A tower erected at Babel by the descendants of Noah's son Ham to reach the sky, and whose completion God thwarted by making the workers speak different languages so that they were unable to understand one another
a tower in a story in the Old Testament of the Bible. According to the story, everyone originally spoke the same language, but when the people of Babel tried to build a tower that would reach to Heaven, God prevented them by making them all speak different languages. The people could not understand each other, and were unable to finish building the tower. People sometimes use the word "babel" to talk about a situation in which many people are talking at the same time and it is impossible to understand anyone. In the Hebrew scriptures, a high tower built in Shinar (Babylonia). According to Genesis 11: 1-9, the Babylonians wanted to build a tower "with its top in the heavens." Angry at their presumption, God disrupted the enterprise by confusing the languages of the workers so that they could no longer understand each other. The tower was left unfinished and the people dispersed over the face of the earth. The myth may have been inspired by a tower temple located north of the Marduk temple and known as Bab-ilu ("Gate of God")
(Biblical) tower built by the descendants of Noah in an attempt to reach heaven (as a punishment, God created many different languages so they could not understand one another)
(Genesis 11: 1-11) a tower built by Noah's descendants (probably in Babylon) who intended it to reach up to heaven; God foiled them by confusing their language so they could no longer understand one another