The name, בָּבֶל or Babel, might well be derived from בָּלַל or balal, which is glossed “mingle, mix, confuse, confound,” since the text explicitly states that the city was called Babel “because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth”. The implication is that the future Babylon—which would have been well known to Moses—had roots in this city founded on the “confusion” wrought in their defiance of God.