What did God create in Genesis 1:1?

[Paul of Eugene]

Agreed that God created the universe including the earth's foundation

Disagree that the ancients had any clue that the rest of the universe was created earlier than the earth (at least the formless earth of the first day)

Disagree that the narrative of Genesis One allows that there was ever any light anywhere until God said "let there be light".

Job 38:8-9
"Or who enclosed the sea with doors
When, bursting forth, it went out from the womb;
9 When I made a cloud its garment
And thick darkness its swaddling band,
NASU


Hmm. Looking for light in that verse. Nope, don't see any light there.

Literally, there was no light until God said "let there be light". That's what the narrative says.

On the other hand, while our narrative explicitly states there was evening and morning for the various days, there is nothing to say that before the placement of the Sun and Stars in the Firmament there was necessarily 24 hours of time in those days. They could have been, I suppose, any length at all, but they would have been times of dark followed by times of light. But by calling them "days" the implication is they are timed like our days today.

The essential thing is that there was dark as in the darkness of night and light as in the light of the day, for days one through three. The narrator doesn't worry about how there could be light without the Sun; after all, God was there, and He is perfectly capable of making light without a Sun.

 

[Paul33]

This gets tedious when I have to explain again and again the meaning of words like "asah" on day four. So I'm not going too. Until you can show me that asah does not mean "did, fashion, appoint, etc.," I'm not going to respond to your interpretation of day four.

In the same passage, Job 38:6-9, that you use to prove that there was no light in the universe that was created in verse one of Genesis, Job says,

"On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone - while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?"

When God created the heavens and the earth, meaning the foundation of the earth as described in Job 38, the morning stars were already in existence. No where in the OT do "stars" refer to angels, so I believe these are literal light-bearing stars like the earth's sun!

Isaiah 45:12 says the same thing.

"It is I who made the earth and created mankind upon it. My own hands stretched out the heavens; I marshaled their starry hosts."

The stars and the earth's foundation were created when God stretched out the heavens. If this is a description of what took place in Genesis 1:1, the stars were created in verse one, prior to day one on the earth, and not on day four as so many assume.

 

[El_Guero]

If this is a description of what took place in Genesis 1:1, the stars were created in verse one, prior to day one on the earth, and not on day four as so many assume.

That is eisegesis . . .

 

[Paul33]

It's not eisegesis when you start an interpretation, "If."

I am admitting that I can't prove from Scripture just exactly what God did in verse one of Genesis.

What I know for sure is that God created out of nothing the heavens and the earth, meaning the universe.

Now if you could exegete what I post, you wouldn't be so quick to eisegete!

 

[Paul of Eugene]

Originally posted by Paul33:
[
In the same passage, Job 38:6-9, that you use to prove that there was no light in the universe that was created in verse one of Genesis, Job says,

"On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone - while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?"

When God created the heavens and the earth, meaning the foundation of the earth as described in Job 38, the morning stars were already in existence. No where in the OT do "stars" refer to angels, so I believe these are literal light-bearing stars like the earth's sun!

[/QB]

So what do you make of the part about their singing? With what mouth do they make their songs? With what air does the singing spread through space? With what mind did they compose melody and harmony? With what mind do they understand the words of the song?

 

[Charles Meadows]

My reason for mentioning eisegesis is that you seem to come up with reasons showing that features of grammar or lexis prove your point.

Examples:

1. You claimed that the disjunctive waw prevented 1:1 from being a summary statement.

It does not do so. That is an issue of interpretation.

2. You insist that the meanings of "asah" and "bara" are necessarily different.

They are not necessarily so. The semnatic domains of words are broad and overlapping.

I believe, as I said before, that your argument is flawed. It seems to me that you have decided a priori that you want Genesis to be compatible with an old earth.

I do however concede (regarding a statement you made on the first page) that we cannot DISPROVE YOUR POSITION USING ONLY THE TEXT.

 

[Paul33]

Hi Charles,

I want to be gracious and teachable. The Hebrew scholars that I consulted concerning the waw disjunctive indicate that it is used in narrative to continue the story but identify a shift in that story. If they are wrong, then, of course, I would be wrong as well.

Yes. Asah and bara have a significant overlap in meaning as do all synonyms, but I'm not so synical that I agree with D. A. Carson, that there is no difference. Again, the Hebrew scholars that I consulted indicate that bara is used only of God and speak to those things that are uniquely created by God, including the idea of ex nihilo, but not requiring that meaning in all contexts.

I don't think my interpretation is flawed because it fits the context, accounts for all of the textual information, and is a simple, straight-forward handling of the narrative.

I appreciate the discussion. Thanks.

 

[Paul33]

Paul of Eugene,

Because stars consist of light and therefore light waves, scientists have concluded that the stars sing. That is, they can identify the tones of the different light waves that are unique to each star.

 

[Charles Meadows]

Paul33,

I admit that I am somewhat of a minimalist when it comes to linguistic theology. And as you might expect my favorite authors here are Stanley Porter, D A Carson, Bruce Waltke, Christo van der Merwe and others.

I disagree with your position - but that is my opinion.

My main point is to show that we must not overread the text. Much of our discernment of meaning comes properly from context and not text.

 

[Paul of Eugene]

Originally posted by Paul33:
Paul of Eugene,

Because stars consist of light and therefore light waves, scientists have concluded that the stars sing. That is, they can identify the tones of the different light waves that are unique to each star.

Well, most of us all know that stars shed light, and that there are lines MISSING from the light, where elements in the star have absorbed a certain part of the light.

Most of us see stars singing as a poetic touch not to be taken literally.

I'm curious as to what SCIENTIFIC source you actually have in mind about stars singing! Your statement is a definate assertion to the affect that "scientists" - plural even - have concluded stars "sing". Do you really have a source, or did somebody just make that up?

Or could this verse be (gasp!) poetic and non-literal?