Tanach · Rishonim on Tanach · Ibn Ezra · Torah
Ibn Ezra on Genesis 11:7/אבן עזרא על בראשית י״א:ז׳
אהבה נרדה. דבור השם עם המלאכים,
1COME, LET US GO DOWN. This is what God said to the angels.
בומלת ונבלה שם שפתם, כל המדקדקים אומרים שהוא מבנין נפעל וכמוהו ונבקה רוח מצרים (ישעי' יט ג),, וכן "אבלה נבלה" (שם כד ד) וזה רחוק, כי מה טעם נרדה ותתבלב. לשונם, ולשונם לא נבלה בעבור הירידה, רק ונבלה כמו ונעשה והראיה שאמר בסוף "כי שם בלל ד'" (בראשית יא ט) וזה דקדוקו הוא מבנין הפעיל והיה ראוי להיותו שלם ונבלילה ובבילוע הכפל, וְנָבֵלה על משקל וְנָסֵבָה את ארון ד' (דה"א י"ג ג) (ובחסרון הכפל ונבלה שם) ויפה תרגמו הזקנים ואבלה תחת ונבלה, ואילו היה כדברי המדקדקים למה חסרו הנון וי"א שנהפך לבם לשנוא זה את זה וכל אחד חידש לשון ויש אומרים כי המלמד אדם דעת שכחם דעת לשונם והנכון בעיני שנפוצו משם, ואחר שנפצו מלך נמרוד על בבל, וקמו מלכים אחרים, ובימים רבים במות הדור הראשון נשכח הלשון הראשון, והשם הפיצם, והוא טוב להם, וכן אמר "ומלאו את הארץ" (בראשית א יח):
2[AND THERE CONFOUND THEIR LANGUAGE.] All the grammarians claim that ve-navelah (and confound) is a nifal.29 (and there confound their language) means, and their language will be there confounded, the nun of ve-navelah being the nun of the nifal. They compare it to ve-navekah (and shall be made empty) in And the spirit of Egypt shall be made empty (ve-navekah) (Is. 19:3) and to navelah (fadeth) in The earth fainteth and fadeth away (navelah) (Is. 24:4). However, their interpretation is farfetched. Why would the Bible say: Come, let us go down and their language will be confounded, when their language was not confounded because God and the angels went down?30 Ve-navelah can only be interpreted as an active verb.31 not being the sign of the nifal but of a first person plural imperfect prefix. Proof of this is Scripture’s stating at the close of this incident, because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth (v. 9). The following is then the grammatical explanation of ve-navelah. It is a hifil. Scripture should have employed the entire root and read ve-navlilah,32. The root of ve-navelah is bet, lamed, lamed. or ve-navellah33 when one of the letters of the double root is dropped (swallowed) in the conjugation. In this case ve-navelah has a tzere beneath the bet and a dagesh forte in the lamed. The dagesh doubles the lamed and thus compensates for the missing lamed. if one of the two lameds of its double root was swallowed. In the latter case it would have followed the paradigm of ve-nasebbah (let us bring back)34 in and let us bring back (ve-nasebbah) the ark of our God (I Chron. 13:3). Our word reads ve-navelah because one of the lameds of the root was dropped without the remaining lamed receiving a dagesh forte to make up for it. The sages who translated the Torah into Greek correctly rendered ve-navelah as I will confound,35 as an active form, we will confound. rather than we will confound.36 9a. If the above mentioned grammarians are correct, why did the sages omit the nun?37 is passive (nifal), meaning it will be confounded, why did the sages who translated the Bible into Greek change ve-navelah to ve-avelah? Obviously the sages saw it as active, meaning we will confound, hence the change from the plural to the singular. Some say that the people building the tower started hating each other and each one invented a new language. Others say that the One who grants knowledge to man caused them to forget their language. In my opinion, they were first scattered. After their dispersion Nimrod ruled over Babel and other kings arose. With the passage of time and the death of the first generation to be scattered, the original language was forgotten.38 God scattered the people for their own benefit. He similarly said, and replenish the earth (Gen. 1:28).39