The eleventh chapter of Genesis is the final unit in the book before reaching the story of Abraham. Chapters 10 and 11, like the dual creation stories in chapters 1 and 2, offer two distinct versions of the world's repopulation after the flood. The Priestly writer of chapter 10 suggests the natural spreading out of all Noah's offspring to account for the diversity in language, culture and race among humanity. The Jahwist writer of chapter 11 deals with the same issue. This writer finds a very different way of explaining the bothersome phenomena.
The arrangement of the two stories is not by happenstance. By placing the Jahwist's version after the Priestly writer's chapter, the story of Babel becomes the final entry in the first phase of human history. From the time of Abraham on (beginning…