I have recently been doing Bible studies on campus at UWS
Bankstown on Genesis 1. Because of the limited time it always seems such a rush
and there are often questions from students at the end which we don’t get to answer in full. In this post I will outline some of the main
points that ARE made in Genesis 1. In a future post I will try to answer some
questions about the relationship of these points with modern science.
It is important to remember that Genesis was written down
probably 3,500 years ago at around the time Moses lead the people of Israel out
of Egypt. Although it is clearly God’s word to US, we need to remember it was
initially directed to THEM. Therefore it is not surprising that many things
taught in Genesis 1 directly challenge the common creation stories of the
Ancient Near East – from (for example), Egypt, Babylon, Sumeria and Akkadia.
While not ‘borrowing’ from these accounts, Genesis teaches about God, humans
and the creation in a way that highlights the differences to these alternative
accounts - while having some similarities.
The most significant similarity with other creation accounts
is the common ‘cosmology’ and ‘scientific’ understanding. Put simply, Genesis
assumes the ancient (pre-scientific?) understanding of the structure of the
cosmos – using the ‘scientific’ understanding that was common at the time. In
particular this assumed the existence of the chaotic ‘waters’ (or deep) which
had to be gathered into the seas and still exists above the heavens and below
the earth, but is now providing water to nourish the lands. We can perhaps
think of ‘the heavens’ as a dome shaped surface above the earth which holds the
‘heavenly objects’. We see many traces of this in the text of Genesis 1. This
ought to make us cautious in trying to make the creation account accord too
closely with our modern (or post-modern?) cosmologies – especially fixing times
and dates associated with the age of the earth, the existence of the first
humans and so on.
Verses 1-2 – An Overview.
These verses stand as an introduction and overview of the whole chapter.
The emphasis is on ‘creation’ by one God (as opposed to the many gods involved
in other accounts). The ‘heavens and the earth’ is a term that means ‘everything’
and not simply the sky and the land. Verse 2 seems to describe the state of
things before God begins his work. It is worth noticing that the ‘creation
account’ does not start with ‘nothing’ but with ‘formless and empty’ – darkness
over the surface of ‘the deep’ (chaotic seas?) and the Spirit of God over the
waters.
