Third Baruch

And the angel of the Lord took me and led me into a second heaven. And there he showed me a door similar to the first. And he said, “Let us enter through it.”

And we entered, soaring as if traveling a journey of sixty days.

And there he showed me a plain, and it was full of people; but their appearance was like dogs, and their feet like deer.

And I asked the angel, “I beg you, Lord, tell me who these are?”

And he said, “These are those who gave the counsel to build the tower. For these whom you see cast out multitudes of men and women to make bricks. Among them, one woman, while making bricks, at the hour of giving birth, was not allowed to be released, but she bore while making bricks; and she carried her child in her apron and continued to make bricks.”

And the Lord appeared to them and changed their tongues, from which they built the tower for four hundred and sixty-three cubits.

And taking a drill, they hastened to drill the heaven, saying, “Let us see if heaven is earthenware or bronze or iron.”

God, seeing these things, did not permit them, but struck them with blindness and with a confusion of tongues, and he established them as you see.