Log in

View Full Version : Genesis, Chapter 1 (Gods Work of Creation)


LostCause
2004-11-02, 07:40
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.



I'm not quite clear on what "the face of the deep" is. But, I imagine that just kind of goes along with the "void; and darkness" bit.



3 And God said, Let there be light; and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.



The first suggestion of duality.



5 And God called the light Day and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.



For some reason that reads like Alice In Wonderland to me. Okay, but anyways, I bare in mind that this was written in a different language that used characters to describe words as well as letters and numbers. So "Day" and "Night" could have different meanings.



6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

7 And God made the fimament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so.

8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.



I'd thought he was talking about Earth! Anyways, why is the evening and the morning the first and second day?

*shrug*



9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear; and it was so.

10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the father together of the waters called he Seas; and God saw that it was good.

11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind whose seed is in itself, upon the earth; and it was so.

12 And the earth brought forth grass and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding gruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind; and God saw that [i]it was[i] good.



That was really redundant.



13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.



Still not getting that.



14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years.



I assume he's talking about the stars, which is how people, at that time, kept track of such things as seasons, days, and years. That sounds like it was written by a man of his day.



15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth; and it was so.

16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made[i] the stars also.

17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to light upon the earth.

18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness, and God saw that [i]it was good.

19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.



I see a lot of change in the choices of words and a lot of redundancy. It either shows a flaw in translation or god just talking out of his butt.



21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind; and God saw that it was good.

22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas; and let fowl multiply in the earth.

23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping things, and beasts of the earth after his kind; and it was so.



This implies that he had creatures like cattle and "creeping things, and beasts of the earth", etc...



25 And God made the beast of the east after his kind, and cattle after their kind and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind; and God saw that it was good.

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.



"Our image" entails that theres more than one of him. But, I suppose christians chalk this up to the trinity.



27 So God created man in his own image, and in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.



That sort of entails that we shouldn't be eating animals for meat, doesn't it?



30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life. I have given every green herb for meat; and it was so.

31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.



I take note to that the last time he says "And the evening and the morning were the sixth day." he didn't give it it's own number, like he did the five times before. An error?

So, in the nutshell: God created heaven, first. Then he seperated it from the earth. Then he seperated the earth from the sky. And then he created all the stuff on the earth, starting with the plants, then the animals, then a man and a woman who's names have yet to be stated.

Cheers,

Lost

jackketch
2004-11-02, 08:09
i'll reply in greater depth maybe later but

quote: Anyways, why is the evening and the morning the first and second day?

the ancients tended to measure a day from sundown to sundown (the jews and the adventists still keep to this for the sabatth even today).

'there was an evening and a morning' is just the poetic way of saying it.

jackketch
2004-11-02, 08:54
quote:"Our image" entails that theres more than one of him. But, I suppose christians chalk this up to the trinity.

yeah you're right there, the hebrew speaks of the 'gods' and yes christians (with their usual disregard for the bible) get around this uncomfortable fact with the nonsense of a triune god.

xtreem5150ahm
2004-11-02, 15:23
quote:Originally posted by jackketch:

i'll reply in greater depth maybe later but

the ancients tended to measure a day from sundown to sundown (the jews and the adventists still keep to this for the sabatth even today).

'there was an evening and a morning' is just the poetic way of saying it.



there is something else about this...

it is more than just poetry. it is a punctuation. it uses the hebrew word "yom" for day in conjuction with evening and morning and also in conjuction with a number (day 1, day 2, ect.)

to make my post short, it is as if the author knew that someone, somewhere would be saying that it was more than a solar day (about 24 hours)

gotta cut this short cause i have to go to a funeral and my wife is ready to go.

God Bless

jurainus
2004-11-02, 16:52
quote:"Our image" entails that theres more than one of him. But, I suppose christians chalk this up to the trinity.

In the Genesis God is referred as 'Gods'. This could mean that the man who made up this story was a syncretist or polytheist of somekind. Rest of the OT talks about 'God'. Correct me if I'm wrong.

jackketch
2004-11-02, 16:56
^^^sorry but you are very wrong.pretty much the entire OT refers to god in the plural.

Rust
2004-11-02, 18:30
The early Semite tribes were polytheists, which explains the use of plurality throughout the Old Testament. It was not until around 900 b.C. that they began worshiping one god, when prophets began denouncing other gods as false ones.

jackketch
2004-11-02, 18:39
^^^yep thats right

LostCause
2004-11-02, 23:17
Also, in hebrew "god" is referred to as "elohim" which translates directly to god of all gods.

Cheers,

Lost

Lolita
2004-11-02, 23:44
quote:Originally posted by jackketch:

yeah you're right there, the hebrew speaks of the 'gods' and yes christians (with their usual disregard for the bible) get around this uncomfortable fact with the nonsense of a triune god.

Another interpretation:

Many of my professors (Jewish and Christian theologians) have stated that some people believe Genesis's use of the plural for divinity is "the royal we." If you're not familiar with it, there's more explanation halfway down the page here:

http://www.webster-dictionary.org/definition/we



That's just one possible interpretation, though; I'm not claiming it's THE interpretation (something I would never do with anything, ever).

jackketch
2004-11-02, 23:45
^^ /me wonders if many jewish and christian scholars have heard of the phrase 'clutching at straws'

edit actually i was a little unfair...there is biblical evidence that 'God' was the spokesman for the pantheon



[This message has been edited by jackketch (edited 11-02-2004).]

jurainus
2004-11-03, 17:46
quote:Originally posted by jackketch:

^^^sorry but you are very wrong.pretty much the entire OT refers to god in the plural.

Thanks

Aphelion Corona
2004-11-03, 22:38
It's Jewish spin time with AC!

Some Jewish scholars believe that the first verse of Genesis should be read "In the beginning of God's creation of the world".

Rashi and Ibn Ezra agree with this view and it removes a lot of the chronological time sequencing in the creation story.

Jackketch: I can think of more situations off the top of my head where Adonai (My Master) is used more than Elohim, so I would doubt that the OT uses Elohim more, though I'd have to check. (But I really can't be bothered to count so has anyone got any links?)

And I personally don't think Gen 1:4 suggests duality. God split one entity into two whereas surely duality works on the basis of two entirely seperate entities. Meh I suppose that's just speculation on my part.

And that text you are using is way way different to the literal translation. Pretty please can we use Young's Literal it makes it so much more accurate and we can fully understand what the author was getting at?

http://www.htmlbible.com/youngs/

Genesis 1: http://www.htmlbible.com/youngs/B01C001.htm

(This is way fun! I have been writing a commentary on Gen 1:1 but so for I have about a page only on the first verse so it needs cutting down.)

jackketch
2004-11-03, 22:45
Youngs sucks! at least the translation of the NT does! hope the OT is better done.

quote:Jackketch: I can think of more situations off the top of my head where Adonai (My Master) is used more than Elohim, so I would doubt that the OT uses Elohim more, though I'd have to check. (But I really can't be bothered to count so has anyone got any links?)

nope can't say i've ever felt the need to count it either. but my point was that the plural is used throughout the OT not how many times or which title is used the most (and i'll be frank -i don't know ).



[This message has been edited by jackketch (edited 11-03-2004).]

Aphelion Corona
2004-11-04, 16:16
quote:Originally posted by jackketch:

Youngs sucks! at least the translation of the NT does! hope the OT is better done.

[This message has been edited by jackketch (edited 11-03-2004).]

The Young translation of the OT is literally accurate, moreso than any other i've found on the net. If we are discussing the Bible shouldn't we try to discuss the words that were actually written down and not some approximate translation?

jackketch
2004-11-04, 17:56
quote: If we are discussing the Bible shouldn't we try to discuss the words that were actually written down and not some approximate translation?

exactly! so don't use the Young (at least not for the new testament).

Aphelion Corona
2004-11-04, 19:28
quote:Originally posted by jackketch:

exactly! so don't use the Young (at least not for the new testament).

Fine. We won't use it for the NT.

But this is Genesis.

Using anything but the literal translation would be stupid and Young is more accurate than the text we are currently using.