Genesis 1:1-2
I spent a term in university studying the first eleven chapters of Genesis in Hebrew. I remember the professor saying he believed in creation ex nihilo – that God created the universe out of nothing – but that you can’t draw that belief from this text. (You can combine it though with, say, Ephesians 1:3-4, which celebrates that God knew us before the creation of the world!)
I believe the professor was right on both points. To believe that these verses give us that teaching would require us to take verse 1 leading chronologically to verse 2. More likely verse 1 is a kind of title, or summation in advance. The writing comes from a faith community which already had rich experience of the sovereignty of God over the elements (e.g. Exodus 15:1-21), and his exercising of that sovereignty for the building of a community that would be focused on him and be the means of witness to the world.
Make no mistake, we can stake our lives on the truth of these words, but they are neither history nor science in the way we usually understand those things. So the next few weeks will in many ways be an explanation of the previous sentence (some of you are saying, “You’d better explain it!”).
To God be the glory.
Prayer:
God, with relief and joy I celebrate that you specialize in bringing beauty and life out of chaos and darkness. The slightest breeze of your Spirit makes a huge difference in favour of life. The darkness stirs so easily within, yet is no match for your welcomed Spirit, or the slightest beam of your light. I know I will get what I truly desire. May I prefer your beauty over the chaos of my own making. Through Christ. Amen.
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5 comments:
i remember reading once that a difference between eastern religions and the western judeo-christian-muslim tradition is that some eastern religions don't have "in the beginning..."; time always was and is and shall be. but we westerners have a definite beginning, and a sense of time, an obsession with it, and all that comes with it: history and advent, etc.
east meets west, and a new culture is born where both senses of time are appreciated. i'd say that uptight west needed (and still needs) a little shaking up, a little loosening out, a little more breathing time/space.
time, of course, is god's creation, and not an attribute of god. i love it that genesis is so rich mytho-poetically ("and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters"), so rich spiritually, and that in broad strokes it accords with modern cosmology. remember the argument in school between a Steady State universe and a Big Bang universe? yay! the big bangers won out! the universe has a definite beginning! (it's about 13.7 billion years old, tho' recent evidence suggests it may be 10-15% older). the universe *is* created. from what we cannot prove. we can only have faith.
the universe is created, and it has a marvelous design. everywhere we look we find patterns, harmony, and unbelievable beauty and wondrous revelation. and that initial design is emergent in us: the patterns of quantum mechanics and gravity form our world and our very atoms.
to be a true scientist is to be a child and a lover of the divine. we seek the true interconnectedness of things, and in so doing we heal the alienation that comes with human existence. and in knowing the interconnectedness of all things, we know all things are connected to god the creator.
this is a wonderful expression of god's purpose: "for the building of a community that would be focused on him and be the means of witness to the world." something to think on and carry me through the coming days.
"Who among the gods is like you, O LORD ? - - - and these other gods are...?
I'm glad you're back Jim.
re: other gods:
i'm midway through the old testament -- somewhere in 1 chronicles -- and it seems to me that the old testament's experience of god is that each culture had its own god(s), and this was the norm. the god of abraham literally was the god of abraham and his descendants, it seems, and no one would expect that god to be the god of a foreigner. which explains why the people of israel, as they wandered in foreign lands for 40 years, so easily picked up the gods of those lands and turned their backs on the god who delivered them from bondage in egypt. when in rome, do as the romans do, eh? i mean, how easily do we to this day sometimes pick up the local values and morals when we move to another culture?
what i read happening in the old testament is the gradual evolution in human consciousness of one god, one god of all nations.
Thanks redsaucer for your response re other gods.
23-27 Sing to God, everyone and everything!
Get out his salvation news every day!
Publish his glory among the godless nations,
his wonders to all races and religions.
And why? Because God is great—well worth praising!
No god or goddess comes close in honor.
All the popular gods are stuff and nonsense,
but God made the cosmos!
Splendor and majesty flow out of him,
strength and joy fill his place.
1 Chronicles 16:23-27 (The Message)
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