READ IT! - Introduction to Genesis 1-7

Readings for this week:

Monday: Genesis 1

Tuesday: Genesis 2

Wednesday: Genesis 3

Thursday: Genesis 4

Friday: Genesis 5

Saturday: Genesis 6

Sunday: Genesis 7

Introduction to Genesis 1-7

Genesis is the first book in the Bible, and the first book in the Torah.

It’s title means “beginning” or “origins” and derives from the Greek translation of the Bible (The Septuagint).

Who was the Author?

We don’t really know who wrote it, but it is believed to have been composed about the time period of Moses around the 13th century B.C.

Several stories are very similar to the stories of the nations that surrounded Israel during this time period.

However, the theology of the biblical stories is quite different than that of Israel’s neighbors.

Genesis is made up of 50 chapters and is divided into two parts.

The first part – the Primeval narratives/traditions - makes up Chapters 1-11 and “contains narratives about the world out of which Israel’s ancestor Abraham came to follow God’s call… It looks back at the universal setting of the birth of the nation of Israel.”

The second part – the Patriarchal narratives/traditions makes up Chapters 12-50 and contains “the stories of Israel’s great ancestors - the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

There are Two different Creation Accounts in the book of Genesis.

“The first account (1:1 – 2:4a) is a summary description of the creation of the world and everything in it. This account may be called a theocentric account because God and his majestic work of creation is its primary focus.”

“The second account (2:4b-25) is a more specific treatment of the making of man, the animals, the woman, and the divine assignment of work to the man in the garden. It is an anthropocentric account in which the emphasis is on humanity’s nature, destiny, and vocation.”

The creation stories have confused people since ancient times.

The first creation story in Genesis 1 is told in the literary format of exalted prose.

The focus of the first creation story is on the Creator and what the Creator made.

Beginning with the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden, the Primeval History of Genesis lays out a series of different stories intended to show the many different ways in which humanity has turned away from God since our beginnings.

The second creation narrative in the Bible is found in Genesis 2 and 3 and is written in a very different style than the first creation story.

It begins with the words, “This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.” (v. 4)

God creates man and woman and they eat the forbidden fruit. This event symbolizes a turning point in the history of humanity. Humans have now become capable of distinguishing between good and evil.

In “the Fall of Mankind” we see humanity’s desire to not just be like God in His perfect goodness, but to become God Himself.

Humanity can no longer exist in a perfect relationship with God because humanity has ceased to be perfect.

Genesis chapters 4 and 5 contain two separate genealogies – one listing the descendants of Cain, who killed his brother Abel, and the other listing the descendants of Seth.

These two genealogical lists are similar in nature to the ancient Sumerian record of their ancient kings.

The Cainite and the Sethite genealogies represent two different paths for the human race… one good and one evil.

We then come across an even weirder story about the marriage between the ‘sons of God’ and ‘daughters of men’ which perhaps reflects the view of Israel that in the primeval period sin affected even the divine realm.

The text also speaks of the Nephilim, who according to the writer were a race of super-humans who came from this alliance.

We don’t really know a lot about these Nephilim creatures, but they seem to be very similar characters in nature to other ancient mythological heroes, such as Hercules for example.

The story of Noah and the flood is one of the oldest stories found in the Bible.

It originated before Israel’s existence, in the time of the ancient Mesopotamians.

Different versions were told by the many people groups who made up the region of the Mesopotamian Valley.

And Even ancient people groups as far away as China and Central America have their own versions of the story of the Great Flood.

So In the story, God sees that the people of the earth have become extremely wicked and violent.

So God decides that He is going to destroy the earth with a flood in order to wipe out all of the evil in the world.

God also sees that there is one guy in the world who is not completely wicked – Noah.

God tells Noah to build an “ark,” and gives Noah specific instructions on how to accomplish this.

The ark is a large box-shaped boat, resembling a giant coffin, symbolizing death.

In this story, we see the opposite of what happens in the story of creation.

In the story of creation, the Spirit (or wind) of God is hovering over the waters of primordial chaos, and God enters into the picture and brings order to chaos, creating the heavens and the earth.

In the Flood story, the reversal of this takes place, with God's sustaining Spirit abandoning his creation to destruction and the creation returning to its original state of the primordial waters of chaos.

However, God does not abandon his servants forever to destruction in the coffin-box-ark-thing, but He sends his wind (spirit) back over the waters of chaos, causing them to recede, and He begins his creation all over again. 

The story of the Flood, then, can be understood as a Creation story, or rather a story of New Creation - death and resurrection.

Genesis 1

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.

And God said, “Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.” So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day.

And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years, and let them be lights in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so. God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars. God set them in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the fourth day.

And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky.” So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living thing with which the water teems and that moves about in it, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the fifth day.

And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: the livestock, the creatures that move along the ground, and the wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

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

God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.