Astronomical Enigma", and/or "Stonehenge Equation". ) I kept an open mind, or tried to, and was willing to accept the Bible on its own terms. My approach was to say, 'O.K. The Bible is myth, but let us accept it, let's accept the context, and see where it leads.' The idea was, of course, that if the Bible was myth then accepting it would produce no valid result. If I were to base logic and reasoning on Biblical clues, and if those clues were not real, then quite obviously, I would not expect real results. The fact that I did obtain real results came as something of a shock, but more of that later. The first thing I did was to draw up a list of all the things I could that concerned Babel, along with a fresh translation of the text. The translation I made with the aid of a concordance, and common sense, I am no expert on Hebrew. I knew that Hebrew words had many nuances of meaning, just like English words, and the exact meaning chosen by the King James translators, or any others for that matter, would depend on the expectations and religious views of the translators. For example, it is well known that there is no Hebrew word that can be directly translated as 'God'. The Hebrew uses the word 'Elohim' which is plural and literally means 'strong ones' or 'mighty ones'. Chapter one verse one of Genesis actually says that the heavens were created by 'Elohim'.

Perhaps, before we go further, I should present the reader with my alternative translation to the Babel story. It is much the same as the King James version, I have merely allowed myself to explore some of the nuances of meaning in both Hebrew and English. It should not trouble the reader that I am not an expert on Hebrew, if my translation is wrong, then it does not matter. A wrong translation will lead nowhere. Only a correct translation will yield positive results. The reader might like to assess the accuracy of the translation later, when the results of the investigation are considered. The chapter and verse references are just that, for ease of reference, they mean nothing of themselves and should be ignored when reading the text. The translation that follows should not be seen as authoritative, for the most part it is derived from the alternative meanings that can be found in all languages. The particular sense of meaning that emerges is just one of a range that are possible from the semantics of the passage. If critical experts disagree with the translation, then I can do no more than point to the reasoning already expressed. If it is wrong, it will lead nowhere.

Genesis Chapter Eleven 1) And the whole Earth was of one language. United. 2) And it came to pass, as they journeyed westward, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. 3) And they said one to another, go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick and stone and pitch for mortar. 4) And they said , Go to, let us build us a town and a place of pillars whose top elevation, or plan, may connect with the heavens: and let it be for a memorial to our name, lest we be scattered across the earth and forgotten. 5) And the Mighty Ones came down, to see the town, and the place of pillars, which the children of men were building. 6) And the Mighty Ones said, Look, the people are one, and they have all one language: and this they begin to do: Now nothing will stand in their way, they can do anything they can imagine. 7) Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand each other. 8) So the Mighty Ones scattered them across the Earth, and they stopped building the town. 9) Therefore is the name of it called The Gate of Strength, or the Gate of God, because the Mighty Ones did there confound the language of all the earth and from thence did the Mighty Ones scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.

It is worthwhile drawing attention to verse two, which claims that they 'journeyed'. Now it matters not, for the moment, which direction they were moving in. The point I would wish to bring out is that this was a smallish group of people, on the move as one united body. It was not a global population of many billions, as might be inferred from words like 'The whole Earth'. A truly global population would not be considered as being capable of journeying as a united body. The context refers to a smallish group of people who, because of their unique circumstances, were the only people in the world, and could therefore be described accurately as 'The whole Earth'. pppp After the confusion of tongues and the scattering, the narrative jumps back to chapter ten verse ten, where it is reported that one section of the fragmented society under the leadership of Nimrod, established a kingdom centered on Babel, while the others were scattered abroad. Chapter ten, verse five, describes the process in more detail. "By these were the isles of the gentiles divided in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations." pppp I would like to remind the reader that I am making no claim for the literal truth of these verses, nor am I trying to prove a point. My purpose is to relate the sequence of events that led to the discovery of the mathematics on web site An Astronomical Enigma Once discovered, the math is independent of the path that led to its discovery. I could have obtained the mathematics by following a false trail, it matters not. The math is what matters. I started with the information reported above, be it true or false, I considered that it had meaning. Someone took the trouble to preserve it for thousands of years, so the least I could do was take it seriously. Let us return to the narrative, and use it firstly to clear up a few misconceptions promoted by 'experts'. pppp We may note again the comment that the people were united under one leader, presumed to be Noah, and that they travelled westward away from Ararat. This would bring them into Europe, and not Mesopotamia. The 'land of Shinar' is often said to be located in Babylon by those same experts, who presume that because Babel was a ziggurat (according to them) and because Babel was built in 'Shinar', then, using false logic, it follows that Shinar must be a region or sub district of Babylon. That ties it all down neatly, but is not necessarily correct. If the people moved to the west of Ararat, then there can be no connection whatever with a country that did not even exist at that time. So, the first misconception to correct is the notion that Babel or Shinar was in Mesopotamia. Since we conclude it was not Babylonian, we can further conclude that it was not a Ziggurat, since they came later, and were only built by Babylonians, as far as we can tell. The people who built Babel, were not Babylonians. They were the only people on Earth, they were united, with a common language, and they moved westward into Europe. There is another commonly held misconception that is somewhat easier to clear up. Babel is often shown in rather lurid pictures as a toppling tower, in the process of being destroyed by the wrathful hand of God. In the narrative, the structure of Babel was not destroyed. The Mighty Ones did not destroy it, nor is there any indication that they wished to do so. The scripture simply reports that building work was stopped on the 'city' or town. The people subsequently scattered. No mention is made, not anywhere in the Bible, of a destruction of Babel. It was simply taken over by Nimrod after the scattering.

To summarize the misconceptions.... A) Babel was not in Babylon. B) Shinar was not in Babylon. C) Babel was not a ziggurat. D) Babel was not destroyed. E) There is no indication that Babel was a temple. F) The population was small. G) Babel was a memorial of some kind.

Let us turn our attention to item 'C'. It is valid to say that Babel was not a ziggurat, but it could have been some other kind of tower. Why have I changed the word 'Tower' into 'Place of Pillars'? I did this for several reasons, not least amongst these reasons was the fact that the language allows for the use of the word 'pillars'. A pillar is a small tower, a tower is a large pillar. The literal translation is "upright things". Another reason is related to the statement that the top "may reach unto heaven." The King James translators were in the habit of inserting words to make better sense of a dubious translation, these they dutifully rendered in italics. The words in the text, reading, 'may reach' were not in the original, and can be omitted. This leaves us with "Whose top unto heaven" as the King James English version of the Hebrew. The language seems to indicate that the top connected with the heavens, rather than reached towards the heavens. The text appeared to me to read 'connected' but this could not be literal, on the understanding that the people who built it were not stupid, nor were the people who wrote the text. They must have had experience of mountains, they had recently departed from mount Ararat. The people who built Babel would have known that the mountains do not literally reach the heavens, as the scribe who wrote the story would also have known. Knowing that the high mountains did not reach heaven, would they be likely to think they could build a tower, so much higher than the mountains ? The structure was built on a plain. Had they wished it to reach the heavens, surely it would have been better to build the foundations on a mountain top ? Starting at the top of a mountain would mean they were at least half way there, it would reduce the amount of work considerably. If the monument top did not reach the heavens literally, and if the words do not really indicate 'towards', then we must seek some other meaning. I inserted the words 'connect', since it covers several possibilities, including the literal. It is often claimed that the structure was to serve as a pagan temple, a claim that may have been deduced from the apparent displeasure shown by 'God', however, the context indicates it was built under the auspices of Noah, and he is elsewhere described as righteous, he would not be expected to build a pagan temple. The structure is nowhere described as a temple, pagan or otherwise. In fact the text describes it as a 'memorial'. (Verse 4). It is expressly stated that the structure was to be some kind of memorial, a monument to the builders who anticipated being forgotten by posterity. It seemed to me that these people wanted to build something special, or to record some special knowledge, as a memorial to their name. They wanted to build something that future generations would look upon, marvel at, and be impressed by. It was to be something grand, to perpetuate the name and the memory of the builders. It was this thought, that the structure was a memorial, built to last, that hinted at the possibility of stored knowledge. If the people who built it were survivors of a global disaster, as described by the text, then they might well wish to preserve some record of what happened. Such knowledge, if it existed, could be preserved in architecture, designed into this 'memorial'. The thought led me to examine the text even more closely. The understanding of 'Top reaching unto the heavens' was imposed by the translators, they could only conceive of such a literal meaning, because they viewed the structure, and the scripture, as being primitive. Having decided that 'Top reaching the heavens' was to be understood in a primitive literal sense, that it meant 'High', the early translators left themselves no option but to use the word 'Tower'. No doubt their translation made sense to them, since they were always ready to equate 'old' with 'ignorant'. ppppp The original language, and the English, allow for my version. 'A place of pillars whose top elevation (plan) connects with the heavens' is a legitimate translation. ppppp

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