Some bible stories aren’t pretty. Some of the biblical kings are downright awful individuals and terrible leaders. In the original text and in the imaginative elaborations of the ancient Jewish sages, Nimrod is the archetype of the bad king, a way for Jews to understand their situation under the power of the Romans and, by extension, under any bad leader who follows. The sages see in Nimrod’s deeds the necessity of a constant check against the arrogance of power.
Yet they also offer a warning to his followers: You follow a bad king at your peril. It is a salutary message in our own era as well. The seeds of Nimrod—for leaders and followers alike—are embedded in the very notion of human power.
Nimrod first appears in the story of Noah as a strong man, a descendent of Cush, Ham, and Noah, and “a mighty hunter before the Lord” whose kingdom includes Babel and other cities (Gen. 10:6–10). On the surface the text suggests that Nimrod is a legend during his own lifetime, an outstanding figure of his generation. But the sages weren’t persuaded.
