A thematic unity exists between Adam's individual and existential state of aloneness and the tragic social isolation which results from the Tower of Babel, when one universal language is replaced by seventy incomprehensible languages, creating in its wake bedlam, confusion, and dispersion.


In order to understand the sin of the Tower of Babel, we must remember that all social ills

All social ills can be traced back to individual transgression.

can be traced back to individual transgression. Let us, therefore, return to G-d's declaration: "It is not good for man to be alone. I will make a help-opposite for him." (Genesis 2:18) Failing to find his help-opposite among the animals, a deep sleep falls upon Adam, "And He [G-d] took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place, and of the rib, which the Lord G-d had taken from the man, He made a woman, and brought her to the man." (Genesis 2:21-22)


But why is the 'birth' of Eve surrounded with a mythic quality? Why does her creation differ radically from that of all other creatures?


In the question lies the answer. Had Eve been created from the earth like the rest of the animals, Adam would have related to her as a two-legged creature. Even if she walks and talks, she'd end up as one of the animals to name and control. Her unique 'birth' marks her unique role.


In an earlier verse, we read that "G-d created the human being in his image; in the image of G-d He created him, male and female created He them." (Genesis 1:27) "Male and female" suggests androgynous qualities, and on that verse Rashi cites the later reference to Eve's birth from Adam's 'rib,' quoting a midrashic interpretation that G-d originally created the human with two "faces," Siamese twins as it were, and when He puts Adam into a deep sleep, It's not to remove a rib, but to separate the female side from the male side.


According to Rashi, it seems that G-d's original human being was male and female. While Adam sleeps, G-d divides the creature into two so that each half will seek completion in the other. Had Eve not emerged from Adam's own flesh to begin with, they could never have become one flesh again.


Awakening, Adam says of Eve, "Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh." (2:23) His search is over, and what's true for Adam is true for humankind. In the next verse, G-d announces the second basic principle in life: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh." (2:24) "Leave" does not mean reject; it does mean, however, that one must be mature and independent in order to enter into a relationship of mutuality with one's mate. (How many divorces can be traced to crippling parent-child relationships?)


The goal of a human being is to become one flesh with another human being, and this, the truest of partnerships, can be achieved only with someone who is really part of yourself, only with someone to whom you cleave intellectually and emotionally. If a relationship suffers from a lack of concern and commitment, sexuality suffers as well. The Torah wants us to know that for humans, sex is not merely a function of procreation needs, but rather an expression of mutuality on a profound level. Hence, in contrast to the animal kingdom, humans are not controlled by periods of heat; sexuality is ever-present. Thus, Nahmanides (ad loc.) speaks of one flesh in allegoric terms: through a transcendent sexual act conceived in marriage, the two become one.


Rashi interprets the verse, "You shall become one flesh" to mean that in the newborn child, mother and father literally become one flesh. In the child, part of us lives on even

The flood struck when the world rejected the ideal relationship between man and woman.

 after we die.


The entire sequence ends with the startling statement, "And they were both naked, and they were not ashamed." (12:25) Given the Torah's strict standards of modesty and sexuality, how are we to understand a description that seems to contradict traditional Jewish values?


I would suggest a more symbolic explanation. Nakedness without shame means that two people must have the ability to face each other and reveal their souls without external pretense. Usually, we play games, pretending to be what we're not, putting on a front. The Hebrew word beged (garment) comes from the same root as bagad' - "to betray." With garments, I can betray, wearing my role as I hide my true self. The Torah wants husband and wife to remove garments that conceal truth, free to express fears and frustrations, not afraid to cry and scream in each other's presence without feeling the "shame of nakedness." This is the ideal ezer kenegdo, each listening to and attempting to understand the thoughts and feelings of the other, each respecting and leaving room for the other, working together in unity, but not in conformity.


The first global catastrophe, the flood, struck when the world rejected the ideal relationship between man and woman. Rape, pillage and unbridled lust became the norm, even among animals. Sex became an act of conquest rather than an expression of mutual giving and loving. Only one family on earth (Noah's) remained righteous. With the Tower of Babel, whatever values Noah attempted to pass on were again forgotten.


"And the entire earth had one language and uniform words." (Genesis 11:1) So begins the Tower of Babel story. How and why the speakers of one language and uniform words turned into the scattered seventy nations speaking seventy languages is not clearly explained by the text, and problematically an earlier text describes that "different tribes and different peoples spoke their languages." (Genesis 10:5) Yet, metaphorically speaking, "one language" means people understand each other. If the message of ezer-kenegdo is remembered, it might mean that people can strive together for a united ideal even while they respect the unique quality in different people having different ways to reach the ultimate symphony of the many, which produces the harmonic unity. "Uniform words" is a jarring note.


The Tower of Babel represents a new stage of depravity, not sexual but social. The united goal was to create a great name by building great towers, not for the sake of Heaven, but for the sake of materialism; the new god became high-rise achievements with mortar and

If a brick crashed the ground, people mourned.

brick. As they reached greater physical heights, they completely forgot the human, inter-personal value of a friend, a wife, a life's partner. According to the midrash, when a person fell off the Tower, work continued, but if a brick crashed the ground, people mourned. The picture is one of heartless, soul-less, communication -less Stalin totalitarianism.


Thus, the total breakdown of language fits the crime of people who may be physically able, but whose tongues and hearts are locked - people who are no longer communicating with each other. Existential loneliness engulfed the world and intercommunication a forgotten act. The powerful idea of one language became a vague memory.


The Tower of Babel ends a major period in the history of mankind, and the social destruction it leaves behind can only be fixed with Abraham; his message of a G-d of compassion who wishes to unite the world in love and morality is still waiting to be heard. And it must be heard, if humanity is to be saved.