Genesis 1-2 -- Creation

Moderator's Note: If there are any two other books of the Bible that cause more argument than these two, I don't know what they are. And yet here is the foundation of the Bible itself.

A simple, straightforward reading in any language yields the story that the universe itself, earth, and life itself, including human beings, were created in six 24-hour days. However this is strongly and widely challenged by current science, which declares on the basis, primarily, of radiodecay dating, that the universe is somewhere between 10 and 15 billion years old and that the earth itself is about 4.5 billion years old, with life as we know it today all evolving through a process of change and natural selection from an initial unicellular organism.

In other words, standard science today directly contradicts Genesis 1 and 2.

So there are a number of ways people have tried to reconcile the two. The three main ways are the "Gap Model," the "Day-Age Model" and the model which simply claims that the creation story in Genesis is allegorical and not historically true. In the evolution/creation forum here at Baptist Board, there have been some extended discussions about each of these ideas, so rather than go into them in detail here, I will link the discussions which have occurred there:

The Gap Theory -- this states, essentially, that there is a very large time gap between Genesis 1 and 2. It also usually states that there was a pre-Adamic race of humans who populated the earth during this gap time, and that Satan's activity caused a devastating Flood which left all the fossils. THEN the earth was re-made in six days. Discussions regarding the Gap theory can be found here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=000046&p=

The Day-Age Theory -- This theory claims that each of the days of Genesis was really a very long era, or age. This discussion can be found here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=000029&p=

Genesis is a Myth or Allegory -- This states that although the creation story of Genesis contains moral and spiritual truths, it did not really happen as stated. You will find parts of this discussion in the above two links as well as here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=000045&p=
and
http://www.baptistboard.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=000050&p=

The historical Christian (and Jewish) approach to Genesis 1-2 is that it is literally true. The early Christian Church and belief in a recent creation according to Genesis was researched quite well by Robert Bradshaw and his material is in a book on the net here:
http://www.robibrad.demon.co.uk/Contents.htm

Because the first five books of the Bible are referred to as the Books of Moses, or the Law of Moses (The Torah), the historic tradition is that Moses wrote Genesis himself, either as a matter of direct inspiration from God or as a collected group of oral histories brought down through time. Starting in the 1930's however, some archaeological finds caused another theory to surface. This theory, called the Tablet Theory, claims that Genesis not only gives every indication of being a series of eyewitness accounts, but that there are indications within the text itself that this may be exactly what it is. This theory is becoming more and more widely held today by Old Testament scholars who are reviewing the evidence. A good summary of what the Tablet theory is about and the evidence for it may be found here:
http://www.ldolphin.org/tablethy.html
This link also briefly summarizes another theory of the writing of Genesis, called the Documentary Hypothesis, which states that Genesis is not nearly as ancient as it seems, but was actually written by several different authors thousands of years later.

Personally, I think the Tablet theory accounts for everything we find in Genesis and that this remarkable book is, indeed, a series of eyewitness accounts which was available to Moses because of his position in the Egyptian Court. There appears to be evidence of editorial comments occasionally through the book, which would also lend support to this idea.

Now, let's consider that Genesis is actually true as the rest of the authors of the Bible and Jesus Himself indicated it was (in fact there are over 70 direct references in the New Testament to Genesis, all of which treat it as an historically reliable document). What is it saying?

First, that God Himself created everything. For those interested in science, it might be of interest to note that the entire time/space/mass continuum seems to be created out of nothing in the first verse: In the beginning (time) God created the heavens (space) and the earth (mass). That may not be correct, but it is an interesting thought.

The word translated 'created' is 'bara.' There is another word in Genesis 1 used to indicate some of what happened that week, and that is 'asaph.' 'Asaph' is translated 'formed' or 'made' and 'bara' as 'created.' When the two verbs are used in juxtaposition like this, bara means something different from asaph. The only different meaning 'bara' can have is 'create something from nothing.' True creation.

We see the word used first in the first verse. Everything after that is 'formed' until the great animals of the sky and sea in verse 21. It is only used one more time, and that is in verse 27. If 'bara' does iindeed mean 'something from nothing' in this context, then we have three distinctly different things being created. One interpretation, and the one I personally prefer, is that the first 'bara' in verse 1 refers to physical creation. The second refers to the creation of 'nephesh' which is variously translated as 'breath of life,' or 'soul.' This is something the complex animals have along with man and seems to be expressed through the complex central nervous system (which the simpler life forms don't have). The third 'bara' is reserved for man alone, and may well refer to spirit. Man, being created in the image of God, is a spiritual being.

Genesis 1 actually ends at Genesis 2:4a. After this we have a new author. The tablet theory says that Adam wrote from here on to Genesis 5:1. This would explain why a different word for God is used (actually it is a word added to 'elohim' which is the term "God" in Genesis 1).

We see that Adam's body is of the dust of the earth, or the same elements physically as everything else. God breathes the breath of life into him, giving him 'nephesh' or soul. But Adam is also a spirit being inside all that, and that is the unique thing about men.

A little more science here: we see that water is seeping up through the ground to water everything on the land. Water does not come UP unless it is under pressure. Later when we get to the Flood, you will see that the first event was the fountains of the deep exploding. Something was going on in the earth's interior to put this water under so much pressure! We also see that Eden must have been on a rise of land, for the waters for FOUR rivers began there.

Please note that Adam does NOT name anything but the beasts of the field and the birds of the air. He did not name fish, insects, amphibians, etc.

Toward the end of chapter 2, we see the creation of woman directly from Adam. An interestng parallel has been made concerning this event with Christ on the cross. Both Adam and Christ "fell asleep". Both has their sides opened up. Both received a bride as a result. It's interesting...

Adam's view of Eve was -- or seems to be -- astonished gratification.

And chapter two closes with the note that a man and wife shall become one in flesh, or have sex, and then that Adam and Eve were naked and felt no shame.

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I will NOT be commenting this extensively normally, but I thought it was important this time for as much to be laid out as possible. Comments are MORE than welcomed!

 

This post is from Scarlett, and so that we could keep the titles of this forum as just the Bible passages involved so people could look them up more easily in the future, I have moved her post which began a new thread on the Holy Spirit, to this thread. Thank you for your response, Scarlett!

Helen

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Helen

Thanks for your introduction. It was quite informative and, as usual, very useful information to have.

I know that the entire trinity of God created the universe, but I, personally, enjoy reading about the Holy Spirit moving
or "brooding" over the face of the waters in chap. 1:2.

What I see here is that God had created the entire universe, but that it was not "alive" if you will let me use that
particular word.

The universe was lifeless and the earth was shapeless, without life, without the capacity for life even.

It all hung there. Cold. Barren. Waiting...

...and the Holy Spirit waited. Pacing. Moving. Brooding. Waiting...

Waiting for God to give the signal. The signal that all of His plans were to begin and that there would be no turning
back from that point on.

God gave that signal when He opened His mouth and spoke the words, "Let there be light!"

I believe there was more to that "light" than just illumination. I believe that the Holy Spirit did to the earth what He
did to Mary the mother of Jesus when he "overcame" her body.

He made Mary's body, in some supernatural way, able to contain the Son of the Living God. He "overwhelmed" her.

I believe that the Holy Spirit also "overwhelmed" the earth after His moving and brooding. He made the earth, again in
supernatural way, able to contain the life-force of the Living God and therefore, the planet was able to bear life and
sustain it perfectly, where there was absolutely nothing.

Peace-

YSIC
Scarlett O.
<><

 

Glen, I think you are right about Eden. I must have been beyond imagination. In Ezekiel 28, God is speaking to Satan through Ezekiel and also through the King of Tyre. In verse 13 We can read "You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz and emerald, chrysolite, onyx and jasper, sapphire, turquoise and beryl. Your settings and mountings were made of gold; on the day you were created they were prepared."

As far as Adam and Eve, one of the ideas is that they were not clothed physically, but that they were surrounded by the 'shekinah glory' of God, having been made in His image, until they disobeyed, as which point the glory left them and they realized their nakedness. I do not know of any Scripture to back this up, but I thought I would pass it along as something a number of people seem to hold to.

Scarlett, I love the idea of Adam needing Eve and Eve needing Adam in the way you put it in your post. Another way of looking at it is that what Adam no longer was, Eve was. And what Eve wasn't, Adam was. No wonder men and women have not understood each other ever since!

The word the KJV translates as 'moved' and the NIV as 'hovering' there in Genesis 1:2, comes from a primary root meaning to shake or flutter! The verse IMMEDIATELY following the verse concerning the movement of the Holy Spirit is "Let there be light". Photons of light are released when an electron jumps orbits from an outer orbit to an inner orbit. This happens after the electron has been knocked out of its original orbit by some kind of impact upon the atom from an outside source. One of my curiosities is whether or not the movement of the Holy Spirit -- this fluttering or possibly vibrating, -- was what started atomic processes...

One common point of confusion is about the evening and morning on the first day, as the sun was not formed until the fourth, or if formed, not 'lit.'

In Job 37, we see reference to the morning stars singing at creation. But in Genesis 1 we see what appears to be the stars formed on day 4. But the mention of the stars is quite vague: "He made the stars also." Astronomers recognize two basic populations of stars, the "old" stars and the "younger" stars. This may also be the message of the Bible.

If so, then the first light on the earth which gave rise to day and night as the earth spun on its axis for the first time, would have come from a quasar in the middle of our galaxy. We are on a spiral arm of the Milky Way and so the light would have been directional, and that is all that is needed for day and night as long as we are spinning around on our axis. As we look further out into space, which is also further back in time, we see that the farther galaxies all seem to have these incredibly bright quasars associated with their central black holes. All we have left is a black hole here in the Milky Way, but if that quasar was there during the first few days, then the light would have been quite intense, actually, as we reach each of the first four days, before our own sun took over.

Just another note from the science side of me!