Og's Bed and the Tower of Babel Connection

Deuteronomy pauses in the middle of a conquest account to tell you the size of a bed. That is a strange thing for a battle report to do, and it is not trivia.
Og of Bashan is named as the last of the remnant of the Rephaim, and his iron bed measured nine cubits by four. Those dimensions match, to the cubit, the cultic bed housed in Etemenanki - the ziggurat most archaeologists identify as the tower of Babel. That bed stood in what the Babylonians called the house of the bed, understood as the place where Marduk and his divine consort met each year.
So the detail is a polemic. The last giant king of Bashan is being described using the furniture of Babylon's temple. Deuteronomy is telling its readers what kind of enemy this was, and whose story he belonged to.
Scripture links:
- Deuteronomy 3:11 - Og is named as the last of the remnant of the Rephaim, and the measurements of his bed are recorded.
- Genesis 11:1-9 - Babel, whose ziggurat supplies the match.
The Bible's odd details are usually the ones doing the most work. This one ties the giant clans of Canaan back to the rebellion at Babel.