Babel and Jesus: Two Ways Up and Down
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Wilhelm Gunkel
As 2026 has begun, I’ve been reading through Genesis in my quiet times. When I reached Genesis 11, the Tower of Babel, I was reminded of an observation someone pointed out to me years ago: this passage is almost a mirror-image of the Christ-hymn in Philippians 2. Everything Babel reaches for, Jesus achieves, but by going the opposite way.
The Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1–9) and the Christ-hymn of Philippians 2:5–11 tell the same story in reverse. They present two radically different ways “up”, and therefore two radically different ways “down”. Let’s unpack that.
Going Up and Down
At Babel, humanity chooses one way up:
“Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens” (Genesis 11:4).
This is the human instinct: climb, ascend, reach heaven by effort and achievement. The assumption is that greatness comes through ascent, through strength, technology, unity, and ambition.
But God responds:
“Come, let us go down and confuse their language” (Genesis 11:7).
Humanity goes up; God comes down. The downward movement here is judgment.
Philippians 2 presents the opposite pattern. Jesus also takes a downward path:
“Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant” (Philippians 2:6–7).
This is a completely different way “up”. Instead of climbing toward glory, Jesus descends. And because this descent is obedience rather than rebellion, it leads not to scattering but to exaltation:
“Therefore God exalted him to the highest place” (Philippians 2:9).
Babel and Philippians 2 therefore present two completely different patterns:
Babel: Humans go up → God comes down in judgment → humans are brought low
Jesus: God comes down in salvation → Jesus is exalted → we are raised with him and bow before him
There really are two ways “up”. And only one of them actually works out.
Pride and Humility
Babel shows us the inner posture behind the first path: pride. The builders want security, unity, and permanence on their own terms. They refuse to live as dependent creatures. Like Adam and Eve, they grasp rather than receive.
Philippians 2 shows us the opposite posture: humility.
“He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:8).
Pride says, I must secure my own future.
Humility says, I will entrust myself to God.
Babel refuses limits. Jesus embraces obedience. And the difference between them is the difference between ruin and glory.
“Make a Name” vs “Given the Name”
Babel’s ambition is crystal clear:
“So that we may make a name for ourselves” (Genesis 11:4).
In Hebrew, the word for name is shem, and in Genesis, shem is never just a label. A name represents identity, significance, legacy, and lasting remembrance. To “make a name” is to secure your place in history and meaning in the world.
This is where the story becomes even richer.
In the previous chapter, Genesis 10, one of Noah’s sons is named Shem (Genesis 10:21). The genealogy of Shem shows us the line through which God will work blessing. Against that backdrop, Babel’s desire to “make a shem” is a counterfeit attempt to secure legacy apart from God.
And what happens in the very next chapter?
“I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2).
Notice the contrast:
Babel: Let us make a name for ourselves.
Abraham: I will make your name great.
Babel tries to seize what God gives only by promise.
Philippians 2 brings this thread to its climax:
“Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name” (Philippians 2:9).
At Babel, humans try to author their own name, and it collapses. Because he goes through with the cross, Jesus receives a name that is greater than anything those at Babel could have hoped for.
Scattering in Confusion; Gathering in Confession
Babel doesn’t just end in people being sent out. It ends in people no longer being able to understand one another:
“Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other” (Genesis 11:7).
What begins as a project of unity ends in fragmentation. And that fragmentation goes deeper than vocabulary. Babel explains why human life is marked by endless incompatibilities; why we drive on different sides of the road, use different plugs in the wall, write dates in different orders (for what it’s worth, I prefer YYYY-MM-DD), argue about whether metric or imperial is normal, discover that two “identical” USB-C cables are not in fact identical, and learn—again—that what works perfectly on a Mac may or may not open on a PC. Humanity is no longer naturally aligned. Babel means that we are utterly confused.
The result is dispersion:
“So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth” (Genesis 11:8).
Humanity becomes not one people but many peoples, divided by language, culture, and identity.
Philippians 2 points toward the opposite outcome:
“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians 2:10–11).
At Babel, languages divide humanity. In the gospel, every tongue is gathered into a single confession. The unity Babel could never achieve by pride, God accomplishes through humility. Not by flattening difference, but by uniting their voices as they confess the truth that defines the final outcome of history.
The Shape of the Gospel
As much as we try to convince ourselves otherwise, we cannot climb our way up to God. It only leads us down. The good news of the gospel is that God’s Son humbly came down to bear the consequences of our pride, so that we might be raised with him, gathered around his throne, bowing before him, confessing with one voice and no confusion at all that Jesus Christ is Lord.
