Genesis

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1). These famous opening words of the Bible express the Hebrew and later the Christian belief about the foundation of the universe. Does the universe have meaning? Genesis tells us that it does. The universe was divinely conceived. Therefore, it can only be fully understood in light of a divine plan.

The poetic flow of the Hebrew language of Genesis is simple, yet profound. Creation is described as taking place in six days. Notice in the following box a summary of the creation week.

The Creation Week
Day 1: separation of light and darkness, day and night	Day 4: creation of sun and moon to govern the day and night
Day 2: separation of water and sky, the expanse	Day 5: creation of animals for the water and the sky
Day 3: separation of land and water; creation of plants	Day 6: creation of animals for the land, and humans to govern all animals
Day 7: creation completed; God rests

"Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed’ (Genesis 2:8).

The purpose of the Genesis account is to establish God as Creator (Hebrews 1:10). It was never intended to be a scientific explanation of how he accomplished the creation. The Bible is not a science textbook. The scientist searches for the what and how of life’s questions, but the Bible addresses the who and why behind those questions.

Before scientific knowledge proliferated during the last 200 years, most Christians believed that Genesis 1 was a literal description of the beginning of the universe. Many Christians still do. However, a considerable number of Bible scholars today, while believing in the inspiration and accuracy of the Genesis account, find the traditional, literal interpretation inconsistent with evidence from scientific research.

These scholars have offered various explanations to account for these apparent inconsistencies. Some, having noticed that "light and darkness" is the subject of both the first and fourth days of creation (verses 3-5 and 14-19), "waters and sky" the subject of the second and fifth days (verses 6-8 and 20-23), and "land life" the subject of the third and sixth days (verses 9-13 and 24-31), believe the account to be a poetic or schematic portrayal of creation.

Other scholars consider Genesis 1:2-31 as describing a re-creation. This view was popularized by C.I. Scofield in his reference Bible, published in the United States in 1909. Scofield believed that Genesis 1:1 describes an initial creation that took place in the dateless past," while verses 2-31 describe a re-creation of an earth being prepared for human life (The First Scofield Reference Bible, Barbour & Company, Inc., Westwood, New Jersey, 1986, commentary on Genesis 1:2).

So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs.... Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib.... The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame" (Genesis 2:21-22, 25).

This theory attempted to harmonize the Bible and geology. The intervening gap between the beginning (verse 1) and the seven days of re-creation, Scofield reasoned, would be great enough to explain the fossils and rock strata found in the geological record. It would also explain the apparent contradiction between Isaiah 45:18 (New King James Version), which says that God did not create the earth "in vain" (Hebrew: tohu), and Genesis 1:2 (NKJV), which describes the earth as being "without form, and void" (Hebrew: tohu and bohu).

In addition, according to Scofield, the verb "was" (Hebrew: hayah) should be translated "became." Genesis 1:2, in this view, reads, "And the earth became without form, and void."

Although the Hebrew word allows for such a translation (see Genesis 19:26, Deuteronomy 27:9 and 2 Samuel 7:24), hayah is most often translated "was" throughout the Old Testament. Hence, it could also be translated, "Now the earth was without form, and void" (Jewish Publication Society translation, 1917). While Bible scholars have proposed various interpretations of the creation account, the fact remains that Genesis does not explain the natural laws or the mechanism by which God created the universe. Genesis is not physics, astronomy or geology. It is a story of faith, telling why we came to be and to whom we belong. Its message is that "the earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it" (Psalm 24:1). It declares that in the beginning there was God, and that all things came to be as God called them forth.

This does not mean, however, that a Christian should leave scientific knowledge at the church door. When properly interpreted, scientific evidence may help us understand certain details. When scientific evidence seems to contradict biblical revelation, one or the other, or perhaps both, have been misunderstood.

The Bible makes an important distinction between humans and other living creatures. The animals were made after their kind (verse 25), but the man and the woman were made in the image, or likeness., of God.

Being made in God’s image means that men and women have a special relationship with God and can communicate with him. "Knowing that we are made in God’s image ... provides a solid basis for self-worth. Human worth is not based on possessions, achievements, physical attractiveness, or public acclaim. Instead it is based on being made in God’s image. [Furthermore,] God made both man and woman in his image. Neither man nor woman is made more in the image of God than the other" (Life Application Bible, NIV, commentary on Genesis 1:26-27). Both sexes have equal access to God and can experience a personal relationship with him.