Genesis 11:7

11:7 Come, let’s go down and confuse 1  their language so they won’t be able to understand each other.” 2 

Genesis 41:25-26

41:25 Then Joseph said to Pharaoh, “Both dreams of Pharaoh have the same meaning. 3  God has revealed 4  to Pharaoh what he is about to do. 5  41:26 The seven good cows represent seven years, and the seven good heads of grain represent seven years. Both dreams have the same meaning. 6 

1 tn The cohortatives mirror the cohortatives of the people. They build to ascend the heavens; God comes down to destroy their language. God speaks here to his angelic assembly. See the notes on the word “make” in 1:26 and “know” in 3:5, as well as Jub. 10:22-23, where an angel recounts this incident and says “And the Lord our God said to us…. And the Lord went down and we went down with him. And we saw the city and the tower which the sons of men built.” On the chiastic structure of the story, see G. J. Wenham, Genesis (WBC), 1:235.

2 tn Heb “they will not hear, a man the lip of his neighbor.”

3 tn Heb “the dream of Pharaoh is one.”

4 tn Heb “declared.”

5 tn The active participle here indicates what is imminent.

5 tn Heb “one dream it is.”