PARALLEL GUIDE 3

The Priestly Creation Story

Summary: Genesis presents numerous major themes that are developed throughout the Bible. This chapter, which begins a detailed discussion of Genesis spanning nine chapters, studies the Priestly creation story verse by verse, emphasizing its highly refined theology.

Learning Objectives

• Read Genesis 1-2:4a

• State the meaning of creation ex nihilo
• Understand dualism
• Name the ways God controls chaos in the P story
• State how P deals with polytheism and astrology
• Describe how the P author understands human nature
• Know why P uses the seven-day format for this story
• State the characteristics of Manichaeism
• State the main characteristics of Platonism and Neo-Platonism
• Identify Marduk and Tiamat
• State the difference between pantheism and deism

Assignments to Deepen Your Understanding

1. When you read the Bible, you engage your mind, employing your faculties of reason, analysis, and logic. You also can use your imagination, intuition, and creativity when reading scripture. While people usually do not bring both approaches to their study, a balance should be struck that engages both the analytical and the intuitive sides of human consciousness.

Skillful study of holy scripture strikes a balance between the two approaches. Exegesis tends to engage the intellectual and logical dimensions. Meditation involves your imagination and intuition.

This exercise allows you to practice using your imagination in your reflection on a biblical passage. A method of meditation is used.

• Use your notebook as you read Genesis 1:1-2:4. Record your thoughts and reactions.

• Begin by taking a few deep breaths. Let yourself relax, dwelling in silence. Stay quiet for a few moments.

• When you are ready, read the passage over slowly, line by line, phrase by phrase. Read it once, then return to the silence with your eyes closed. After a few moments read the passage again and return to the silence. Repeat the cycle a third time.

• After remaining silent, record your thoughts and reactions. Do this uncritically. Simply write what you have experienced.

• Write a short paragraph on what the passage means to you.

2. Think about the relationship of order and chaos. Are they different aspects of the same reality or are they mutually exclusive? Prepare a short essay around the tension between order and chaos. What are the benefits of both? What are the deficits they produce?

Here are some questions to ponder as you come together

• What are some of the ways in which we still tend to be dualistic?

• What are some of the ways in which we still feel threatened by chaos?

• What does the biblical notion of humanity as God’s representative imply for ministry?

• Where do you see Platonism in the world today?

Additional Sources

Anderson, pp. 451-459, discusses the Priestly writer’s background and theology. In Anderson’s book, this section occurs within the discussion of the Exile in Babylon. Consult your historical overview in Chapter One to place this important event. The chart on page 453 expands the earlier chart we looked at on page 25. If you read through the middle of page 459, you will find described the Priestly writer’s point of view as it is expressed in the stories of the creation to the Flood.

von Rad (pp. 45-73), Brueggemann (pp. 22-39), and Peake’s (pp. 175-179) contain commentaries on this portion of Genesis. You may profit from reading the commentaries in one or more of them as we move through the study of the Old Testament. The commentary on Genesis by Terence E. Fretheim, The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. I (Nashville: Abingdon, 1994), may be a better choice than von Rad’s commentary, because Fretheim is able to make use of an additional generation of scholarship which was not available to von Rad.

Chapter 3
THE PRIESTLY CREATION STORY

The Priestly creation story in Gen. 1-2:4a is one of the shortest and yet most tightly packed theological statements in the Bible. In its present form it dates from the time of the Restoration in the fifth century BCE. It had developed, however, over a much longer period and had been polished smooth by the time P gave it its final working. We must study it line by line in order to unpack the many levels of meaning in it. Let us go over the main points. First read Gen. 1-2:4a. Then read again the biblical reference for each point in conjunction with the discussion.

1. God alone is the creator of all, with no divine helpers. The world is not simply shaped by God. (1:1)

2. God creates by speaking; God simply says, “Let there be . . . ,” and what is spoken comes to be. (1:3, 6, 9, etc.)

3. God creates light; it is not the gift of the sun, which shines only with the light God has given it. (1:3)

4. God keeps the waters of chaos in their place by calling for a firm dome to keep out the waters that are above and by gathering the waters below into the seas so that the dry land appears. (1:6-10)

5. The heavenly bodies—sun, moon, planets, and stars—which were thought to be gods by many cultures in the ancient Near East, are only creatures of God. (1:14-18)

6. The earth shares in the task of creation, though only at God’s command: the earth brings forth vegetation. The waters also bring forth sea creatures and the earth animal life, but not in the same way as the earth brings forth vegetation. God creates the higher forms of life. (1:11, 20-21, 24-25)

7. God creates humankind in God’s own image and gives it dominion over all the creation. (1:26)

8. God creates humankind male and female, and this fact is connected closely with humankind’s creation in the divine image. (1:27)

9. God blesses humankind with sexuality and the gift of children. (1:28)

10. The final work of creation is God’s rest on the seventh day. (2:2)

The First Words

Even from this brief outline we can see some of the things that were on the mind of the author. First, one important aspect of this story cannot be seen in most English translations. Grammatically, the Hebrew begins in the middle of a sentence. What could this mean? Is it a mistake? Was the first corner of a manuscript lost? No, there is a theological meaning. Beginning a sentence in the middle is a way of saying, “We do not know what God was doing before our world came into being. Our knowledge cannot pry before the beginning of our world; God’s beginning is unknowable to us.”

God and Creation

Next, it is important to say, above all else, that God is completely different from everything else. Other religions may have said that there were all sorts of divine beings: animal monsters, heavenly bodies, the seas, storms—anything that seemed powerful or mysterious. For the P writer, nothing in the world is divine. Rather, the whole universe is God’s creation. Some religions may have thought of at least part of the universe as being made out of the substance of the divine, flowing forth out of the god. For P, nothing of God flows into the universe; God is God, and all else that exists is not God and is not divine.

Third, there is no need to look to lesser gods for the fertility of the earth. Vegetable crops and animals are included in God’s design for the world, and the earth brings forth her increase at God’s command. The worship of Baals (fertility gods), with all the gross practices that went with it, is not necessary; indeed to worship them would be to deny the power of the one Creator.

Fourth, the whole creation leads up to the creation of humanity. Life has not been created in order to provide playthings for the gods nor to act as slave-servants to the gods. Humanity, man and woman, is created to be God’s representative in governing creation. It is a position of great dignity and worth.

Israel, the Chosen People

Each of these points was important in the life of Israel. She had been chosen to be God’s people; God had made a covenant with her and had promised that, through Israel, all the nations of the earth would be blessed. The covenant was the basis for all of Israel’s religious faith. After the Israelites had settled in Canaan, they were tempted and led away from God to the worship of the Baals and the astral deities—the sun, moon, planets, and stars—which the other nations worshiped. The prophets constantly tried to overcome the worship of these false gods so that Israel would be faithful to the covenant. When the northern kingdom was destroyed and the leaders of Judah (the southern kingdom) were carried into exile, the warnings of the prophets were shown to have been correct. Thus we can see the P writer—in the circumstance of exile—expressing in this story the true dignity of humankind and the complete sovereignty of God as these facts had been learned in Israel’s life and taught by the prophets. All of what Israel stood for was expressed by the covenant. This was how Israel knew God; God was the God who had made the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and who had sealed it at Sinai through Moses. This God, and this God alone, had created the nation of Israel, and this God alone had created the heavens and the earth and all things.

The creation story expresses the faith of Israel learned by her experience as the people of God’s covenant. Just as God had made Israel God’s people at Sinai, so also God had made all of humanity in God’s own image at creation. Both the covenant story and the creation story say the same thing: God has given humanity dignity and worth and dominion; therefore, the creation story reaches its climax in the creation of humankind.

The Sabbath

The P author does not end the story with the creation of humanity. The final day of creation is not the sixth, on which human beings are created, but the seventh, on which God rests. This rest does not mean only a mere recuperation from the exhaustion of creation. Rather it is a cessation of regular work in order to enjoy the fruits of that labor. God rests in order to enjoy creation. The P author, with special interest in the cult—the practices of worship—leads us to the practice of the Sabbath. This is not, however, a contradiction of what we have just said about the creation of humanity as the climax. The covenant, the basis of Israel’s faith in the dignity of all people, is what the Sabbath is all about. The Sabbath is the celebration of the covenant. Therefore, the story leads to two ends, both of which refer to the same central point of Israel’s faith: (1) God’s gift of life and authority—a people under God—and (2) the Sabbath, which is the celebration of this people under God through the covenant.

You are not expected at this point in your studies to be able to feel all that is involved in the covenant. The point you should be able to grasp at this stage is that the P creation story sums up the experience of Israel and is not a simple childish story. You will come back to this story again and again, and the more you become familiar with the rest of the Old Testament, the more you will feel the power of it. Now look back again to the beginning of the story, and we will go over it more closely.

The Priestly Creation Story

This verse, which looks so simple in the English translation, is very strange in the Hebrew because it begins mid-sentence. The text can be translated, carrying it on through verse three, in several ways. (1) “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness. . . .” (2) “When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was without form and void, and darkness. . . .” (3) “In the beginning of God’s creating of the heavens and the earth—(when) the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the wind of God was moving over the face of the waters—God said, ‘Let there be. . . .”’ None of these translations really fits the text as we have it, but each one is possible. Somewhat closer might be to start with an ellipsis “. . . ” and then use the wording of option 3 above.

What difference would it make which translation we pick? Some people have argued that if we use the first one, there is nothing before God creates. God creates the heavens and the earth, and they are formless and empty until God then shapes and fills them. While it is fine theology to believe God created from nothing—ex nihilo is the Latin phrase which is used—Genesis 1 does not make such a claim. If we take the second or third translation, there is already a formless empty abyss and God begins to create; God shapes and fills a chaos that already existed.

Dualism

Later theology, especially Christian theology, has insisted that God created out of nothing not simply as a way of choosing one of these translations over the other. Theologians have been trying to oppose a point of view which was very common in the world of the first few centuries of the Christian era and is still very much with us. This point of view is called dualism. It says that there are two aspects of the world: the material and the nonmaterial, sometimes called the “spiritual.” The material is usually regarded as less good, sometimes evil. Theologians have not wanted to say that there was something, anything, already existing when God began creation, because this already existing something, chaos, could be used by the dualists to refer to matter, the material stuff, which God shaped. They could then say that this matter is the source of evil. So the theologians said that God created ex nihilo, out of nothing; anything and everything that is, matter included, is created by God and is good. You can begin to see here that many beliefs, many truths, are not stated explicitly by every biblical passage on a similar theme.

Dualism had a great effect on the thinking of the early church. It came from eastern roots. In Persia the religion of Zoroastrianism taught that there were two gods, one evil and one good. The good god was the god of light; the evil god, the god of darkness. (The name of the god of light, Mazda, is known to many people although they may not know where it originated.) A man named Mani, who was greatly influenced by Zoroastrianism, developed a religion, dualistic in nature, which prescribed ways of combating the power of the material world and escaping into the world of spirit and light. His religion, called usually Manichaeism, flourished in the third and fourth centuries, especially in North Africa, and influenced many Christians. St. Augustine, one of the greatest theologians of the church, was a Manichee before he converted to Christianity.

Plato

The teachings of the great pre-Christian philosopher Plato have also led to dualistic conclusions. Plato taught that, although individual things in this world come and go—they are born and they die, they come into being and they decay—there lie behind the individual things the ideas of them. There are many individual trees, each different to some degree from the others and each destined to die and decay, but each is a partial representation of the idea Tree. The idea contains all that it is possible for a tree to be; it is complete and single, not needing many separate examples of itself to express its completeness; it lasts forever, eternally existing while the individual representations of it come and go. Why Plato said this, what problems he was trying to understand, we shall look at later. The fact that he said it, however, allowed people of a later time—during the third through the fifth centuries CE—to develop a religion that was dualistic in a much more subtle and sophisticated way than was Manichaeism. The Neo-Platonists taught that the ultimate One lies beyond all things, and it is impossible to speak of that One at all. The via negativa is all that is possible. From the One all the rest of the universe emanates as light emanates, flows, or shines from a light bulb or a candle. The farther away from the source, the less like the One a thing becomes, until finally, at the farthest remove, there is matter. A human being, according to Neo-Platonism, is really spirit, akin to the One, but the spirit is trapped in a material body. Below humanity there is no spirit; all is merely material. Only by mystical exercises can humankind rise above the material body and reach union with the One. This point of view has influenced much of Christian piety. Augustine was also a Neo-Platonist before becoming a Christian. Whatever the correct translation of this verse may be, theologians were right in thinking that the Old Testament opposed dualism. The Hebrews did not make a distinction between matter and “spirit.” As we shall see in the JE creation story, the first human being is made from the dust of the earth and has life breathed into him so that he becomes “a living being.” The entire creature, without division into body and spirit, is a living being. When the Christian church said that Jesus is the word of God made flesh, it also spoke against any kind of dualism. This is why many theologians prefer the reading of verse one which says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” But there is no way to decide on the basis of the text itself. The P writer has other ways of dealing with the problem of dualism.

Genesis 1:2

Whichever way you translate the first verse, when the earth appears it is without form and void—that is, it is chaotic, empty of all form, design, or meaning—and darkness is upon the face of “the deep.” “The deep” is a translation of the Hebrew word tehom. Behind this word there lies a whole mythic tradition. In the ancient world of the Mesopotamian basin there existed a story of the creation of the world by means of a great battle between a warrior god and a dragon, a sea-monster, who represented watery chaos. To many peoples who lived in desert lands far from the sea, the sea was fearsome. Its great storms were powerful and destroyed ships and houses built close to the shores. Stories of sea monsters were told by returning sailors. So “the deep,” the waters of the sea with its monsters, was a symbol of chaos to the ancient people.

The Babylonian creation myth is a long story about the birth of various gods and about the eventual conflict between the god Marduk and the goddess Tiamat. In the course of the conflict, Tiamat is slain, and it is from her body that the firmament, the great dome of heaven, is made. It is worth noting here that the name Tiamat is closely related linguistically to tehom. By slaying Tiamat, the chaos monster, the monster of the deep, Marduk makes it possible for order to reign.

Much has been made of the common background out of which the Babylonian and the Hebrew creation stories come. The differences between the stories are more important—and more instructive—than their similarities. The Babylonian myth is an involved story of the birth of the gods and of the struggles among them for supremacy. Human beings are created almost as an afterthought, to serve as slaves for the gods, tending the earth so that the gods might have leisure. In the P story, the reference to “the deep” is virtually the sole remnant of this older myth. There is no birth of God; God is there before the story begins. Only by taking a broad meaning of myth as we have done can the P story be called a myth at all. P has stripped the narrative of all features of a “story about the gods” and has reduced it to a statement of doctrine, using the older myth as a framework only. By using an older framework with which people were familiar, the writer is also able to “start where they are” and show them greater truth.

The capriciousness of the gods and the denigration of humanity in the Babylonian myth stand in complete contrast to the picture of the sovereign and loving God of the Hebrew story. Nothing is told of God except God’s acts toward the world he is creating. No questions of God’s origins are raised; no relationship to any other god is assumed (until we get to the plural pronouns in verse 26); and the dignity of humankind toward which the whole story moves is a contradiction of the Babylonian estimate of human worth.

Still, the symbol of chaos, tehom, the deep, like Tiamat—the monster of the deep—is important. Chaos, or the threat of chaos, is always present in life. We know that we are insecure in the world we live in. We feel the threat of destruction. The world itself is not secure. The ancients felt this, too, in the dark, a storm at sea, a tornado, wild forces of any kind. As the P story of creation unfolds, by bringing order to chaos, God takes possession of it and subdues it. In Hebrew thought, it is God alone who keeps chaos under control. In the story of Jonah, a man who refuses to obey the word of God finds himself thrown back into chaos where he is swallowed up by the very monster of the deep herself. Jonah returns to dry land when he promises to obey God.

There is an additional level of meaning in the use of tehom/Tiamat. Since the Priestly account comes to us through the experience of exile, using the term may be a subtle way for the Israelites to remember that ultimately the Lord and not the Babylonian gods is the source of all creation. (We see another example of this with the creation of the sun and moon.)

The wind or storm of God was moving over the chaos. The word which the English Bible translates “spirit” is ruach (pronounced ROO-ahk). This word can mean “spirit,” but also means “wind, breath, or storm.” In this verse, the picture is that of the great divine wind blowing storm-like over the sea, or “hovering” over the deep like a great bird about to light on its nest, especially one incubating its eggs. The “spirit” of God here should not be thought of as acting to create; it is simply there, a storm, almost part of the chaos itself in wildness, yet showing forth the presence of God about to create, to bring order into the chaos. The image of the “hovering” of the spirit is one of almost-life, of the care and tending immediately before birth.

Genesis 1:3

Light is created. It is not some god-like stuff which flows from God into the darkness. Some religions have thought of light itself as a god. With the fear of darkness that most people have, it is understandable that light should be thought of as divine, as saving in some way and giving safety. In Genesis light is from God. God alone is the source of the safety which light brings. Notice also that light is created before the sun, stars, and moon. Light does not come from them, according to this story, but directly from God.

The form of words in verse 3 is important: “God said . . . .” God creates by his word. In the P account God creates by speech alone. This shows God separated from his creation and speaking to it. It portrays God with such immense power that it takes only a word for there to be a creative response. Later philosophers and theologians speak of both the transcendence of God and immanence of God. Transcendence refers to the separateness of God from God’s creation; immanence refers to God’s nearness. The creation-by-speech here in Gen. 1 shows God’s transcendence. In Gen. 2 the immanence of God is evident in the manner of creation, for God shapes the clay.

Thought about God swings between these two poles. On the one hand, if God is not transcendent, God tends to become confused with the rest of the world. Pantheism is a form of religion that overemphasizes the immanence of God at the expense of transcendence. The term means literally “all is God.” Stoicism is an ancient religion, prominent in the world of the first few centuries of the Christian era, which is pantheistic. Much modern thought tends also toward pantheism, confusing nature with God. Unless God is not the world, God loses the dimension of divinity.

On the other hand, if God is not immanent, near to us, then God is irrelevant. A merely transcendent god who was not accessible to his people could not even be known, let alone worshiped. In the eighteenth century, when people were supremely confident in the power of human reason to know and understand all things, a view of the world developed that did not allow God to have any significant relationships with the world. The universe was thought to be like a huge machine, operating according to the laws inherent in it. A theological school of thought called deism pictured God as a clockmaker. God designed the universe and made it as a clockmaker makes a clock, in such a way that it could continue to run on its own. Then God withdrew from it, allowing it to run in accordance with its inherent laws, never intervening again. This is a doctrine of God which overemphasizes the divine transcendence. If it be true, there is no point in praying to God or expecting any relationship with God other than adoration for the work which the almighty has done in time long past. By saying that God creates both by the word and by handling the stuff of creation, the biblical writers express both the transcendence and the immanence of God. God is the one who stands over against us, completely different from us, and speaks the divine word to us; God is also the one who is immersed deeply in the world with the stuff of it clinging to God’s hands. God is not the world, but God is deeply involved in it.

There is one further point that P wants to make: the world is “good.” It is like a refrain in a song. Here, God declares the light to be good. This does not simply mean that it is pleasant or beautiful. God also creates the great sea monsters and creeping things and calls them good. When God calls them all good, the meaning is that they fit in with the great overall purpose of creation. They have their place in the grand design. The goodness of creation is based on God’s purpose, not on our sense of beauty.

Genesis 1:4-5

Notice that although God creates the light, darkness is not created. God separates the light from the darkness, but darkness continues. Primitive people, like many of us moderns, feared the darkness, especially when there was no moon or when it was cloudy so that there were no stars. Evil spirits—and evil people—can work their wills in the darkness.

Notice also that, even though God does not create darkness, God calls the light “day” and the darkness “night.” In naming the darkness God takes possession of it. Throughout our study of the Old Testament we become aware of the power which ancient people ascribed to the act of naming. If you were able to name something, you had power over it. Even today we see something of this. A parent gives a newborn child her or his name; the child has nothing to say about it. When children grow up, they can legally change their names, but while they are children, it is the parents who decide what they shall be called. It may be that the custom that teenage children have of taking a nickname by which their friends know them is an unconscious attempt to break loose from the bonds of parental control. A remnant of this control-by-naming can also be seen in the care with which some people try to insure that coworkers never discover that childhood nickname. To know someone’s embarrassing nickname would be tantamount to having a certain degree of control over the person. In the Old Testament we see events in which God changes a person’s name: Abram is changed to Abraham, Jacob to Israel. The meaning of the name is not as important as the fact that God has changed it and has thereby claimed the person. When God names the darkness “Night,” God claims it, takes possession of it, and thereby restrains it by his power. We said earlier, in discussing the first verse, that P had ways of combating dualism: this is one of them. The possibility of chaos taking control of God’s creation is overcome because God takes possession of darkness and is Lord of the night as well as of the day.

The final sentence in verse 5 shows the Hebrew system for counting the days: a day goes from evening to evening, not from morning to morning as ours does. In Jewish custom this is still so; the Sabbath, for example, does not begin on Saturday morning, but on Friday evening at sundown. In the Christian church holy days are first celebrated on the evening before. Christmas eve and Hallowe’en (which is “All Hallows’ Eve,” the eve of All Saints’ Day) are well-known examples, but the rule applies in all cases. Worship services held on such “eves” characteristically contain prayers and scripture readings concerned with the theme of the holy day itself.

Genesis 1:6-8

The word translated firmament means a hammered metal bowl; the firmament is like a great upside-down metal bowl which separates the waters. In this imagery we have the ancient view of a three-tiered universe, which was held, with modifications, until the sixteenth century CE when Copernicus put forth his theory of the motion of the planets around the sun. In the Genesis picture, the earth is a disk with waters beneath it and the firmament above it holding back the waters. So the three tiers are the waters under the earth, the earth, and the waters above the firmament. We see this cosmology (picture of the earth) again in the second of the Ten Commandments, when we read, “You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. . . .” The reason for this commandment is that all the things in this three-tiered universe are creatures, not god.

Notice that heaven is not the sacred dwelling-place of God; it is simply the firmament. God dwells above heaven. The important point about this is not that it tells us where God is, but that it says God is not to be localized in any point within creation.

The creation of the firmament to keep the waters in their proper place reflects the ancient fear of water in large quantities; a deluge of water symbolizes chaos. Once again, the P writer deals with chaos and dualism. Chaos is held in check by the firmament which God has made. Humankind is dependent only on the good God for safety. In the P account of the story of Noah and the Flood, God opens the windows of heaven and the springs of the deep and releases the waters of chaos to destroy a large part of creation. As we see when we study that story, God makes a covenant with Noah promising never to do that again—God’s creation shall stand and the watery chaos be held back forever.

Genesis 1:9-10

Again we see the fear of water, and God sets the proper limits of the seas so that the dry land appears. This is a different form of the creative act of God of withholding the power of chaos.

By having God name the dry land “Earth” and the waters that were gathered together “Seas,” the P writer is using the names of powerful gods in ancient religions. Because God both creates and names these, we are to see that they are merely creatures, not gods. The P writer thus combats the influence of polytheism (belief in many gods). Once again comes the refrain: “And God saw that it was good.”

Notice that the refrain did not occur at the end of the second day when the firmament was constructed. This formula of approbation does not reappear until the seas and the dry land are created. This is because the creation of the firmament is only part of the complex work of creating the world of cosmos within which the rest of creation will take place. The formula of approbation designates the completion of an act. On the second day a creative act is left incomplete, and on the third day two acts occur. The fact that two days are spanned shows that P is using older traditional material, fitting it, sometimes awkwardly, into a seven-day scheme. The liturgical interest of P, the concern that the whole story lead up to the Sabbath, compels the use of a seven-day scheme and the fitting of material into that scheme as neatly as possible.

Genesis 1:11-13

In the ancient world, wherever the growing of crops took the place of hunting or herding as the chief means of life and livelihood, people became concerned about the fertility of the earth. Without the proper mixture of good soil, water, and sunlight, the crops would not grow. Almost all agricultural societies have religions that try to bring about the fertility of the earth. In the ancient Near East these religions often tried to do this by practicing sacred prostitution. By having sexual relations with a temple prostitute, one guaranteed that the land would be fertile. In these verses the P writer combats this kind of religion.

Plant life is created by God. But notice how this happens. Previously, God has created by his word. Here God speaks to the earth, commanding it to “put forth” vegetation. P does not try to deny the obvious fertility of the earth. The wonder of the seasonal rebirth of green things from the earth is too clear to be denied. But P has the earth act at God’s command. The earth’s fertility is God’s gift.

The reference to “plants yielding seed and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit in it” is to grasses and herbs which yield seed directly, and those plants and trees which have their seed inside a fruit or nut. That is, all kinds of plants have within them the means of reproduction. The earth is fertile and plants have the power to reproduce, due to the command of the word of God. The self-contained powers of nature to bring forth life are not nature’s own; nature is a creature. And it is good. Agricultural fertility cults frequently have in their mythology a dying and rising god. When scholars of the history of religion noticed this, and especially when they saw the forms it took in the Near East, many of them suggested that this accounted for the Christian belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus. This, they thought,3was simply a variant on the dying and rising god of the agricultural fertility cults. In fact there is much of the symbolism of the rebirth of nature in the proper celebrations of Easter. The lily, the rabbits, Easter eggs, all speak of the rebirth of natural life. (But for those of us who live in the northern hemisphere, it is too easy to drift into a belief that Jesus’ resurrection was somehow part of the natural order, rather than a gracious act of a loving God.)

The ancient Hebrews were surrounded by these kinds of religions, particularly in the myths surrounding Baal, the Canaanite god of fertility, and Anath, his sister. The myth tells of the death of Baal. The god of death, Mot, holds Baal in the prison of death. Anath goes to Mot, slays him and cuts up his body, casting it about over the land, and Baal comes back to life. The prophets of Israel constantly fought against Baal worship. Israel had been created as a nation by God and must remain faithful to him. Still, the need for successful agriculture was obvious. In the P creation story the author maintains that the God of the deliverance from Egypt is also the one who gives fertility to the earth. Faithfulness to the covenant will suffice to ensure the fertility of the land.

The figure of Jesus comes out of this kind of background. There can be no possibility of adequately describing his death and resurrection in the terms of the fertility cults. His death was a once-for-all event and his resurrection has its meaning only in connection with the promises God made to Israel in the covenant. It speaks not of life coming naturally out of death, but of God being faithful to God’s promises.

Genesis 1:14-19

On the fourth day the heavenly bodies are created. Worship of the astral deities—the sun, moon, stars, and planets—was widespread in the ancient world. Indeed, almost anywhere you go around the world you will find evidence of such worship. The stars and planets are one feature of nature that is there for all to see. Hunting tribes may not be concerned with growing crops; different animals that have been worshiped may not be known in places far from where they live; oceans may be unknown to inland dwellers, and deserts with their sandstorms may be unfamiliar to people who live along the coasts. But the lights of the heavens can be seen anywhere in the world. One of the things about the stars that impresses people who pay close attention is that they move with such regularity. We are sometimes amazed that our astronomers can predict with accuracy where a particular planet will be at a specific time, but the ancient astronomers could do this, too. Ancient people were impressed with the fact that, although much in life was uncertain, the movement of the stars was always the same.

Because of the regularity of the heavenly bodies, many believed that the stars controlled everything else and determined what was to happen on earth. Even today astrology, the study of the stars to see what they tell of life, is popular. Some people really believe what their horoscopes say. Others may view astrology as mere su- perstition, but in ancient times it was a serious matter. All of life was thought to be governed by the astral deities. Men and women, in this view, simply live out lives that have already been determined at the time of their birth. They have no freedom and nothing much matters, since all is determined in advance.

For Israel, however, this could not be so. God had called the people Israel and made a covenant with them. God would be their God and bless them, and they were to keep God’s commandments. Israel could be faithful to God or unfaithful. Israel was free—to obey or disobey. Therefore, Israel was responsible for what she did. To believe in the astral deities and their control over life was a denial both of the lordship of God and of human responsibility.

The P editor says that God created the lights in the firmament—they are not gods. Although P used the names of the gods Earth and Sea, “Sun” and “Moon” are not used. By using the clumsy expressions “greater light” and “lesser light,” P makes it plain that these, too, are creatures of God. We may have here another example of the exiled Israelites being able to find a “safe” way to jeer at their captors. “You worship ‘big light’ and ‘little light,’” they are saying, “while we worship the creator of all that is.”

The heavenly bodies are creatures of God, and they have quite simple jobs to do. They do not control the lives of people: they are the means by which to tell time! They divide the day from the night and they mark off the seasons and the years. They also give light on the earth, but it is not their own light, but the light that God created first of all creatures. This, too, is good; another act of creation is completed. With this, the cosmos (the universe itself) is finished.

Genesis 1:20-23

On the fifth day living beings are created, beginning with those which are least like humans and moving, on the sixth day, to humankind, which is created in the image and likeness of God. Living creatures are treated in a special way in this story. The plants, which were brought forth from the earth, are not thought to be forms of life. They have their seed and reproduce, but they are not called living creatures. When we look at this first creation story, we see that humans were allowed to eat vegetables but not meat. The life given to God’s creatures is sacred and is not to be taken away by any other creature.

There is a Hebrew word used in this chapter which is not translated into English in every instance. When used of human beings, the word nephesh is usually translated “soul.” But when used of other members of the animal world, it is often left out. This is unfortunate, for the P writer’s use of nephesh makes some important theological points. There is no simple English word or phrase to cover the two aspects of nephesh. It refers to the life force which separates animals from rocks, for instance, or stars, and also from plants. Nephesh also refers to the individuality of each creature. We are accustomed to recognizing each human being as unique; the P writer believes every animal—even the “creepy crawlies”—is unique to God.

Of the living creatures, first the sea monsters are created, then the rest of the sea creatures and the birds. The seas have been separated from the dry land and held in their place—chaos has been controlled. Now even the fearsome monsters of chaos are discovered to be creatures of God and are called good; they are nothing to fear. These living creatures are then given the gift of procreation as a blessing. Even for living creatures, fertility is not simply a power contained within them but is a special gift from God. Only God is the source of creativity.

Verse 21 uses the verb bara: create. This is a different verb from those used before, except in verse 1 when bara is used for the whole process of creation. This verb never has anyone or anything except God as subject. Both God and people can “make,” “shape,” “form,” and so on; only God is said to bara.

Genesis 1:24-25

On the sixth day the earth brings forth living creatures: domestic animals (cattle), wild animals (beasts), and creeping things—all the forms of life on dry land. All are connected very closely with the earth, which acts as mediator of God’s creation. There is no blessing or command to be fruitful; apparently, as with the plants, this is part of their nature. Perhaps the blessing was necessary for the creatures which came from the sea because the sea was not given the ability to give power to reproduce. This is the suggestion that Gerhard von Rad makes in his book Genesis. He says, The absence here of divine blessing is intentional. Only indirectly do the animals receive the power of procreation from God; they receive it directly from the earth, the creative potency of which is acknowledged throughout. Water, by creation, stands lower in rank than the earth; it could not be summoned by God to creative participation. (p. 57)

Yet in verse 20 it seems that the same command is given to the waters as was given to the earth: “Let the waters bring forth. . . .” This is a case in which the English translation is somewhat misleading. In the Hebrew three different verbs are used in those places where the English reads “bring forth.” In verse 11 the verb is dasha, “to yield tender grass,” and it is in the causative form—“cause to yield tender grass.” In verse 12, the verb is yatsa, “to go out,” again in the causative—“cause to go out.” Thus in the case of the earth’s “bringing forth” vegetation, the verb is in the causative: the earth causes the grass to come forth. In verse 2 also the verb is yatsa in the causative, so the earth causes the living creatures to come forth. In verse 20, however, the verb is sharats, “to swarm,” and it is in the simple form not indicating causation. Verse 20, therefore, means, “Let the waters swarm with living creatures. . . .” God created them directly, without the mediation of the waters, and gave them the power to reproduce.

The real significant contrast seems to be not so much between the creatures of the water, the birds of the air, and the animals of the dry land, but between the animals and human beings. The animals are closely tied to the earth, whereas humans are more intimately related to their creator.

Genesis 1:26-28

This is the climax of the story. In all the other acts of creation the form of words is very direct: “Let there be . . .”; “Let the earth put forth . . . .” Here, God takes counsel with God’s self for a more deliberate and important act: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” This is a very strange expression. The name for God in this story is Elohim. When we discussed this before, noting that it is the name which the E writer uses and also the P writer at this point in the story, we mentioned that the word is in the plural: the gods. We also said that there was no doubt that both E and P believed in only one God. All through this story of creation the word Elohim has been translated “God,” but now, in verse 26, the plural is used: “Let us . . . in our. . . .”

In the ancient world the idea of a heavenly court was common. The main god was surrounded by other heavenly beings the way a king or queen is attended by the members of an earthly court. In most of the old religions the court was made up of lesser gods. In the Old Testament there was only one God, but God was frequently pictured as being served by a court. In some present day eucharistic liturgies this same imagery occurs: “Therefore with Angels and Archangels, and with all the company of heaven. . . .”

God is submerging God’s self in the heavenly court. “Man” is made in God’s image. “Man” is like God, but is also quite distinct from God. The P writer in this whole section seems to be saying these two things about humankind. On the one hand P uses the words “image” and “likeness”: an “image” is a copy of the original, like a statue, and a “likeness” is an outline or silhouette. This would indicate a very close likeness to God, even in a physical sense. On the other hand, God is submerged into the heavenly court, so the likeness to God must be somewhat blurred.

In addition, the Hebrew word for man used here is ‘adam (the same word which later will be used as a proper name, Adam). This word is closely related to the word for earth, ‘adamah. Thus P also shows that though humankind differs from the animals, it remains tied to the earth and therefore to the animals and indeed the rest of creation.

The result of this very subtle use of words is to give a picture of humankind (“man,” male and female: see below) as a being who is very much a creature, not to be confused with God, but one who stands in a very special relationship to God and is very much like God. It would seem that the point here is not so much to say that humanity, as the image of God, can give us an idea of what God is like, as it is to say that humanity is to act like God in the world: God gives human beings dominion over all the living things in the world. Their purpose is not to rule, but to act as God’s agent or steward.

It was a common practice in the ancient world for statues of a king to be set up throughout his realm. These were not regarded simply as carved statues, but as the king’s representatives, looking out for his interests in those places where the king himself could not always be. This seems to be the idea expressed here: humankind is God’s representative, looking after God’s interests in the world. This authority, dominion over God’s creation, is given in the creation.

‘Adam is not a sexually specific word. There is another word for a male person: ‘ish. In spite of the male domination of ancient society, P means both “man” and “woman” when he uses ‘adam. (Notice the change of pronouns in v. 27: “In the image of God he created them, male and female he created them.”) In the P account, sexuality, male and female together making up ‘adam, is a direct creation by God from the outset. (The JE story has woman made after man.) God blesses and commands humankind to procreate: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it.” Sexuality, then, is a gift of creation, a blessing, and a command.

Genesis 1:29-31

Notice that there is a limit to human dominion: only vegetables may be eaten. Both humans and beasts are given vegetables for their food, though to humans both herbs and fruit are allowed while the animals have only herbs (green plants). The shedding of blood is not part of the divine plan for creation. In the Old Testament it is a basic belief that “in the blood is the life.” God alone gives life, and it is not to be taken. Those who spill blood put an end to what cannot be revived. Later visions of the perfect time that will come when God brings in the kingdom show animals and humans living without shedding blood. The P writer, of course, knows that both animals and humans eat flesh, but a complete respect for life leads the writer to say that this is not part of God’s plan. We shall see that P has God give animals to humans for food at the time of Noah. Even then the blood is not to be eaten. It is to be poured out to God as giver of life.

The final refrain is emphatic: “. . .indeed, it was very good.” The world as it comes from the hand of God is perfect. This is the basic faith expressed in the Old Testament: whatever evil there is now in the world is not due to God. As God created the world there was no evil in it, and no dualistic power of evil. As the JE account will go on to show, evil comes when human beings overreach their assigned role. Not content to be God’s representatives in the world, humans aspire to be as gods themselves.

Genesis 2:1-3

We would expect the P writer to say that creation ended on the sixth day, but this does not happen. God finished the work by resting on the seventh day. Rest is part of creation. To us rest sounds like doing nothing. To those who have to work until they are exhausted, to fight for the very possibility of life, leaving the old to die by themselves because there is no time to tend to them and still carry on the struggle for life, rest is an activity of sheer bliss. This is the kind of life that was usual for the ancient people, and is still true for most of the earth’s people now. Rest, for them, is a necessary activity of life; without it, life is ground down into death. Thus the seventh day is not a day apart from creation, but the time of the creation of the act of rest. The Sabbath, in the Israelite calendar, is not a day of inactivity, but a day when work is not done so that rest may be done. As a celebration of the covenant, the Sabbath was especially seen as the day of recreation, of being restored to the very basis of life. God has hallowed, set apart, this day for this use.

Verse 4a says that all this is a genealogy, the generations of the heavens and the earth. P usually puts this kind of verse first as a title. Here, since the creation story has its own introduction, it had to be put at the end.

Summary

1) Dualism is rejected. Light is created and comes from God. Though light is good and necessary, it is not to be worshiped. Darkness, though it is fearsome because it conceals evil action and makes it easier to commit evil, is not in itself to be feared; God claimed it and is Lord of it when God named it “night.” The waters of chaos are set within their proper limits by God: the waters above are held out by the firmament and the other waters are gathered together as the seas and kept in their place by God’s command. The monsters of the deep are like playthings to God, who created them and gave them the seas in which to roam. All this may sound very far from our way of thinking, but its message to us is clear. Biblical faith does not allow us to call anything that God has made evil or unclean, nor does it support our fears of the unknown. God is behind all that is, and we need fear nothing but God’s absence.

2) God is both transcendent and immanent. God is the absolute Lord over creation. Nothing else is to be mistaken for God and worshiped. This means that we need not bow down before anything in the world! But God is also very near to everything in the world. God is involved in creation, so that we cannot treat anything that God has made as though it did not matter. The immanent side of God is presented more explicitly in the creation account of Gen. 2.

3) There is freedom in the world. Nature acts as God has created it to act, but it does so in respect to God’s command to it. Human beings are given a role to play in God’s design, but they must respond from their own freedom. The sun, moon, and stars do not control the things that happen. Nothing is decreed beforehand and sealed in fate. The astral bodies measure time, but they do not control it.

4) Creation is fertile by the gift of God. Ancient people thought that the powers of nature which gave or withheld fertility had to be worshiped. P says that fertility is from God, and God alone is to be worshiped. This belief, by assuring us that nature is not sacred, has allowed us to subdue it and bring it under our control. Much mischief has been done under the auspices of this word “subdue.” The notion is one of responsible stewardship, not at all one of exploitation. We need now to remember that it belongs to God and brings its resources to us as a gift; ours to control, it is not ours to plunder.

5) Humanity is in the image of God. Humankind is shaped after the pattern of the elohim. This strange imagery both expresses the dignity of humankind and sets its limits. “Man,” male and female, is like God, but is not to be confused with God. 6) “Man’’ includes woman. Sexuality is not simply a sign of our kinship with the animals and therefore a lower bestial function to be concealed and denied as unworthy of us. Humankind, ‘adam, is not complete as male or female; neither is humankind originally a complete being, solitary and alone, who later “falls” into sexuality. From the outset God created humankind so that both sexes were needed for completeness. The modern notion of the self-sufficient individual is ruled out by this, as is the idea of male superiority. (This is quite remarkable since the place of women in ancient society, Hebrew included, was definitely lower than that of men. We can see this, and how it was made somewhat better, when we turn to the JE creation story.)

7) Human beings are God’s representatives. Although the blessing of reproduction is given to humankind and animals alike, only human beings are commanded to fill the earth and subdue it. This has sometimes been taken to mean that we are given complete ownership of the world, but this is not the case. Humanity is God’s steward. It is to fill the earth so that God may be represented everywhere and to subdue the earth for the purposes of God. In spite of being made in God’s image and being given the dominion, ‘adam is still connected to ‘adamah: that is, ‘adam is of the earth and thus has limits set.

In these terms the P writer sees a perfection in humanity’s original relationship to God and to the world. There is no downgrading of humanity as a mere puppet or slave to a tyrannical God; “man” (male and female) has great dignity and value. The terms of human dignity are clearly spelled out. The P writer was well aware of the fact that humankind had sunk to a level lower than that of the beasts; that we had denied our own dignity and taken it away from others; that we were such as to be worthy of complete condemnation before the righteousness of God. This merely points up the rightness of the terms of human life which humankind has violated. All, even the downfall of humankind, is set within the order which God has created.

*****

The redactors lead us from this first creation story to the JE account of creation and fall. This is quite proper, as it gives a rounded picture of the human state—humanity, the image of God, falling from this high position by sin. The P account itself, however, continues in Gen. 5 with a genealogy of humankind from the creation to Noah. We do not look at this in detail, but you might for the moment skip from Gen. 2:4 to Gen. 5 and from there to Gen. 6:9 ff. to see how P ties creation to the downfall and judgment upon humankind. You can tell that Gen. 6:1-8 is the J writer rather than P or E because of the name for God that is used. You know that Gen. 6:9 ff. is P rather than E because of the genealogy which serves as the introduction to the Noah story.