20And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.” 21So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. 22God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
24And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. 25God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind, and the cattle of every kind, and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.
26Then God said, “Let us make humankindc in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth,d and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”
27So God created humankinde in his image,
in the image of God he created them;f
male and female he created them.
28God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” 29God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. 30And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. 31God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
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a Or when God began to create or In the beginning God created
b Or while the spirit of God or while a mighty wind
c Heb adam
d Syr: Heb and over all the earth
e Heb adam
f Heb him
1.1–11.32 The primeval narratives of chs. 1–11 present a universal backdrop to the stories of Israel’s past. In both the P and J versions (see Introduction), an idyllic beginning is sullied by human transgression. In the P version God counters these transgressions with the flood, marking the beginning of a new era of creation, which is protected by the covenant with Noah. The J version presents a narrative cycle of transgressions and divine responses, of which the flood is one instance, which collectively build up the conditions and problems of the present world. The primeval era is a time of corruption and curses, but it is also a time when the world is formed to be good (P) and when humans experience an enlargement of capacities from an innocent, animal-like existence to the broadened, godlike consciousness of “knowing good and evil” (J). But human autonomy is tainted by a tendency toward violence and evil, which entails conflicts with God and the cosmic order. These stories sketch the origins, growth, and limits of the human situation in the world and the moral problems that create the need for an enduring solution, providing the background for God’s call and covenant with Abraham.
1.1–2.3 The P account of creation is a magnificent and terse portrayal of God’s transcendent power and the intricate order with which he created the cosmos. The seven-day structure highlights the sacred time of the sabbath, which is later revealed to Moses at Mount Sinai as a “sign” of God’s covenant with Israel (Ex 31.12–17). There is a symmetrical relation between the creations of the first three days (light; sky, division of waters; land and plants) and those of the next three days (heavenly lights; water and sky animals; land animals and humans, with plants as food) that highlights the uniqueness of the seventh day (cessation of work). On the first three days God creates the major domains of the cosmos by creating new things and using them to separate the primeval materials of chaos. On the second three days God populates these cosmic domains and empowers his new creations to govern and fill these domains. The last creation, humans, are to rule the earth and its creatures as the earthly representative (“image”) of God. The harmonious order of creation is characterized by the themes of separation, blessing, and goodness.
1.1 In the beginning when God created, or “When God began to create.” The grammar of this temporal clause was clarified by the medieval Jewish commentator Rashi, who noted that the Hebrew word for “beginning” (reshit) requires a dependent relation—it is the “beginning of” something—and can be followed by a verb. The traditional rendering, “In the beginning, God created,” dates to the Hellenistic period (as in the Septuagint), when these details of classical Hebrew grammar had been forgotten. The idea of creatio ex nihilo (Latin, “creation out of nothing”) is dependent on the later rendering. In the original grammar, creation is a process of ordering and separation that begins with preexisting chaotic matter.
1.2 This disjunctive clause portrays the primordial state as a dark, watery chaos, an image similar to the primordial state in Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and Greek traditions. Unlike these other traditions, the chaos here is not a god or gods, but mere matter. The wind from God is he only divine substance and seems to indicate the incipient ordering of this chaos (cf. the role of God’s wind in initiating the reversal of watery chaos in 8.1).
1.3–5 Light, the first creation, created by God’s effective word in a marvelously terse and sublime utterance. Creation by word is celebrated in Ps 33.6. The separate existence of light from the sun is implied in Job 38.19 and in other ancient Near Eastern creation accounts. The separation of light and darkness initiates the theme of creation by separation. Time begins with the first procession of day and night.
1.4 God saw that…was good, a refrain occurring seven times (also vv. 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31), a number representing wholeness and corresponding to the seven-day structure of creation.
1.6–8 Dome, made of hard material (the Hebrew word means “hammered out”) that shines like ice or crystal (Ezek 1.22). The dome’s separation of the waters is later reversed in the flood when the windows in the dome are opened (7.11).
1.9–10 The Septuagint, supported partially by a Qumran biblical fragment (4QGenk), preserves a sentence after v. 9 that was lost by scribal error in the traditional Hebrew text: “And the waters under the sky gathered together into their gathering place, and the dry land appeared.” The separation of the terrestrial waters and the dry land and their naming as Seas and Earth completes the transformation of primordial matter into beneficial cosmic domains ready to support life.
1.11–13 God’s command for the earth to bring forth vegetation initiates the process of life on earth, which will be self-sustaining. Hence the emphasis on seed and every kind—the vegetation will propagate its kind on the earth through its seed, continuing the task of creation, comparable to the later fruitfulness of animals and humans.
1.14–19 The heavenly bodies do not create light but rather govern the light (which was created on the first day) and the alternation of day and night (which had begun on the first day). Their purpose is regulatory and calendrical. The designation of the sun and the moon as the greater light and the lesser light (v. 16) seems to emphasize that they are merely lights and not independent gods. As material objects set into the dome of the sky, the sun, moon, and stars may have been conceived of as holes or membranes channeling various amounts of heavenly light.
1.20–23 Great sea monsters, included among the water and sky animals, which populate the domains created on the second day. According to other biblical texts, God defeated these monsters in battle in primeval times (Ps 74.13; Isa 51.9) or will defeat them again in the future (Isa 27.1). These biblical traditions are rooted in older Near Eastern traditions. The reference here seems to refute these older traditions—God established his authority over the sea monsters by creating them,
not by engaging them in battle. The dragons are here just another type of sea creature, not independent deities. They, along with the other water and sky creatures, are declared to be good (v. 21) and given a blessing of fertility in order to continue the task of creation (by procreation) and fill their respective cosmic domains.
1.26–28 Humans are God’s last and climactic work of creation. The style of the text briefly verges on poetry, indicating a dramatic high point. Let us…our image. The plural seems to refer to the lesser deities of the divine assembly described in other biblical texts (e.g., 1 Kings 22.19–22; Isa 6; Job 1–2). In the accomplishment of this utterance, however, God acts alone (God created humankind in his image, v. 27). The reference to the divine assembly seems to acknowledge its presence but discounts its active participation in creation. It also complicates the idea of the image in which humans are made. The concept of being made according to the image of God (or the gods) has various overlapping implications—humans in some way look like God/gods; humans collectively represent God on earth; and humans are like God/gods with respect to moral, spiritual, political, or other qualities. The immediate implication of this concept in God’s speech is that humans are appointed to rule over the earth and its creatures. This ruling function is related to the ancient Near Eastern concept of the king as the image of the high god on earth, a concept that is democratized here. The implication that creation in the image of God entails male and female seems to be connected with the following blessing to be fruitful and multiply (v. 28); i.e., procreation (as the human mode of creation) is part of what makes humans correspond to the image of God. This is a dense and multivalent notion characterizing different aspects of human qualities and duties.
1.29–30 God grants the vegetation (created on the third day) to the humans and land animals as food. This rule of vegetarianism is later altered in the Noachian covenant when God allows humans to eat animal meat in addition to vegetation (9.3–4). The killing of animals for meat and the resulting bloodshed seem to be included in the violence that precipitated the flood (6.11–13).
1.31 It was very good. The last and most emphatic instance of the sevenfold refrain (see note on 1.4) seals the moral and functional harmony of creation. The goodness of creation is fragile, however. In the light of later transgressions by all flesh, God sees that the earth is corrupt (6.12), a verse that echoes and reverses this one and results in God’s decision to undo the created order with a flood.
GENESIS 2
1Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude.2And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. 3So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
4These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created.
Another Account of the Creation
In the day that the LORDa God made the earth and the heavens, 5when no plant of the field was yet in the earth and no herb of the field had yet sprung up—for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was no one to till the ground; 6but a stream would rise from the earth, and water the whole face of the ground—7then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground,b and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being. 8And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east; and there he put the man whom he had formed. 9Out of the ground the LORD God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
10A river flows out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it divides and becomes four branches. 11The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one that flows around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; 12and the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. 13The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one that flows around the whole land of Cush. 14The name of the third river is Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.
15The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. 16And the LORD God commanded the man, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; 17but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”
18Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner.” 19So out of the ground the LORD God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of the field; but for the manc there was not found a helper as his partner. 21So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then he took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. 23Then the man said,
“This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
this one shall be called Woman,d
for out of Mane this one was taken.”
24Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh. 25And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed.
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a Heb YHWH, as in other places where “LORD” is spelled with capital letters (see also Exod 3.14-15 with notes).
b Or formed a man (Heb adam) of dust from the ground (Heb adamah)
c Or for Adam
d Heb ishshah
e Heb ish
2.1–3 God…hallowed it. The seventh day, when God rests from his work of creation, is the first sacred thing. The implications of this sacred day are later revealed when the sabbath command is given to Israel (Ex 20.8–11; 31.12–17). The sabbath commemorates God’s rest, functions as a “sign” of the covenant, and allows Israel to be refreshed by its sacred time. This particular Israelite practice is “hidden” in the structure of creation.
2.4–3.24 The garden of Eden story, from the J source, begins with an account of creation (2.4–25), which sets the stage for the story of human disobedience and expulsion (3.1–24). The J creation account differs in many ways from the P account (1.1–2.3). The sequence of creations is man, garden, animals, woman, which differs in tone and detail from the grand sequence of creation in P. The J story is earthy and folkloristic and is focused on the characters and their moral and psychological dilemmas. It is not a complete account of creation, but provides only as much as is necessary for the ensuing plot. God is now named YHWH (probably to be vocalized Yahweh) God, rendered LORD God, and is a more anthropomorphic and fallible God than in P. (Note his unsuccessful experiment in creating animals to be the man’s “helping partner” in 2.18–20 and his humanlike afternoon stroll in the Garden in 3.8.) The story explores the complexity of the human condition as rooted in primeval events and transgressions and the beneficent and troubled relationship between humans and God. It is a story of paradise and why we are no longer in it.
2.4–5 The J account of creation begins like the P account, with a temporal clause followed by a description of the primeval chaos. The earth and the heavens, the reverse of the P order (1.1), perhaps showing J’s more earth-centered perspective in contrast to P’s cosmic scope. The primeval chaos in J is a picture of a barren landscape—no plants, no rain, and no one to till the ground. This picture of lack will be filled in by the following acts of creation. No one to till the ground has a Hebrew wordplay between one, lit. “man” (’adam), and ground (’adamah), anticipating a key thematic relationship in the story.
2.4 These are the generations (also These are the descendants, This is the story), a structuring refrain inserted in Genesis by an editor that occurs ten times: five times in the primeval narratives (also 5.1;
6.9; 10.1; 11.10) and five times (with one duplication) in the patriarchal narratives (11.27; 25.12, 19; 36.1, 9; 37.2). It was probably adapted from the opening line of the book of generations (or list of the descendants) in 5.1. This refrain emphasizes the idea that the past is conceived as a genealogy, which provides continuity for past events. The garden of Eden story is therefore the next link in the genealogy of the past.
2.6 The primeval stream seems to anticipate the rivers of Eden in vv. 10–14.
2.7 The creation of man differs in many respects from the parallel in 1.26–28. Here the man has a more humble origin—he is formed from the dust of the ground, rather than created in the image of God. Formed suggests an act of physical molding, as a potter forms clay. The earthy quality of man anticipates both his role in working the ground and his mortality (return to the ground, 3.19). The breath of life that God breathes into his nose is the divine life-breath, and humans are alive as long as they breathe. Man consists of a “soft” duality of flesh and life-breath. At death the life-breath returns to God and the flesh returns to earth; hence human destiny is already implied or anticipated in the creation of man. The first man stands for humankind in general and is also a solitary male, though his gender is not prominent until the creation of his helper-partner, woman. Man (’adam) can be a collective plural or a single creature, a semantic range that is central to the story. Paul in 1 Cor 15.45 uses this verse in his explanation of resurrection, comparing the initial gift of life with its counterpart in the end time.
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