The Torah: Building with Bricks, not Stones
The settlers of the valley in Shinʿar initiate a building project.
בראשית יא:ג וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל רֵעֵהוּ הָבָה נִלְבְּנָה לְבֵנִים וְנִשְׂרְפָה לִשְׂרֵפָה וַתְּהִי לָהֶם הַלְּבֵנָה לְאָבֶן וְהַחֵמָר הָיָה לָהֶם לַחֹמֶר. Gen 11:3 They said, (each) man to his neighbor: “Let us brick-make bricks, and let us burn-them a burn.” So the brick was for them stone, and bitumen was for them mortar.
The narrator is aware that in Mesopotamia, people built with baked bricks, made of clay, and bound them together with bitumen. In the second sentence, the narrator contrasts that method of building with the local method in the Levant, where the Hebrew text was composed: one shaves stones and binds them together with mortar.
Conventional biblical commentators regard this second sentence as a marginal remark that needlessly interrupts the narrative flow.[8] Some place it in parentheses; the NJPS Tanakh sets it off with em-dashes. In contrast, I regard this sentence as an essential observation on language, right on topic. The remark on different methods of construction applies analogously to the linguistic theme of the story: different languages employ different vocabulary (bricks) and different syntax (mortar).
The focus on language and its diversity is highlighted by wordplay. The Hebrew for “brick” and “for stone” are a pun: levena – le’even. So is the Hebrew pair “bitumen” and “mortar”: ḥemar – ḥomer. Difference in meaning depends on an oh-so-slight difference in sound.[9]