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The Flammarion woodcut: an artistic portrayal of the cosmos as portrayed in Genesis.
This article is about the biblical text. For the controversy between creationism and evolution, see Creation-evolution controversy.
Creation according to Genesis refers to the Hebrew narrative of the creation of the heavens and the earth by the God of Israel as told in Genesis (chapters 1 and 2), the first book of the Pentateuch.
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The modern division of the Bible into chapters dates from c.1200 AD, and the division into verses somewhat later. The distinction between Genesis 1 and 2 is therefore a relatively recent development.Gordon Wenham, "Ëxploring the Old Testament: Volume 1, The Pentateuch", SPCK, (2003), p.5. Many Biblical scholars regard Genesis as beginning with two accounts of the creation, 1:1-2:3 and 2:4b-2:25, each with its own focus of attention, with 2:4a forming a bridge between them. Others view the "second account" as simply a continuation of the story.
See Genesis 1:1-2:3
The creation week narrative consists of eight divine commands executed over six days, followed by a seventh day of rest:
The phrase "These are the tôledôt (\'generations\') of the heavens and the earth when they were created" lies between the "creation week" account and the account of Eden which follows. It is the first of ten "tôledôt" phrases used by the author to provide structure to the book of Genesis.Frank Moore Cross, "The Priestly Work," in Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic, 1973. Since the phrase always precedes the "generation" to which it belongs, the "generations of the heavens and the earth" should logically be taken to refer to Genesis 2; a position taken by several commentators.Gordon J. Wenham. Genesis 1-15 (Word Biblical Commentary). Word Books, Texas, 1987. Nevertheless, other commentators from Rashi to the present day (e.g., Driver) have argued that in this case it should apply to what precedes.The argument is based on several grounds, notably the fact that Genesis 1 uses the phrase "heavens and earth" to introduce and close the Creation, while the account in Chapter 2 is introduced by the phrase "earth and heavens." Advocates of the other view argue that 2:4 is designed as a chiasm (Wenham, 49)
Painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder, depicting Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
See Genesis 2:4-25
The Eden narrative addresses the creation of the first man and woman:
Genesis 1-2 opens the “primeval history,” a unit of three narrative blocks interspersed with two genealogical/chronological sequences and a section on the origins of the world’s peoples:
The primeval history contains the first mention of many themes which are continued throughout the book of Genesis and the Torah, including fruitfulness, God\'s election of mankind, and His ongoing forgiveness of man\'s rebellious nature. It is therefore impossible to understand either Genesis 1-2 or the Torah as a whole without reference to this introductory history.For a schematic representation of the structure of the "primeval history", see table iii of this document from McMaster University (table i contains a breakdown of the "history"according to the documentary hypothesis); for a more detailed discussion, see "Pentateuchal Research", Encyclopedia of Christianity (somewhat dated, but scholarly).
The world whose creation is described in Genesis 1 was the standard universe conceived in ancient Middle Eastern cosmology: a flat disk, with infinite water both above and below. The "firmament", the dome of the sky, was a solid metal bowl - tin according to the Sumerians, iron for the Egyptians - separating the surrounding water from the habitable world of men; the stars were embedded in its surface, and it was fitted with gates to allow the passage of the Sun and Moon. The habitable earth formed a single island-continent surrounded by a circular ocean, of which the known seas - the Mediterranean, the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea - were inlets. Beneath the earth was a fresh-water sea, the source of rivers and wells.For a description of Near Eastern and other ancient cosmologies and their connections with the Biblical view of the Universe, see Paul H. Seeley, "The Firmament and the Water Above: The Meaning of Raqia in Genesis 1:6-8", Westminster Theological Journal 53 (1991), and "The Geographical Meaning of \'Earth\' and \'Seas\' in Genesis 1:10", Westminster Theological Journal 59 (1997).
In addition to their cosmology the ancient Israelites shared with their neighbours a common inheritance of religious beliefs, from which Yahwistic monotheism emerged only gradually.For a discussion of the roots of Biblical monotheism in Canaanite polytheism, see Mark S. Smith, "The Origins of Biblical Monotheism"; see also the review of David Penchansky, "Twilight of the Gods: Polytheism in the Hebrew Bible", which describes some of the nuances and problems underlying the subject. See the Bibliograhy section at the foot of this article for further reading on this subject. The traces of this shared heritage can be traced in Genesis 1-11, which "appears to be a reformatting of motifs and characters from four Mesopotamian myths, Adapa and the South Wind, Atrahasis, the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Enuma Elish.""Genesis\' Genesis, The Hebrew Transformation of the Ancient Near Eastern Myths and Their Motifs.
According to the Enuma Elish, which has the closest parallels with Genesis, the original state of the universe was a chaos formed by the mingling of two primeval waters, the female saltwater god Tiamat and the male freshwater god Apsu. The two waters engendered six successive generations of gods, at the end of which the god Marduk slew Tiamat, cut her hide in two, and used one half to form the earth and the other half to form the firmament of the heavens. (The Euphrates and the Tigris were believed to emerge from the eye-sockets of the slain Tiamat - a faint trace of this can perhaps be seen in the river which emerges to water Eden in Genesis 2). The gods then consulted and decided to form mankind, whom they made - in seven pairs, male and female - from clay mingled with their own spit and the blood of another slaughtered god. Mankind was set on earth to be the servant of the gods, while Marduk was enthroned in Babylon in the Esagila temple, "the house with its head in heaven," near his ziggurat of Etemenanki, the Bible\'s Tower of Babel.Barry Bandstra, "Enuma Elish"
Genesis is not, however, a simple re-telling of the Babylonian myths: instead, the myths are inverted to serve a theological purpose. For example, the Babylonian serpent-god Ningishzida is a friend of mankind who helps the human hero Adapa in his search for immortality, while Genesis\' serpent is man\'s enemy, seeking to trick Adam out of the chance to attain immortality."Genesis\' Genesis, The Hebrew Transformation of the Ancient Near Eastern Myths and Their Motifs. See the end of the article for a full list of the inversions in Genesis 1-11. The inversions represent a rejection of the power of Babylon\'s gods in favour of the might of Yahweh; more than this, they replace the essentially optimistic world-view of the Mesopotamians - "things were not nearly as good to begin with as they have become since" - with a world-view in which the world was created perfect but grew steadily worse, until God finally had to do away with all mankind except for the pious Noah who would beget a new and better stock.T. Jacobson, "The Eridu Genesis", JBL 100, 1981, pp.529, quoted in Gordon Wenham, "Exploring the Old Testament: The Pentateuch", 2003, p.17. Se also Gordon J. Wenham. Genesis 1-15 (Word Biblical Commentary). Word Books, Texas, 1987.
The first word of Genesis 1 in Hebrew, "in the beginning" (Heb. berēšît), provides the traditional Jewish title for the book. The ambiguity of the Hebrew grammar in this verse gives rise to two alternative translations, the first implying that God\'s first act of creation was heaven and earth, the second that "heaven and earth" already existed in a "formless and void" state, to which God brings form and order:Harry Orlinski\'s Notes to the New JPS Translation of the Torah, Genesis 1.
Two names of God are used, Elohim in the first account and Yahweh Elohim in the second account. This difference, plus differences in the styles of the two chapters and a number of discrepancies between them, formed one of the earliest pieces of evidence that the Pentateuch had multiple origins, and was instrumental in the development of source criticism and the documentary hypothesis.
The phrase traditionally translated in English "formless and void" is tōhû wābōhû (Hebrew: תהו ובהו). In most Bibles the phrase is translated by various combinations of adjectives with which translators attempt to capture the flavor of the primeval terrestrial moment which tōhû wābōhû describes. This phrase is shrouded in ancient obscurity, and although it has some limited traffic in Modern Hebrew, is deemed to be a deeply mystical concept.http://www.greeklatinaudio.com/six24hrdays.htm Accessed 09–12–2007,. The Greek Septuagint (LXX) rendered this term as "unsightly and unfurnished" (Greek: ἀόρατος καὶ ἀκατασκεύαστος), paralleling the Greek concept of Chaos.
Some English translations have "the spirit of God," others "a wind from God." The Hebrew rûach has the meanings "wind, spirit, breath," but the traditional Jewish interpretation here is "wind," as "spirit" would imply a living supernatural presence co-extent with yet separate from God at Creation. This, however, is the sense in which rûach was understood by the early Christian church in developing the doctrine of the Trinity, in which this passage plays a central role.Notes on the NJPS translation of the Torah
The "deep" (Heb. tehôm), a formless body of water, is a mythological term referring to the chaotic primordial ocean that, through the creation event, became locked within the underworld or abyss. These waters are later said to be released during the great flood, when "all the fountains of the great deep (tehôm) burst forth" (Genesis 7:11). The word is cognate with the Babylonian Tiamat.
The "firmament" (Heb. rāqîa) of heaven, created on the second day of creation and populated by luminaries on the fourth day, denotes a solid ceiling which separated the earth below from the heavens and their waters above. The term is etymologically derived from the verb rāqa, used for the act of beating metal into thin plates.Victor P. Hamilton. The Book of Genesis (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). William B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1990.
On the fifth day God creates "great sea monsters", or tannînim (Genesis 1:21). These tannînim are thought to be associated with mythological sea creatures such as "dragons", Leviathan, and Rahab (cf. Isaiah 27:1, Isaiah 51:9, Psalm 74:13-14) which were considered deities by other ancient near eastern cultures; the author of Genesis 1 asserts the sovereignty of Elohim over such entities.
Seven was regarded as a significant number in the ancient Near East. It has been argued that the author of Genesis 1:1-2:3 has intentionally embedded it into the text in a number of ways, besides the obvious seven-day framework: the word "God" occurs 35 times (7 × 5) and "earth" 21 times (7 × 3). The phrases "and it was so" and "God saw that it was good" occur 7 times each. The first sentence of Genesis 1 contains 7 Hebrew words, and the second sentence contains 14 words, while the verses about the seventh day (2:1-3) contain 35 words in total.Gordon Wenham (1987). Genesis 1-15 (Commentary). Word Books, 6.
The meaning of the phrase "image and likeness of God" has been much debated. The great medieval Jewish scholar Rashi believed it referred to "a sort of conceptual archetype, model, or blueprint that God had previously made for man." Maimonides pointed out that only man has free will.Footnotes to Genesis translation at bible.ort.org
Genesis 1:26-27 states "God created man (lit. adam) in his own image; in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them". Modern scholarship is divided over whether these verses teach that the image of God was represented symmetrically in Adam and Eve, or whether the first two parts of the verse indicate that Adam possessed the image more fully than the woman, reflecting the bias of an ancient patriarchalist culture.
Michelangelo\'s painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel shows the creation of the stars and planets as described in the first chapter of Genesis.
Genesis 1 consists of eight acts of creation within a six day framework. Each of the first three days is an act of division: dark/light, waters/skies, sea/land & plants. In the next three days this framework is populated: heavenly bodies for the dark and light, fish and birds for the seas and skies, animals and (finally) man for the land. This six-day structure is symmetrically bracketed by day zero representing primeval chaos and day seven representing cosmic order.Priestly Creation Story - course notes by Professor Barry Bandstra, Hope College.
Genesis 2 is a simple linear narrative, with the exception of the parenthesis about the four rivers at Genesis 2:10-14. This interrupts the forward movement of the narrative and might therefore be an insertion based on the spring or stream at Genesis 2:6 which waters the ground "on the day when Yahweh Elohim formed earth and heavens."David Carr, “The Politics of Textual Subversion: A Diachronic Perspective on the Garden of Eden Story”, Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 112, No. 4 (Winter, 1993), pp. 577-595.
The “Primeval History” mimics Genesis 1’s intricate structure of parallel halves. The first half runs from Creation to Noah, the second from the Flood to Abraham. Each half is marked by the passage of ten generations (ten from Adam to Noah, another ten from Noah to Abraham). Like Genesis 1, each half has a six-part structure, and the content of each half exactly mirrors the other. Each follows the same themes, but with very different results: in the first half, God creates a perfect world for man, but man sins and God eventually returns his creation to its original state of chaos (i.e., the water of tehom); in the second, man finds himself in a newly created post-Flood world, as if given a chance to start again, but sins again (the Tower). But the result the second time is different: God choses Abram and makes his name (Heb. shem) great. The word shem appears to have structural significance: in Genesis 1, God names the elements of his Creation; in Genesis 2, “the man” (not at this stage named Adam), names the creatures over which he has been given dominion; Noah’s eldest son is “Shem”, and Yahweh is identified as “the God of Shem,” ancestor of Abraham and the Chosen People.Thematic Unity - course notes by Professor Barry Bandstra, Hope College.
According to Jewish tradition the first five books of the Bible were written by Moses. Opinions differed among the rabbis on just how Genesis fitted into the picture, some saying God revealed it to Moses on Sinai, others holding that Moses compiled it in Egypt from writings left by the Patriarchs, with an account from Adam providing details on the Creation.For a description of rabbinic thinking regarding the process by which the Torah was composed, see Gil Student, "On the Authorship of the Torah" (Gil Student is a noted Orthodox Jewish scholar, working from within the framework of traditional Rabbinicism). The tradition of Mosaic authorship was adopted by the earliest Christians and is still held by many believers today, most notably among Orthodox Jews and Evangelical Christians.For an Evangelical Christian defense of Mosaic authorship couched in terms of the book of Deuteronomy (the last book of the Torah), see Daniel I. Block, "Recovering the Voice of Moses", Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, September 2001
Today virtually all scholars accept that the Pentateuch "was in reality a composite work, the product of many hands and periods.”, quoted in E. A. Speiser, Introduction to the Anchor Bible Dictionary (1964), quoted in "Development of the Documentary Hypothesis", University of Maryland]. In the first half of the 20th century the dominant theory regarding the origins of the Pentateuch was the documentary hypothesis. This supposes that the Torah was produced about 450 BC by combining four distinct, complete and coherent documents, known as the Yahwist (“Y” or “J”, from the German spelling of Yahweh), the Elohist (“E”), the Deuteronomist (“D”), and the Priestly source (“P”). Genesis 1 is from P, and Genesis 2 from J.Documentary Hypothesis (notes from from John Barton, "Source Criticism," Anchor Bible Dictionary) describes both the documentary hypothesis and the Mosaic authorship tradition.
Some scholars believe that the Genesis account is a single report of creation, which is divided into two parts, written from different perspectives: the first part, from Genesis 1:1–2:3, describes the creation of the Earth from God\'s perspective; the second part, from Genesis 2:4-24, describes the creation of the Garden of Eden from Humanity\'s perspective. One such scholar wrote, "[T]he strictly complementary nature of the accounts is plain enough: Genesis 1 mentions the creation of man as the last of a series, and without any details, whereas in Genesis 2 man is the center of interest and more specific details are given about him and his setting" (Kitchen 116-117).
Other scholars, particularly those ascribing to textual criticism and the Documentary hypothesis, believe that the first two chapters of Genesis are two separate accounts of the creation. (They agree that the "first chapter" should include the first three verses and the first half of the fourth verse of chapter 2.) One such scholar wrote: "The book of Genesis, like the other books of the Hexateuch, was not the production of one author. A definite plan may be traced in the book, but the structure of the work forbids us to consider it as the production of one writer." (Spurell xv). For some religious writers, such as Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, the existence of two separate creation stories is beyond doubt, and thus needs to be interpreted as having divine importance.[citation needed]
Some of the issues involved in the single vs. dual acount debate include:
Michelangelo\'s The Creation of Adam (1512) is the most famous Fresco in the Sistine Chapel
According to Professor Klaus Nurnberger,Klaus Nurnberger, Professor of Theology and Ethics at the School of Theology, University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg (South Africa). the motive of the biblical authors was not to put forward a coherent statement of their theology, but "to reassure fellow believers...of the strict, but benevolent, commitment of their God to his people." The rationale which holds together the "vastly divergent" biblical materials can therefore only be understood through studying the evolutionary process by which the texts were created. Klaus Nurnberger, "Theology of the Biblical Witness: An Evolutionary Approach" (2002), p.3
The vast majority of modern scholars agree that "primeval history" within the Torah (Genesis 1-11) is composed of two distinct sources, the Yahwist and the Priestly (best understood today as bodies of texts with distinctive markers, rather than as distinct documents). The Priestly source "emphasizes the continuity of God\'s care for Israel as demonstrated in its history." This is expressed in in certain pervasive themes: God\'s blessing (Genesis 1:28 provides the first of four important blessings within the overall Priestly narrative: "And God blessed them, and God said to them, \'Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.\'"); God\'s word (God\'s important involvements with the world are expressed through his spoken words, throughout the "And God said" Creation sequence of Genesis 1, and through the three subsequent major covenants with Noah at Genesis 9, Abraham at Genesis 17, and Israel at Exodus 20); and God\'s continuing presence among the Chosen People.Barry Bandstra, Table C: Priestly Document, at "Reading the Old Testament"
The Yahwist writer tends to express his theology through speeches of Yahweh placed at decisive points in the story. Six of the eight major speeches in Genesis occur in the "primeval history," the first being the speech at Genesis 2:16-17 prohibiting the fruit of the tree of knowledge. The import of these stories is that man will fail if he tries to become as God (the Eden story, repeated in the Flood story and again in the Tower of Babel story). But God is merciful, (each attempt produces a progressively more merciful response from God), and selects a people who will be his own (the promise to Abraham at Genesis 12, which is the fulcrum of the Yahwist history - Abraham is the ancestor of David, the culmination of God\'s promise). "Abraham, and hence David and all Israel, were chosen to be an instrument of blessing: \'Through you all families of the earth shall bless themselves/be blessed.\'" The universal promise was planted when the Yahwist prefaced the national story of Israel with the "all-world" Primeval history.Barry Bandstra, Table A: Yahwist Narrative", at "Reading the Old Testament"
Biblical literalists believe that the seven "days" of Genesis 1 correspond to normal 24-hour days of history during which God created the world in eight divine acts, or "fiats" - hence the view is also referred to as "fiat creation.""Fiat" derives from the Latin for "Let there be..." Defines fiat creation Young Earth creationism holds that the creation week occurred a mere six to ten thousands years ago. Other literalists have attempted to reconcile their literal reading with the findings of modern geology regarding the age of the Earth. Gap creationism inserts a "gap" between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 into which geologic time can be inserted, during which the world of a presumed pre-Adamite race was destroyed and then rebuilt – a position called the "Ruin-Reconstruction Interpretation".Jordan, James B. Creation in Six Days. Canon Press, 1999. ISBN 1885767625. Jordan describes other views, but holds to the traditional plain historical and narrative sense of the text – six consecutive 24-hour days. He discusses other theories in considerable detail. Arthur C. CustanceReferences to Gap creationism has documented numerous precursors to "gap creationism" centuries before literalists found themselves debating scientists, and thinks it may be better to think of this view as a textual debate among literalists first, and a debate topic versus evolution second. Another response, the day-age theory, holds that each "day" (Heb. yom) of Genesis 1 represents an "age" of perhaps millions or even billions of years.
The "framework interpretation" of Genesis 1, advanced by biblical scholars Meredith G. KlineMeredith G. Kline (May 1958). "Because It Had Not Rained". Westminster Theological Journal 20 (2): pp. 146-57Meredith G. Kline (1996). "Space and Time in the Genesis Cosmogony". Perspectives on Science & Christian Faith (48): pp. 2-15. and Henri Blocher,Henri Blocher. In the Beginning: The Opening Chapters of Genesis. InterVarsity Press, 1984. and with antecedents in St. Augustine of Hippo,Davis A. Young (1988). "The Contemporary Relevance of Augustine\'s View of Creation". Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 40 (1): 42-45. argues that the "Creation week" should be read as a monotheistic polemic on creation theology directed against pagan creation myths. Klein and others have pointed out that Genesis 1 is built upon a literary framework where the sequence of events is topical rather than chronological, and builds to the establishment of the Sabbath commandment as its climax - the Sabbath being a prime concern of the Priestly source of the Torah.
A similar spectrum of views is encountered in relation to Genesis 2-3. Many biblical literalists and fundamentalist Christians read this as strictly literal and historical - that God literally breathed into the nostrils of a being formed out of dust, turning it into a living man; there was a literal Garden of Eden with a literal Tree of Life; a literal couple (Adam and Eve) ate a literal forbidden fruit at the urging of a talking serpent; Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden and barred from re-entering it by a literal flaming sword. Other conservative Christians and Jews read it as a record of real events, but consider that the actual details are re-cast as symbols - thus the forbidden fruit, the serpent, the fig leaves and so forth, possibly even the Garden itself, are metaphors for religious or spiritual concepts that underlie the original sin of Adam, and/or an allegory describing the creation and sin of each individual human being. Many modern commentators note that "architecture" and depiction of the Garden of Eden resembles that of the Temple in Jerusalem, suggesting religious symbolism.
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