Answers In Genesis, the ministry that created the extraordinary Ark Encounter in northern Kentucky – a replica of Noah’s Ark built according to the directions God gave Noah – now plans to build a replica of the ancient Tower of Babel adjacent to it.
The Bible’s Old Testament says the ancient tower was built by Noah’s descendants after the worldwide flood. They rebelled against God and refused his command to “fill the earth” with their offspring.
As the project planners explain on the Answers In Genesis website:
“As he had done to Adam and Eve (Genesis 1:28), the Lord blessed Noah and his family and instructed them to be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth (Genesis 9:1). While Noah’s descendants multiplied, they refused to fill the earth. Instead, they decided to stick together and gathered in a place called Shinar. Refusing to scatter and desiring to make a name for themselves, they began to build a city and a tower with a top “in the heavens” (Genesis 11:4).
God confused their language to keep them from communicating about their rebellious plans, forcing them to eventually scatter and “fill the earth.”
The purpose of the Babel project, the planners explain, is not to glorify that rebellion but to glorify God and provide insight into issues confronting society today, particularly racism.
At its heart, the tower planners say is whether the biblical view of human beings prevails or the evolutionary theory does.
“Our culture has been inundated by false views of our origins, teaching that we evolved from ape-like ancestors. While most evolutionists are probably not racists, the philosophy they hold is inherently racist, implying that some people groups are more closely related to apes than others,” states the Answers in Genesis website.
The racist philosophy that some people are less than human motivated notable tyrants of the last century like Adolf Hitler. And the quest to root out “inferiors” spurred Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger to develop her organization that has become the largest abortion provider in the United States.
It also manifests today in philosophies that reduce human beings to skin color or ethnicity.
The late Stephen Jay Gould, a leading evolutionist of the 20th century, acknowledged that acceptance of evolution spurred the rapid growth of racism, and argued that “modern science shows us that races can be ranked on a scale of superiority.”
Gould wrote the following disturbingly racist comments, based on his belief in evolution:
“Biological arguments for racism may have been common before 1850, but they increased by orders of magnitude following the acceptance of evolutionary theory. The litany is familiar: cold, dispassionate, objective, modern science shows us that races can be ranked on a scale of superiority. If this offends Christian morality or a sentimental belief in human unity, so be it; science must be free to proclaim unpleasant truths.” — Stephen Jay Gould, Ontogeny and Phylogeny (Cambridge, MA: Belknap-Harvard Press, 1977), 127.
“Evolutionists explain the so-called racial differences through the lens of a fundamentally racist philosophy,” according to Answers in Genesis.
However, the Tower of Babel’s planners point out the biblical view is quite different.
“Noah’s descendants scattered from Babel in family groups and settled new lands. Separated from one another, the various groups began to express distinct traits. No group is more “evolved” than any other. Some people may have achieved greater advancements in agriculture, industry, or technology due to having a greater number of skilled trades people when the language division occurred, but this does not mean they are ‘more human’ than others. Instead, all people today descended from Noah and are members of the one human race (we’re all of ‘one blood,’ per Acts 17:26).”
“All people are descendants of Adam, and we are all made in God’s image. Our true problem is sin, which includes prejudice and racism, and the solution is the same for all of us—the gospel of Jesus Christ. Ironically, critical race theory is also the exact opposite of Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream that people would be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin,” the Answers in Genesis website notes.
The ministry says the goal of the Tower of Babel project is to confront racist, ethnocentric philosophies with the truth of humanity’s origins according to God’s Word,
“Most importantly, we will proclaim the only solution to racism and every other sin that besets mankind: the gospel of Jesus Christ,” the Answers in Genesis website states.
The Babel project is expected to be a three-year effort and will be located on the same property as the Ark Encounter.
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