Genesis 11:1 – Now the entire earth was of one language and uniform words.

Jerusalem Talmud Megila Chapter 1, Halacha 9:  Rabbi Eliezar and Rabbi Yochanan commented. One said that they [each] spoke 70 languages and one states that they spoke the language of the Unique one of the world – the holy language [ie, Hebrew].

Torah Temimah Colloquial Translation on Note #1

This rabbinic comment requires explanation. The commentaries state that until the generation of the tower of Babel, everyone spoke Hebrew.  Afterwards, [the commentaries say] when God mixed up the languages, the world then began to speak in 70 languages.

This is astounding that they would then begin to speak in 70 languages. Additionally, in general, it is impossible to say that until this point the whole world was speaking just Hebrew. Behold, it explicits states in the previous chapter (Genesis 10:20) “These are the sons of Ham, according to their families and their tongues, in their lands, in their nations”. Also, in Genesis 10:31 it states: “These are the sons of Shem, according to their families, according to their tongues, in their lands, according to their nations.” There already existed set languages for the various nations.

Therefore, it appears that the explanation is that before the generation of the tower of Babel even though Hebrew was a global language spoken by everyone, still each nation had its own language, specific for that particular people. Just as we find examples in our own time, citizens of a certain nation will speak the national language, and in addition to this each people within the country speaks a separate language that pertains just to that people.

However, when they began to build the tower of Babel, they needed to use a common language so that the builders could understand each other throughout the world. They then agreed to use for this purpose the common language of Hebrew since they all already understood it. God then caused them all to forget Hebrew and they returned each group back to speaking their own individual language. The result of this was that they no longer understood each other. They then had to stop building what they had begun.

This, then, is the intent of the sages in the Gemora that we quoted above. One sage is speaking of the languages that the nations spoke amongst themselves. The number 70 is used as this is the common number used in the Talmud to indicate the multiplicity of nations.  The other sage notes the language that was used to do the building, that they had all agreed to use the language of the world, Hebrew.

Editor’s Note: I feel that the Torah Temimah chose to highlight this aggada from the Jerusalem Talmud because he could not see, rationally, how the world suddenly learned 70 new languages. There still needs to be miraculous occurrence that God caused everyone to forget Hebrew, but I think that for the Torah Temimah, this was a more believable miracle, perhaps.