Sodom and Gomorrah

These are notoriously sinful cities in the Old Testament Book of Genesis. They are now possibly covered by the shallow waters south of Al-Lisan, a peninsula near the southern end of the Dead Sea in Israel. Sodom and Gomorrah constituted, along with the cities of Admah, Zeboiim, and Zoar (Bela), the five biblical "cities of the plain", destroyed by "brimstone and fire" because of their wickedness.

Sodom and Gomorrah presumably were devastated about 1900 BC by an earthquake in the Dead Sea area of the Great Valley, an extensive rift extending from the Jordan River valley in Israel to the Zambezi River system in East Africa. Archaeological evidence indicates that the area was once fertile in the Middle Bronze Age (c. 2000-1500 BC), with fresh water flowing into the Dead Sea in sufficient amounts to sustain agriculture.

When the catastrophic destruction occurred, the petroleum and gases existing in the area probably contributed to the imagery of "brimstone and fire that the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah out of heaven and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground" that accompanied the geological upheaval that destroyed the cities.

An inspiration to writers, artists, and psychologists, Sodom and Gomorrah and their legendary wickedness have been the subject of numerous dramas.

Babel tower

Babel tower in biblical literature was a structure built in the land of Shinar (Babylonia) some time after the Deluge. The story of its construction appears to be an attempt to explain the existence of diverse human languages. According to Genesis, “the whole earth used the same language and the same words. And it came about as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said one to another, “Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach the heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them. Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because the Lord confused the language of the whole earth”.

The myth may have been inspired by the Babylonian tower temple north of the Marduk temple, which in Babylonian was called Bab-ilu ("Gate of God"), Hebrew form Babel, or Bavel. The similarity in pronunciation of Babel and balal ("to confuse") led to the play on words in Genesis: "Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth."

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• Do you know other myths?