I agree, but I think Gen 1 needs to originate with a prophet of the caliber of Moses.
Just because it had not been written down before does not mean it had not been thought of before. the achievement of Moses was to bring it together into a coherent narrative.
What is interesting is to look at the flood as the great punishment. If you look at God as a creator you would have to think that the only reason that as a creator he would have destroyed part of his creation would have been punishment. It is like looking at evolution as a governed by death instead of survival because we look at life as the normal and death as the punishment instead of seeing death as the normal and looking at life as the miracle. To me Noah is not about teaching us about Godās ability to punish but about Godās wisdom to tell us how to survive. you can tell it to kids to frighten them of Godās judgement or to make them look forward to gods wisdom. It is a matter of ābetonungā or emphasis
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I wish to invite more to view this part of the forum if you should be interested in linguistics and the development of human speech. If there are other linguists here on BioLogos, I would like for you to join in and make constructive comments in your knowledge of the subject. I plan to do some research to see what I can find out about Pre-Indo-European languages in Europe. I believe that would be of interest. As I mention above, Basque and Etruscan are Pre-Indo-European. No one has been able to link these two languages to any family group although some believe that Basque is related to Japanese. I find that rather hard to believe. 
I have donated many books to the Chesapeake Public Library; perhaps I will go there and research my own old books. Perhaps some of you may want to make this research too. In any case, I wish to thank those that have shown an interest in this subject. May the Lord Jesus Christ bless each and every one of you.
Your friend,
Charles
My friend Wolfe,
I have enjoyed your comments here along with the others that have replied. I like your knowledge of Hebrew. Yours is superior to mine. May God bless you and your family. I could make a bad joke and call you Werewolf, but I will not do that. 
Adams, Sie sind wirklich ein guter Mensch.
Mit herzlichen Gruessen,
Charles
Very interesting topic for me, great article, Thank-you!
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Itās worth noting that Genesis 11 does not actually say the events at the Tower of Babel resulted in new languages. On the contrary, we are told that what happened was peopleās language was confused so they could not understand teach other.
Genesis 11:
7 Come, letās go down and confuse their language so they wonāt be able to understand each other.ā
9 That is why its name was called Babel ā because there the Lord confused the language of the entire world, and from there the Lord scattered them across the face of the entire earth.
Additionally, Genesis 10 tells us that different languages were already being used elsewhere in the world.
Genesis 10:
31 These are the sons of Shem according to their families, according to their languages, by their lands, and according to their nations.
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Interesting point! But then what do you make of the opening of the chapter?
Now the whole world had one language and a common speech.
P.S. If you follow the link in my very first comment above, you may find the long comment by āwolfeevolutionā in the comments section to be of interest.
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I make of it exactly what it says; the whole land had one language. This is not a reference to the entire globe. This kind of language is found in Mesopotamian texts.
āin those days
in the countries Subartu,
Hamazi,
bilingual Sumer
being the great country
of princely office,
the region Uri
being a country
in which was
what was appropriate,
the country Mardu5
lying in safe pastures,
(in) the (whole) compass
of heaven and earth
the people entrusted (to him)
could address Enlil,
verily, in but a
single tongue.ā(1)
Note the words Iāve placed in bold. The writer is clearly aware of ābilingual Sumerā, but speaks of āthe whole compass of heaven and earthā addressing the god Enlil āin but a single tongueā. And then, in the same document, we have a record of the language being confused (not made into lots of different comprehensible languages).
"did Enki, lord of abundance,
lord of effective command,
did the lord of intelligence,
the countryās clever one,
did the leader of the gods,
did the sagacious
omenārevealed6
lord of Eridu
estrange the tongues
in their mouths
as many as were put there.
The tongues of men
which were one.ā(2)
This is the context in which we should read Genesis 11.
(1) William W. Hallo and K. Lawson Younger, The Context of Scripture (Leiden; New York: Brill, 1997ā), 547.
(2) William W. Hallo and K. Lawson Younger, The Context of Scripture (Leiden; New York: Brill, 1997ā), 548.
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I like your perspective here. I would say that if the Tower of Babel is a literal event, it was a local one. You are correct. Would language evolution have taken place in any case? You and I would probably agree that the answer is yes. I also like the examples you give. You seem to be a very fine scholar.
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I believe that the Babel Story represents a miracle; however, I can also see Godās active part in the evolution of human language, no matter how one interprets it. I would like to hear your views of the Pre-Indo-European languages of Europe. Lets not wait for another forum in relation to that. That concept fits perfectly here with this forum. I have changed my mind and decided to do more research. It seems there is new information on Paleo-European.
Thank you Henry. I believe it was a local event, and I believe language evolution had already taken place anyway. I hasten to add I am not a scholar in any field related to the topic under question. I have formal post-graduate qualifications in other subjects.
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Unfortunately I have little to no knowledge of Pre-Indo-European languages. The very few bits and pieces I know about the historical development of language, I learned from this book.
I have found some information on Pre-Indo-European languages; therefore, I again feel this could develop into a separate forum. I will need to see how much information is out there in libraries. This will take me some time. I may be a short while before I start to develop that topic. These languages are sometimes called Paleo-European. I know of only two: Basque and Etruscan. I have learned that my fellow linguists have discovered more. I will need to feed the old brain 
May God bless everyone.
This is very helpful! Thanks. I think it may actually fit really well with the comment I referred you to earlier, which highlights the word Genesis 11 uses for ālanguageā:
The word used for language throughout Genesis 11 is שÖø×פÖø× ("lip") not the usual ×Öøש××Ö¹× ("tongue"). From what I can tell ā do a concordance search yourself and see! ā שÖø×פÖø× typically refers metaphorically to speech (i.e., the content or moral quality of what is said), not to the cultural-linguistic idiom (e.g., Hebrew vs. Akkadian, etc.). I'm having a hard time pinning down a single context where שÖø×פÖø× unequivocally refers to the *language*. (Even in Is. 19:18, a possible counterexample, it could easily refer to cultic, rather than linguistic, differences.)
Reflecting briefly on your comment and this one: the reference in Genesis 11 may thus be not to ālanguagesā as we typically use the term today but to ālanguageā with religious or other non-linguistic connotations. I need to think about this some more when I have more time and energy, but this is a helpful direction to explore. Thanks again for your reference to the Mesopotamian literature.
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Youāre welcome, Iām glad you found that helpful. I read the article to which you linked earlier, and thought it made some very good points. Thereās definitely value in a multi-faceted approach to the chapter, but the key point in my view is to avoid the error of the traditional reading, the idea that Genesis 11 is an etiology of the worldās languages. It isnāt.
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In case anyone is interested John McWhorterās course guide on historical linguistics is available free online. Iāve looked at it before and itās got interesting stuff and is a good starting point if you want to explore the topic a little:
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I have studied this course and have the materials here. It is a good course, and I recommend it to all here.
God bless,
Charles
There is one country I forgot to mention that spoke a Germanic language for a time: France. As you probably know, the Franks conquered the Roman province of Gaul in the fifth century AD at the fall of that great empire. The Celts and the Romans left in Gaul spoke Vulgar Latin. I wish to point out that the Gauls were not saying curse words when they spoke this type of Latin; on the contrary, they were speaking a dialect that had developed from Classical Latin. Bad humor The Franks spoke a dialect of Old High German.
Charlemagne, the king of the Franks and first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, spoke both Vulgar Latin and Old High German, a dialect of the Franks living in France and Germany. Therefore, even though the French and the Germans had problems with each other through the years, they are in fact the same people. Charlemagneās name in Modern German is Karl der Grosse, i.e., Charles the Great. In Old High German, Karl or Charles was Karls. The names Carl, Charles, and Karl are in fact the same name. One might say that the name of Karls has evolved into three names. Karls was raised in Paris in Frankenreich, the Old German name for France. If you were to say France in Modern German, it would be called Frankreich, i.e., the Kingdom of the Franks. Karls moved the Frankish capital from Paris to Aix-la-Chapelle, in German Aachen. After his death, the kingdom was divided into three parts: West Frankenreich, Lothringen, and Ostfrankenreich, which was later called Germany. I hope that you enjoy this bit of information. God bless. Karls Molinarius otherwise known as Charles Miller.
Post Scriptum: I just wish to add that Molinarius is the Latin word for Miller.
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