The story begins with creation, which progresses through several stages, culminating in the creation of humans. The humans commit wrongful acts, and eventually God sends a flood to destroy the earth. A remnant—Noah, his family, and the animals in the ark—is saved. The flood is an undoing of creation, and after it, life begins anew. In response to human hubris, God divides humanity into different nations, speaking different languages, and scatters them over the whole earth.
Laws of Hammurabi on Babylonian Stela, eighteenth century BCE. The stela was originally placed in the temple of the god Marduk in the city of Babylon. Inset shows part of the prologue.
[ . . . ] Modern Jewish humor grows from the tension of having to reconcile a belief as absolute as Elijah’s with an experience of failure as absolute as that of the priests of Baal…