The two creation accounts contained in the first two chapters of the book of Genesis provide us with a wealth of wisdom about the creation of all things by the loving hand of God. These two accounts, the first (1:1-2:3) believed to be authored by a source known as ‘Priestly’ (P), wherein God is orderly, and the second (2:4-2:25) by a source known as ‘Yahwist (J), wherein God is anthropocentric, present us with two narratives of the same story. In an historical context when gods are seen as very human-like, childish, and very much a part of the world (such as in the Enuma Elish),1 our loving God shows His people that He is starkly different from all of creation. Yet, He is intimate with His creation, calling it constantly to Himself.
While these two stories are certainly a part of Divine Revelation and without error, this does not necessitate that they are simply history lessons. Scripture is without error in that which God desires to reveal to us for the sake of salvation.2 Therefore, these accounts of creation are intended to teach us that which God desires us to know, and are not necessarily literal history. We see in the creation stories the unraveling of Divine pedagogy; God teaching His people. Not simply those of the time, but those for all time.3 As such, the intention of Scripture is for God to draw man to Himself in a manner that meets man where he is and gently elevates him out of sin and discord and into perfect union with his maker, culminating in the Incarnation, passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ to the glory of God the Father and the salvation of the World.
This story begins with man in perfect union with God. Man was created in the image of God (1:27), ensouled (2:7), given an intellect and a will, bearing dignity, having morality, being given dominion over the rest of creation (1:28), and made for communion and love to be sons and daughters of God(2:23).4 Creation itself is called good (1:25). However, mankind, being made in the image of God is called very good (1:31).5 As such, after God creates His beloved son and daughter He rests on the seventh day of creation (2:2). This provides us with an example of Divine pedagogy. God rests not because He has a body and becomes tired, but because He intends to teach us something: He desires us to rest in Him, to be in union with Him.
As such, the nature of God beings to be unveiled. God is transcendent and completely other from creation, and yet is infinitely intimate with it. God forms and breathes life by a word (1:3), He walks in relationship with His creation, He is orderly, He is relationship and love itself. This is in stark contrast to what we find in Enuma Elish, wherein the gods are many and are not transcendent, struggle for power, must create by the partial destruction of the self (not ex nihilo), enslave each other, kill each other, and utilize humanity as a means of only servitude.6 Because God is so vastly different from those described in Enuma Elish, it is clear that He desires to make Himself known for who He is: a Trinity of loving relationship. This is fundamental to everything in the creation accounts.
The theme of covenant encompasses all of Scripture. In order to understand this great significance, we must once again turn to the cognitive environment of the Ancient Near East by regarding that which people viewed as significant in relation to oaths. In this place and time, it was customary to make a covenant, an oath, with those who were outside of one’s family when the necessity arose.7 Certainly, one can trust family, however, outsiders did not share the same unity as a family. In creating a covenant with another, one essentially makes that person an extension of their family, thus creating a unity where there was not one before.
It is in this light that God creates over the course of seven days just as Abraham presented Abimelech with seven lambs for their covenant (21:25-34). In this way, God is immanent with His creation by making a covenant with man from the beginning: the whole of creation is a sign of the covenant with man, whom He creates last.
The first account of creation in the first chapter and through the third verse of the second chapter of the book of Genesis is an orderly ‘big picture’ of creation, providing us with insights about God, His transcendence, and carries with it priestly concerns such as the importance of structure in relation to the structure of the Tabernacle.8 This shows forth the transcendence of God; that what He creates is a temple for worship and adoration of the Almighty. The second account of creation beginning in the fourth verse of the second chapter of the book of Genesis is anthropomorphic and ‘small picture’: God is immanent, intimate, forms His creation, and breathes life. The garden, as with the Tabernacle, are places wherein God dwells and walks among His creation. This shows forth the nature of God: Divine Relationship. He creates and delights in His creation.
Before the fall in the third chapter of the book of Genesis, man is in complete union with God. Yet, not desiring to make slaves, God has created man with a free will: the freedom to accept God or reject Him. In this way, we can say that God limits Himself out of love for His creation and allows His children to reject Him. As such, the serpent enters the garden among Adam and Eve. The serpent suggests that God’s law is completely arbitrary (3:4-5), that God is nothing but an unloving tyrant; a quite similar view of gods as found in Enuma Elish. Here we can see the way in which the false gods of the time, be they in fable or in belief, are contrasted with the One True God. Upon eating of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, both Adam and Eve have, in some sense, been un-created.
Ultimately, the essential element that has been lost is relationship with God, union with their Creator. As such, they hide themselves as is described when they make for themselves garments of leaves (3:7). This hiding, while many argue is a hiding of their sexuality, can also be referencing guilt and shame. They have just sinned against God for the first time, and they are very aware of this fact. A part of their interior of which they are ashamed is now known. As such, upon leaving the garden, one will notice that while God once openly walked among His creation, He will now, in some sense, hide Himself. Certainly not for the same reasons as Adam and Eve. It is precisely because Adam and Eve hid themselves that God will hide Himself so that His people will not.
This is yet another stark contrast from the culture of the time. Rather than a god that seeks to obliterate in all totality that which he made, God’s first action is that of seeking His children. This is not to say that God is incapable of finding them, or that He does not know where they are, but that He calls to them that they may freely choose to love Him.
Therefore, until the Incarnation, God chooses people to reveal Himself to. He slowly reveals Himself to His very young children, and as they mature, He reveals Himself to more people in more profound ways. He begins with a person, moves to a family, a people, a tribe, a nation, and then the entire world. The human condition is now one of fear (3:10), chaos, domination (3:16), death (5:4), and a lacking of true unity in relationship. At large, this is a rebellion against the created order which God established as good. As such, God desires a new covenant with His people in order to draw them to Himself through what we can see as a type of the creation: the flood.
In the flood, we learn more about the nature of God and His Divine pedagogy: He destroys in accord with justice and He vows never again to destroy in accord with mercy. In everything He does, God desires to teach His people. By the flood, an anti-type of Baptism, the world is re-created and God places His bow in the sky (9:13).9 Just as God limited Himself in giving free will, so too does God limit Himself by placing His bow in the sky. This bow is a sign of a new covenant with His people and is the point from which God gradually re-creates the world. Just as God first created out of love, so too does God now call His people slowly and gradually back to Himself out of love. This covenant now sets the stage for future covenants wherein God gradually reveals Himself to more and more of His people.
Gray, Tim, and Jeff Cavins. Walking With God: A Journey Through the Bible (West Chester, PA: Ascension Press, 2010), 7.
Pope Paul VI. Dei Verbum: Dogmatic Constitution On Divine Revelation. (Vatican, 1965), 11.2.
“Ever ancient, ever new”, St. Augustine of Hippo
Gray, Tim. Walking with God. 8.
‘very good’: מאד טוב
Gray, Tim. Walking with God. 7-8.
Ibid. 10.
It is important to remember that while an oral Tradition existed, some of the earliest manuscripts of these events only date to around 950 BC. Thus, it is thought that the Priestly source made recognition of the importance of structure and order in the Tabernacle and related this to the creation account in hindsight.
The Hebrew here is ‘keshet’: קשת. This word is never used in Scripture to reference a ‘rainbow’, but rather ‘war bow’. As such, it would seem that our predominant interpretation of this passage is its relation to God’s promise never to destroy His people again by a flood: He ‘hangs’ up His weapon.
Bibliography
Gray, Tim, and Jeff Cavins. Walking With God: A Journey Through the Bible. West Chester, PA: Ascension Press, 2010.
Pope Paul VI. Dei Verbum: Dogmatic Constitution On Divine Revelation. Vatican, 1965.