The Generation of Babel and the Open Door of Repentance

Another interpretation: Everything is revealed before the Holy One, blessed be He; rather, [Scripture speaks of His coming down] to teach proper conduct to human beings. "Which the children of man had built" (Genesis 11:5). Rabbi Berekhiah said: And what should we say, the children of donkeys, the children of camels? Rather, the children of the first Adam. Just as the first Adam, after all the good I did with him, said, "The woman whom You gave to be with me" (Genesis 3:12), so too. From the generation of the Flood until the generation of the Dispersion was three hundred and forty years. "And the whole earth was of one language" (Genesis 11:1). "And the LORD said, Behold, they are one people" (Genesis 11:6): if they repent, I will accept them. Rabbi Nehemiah said: What caused them to rebel against Me? The fact that they were one people and one language. "And now nothing will be withheld from them" (Genesis 11:6). Rav Abba bar Kahana said: This teaches that He opened for them a doorway of repentance, for "and now" is nothing other than an expression of repentance, as you say, "And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you" (Deuteronomy 10:12). But they said: No. The Holy One, blessed be He, said: "Will be withheld from them all that they have schemed to do" [that is, even what they planned will fail]. This vineyard, when it bears no fruit, what do its owners do to it? They prune it back.