Picture this by Gary Rose

Last night, I watched one of the first episodes of "Elementary". In it, Sherlock was rescued because his captor sent a text from Sherlock's cell  that did not his excessive abbreviations in it and Watson knew something was wrong and traced the location. 

Today, I thought of that series and how language has changed. For some of us, correct spelling, punctuation and grammar have become a thing of the past. The emoji and the emoticon coupled with the "new-speak" of cell phone communication have almost made a new language.

Because of this, I just couldn't get Babel out of my mind, and wondered....

Genesis, Chapter 11 (World English Bible)

  ¹ The whole earth was of one language and of one speech.  ² As they traveled from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they lived there.  ³ They said to one another, “Come, let’s make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” They had brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar.  ⁴ They said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top reaches to the sky, and let’s make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad on the surface of the whole earth.” 

  ⁵ Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men built.  ⁶ Yahweh said, “Behold, they are one people, and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do. Now nothing will be withheld from them, which they intend to do.  ⁷ Come, let’s go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” (emp. added vss. 6,7)  ⁸ So Yahweh scattered them abroad from there on the surface of all the earth. They stopped building the city.  ⁹ Therefore its name was called Babel, because there Yahweh confused the language of all the earth. From there, Yahweh scattered them abroad on the surface of all the earth.

 Ecclesiastes, Chapter 1 (World English Bible)

 ² “Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher; “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”  ³ What does man gain from all his labor in which he labors under the sun?  ⁴ One generation goes, and another generation comes; but the earth remains forever.  ⁵ The sun also rises, and the sun goes down, and hurries to its place where it rises.  ⁶ The wind goes toward the south, and turns around to the north. It turns around continually as it goes, and the wind returns again to its courses.  ⁷ All the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full. To the place where the rivers flow, there they flow again.  ⁸ All things are full of weariness beyond uttering. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.  ⁹ That which has been is that which shall be; and that which has been done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. (emp. added vs. 9) ¹⁰ Is there a thing of which it may be said, “Behold, this is new?” It has been long ago, in the ages which were before us.  ¹¹ There is no memory of the former; neither shall there be any memory of the latter that are to come, among those that shall come after.

 

I wonder- could our languages merge into a new, universal language that would unite the whole world? And if that happened, what would God do about it?  Babel revisited?