Genesis Chapter 1 - The Creation

This chapter covers creation of heaven and Earth, and within this relatively short section, I found three interesting points.  The Bible claims the Earth was created in six days, God uses the plural forms to describe himself, and he created more than two people.  One of these statements seems at odds with what we know to be true in the modern age, another is a lesson for me in humility and the third is different than what I had always been taught.

First up is the creation of the entire universe in six days.  When reading this section, I found it to be poetic, as a lot of ancient language is, but once I focused on what was being said, I found a few inconsistencies.  The text describes a single being creating existence itself, something that's logically challenging at best.  If nothing exists, then where does God fit into that?  He must be, by definition, supernatural. That may be stating the obvious, but I think it bears saying, if only to show that creationists want us to accept a model of the universe that includes facets that are, by their very nature, outside the laws of the universe.  They also seem to find this comforting, whereas I think it's highly unsettling to consider a being that exists outside the physical laws everything else is compelled to obey.  The text also seems to be hampered by a pre-scientific view of the universe, opting for a geocentric view.  My specific objection?  Night and day are created on the first day, yet the sun and moon aren't created until the fourth.  We know now that it's the Earth's rotation that creates night and day, not the Sun and Moon's movements.  Based on this alone, it seems to me that we may only ascribe the Genesis creation story the same level of respect as other creation myths, of which, there are many.  Of course, as a materialist, I'm more likely to think that the Earth was created roughly 4.5 billion years ago through the process of accreation, a position I believe is supported by current physical evidence such as radiometric dating, but that's just me (and the vast majority of the scientific community).

When I got to Genesis 1:26 (Then God said , "Let Us make man in Our image...), my first thought was, what?!  We're not even off the first page, and already God's admitting to being a polytheist?!  I had no idea!  You see, I had always been taught that Christianity was monotheistic in nature.  Once we get to Jesus, we'll have to deal with the whole 'Holy Trinity' business, but this is pre-Christian, Old Testament God, and he's using plural forms?  I thought I was on to something.  And I was wrong.  I did a little basic research, and I found two competing viewpoints.  First, and less believable, are those who claim that this is proof of the truth of the Bible, in that it predicts the Holy Trinity over a thousand years before its existence.  The second, much more plausible explanation, is that it all comes down to translation.  I found this excellent blog entry, which basically explains that "the Hebrew plural is often used for a singular noun to denote "a 'plural' of majesty or excellence"".  The author explains his position rationally, and then supports it with numerous citations of others who support the view.  I found it to be astute, well-reasoned, and entirely convincing.  I also realized that there are going to be times during this project that I may think I've stumbled onto some fresh, new perspective that no one else has ever considered before, and in that view, I am almost certainly mistaken.

Finally, we come to the creation of man.  As I was raised Lutheran, we were always taught that God created one man, Adam, and out of his rib, one woman, Eve.  It fell, then, for the two of them to populate the Earth, a concept that always nagged at me, even as a child.  It needn't have, because had I just read the Bible, it says right there in Genesis 1:26, "Let Us make Man in Our own image, according to our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea..." [my emphasis added]  It seems pretty apparent to me that God is using the form of man meaning, "the human race."  Also, considering that I find it highly unlikely that the first two humans would be encouraging their own children to interbreed (nevermind the genetic implications therein), it's seems to me much more plausible that while Adam and Eve were the first humans created by God, as we'll see in the next section, there were likely not the only ones, merely the only ones worth mentioning.

So, having made it through the first chapter of Genesis, I've realized that I need to be taking much smaller chunks of the Bible if I'm going to be writing this level of commentary on it.  I hope everyone will forgive me then, for changing the schedule for this week.

Coming up next, Genesis Chapter 2, wherein we take a closer look at some key figures.