Genesis 11:3-5 New English Translation

³Then they said to one another,^[a] “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.”^[b] (They had brick instead of stone and tar^[c] instead of mortar.)^[d] ⁴Then they said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens^[e] so that^[f] we may make a name for ourselves. Otherwise^[g] we will be scattered^[h] across the face of the entire earth.”

⁵But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the people^[i] had started^[j] building.

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Footnotes

Genesis 11:3 tn Heb “a man to his neighbor.” The Hebrew idiom may be translated “to each other” or “one to another.”
Genesis 11:3 tn The speech contains two cohortatives of exhortation followed by their respective cognate accusatives: “let us brick bricks” (נִלְבְּנָה לְבֵנִים, nilb^enah l^evenim) and “burn for burning” (נִשְׂרְפָה לִשְׂרֵפָה, nisr^efah lisrefah). This stresses the intensity of the undertaking; it also reflects the Akkadian text which uses similar constructions (see E. A. Speiser, Genesis [AB], 75-76).
Genesis 11:3 tn Or “bitumen” (cf. NEB, NRSV).
Genesis 11:3 tn The disjunctive clause gives information parenthetical to the narrative.
Genesis 11:4 tn A translation of “heavens” for שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) fits this context because the Babylonian ziggurats had temples at the top, suggesting they reached to the heavens, the dwelling place of the gods.
Genesis 11:4 tn The form וְנַעֲשֶׂה (v^enaʿaseh, from the verb עָשָׁה [ʿasah], “do, make”) could be either the imperfect or the cohortative with a vav (ו) conjunction (“and let us make…”). Coming after the previous cohortative, this form expresses purpose.
Genesis 11:4 tn The Hebrew particle פֶּן (pen) expresses a negative purpose; it means “that we be not scattered.”
Genesis 11:4 sn The Hebrew verb פּוּץ (puts, “scatter”) is a key term in this passage. The focal point of the account is the dispersion (“scattering”) of the nations rather than the Tower of Babel. But the passage also forms a polemic against Babylon, the pride of the east and a cosmopolitan center with a huge ziggurat. To the Hebrews it was a monument to the judgment of God on pride.
Genesis 11:5 tn Heb “the sons of man.” The phrase is intended in this polemic to portray the builders as mere mortals, not the lesser deities that the Babylonians claimed built the city.
Genesis 11:5 tn The Hebrew text simply has בָּנוּ (banu), but since v. 8 says they left off building the city, an ingressive idea (“had started building”) should be understood here.

New English Translation (NET)