God leads men to the places that where they go, in the time in which they are sent and to the races and people groups to whom they are assigned. Babel is important for a number of reasons. It represents the first post flood city. Urban environments are places that God sends many people, and in our generation most people. Babel also represents the first great empire. If God has people living in the context of cities and empires then each has a redemptive purpose. It is also the place where the task of hunting is added to man’s redemptive task. There are sociological and psychological implications to this task both in the person of Nimrod and in the individuals and people groups that follow him. Early America will again provide us a pallet of comparisons for understanding the psyche of the hunter found in Nimrod and his generation. Hunters had a redemptive task in his generation as they did in early America.
The physical transition from pre flood to post flood Earth cannot be overstated. The relationship between man and nature was the greatest of these transitions. A world in which man and beast cohabitated in an environment completely based on vegetarianism is now filled with the appetites for flesh and blood. Men would have hunted and been hunted by the great beast of the world. Hyper-vigilance would have been a normative aspect of life and nature. Let’s look to the book of Job to get an understanding of the types of beast that Nimrod would and encountered. The passage is long but I believe worth including in it entirety. It captures the kind environment that Nimrod would have attained stature and recognition and why the scriptures would say of him, “Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the LORD: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD.” Genesis 10: 8-9.
Matthew Henry said of Nimrod.
Nimrod was a great hunter; with this he began, and for this became famous to a proverb. Every great hunter is, in remembrance of him, called a Nimrod. 1. Some think he did good with his hunting, served his country by ridding it of the wild beasts which infested it, and so insinuated himself into the affections of his neighbors, and got to be their prince. Those that exercise authority either are, or at least would be called, benefactors, Lu. 22:25. 2. Others think that under pretence of hunting he gathered men under his command, in pursuit of another game he had to play, which was to make himself master of the country and to bring them into subjection.
It is certain that Nimrod had as his purpose ruler ship of other men, however the below scripture describes what he would have hunted! Commentators have called what is described a hippopotamus, or elephant. Could it describe two other beast possibly a dinosaur, behemoth, or the secondarily a dragon or leviathan because of its ability to breath out fire?
What Nimrod Hunted
"Look at the behemoth, which I made along with you and which feeds on grass like an ox. What strength he has in his loins, what power in the muscles of his belly! His tail sways like a cedar; the sinews of his thighs are close-knit. His bones are tubes of bronze, his limbs like rods of iron. He ranks first among the works of God, yet his Maker can approach him with his sword. The hills bring him their produce, and all the wild animals play nearby. Under the lotus plants he lies, hidden among the reeds in the marsh. The lotuses conceal him in their shadow; the poplars by the stream surround him. When the river rages, he is not alarmed; he is secure, though the Jordan should surge against his mouth. Can anyone capture him by the eyes, or trap him and pierce his nose?
"Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook or tie down his tongue with a rope? Can you put a cord through his nose or pierce his jaw with a hook? Will he keep begging you for mercy? Will he speak to you with gentle words? Will he make an agreement with you for you to take him as your slave for life? Can you make a pet of him like a bird or put him on a leash for your girls? Will traders barter for him? Will they divide him up among the merchants? Can you fill his hide with harpoons or his head with fishing spears? If you lay a hand on him, you will remember the struggle and never do it again! Any hope of subduing him is false; the mere sight of him is overpowering. No one is fierce enough to rouse him. Who then is able to stand against me? Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me. "I will not fail to speak of his limbs, his strength and his graceful form. Who can strip off his outer coat? Who would approach him with a bridle? Who dares open the doors of his mouth, ringed about with his fearsome teeth? His back has rows of shields tightly sealed together; each is so close to the next that no air can pass between. They are joined fast to one another; they cling together and cannot be parted. His snorting throws out flashes of light; his eyes are like the rays of dawn. Firebrands stream from his mouth; sparks of fire shoot out. Smoke pours from his nostrils as from a boiling pot over a fire of reeds. His breath sets coals ablaze, and flames dart from his mouth. Strength resides in his neck; dismay goes before him. The folds of his flesh are tightly joined; they are firm and immovable. His chest is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone. When he rises up, the mighty are terrified; they retreat before his thrashing. The sword that reaches him has no effect, nor does the spear or the dart or the javelin. Iron he treats like straw and bronze like rotten wood. Arrows do not make him flee; slingstones are like chaff to him. A club seems to him but a piece of straw; he laughs at the rattling of the lance. His undersides are jagged potsherds, leaving a trail in the mud like a threshing sledge. He makes the depths churn like a boiling caldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment. Behind him he leaves a glistening wake; one would think the deep had white hair. Nothing on earth is his equal a creature without fear. He looks down on all that are haughty; he is king over all that are proud.” Job 40:15 – Job 41:34
The Missing Witness
There is a great gap between verses 7 & 8 in Hebrews chapter 11; verse 7 speaks of Noah verse 8 speaks of Abraham. A verse in between could have read. Nimrod was a mighty hunter before the Lord he subdued the great beast and built mighty cities for God’s glory. It does not read that way because Nimrod did not use his God given redemptive gift for the glory of God. He was a mighty hunter because that was his redemptive gift. “For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not” 1 Corinthians 4:7 What made Nimrod “different” was what he had received, and what he had received he received from the Lord. Proverbs 20:29 states, “the glory of young men is their strength.” Nimrod would have rightly attracted glory and honor to his strength, this is also redemptive. Proverbs 22:4, “Humility and the fear of the LORD bring wealth and honor and life. God has no problem with honor or glory being given to men. He just does not want his honor and glory usurped. That is what Nimrod and his followers did.
John Smith and Pocahontas: Redemptive Gift of Mighty Hunter in Cultural Partnership
It was possible for Nimrod to be a great hunter and to be Godly. Christian men did both in early America. Consider the testimony of 16th Century John Smith.
“Smith had to function in a situation where traditional European values, which emphasized the privileges of aristocracy, were unworkable. First, the settlers were physically removed from English political and social influences. Second, the talents needed to survive in the New World were in opposition to the complacent aristocratic assumptions about labor. What the colonial setting required was self-reliance and common sense, qualities Smith possessed. These traits were fore-grounded by the necessities of wilderness living and would eventually make the hunter figure the ideal representation of that experience. In the wilderness, physical self-reliance and independence also fostered mental self-reliance and independence. Smith developed confidence as a result of his abilities, which in turn endowed him with a form of power unknown to commoners under the European power structure. He was especially critical of the cowardly acts by those who considered themselves his betters.”
In Smith own writing he delineates between native peoples who were Christians and those who were not. His partnership with Christian Natives indicates the ability to embrace native people’s gifts with those of European men as equally valuable and necessary and redemptive. Describing himself in the third person he writes.
“Smith prevailed, and in the spring of 1607 he went in quest of the sources of the Chickahominy River. When he was prevented from sailing farther upstream by overhanging foliage, he led a small party to explore the interior of the province. He and his men, who included two Christian Indians, encountered and battled a large group of three hundred Indians, led by Opechancanough, brother of Powhatan and King of the Pamunkey.”
Nimrod had the same opportunity as Smith did to worship God in sprit and in truth. The distinction between the two is a matter of their hearts, not their gift mixes. Nimrod also had the opportunity to magnify God by promoting diversity instead of squashing diversity. Robert Tilton makes this observation of the relationship between John Smith and Pocahontas.
“John Smith and Pocahontas represent an ideal amalgamation of European and Native American. Even though this ideal was never realized, the connection between Smith and Pocahontas has remained fixed in the American imagination over the centuries. Robert Tilton argues convincingly that the rescue story is the basis for the appeal of these figures that it acts as a creation myth for America. The pair incorporates traits from European and Indian cultures essential to the hunter hero who comes to symbolize American independence.”
Difficult task confront every generation. Few people globally hunt for food at this time in history. However each of us is confronted with how our gifts are going to be used to the glory of God. Will we use those God given talents for the glory of God and the betterment of man? The worlds of Nimrod, John Smith and Pocahontas are past. However diversity is as relevant and issue today as in any generation. The English language is universal in a way that no other language has been since Babble. The missionary implications for this fact are more than I can include in this blog. However I will state these humble blogs have been read in more than 15 countries, from Europe to Malaysia, literally ever populated continent of the world, and probably in English. The implications of transference of sin also pervade the world through the English language. Our own glory of the glory of God this is the choice of every generation.
http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0227-population.html
http://www.blueletterbible.org/commentaries/comm_view.cfm?AuthorID=4&contentID=637&commInfo=5&topic=Genesis
http://www.questia.com/read/109254867 Images of the Hunter in American Life and Literature. Contributors: Lynda Wolfe Coupe - author. Publisher: Peter Lang. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 2000. Page Number: 11.
http://www.questia.com/read/109254867 Images of the Hunter in American Life and Literature. Contributors: Lynda Wolfe Coupe - author. Publisher: Peter Lang. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 2000. Page Number: 12
http://www.questia.com/read/109254867 Images of the Hunter in American Life and Literature. Contributors: Lynda Wolfe Coupe - author. Publisher: Peter Lang. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 2000. Page Number: *
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FtSUPAM-uA
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