1:15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
If you recall, the last verse ended in a colon. So, let me summarize to better understand the first phrase. "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven ... And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven ...". In other words, God is explaining that he's creating lights, and that the purpose of those lights is to be lights. In fact, this is apparently the sixth purpose, after the five listed in the previous verse. "I'm making lights, and they're going to do all this stuff, and they're going to be lights." It's just plain silly.
He does go on to say "to give light upon the earth". That is, he views lights as I do, as a source of light. And this light has not just a source, but a target; and that target is the earth. It suggests that these lights aren't just supposed to shine any which way, but to shine earthwards. This is clearly geocentric thinking.
This purpose for these lights makes the earlier creation of light even stranger; that light wasn't made to illuminate the earth, but just to illuminate God's workspace for the first few days until he got around to making lights. Or something.
Of course, "and it was so" sounds like the end of it. But, we've seen this phrase used redundantly before, so we shouldn't be surprised when the next couple of verses effective repeat it, albeit with elaboration.
Let me discuss something that continues to surprise me. Most of us grew up with this story, to some degree or another. We kind of knew it, we heard it in bits and pieces, we may even have read it. And it seemed fine; dramatic and progressing forward, if a little heavy in lists. God made this one day, and God made that the next, and in the end God made everything. But when we actually read it carefully like this, think about it line for line, it borders on incoherent at times. The purpose of the lights is to be lights? Light was created three days before lights? What is going on here?
Not to mention that at times it sounds the way teenagers talk: "We thought maybe we'd go to the mall, so that we could, you know, be at the mall. So we went. And we got in a car and drove to the mall, and then we got to the mall. And it was cool being at the mall. That's where we went. to the mall."
There are probably lots of explanations for why it's as badly written as it is. It was probably passed along orally without being written down for thousands of years, and mangled a bit along the way. It probably predates people thinking seriously about how to tell stories, also by thousands of years.
More interesting is why no one comments on how incoherent is. It's not common to hear things like "The Bible reads like it was written by someone with attention deficit disorder." There's some societal force at work, preventing basic criticisms, no matter how obvious they are. There's also some issue about becoming familiarized with something since childhood, before we could reason clearly. We've been brainwashed.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Signs
1:14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
Having created light back in verse 3, God is now getting around to creating lights. I understand "lights" to be what I might call "light sources", such as light bulbs or fireflies. In this context, I would guess neither, but rather stars. "Light" is what I think of as coming from light sources; so having it around first is strange. The obvious way for me to create light is to start a fire. But apparently these are the first light sources; the other light was just there.
The phrase "the firmament of the heaven" is an odd, redundant construct. The firmament is named Heaven; the heaven is the firmament.
But this tells us a little about the firmament, about heaven. The lights are in it. These lights, therefore, are below the waters above the heaven, but are above earth and sea.
This is a very interesting "divide" phrase. The purpose of the lights being created in heaven is "to divide the day from the night." But, this is very confusing. Recall that God divided light from darkness in verse 4. After that, he named the light Day and the darkness Night. So, God divided day from night in verse 4. Now in verse 14, he is planning lights to divide day from night again.
When we first got to verse 8, it read like heaven was being created for the second time. We used that to reinterpret the earlier structure, and conclude it was not as sequential as it seemed. In particular, we now interpret the first verse as introductory.
So, now that it seems like day is going to be separated from night for a second time, can we go back to verse 4 and find a non-sequential interpretation? Unfortunately, no. Verse 5 identifies the separation of day and night as the first day. Verse 8 marks a second day, and verse 13 marks a third day. I don't want to jump ahead too much, but we seem to be clearly on the fourth day at this point. That all seems starkly sequential to me.
That leaves us with this question: Was day divided from night on the first day or the fourth? The rather unsatisfying answer is that the text pretty clearly says: Both.
The idea of lights somehow dividing day from night is a bizarre one. I can picture heaven as a big (horizontal) dam, dividing water from water. But I don't really get how lights are supposed to divide day from night, divide light from darkness. But that is the first purpose of the lights God is here creating in heaven.
And the lights have other purposes: they are for signs, seasons, days, years. At first glance, it seems like one of these things is not like the others: the last three are all time periods, while "signs" are not. An annoyance about the three time periods is that they are not in order; it should be days, seasons, years; or years, seasons, days.
But there is an interpretation of "signs" which makes it related to time periods, and particularly to seasons. It can be considered a sign, or indication, of when to plant various crops. This is a bit of a stretch; crops aren't explicitly mentioned, but let me elaborate on this a bit.
Like the "seed after his kind" earlier, this would be considered important technology to an early farmer. Understanding how to recognize the seasons in the stars to clearly identify from year to year the best time to plant would be useful.
We can use the stars for navigation: to determine where we are on earth; to determine which direction is which. But this is not the purpose stated here. The authors did not care about navigating; or did not know about navigating. They were not navigators.
We can use the stars to understand physics, gravity, special and general relativity. But this is not the purpose stated here. The authors were not physicists.
If the lights being created in heaven include the sun (suggested by the "for days" purpose), we can use that as an energy source, to power cars, to burn ants; as a light source to read by, to paint by, and so on. But the authors did not care about these uses. They cared about marking times of the year, about when to plant, and when to harvest.
I like the fact that this verse ends in a colon. The traditional division into verses is completely insane. So why is my blog verse-oriented? I have no response to that.
Having created light back in verse 3, God is now getting around to creating lights. I understand "lights" to be what I might call "light sources", such as light bulbs or fireflies. In this context, I would guess neither, but rather stars. "Light" is what I think of as coming from light sources; so having it around first is strange. The obvious way for me to create light is to start a fire. But apparently these are the first light sources; the other light was just there.
The phrase "the firmament of the heaven" is an odd, redundant construct. The firmament is named Heaven; the heaven is the firmament.
But this tells us a little about the firmament, about heaven. The lights are in it. These lights, therefore, are below the waters above the heaven, but are above earth and sea.
This is a very interesting "divide" phrase. The purpose of the lights being created in heaven is "to divide the day from the night." But, this is very confusing. Recall that God divided light from darkness in verse 4. After that, he named the light Day and the darkness Night. So, God divided day from night in verse 4. Now in verse 14, he is planning lights to divide day from night again.
When we first got to verse 8, it read like heaven was being created for the second time. We used that to reinterpret the earlier structure, and conclude it was not as sequential as it seemed. In particular, we now interpret the first verse as introductory.
So, now that it seems like day is going to be separated from night for a second time, can we go back to verse 4 and find a non-sequential interpretation? Unfortunately, no. Verse 5 identifies the separation of day and night as the first day. Verse 8 marks a second day, and verse 13 marks a third day. I don't want to jump ahead too much, but we seem to be clearly on the fourth day at this point. That all seems starkly sequential to me.
That leaves us with this question: Was day divided from night on the first day or the fourth? The rather unsatisfying answer is that the text pretty clearly says: Both.
The idea of lights somehow dividing day from night is a bizarre one. I can picture heaven as a big (horizontal) dam, dividing water from water. But I don't really get how lights are supposed to divide day from night, divide light from darkness. But that is the first purpose of the lights God is here creating in heaven.
And the lights have other purposes: they are for signs, seasons, days, years. At first glance, it seems like one of these things is not like the others: the last three are all time periods, while "signs" are not. An annoyance about the three time periods is that they are not in order; it should be days, seasons, years; or years, seasons, days.
But there is an interpretation of "signs" which makes it related to time periods, and particularly to seasons. It can be considered a sign, or indication, of when to plant various crops. This is a bit of a stretch; crops aren't explicitly mentioned, but let me elaborate on this a bit.
Like the "seed after his kind" earlier, this would be considered important technology to an early farmer. Understanding how to recognize the seasons in the stars to clearly identify from year to year the best time to plant would be useful.
We can use the stars for navigation: to determine where we are on earth; to determine which direction is which. But this is not the purpose stated here. The authors did not care about navigating; or did not know about navigating. They were not navigators.
We can use the stars to understand physics, gravity, special and general relativity. But this is not the purpose stated here. The authors were not physicists.
If the lights being created in heaven include the sun (suggested by the "for days" purpose), we can use that as an energy source, to power cars, to burn ants; as a light source to read by, to paint by, and so on. But the authors did not care about these uses. They cared about marking times of the year, about when to plant, and when to harvest.
I like the fact that this verse ends in a colon. The traditional division into verses is completely insane. So why is my blog verse-oriented? I have no response to that.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Third day
1:13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.
Day one: light.
Day two: heaven.
Day three: dry land, grass and trees.
I was complaining that the parallels weren't quite parallel, but the evening/morning sentences are exactly the same. The only difference here is that someone decided this one should be a verse by itself, unlike the first two. And that decision leaves me with pretty much nothing to write about on this, the thirteenth day.
Day one: light.
Day two: heaven.
Day three: dry land, grass and trees.
I was complaining that the parallels weren't quite parallel, but the evening/morning sentences are exactly the same. The only difference here is that someone decided this one should be a verse by itself, unlike the first two. And that decision leaves me with pretty much nothing to write about on this, the thirteenth day.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Seed after his kind
1:12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw it was good.
There's not much new here, but let me point out that, for all the repetition, the verses rarely perfectly parallel one another. Here, for instance, the "it happened" follows the "and it was so" from the previous verse, while verse 7 reads "it happened: and it was so." Here, as with light and dry land, God saw it was good. But that didn't happen with the creation of heaven.
Also, there's a subtle difference between the repeated parts of this verse and the previous. In the previous verse we had "grass, the herb yielding seed"; now we have "grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind". Before we had "the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself"; now we have "the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind". The distinctions seem too subtle to be important, and apparently God thought it was good enough; but the distinctions are there nonetheless.
This version is a slight improvement technically, since it clarifies that you can't grow barley from wheat seeds. Other than that, what's the point or the differences?
It just makes me want to take a red pen, scribble notes, and get the author to fix the inconsistencies. Or perhaps I should just do the rewrite myself.
There's not much new here, but let me point out that, for all the repetition, the verses rarely perfectly parallel one another. Here, for instance, the "it happened" follows the "and it was so" from the previous verse, while verse 7 reads "it happened: and it was so." Here, as with light and dry land, God saw it was good. But that didn't happen with the creation of heaven.
Also, there's a subtle difference between the repeated parts of this verse and the previous. In the previous verse we had "grass, the herb yielding seed"; now we have "grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind". Before we had "the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself"; now we have "the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind". The distinctions seem too subtle to be important, and apparently God thought it was good enough; but the distinctions are there nonetheless.
This version is a slight improvement technically, since it clarifies that you can't grow barley from wheat seeds. Other than that, what's the point or the differences?
It just makes me want to take a red pen, scribble notes, and get the author to fix the inconsistencies. Or perhaps I should just do the rewrite myself.
Seed
1:11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
Now that the earth has been formed, it's time to fill the void. If I'm parsing this correctly, two things are being created: "grass" and "the fruit tree". The grass is then described or defined, for no immediately obvious reason as "the herb yielding seed". Similar the fruit tree is described as "yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself".
This leaves "Let the earth bring forth grass and the fruit tree upon the earth." I'm not sure at all the significance of the final "upon the earth". I don't see the earth bringing grass forth upon the seas as being a reasonable alternative.
Interesting is that this reads as if God is instructing the earth to do the work, But, since we've already been let down on the magic bits, I can just as easily see a bunch of guys scurrying around, first creating some plant RNA in a lab, then using that to make a few plant cells, which they cultured, and then ran around the dry land planting, watering, fertilizing, lighting.
Going back to the descriptions, there's a couple of points of interest. One interesting phrase is "after his kind." The author had noticed that apple seeds grow into apple trees which bear apples; that fig seeds don't grow into apple trees; that apple trees don't grow figs. We pretty much take this for granted, but this is perhaps the key insight that led to the invention of agriculture. And it's something the author didn't take for granted, but thought was significant.
There's a focus on seeds in both descriptions. Seeds, of course, are important for the plants to reproduce themselves. And they're important for agriculture.
Also, it's striking that "fruit trees" are being created, not just "trees". In fact, based on the "herb yielding seed," I'd suggest that "grass" includes or means grains, wheat and so on. Grains and fruits, the very products of agriculture.
In short, this verse seems to be completely focused on agriculture; specifically on early agriculture. So at this point I'm ready to speculate that this may have been written by a relatively early farmer.
Not much else to say on this verse. It has the same structure as verse 9, "And God said, Let the ...: and it was so." But it has more detailed description than any previous verse. And there's no reason for the descriptions. They make no sense actually being spoken by God as part of a command; they were just very important to the author.
Mildly off track, I can't help but observing that "grass, the herb yielding seed" today sounds like marijuana. It's tough writing something that's going to be read for hundreds of years.
Now that the earth has been formed, it's time to fill the void. If I'm parsing this correctly, two things are being created: "grass" and "the fruit tree". The grass is then described or defined, for no immediately obvious reason as "the herb yielding seed". Similar the fruit tree is described as "yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself".
This leaves "Let the earth bring forth grass and the fruit tree upon the earth." I'm not sure at all the significance of the final "upon the earth". I don't see the earth bringing grass forth upon the seas as being a reasonable alternative.
Interesting is that this reads as if God is instructing the earth to do the work, But, since we've already been let down on the magic bits, I can just as easily see a bunch of guys scurrying around, first creating some plant RNA in a lab, then using that to make a few plant cells, which they cultured, and then ran around the dry land planting, watering, fertilizing, lighting.
Going back to the descriptions, there's a couple of points of interest. One interesting phrase is "after his kind." The author had noticed that apple seeds grow into apple trees which bear apples; that fig seeds don't grow into apple trees; that apple trees don't grow figs. We pretty much take this for granted, but this is perhaps the key insight that led to the invention of agriculture. And it's something the author didn't take for granted, but thought was significant.
There's a focus on seeds in both descriptions. Seeds, of course, are important for the plants to reproduce themselves. And they're important for agriculture.
Also, it's striking that "fruit trees" are being created, not just "trees". In fact, based on the "herb yielding seed," I'd suggest that "grass" includes or means grains, wheat and so on. Grains and fruits, the very products of agriculture.
In short, this verse seems to be completely focused on agriculture; specifically on early agriculture. So at this point I'm ready to speculate that this may have been written by a relatively early farmer.
Not much else to say on this verse. It has the same structure as verse 9, "And God said, Let the ...: and it was so." But it has more detailed description than any previous verse. And there's no reason for the descriptions. They make no sense actually being spoken by God as part of a command; they were just very important to the author.
Mildly off track, I can't help but observing that "grass, the herb yielding seed" today sounds like marijuana. It's tough writing something that's going to be read for hundreds of years.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Dry land Earth
1:10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.
So we get a 4th and 5th name from God. And it's clear that this is in fact the "creation" of earth. Also, we again have an insecure God checking that it's good.
Besides that, there's not much new here. Let me take this opportunity to present a hypothesis about the rather mysterious waters above the heaven.
Right now, we have a 3-level universe. At the bottom, we have the earth on one side and the seas on the other. Above that, we have the heaven. And above that, more waters. This is the world view being described, a world view that someone must have thought was reasonable. I don't have a problem with the flat earth or single sea; those are pretty understandable conjectures for someone who didn't grow up after the moon landing. But why would someone think there is water above heaven?
This is my theory: When you look at the ocean, it looks blue. And when you look at the sky, it looks blue. So, perhaps someone thought a good answer to that ageless question "Why is the sky blue?" was "Because there's an ocean behind it." or "Because it's an ocean." So, the waters above the heaven are obviously there to make the sky blue.
This is only a guess.
This theory, then, would make heaven either the atmosphere or the sky. Which brings me to an odd point about myself. Now that I think about it, I'm not really sure what the sky is. Is it the same as the atmosphere? Is it some not-really-there blue backdrop above the atmosphere? Is it just what you see when you look up? I just tested that idea, and that's definitely ceiling, not sky.
So we get a 4th and 5th name from God. And it's clear that this is in fact the "creation" of earth. Also, we again have an insecure God checking that it's good.
Besides that, there's not much new here. Let me take this opportunity to present a hypothesis about the rather mysterious waters above the heaven.
Right now, we have a 3-level universe. At the bottom, we have the earth on one side and the seas on the other. Above that, we have the heaven. And above that, more waters. This is the world view being described, a world view that someone must have thought was reasonable. I don't have a problem with the flat earth or single sea; those are pretty understandable conjectures for someone who didn't grow up after the moon landing. But why would someone think there is water above heaven?
This is my theory: When you look at the ocean, it looks blue. And when you look at the sky, it looks blue. So, perhaps someone thought a good answer to that ageless question "Why is the sky blue?" was "Because there's an ocean behind it." or "Because it's an ocean." So, the waters above the heaven are obviously there to make the sky blue.
This is only a guess.
This theory, then, would make heaven either the atmosphere or the sky. Which brings me to an odd point about myself. Now that I think about it, I'm not really sure what the sky is. Is it the same as the atmosphere? Is it some not-really-there blue backdrop above the atmosphere? Is it just what you see when you look up? I just tested that idea, and that's definitely ceiling, not sky.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Land
1:9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
First, in case there were any doubts about "Heaven" being the same as "the heaven", this lays them clearly to rest.
Reading this, after the reinterpretation triggered by the last verse, the "and it was so" carries much less of a wallop. I merely picture a bunch of committee members scurrying around with buckets and shovels. This is the "creation" of the earth; it doesn't come from nowhere, but is merely made by organizing the water and the land.
One interesting linguistic point is that this is not a "dividing". The dry land is not explicitly being divided from the water, as the light was from the darkness, or the waters above from those below. Does that make this somehow different? It certainly seems similar. It all makes you think of God as someone who would sort his M&Ms by color.
My last observation on the text is the "in one place" bit. This suggests an earth with a single ocean (and perhaps also that there is more dry land than ocean, but that may be stretching).
On a completely unrelated note, I just noticed that when I hover over one of the buttons in the editor I'm using to write this, it says "Justify". Apparently, if I click on it, it will provide some sort of justification for my blogging. Another button says "Align right", which presumably would drastically change my politics.
First, in case there were any doubts about "Heaven" being the same as "the heaven", this lays them clearly to rest.
Reading this, after the reinterpretation triggered by the last verse, the "and it was so" carries much less of a wallop. I merely picture a bunch of committee members scurrying around with buckets and shovels. This is the "creation" of the earth; it doesn't come from nowhere, but is merely made by organizing the water and the land.
One interesting linguistic point is that this is not a "dividing". The dry land is not explicitly being divided from the water, as the light was from the darkness, or the waters above from those below. Does that make this somehow different? It certainly seems similar. It all makes you think of God as someone who would sort his M&Ms by color.
My last observation on the text is the "in one place" bit. This suggests an earth with a single ocean (and perhaps also that there is more dry land than ocean, but that may be stretching).
On a completely unrelated note, I just noticed that when I hover over one of the buttons in the editor I'm using to write this, it says "Justify". Apparently, if I click on it, it will provide some sort of justification for my blogging. Another button says "Align right", which presumably would drastically change my politics.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
The second day
1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
Now we're getting somewhere. The "firmament" (whatever that may be) is in fact "Heaven" (whatever that may be). So we've gotten to the creation of Heaven. But hold on, wasn't that created way back in the first verse? "God created the heaven and the earth." Barring a subtle distinction between "Heaven" and "the heaven", we've got a problem.
God created heaven, and then two days later created heaven. We have a few options for resolving this:
1. God actually created heaven twice. Not very satisfying.
2. Whoever wrote this wasn't capable of being coherent for eight verses. Also not very satisfying.
3. Despite all of the hints I've discussed, this story isn't progressing serially. Let's go with that one.
Looking back, we can completely reinterpret the first few verses. The first verse could be an overview: "In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth." And then it goes into detail: "The way that happened was this. Before God did his creating, the earth was formless, empty, dark, watery. The Spirit of God was out for a swim, when God grew bored with the darkness and decided to create some light."
A quick point before I go into this interpretation in any more detail. If this is the correct interpretation, the first few of sentences are terribly unclear or misleading. Until you hit the 8th verse, you have a much more straightforward interpretation to go with. So, we have strong evidence here that the document is badly written.
This interpretation makes the first verse much less impressive, frankly. If the earth and water and darkness and God were all already around, "In the beginning" doesn't sound like "In The Beginning Of Time" so much as it sounds like "Our story begins one evening". "God created the heaven and the earth" doesn't sound like "Wham! God made heaven and earth from nothing." Instead, it now reads more like, "I'm going to tell you the tedious process by which God with great difficulty succeeded in creating heaven and earth." In fact, since the earth was already around, God didn't even really create it at all, so much as he shaped it from existing materials, made it go from unformed to formed, empty to full. So, this makes God sound less like the magical all-powerful Creator the more straightforward interpretation of the first verse suggests, and more like a talented sculptor or builder.
This is in keeping with the impressions of God we got from later verses: pretty much human-like, maybe even a committee. It also suggests that perhaps there were more details to the magic-sounding parts that have been omitted for brevity. "God said, Let there be light. And he dug in the earth until he found a methane source, and then he found a couple of pieces of flint, and there was light." So the impressiveness of God drops way off.
Ok, let's get back to verse 8. God gives a name to Heaven, as he did to Day and Night.
And this was the second day. That's particularly odd, given that we now associate day and night with the rotation of the earth, which doesn't necessarily seem to be the case here; all we apparently have is light separated from darkness; why the cycling between Day and Night? The first day we could understand as the creation of light after endless darkness, but what led to the second evening and morning?
And we're not much closer to understanding what is meant by "heaven" yet, although we now know that it's a firmament.
Now we're getting somewhere. The "firmament" (whatever that may be) is in fact "Heaven" (whatever that may be). So we've gotten to the creation of Heaven. But hold on, wasn't that created way back in the first verse? "God created the heaven and the earth." Barring a subtle distinction between "Heaven" and "the heaven", we've got a problem.
God created heaven, and then two days later created heaven. We have a few options for resolving this:
1. God actually created heaven twice. Not very satisfying.
2. Whoever wrote this wasn't capable of being coherent for eight verses. Also not very satisfying.
3. Despite all of the hints I've discussed, this story isn't progressing serially. Let's go with that one.
Looking back, we can completely reinterpret the first few verses. The first verse could be an overview: "In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth." And then it goes into detail: "The way that happened was this. Before God did his creating, the earth was formless, empty, dark, watery. The Spirit of God was out for a swim, when God grew bored with the darkness and decided to create some light."
A quick point before I go into this interpretation in any more detail. If this is the correct interpretation, the first few of sentences are terribly unclear or misleading. Until you hit the 8th verse, you have a much more straightforward interpretation to go with. So, we have strong evidence here that the document is badly written.
This interpretation makes the first verse much less impressive, frankly. If the earth and water and darkness and God were all already around, "In the beginning" doesn't sound like "In The Beginning Of Time" so much as it sounds like "Our story begins one evening". "God created the heaven and the earth" doesn't sound like "Wham! God made heaven and earth from nothing." Instead, it now reads more like, "I'm going to tell you the tedious process by which God with great difficulty succeeded in creating heaven and earth." In fact, since the earth was already around, God didn't even really create it at all, so much as he shaped it from existing materials, made it go from unformed to formed, empty to full. So, this makes God sound less like the magical all-powerful Creator the more straightforward interpretation of the first verse suggests, and more like a talented sculptor or builder.
This is in keeping with the impressions of God we got from later verses: pretty much human-like, maybe even a committee. It also suggests that perhaps there were more details to the magic-sounding parts that have been omitted for brevity. "God said, Let there be light. And he dug in the earth until he found a methane source, and then he found a couple of pieces of flint, and there was light." So the impressiveness of God drops way off.
Ok, let's get back to verse 8. God gives a name to Heaven, as he did to Day and Night.
And this was the second day. That's particularly odd, given that we now associate day and night with the rotation of the earth, which doesn't necessarily seem to be the case here; all we apparently have is light separated from darkness; why the cycling between Day and Night? The first day we could understand as the creation of light after endless darkness, but what led to the second evening and morning?
And we're not much closer to understanding what is meant by "heaven" yet, although we now know that it's a firmament.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Waters which were
1:7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
Who could have seen this coming after the "Let there be a firmament" in the previous verse?
This was predictable, but it adds to our knowledge in one specific way: the division was between low and high, "under" and "above". Actually, a little startling. When I picture water being divided, I see a left/right division. This is interesting and different, but still not terribly informative, since we still have no clue as to what the firmament was.
One interesting point is that this is different from the creation of light. Instead of the firmament just suddenly being, we now have God explicitly making it. Which definitely points to God as a committee; why else say you want a firmament and then make it, unless you're one subcommittee communicating with another?
A less interesting point is that the last phrase "and it was so" is completely pointless. What are the other options, " ... just kidding, no firmament"?
Who could have seen this coming after the "Let there be a firmament" in the previous verse?
This was predictable, but it adds to our knowledge in one specific way: the division was between low and high, "under" and "above". Actually, a little startling. When I picture water being divided, I see a left/right division. This is interesting and different, but still not terribly informative, since we still have no clue as to what the firmament was.
One interesting point is that this is different from the creation of light. Instead of the firmament just suddenly being, we now have God explicitly making it. Which definitely points to God as a committee; why else say you want a firmament and then make it, unless you're one subcommittee communicating with another?
A less interesting point is that the last phrase "and it was so" is completely pointless. What are the other options, " ... just kidding, no firmament"?
Monday, September 21, 2009
Let there be a firmament
1:6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
Here's something new. Instead of a word (like "God" or "heaven") where I worry about piles of preconceptions affecting my interpretation, we have a word "firmament" which means absolutely nothing to me. I know the word only insomuch as I am familiar with this verse (and some which follow shortly). To the best of my knowledge, I've never heard the word used outside of quoting Genesis. Perhaps it was in everyday use back in King James' time, or perhaps the translators punted.
So, I'm going to hold off on doing much interpretation of this, since it's not yet clear what this firmament might be.
Ok, one thing we can say is we're repeating the style of the light creation. God is speaking, "Let there be a firmament." Here's it more drawn out, though. Instead of just slapping on "and there was a firmament", instead we have God explaining where the firmament is, and what the purpose of the firmament is, at least at a basic level. It's in the waters, and dividing them from themselves. Again, this basically reads like God sketching firmament plans for a contractor: So we've got these waters over here, see? And the firmament is gonna go right here, so that it divides these waters on this side from these other waters on the other side. That way, the waters aren't just all right up against each other. I hate the way my waters are touching like that.
So, dividing the waters from the waters seems to be the purpose of the firmament, although it's not made clear why one would want to divide the waters from the waters.
Oh, and what waters? That's less than clear at this point. The waters were there back in verse 2, when the earth was without form. Since not much has happened since besides the creation of light, presumably the earth is still without form, and these are the same waters mentioned then. Are they oceans? What oceans are we separating from what other oceans?
Ok, 6 verses and 2 divisions. God divided the light from the darkness; and now he wants the waters divided from the waters. He's a divider, not a uniter.
Which brings us to the point that there's an astounding amount of repetition in these lines. Every phrase begins with "and". This is our second "And God said, Let there be...". This line alone contains "the waters" three times. Poetry? Indoctrination? Bad writing? An accurate reflection of the way people speak? God only knows.
Here's something new. Instead of a word (like "God" or "heaven") where I worry about piles of preconceptions affecting my interpretation, we have a word "firmament" which means absolutely nothing to me. I know the word only insomuch as I am familiar with this verse (and some which follow shortly). To the best of my knowledge, I've never heard the word used outside of quoting Genesis. Perhaps it was in everyday use back in King James' time, or perhaps the translators punted.
So, I'm going to hold off on doing much interpretation of this, since it's not yet clear what this firmament might be.
Ok, one thing we can say is we're repeating the style of the light creation. God is speaking, "Let there be a firmament." Here's it more drawn out, though. Instead of just slapping on "and there was a firmament", instead we have God explaining where the firmament is, and what the purpose of the firmament is, at least at a basic level. It's in the waters, and dividing them from themselves. Again, this basically reads like God sketching firmament plans for a contractor: So we've got these waters over here, see? And the firmament is gonna go right here, so that it divides these waters on this side from these other waters on the other side. That way, the waters aren't just all right up against each other. I hate the way my waters are touching like that.
So, dividing the waters from the waters seems to be the purpose of the firmament, although it's not made clear why one would want to divide the waters from the waters.
Oh, and what waters? That's less than clear at this point. The waters were there back in verse 2, when the earth was without form. Since not much has happened since besides the creation of light, presumably the earth is still without form, and these are the same waters mentioned then. Are they oceans? What oceans are we separating from what other oceans?
Ok, 6 verses and 2 divisions. God divided the light from the darkness; and now he wants the waters divided from the waters. He's a divider, not a uniter.
Which brings us to the point that there's an astounding amount of repetition in these lines. Every phrase begins with "and". This is our second "And God said, Let there be...". This line alone contains "the waters" three times. Poetry? Indoctrination? Bad writing? An accurate reflection of the way people speak? God only knows.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Darkness he called Night
1:5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
Ok, first a completely straightforward interpretion. The darkness existed before the light was created (and separated from the darkness). This darkness was a long night, and the separation of light from darkness marked the first morning.
How long did the darkness exist? It was around in verse 2, before the creation of the light in verse 3. It wasn't explicitly created; perhaps it was around before The Beginning.
To me, day and night are related to my position on the earth relative to the sun, and change with the rotation of the earth or with my moving around on earth. But this Day and Night seem to be just light and darkness, separated somehow from each other, not tied to the sun and earth.
Is the creation of light (or its separation from darkness) the same as the first morning, or are they somehow distinct? It's not entirely clear, but the juxtaposition of the naming of Day and Night with the first evening and morning makes it seem like it was intended that they are the same.
With that interpretation, the chronology is:
0. The Beginning. God is already there, and perhaps darkness.
1. Heaven and earth are created.
2. It is clearly night; and probably at least as far back as The Beginning.
3. Light is created, but not separated from darkness. The first pre-dawn.
4. Separation. Almost the first morning, but we're not calling it that yet.
5. Day and Night are named by God. And now we're officially identifying the previous time as Night, the current time as Day, and asserting that the first morning is completed.
There's an emphasis here on the naming of Day and Night. And, interestingly, those words are God's. Of course, this is just an English translation, so not so much. But in the original, whatever that may be, presumably these are words that come directly from God.
Words, of course, have sounds; this again suggests that God is speaking, that God has a mouth, that God is a physical being. Further, words have purpose: communication. This suggests that God is speaking to someone else. This again suggests a committee or contractor.
Naming the light and darkness occurs immediately after dividing them from each other. This again suggests a sequentiality to the verses. However, mentioning the evening at the point suggests a quick jump backwards. The last phrase, then, can be considered a summary of everything that went before. We now have a completed description of the first day after The Beginning.
Ok, first a completely straightforward interpretion. The darkness existed before the light was created (and separated from the darkness). This darkness was a long night, and the separation of light from darkness marked the first morning.
How long did the darkness exist? It was around in verse 2, before the creation of the light in verse 3. It wasn't explicitly created; perhaps it was around before The Beginning.
To me, day and night are related to my position on the earth relative to the sun, and change with the rotation of the earth or with my moving around on earth. But this Day and Night seem to be just light and darkness, separated somehow from each other, not tied to the sun and earth.
Is the creation of light (or its separation from darkness) the same as the first morning, or are they somehow distinct? It's not entirely clear, but the juxtaposition of the naming of Day and Night with the first evening and morning makes it seem like it was intended that they are the same.
With that interpretation, the chronology is:
0. The Beginning. God is already there, and perhaps darkness.
1. Heaven and earth are created.
2. It is clearly night; and probably at least as far back as The Beginning.
3. Light is created, but not separated from darkness. The first pre-dawn.
4. Separation. Almost the first morning, but we're not calling it that yet.
5. Day and Night are named by God. And now we're officially identifying the previous time as Night, the current time as Day, and asserting that the first morning is completed.
There's an emphasis here on the naming of Day and Night. And, interestingly, those words are God's. Of course, this is just an English translation, so not so much. But in the original, whatever that may be, presumably these are words that come directly from God.
Words, of course, have sounds; this again suggests that God is speaking, that God has a mouth, that God is a physical being. Further, words have purpose: communication. This suggests that God is speaking to someone else. This again suggests a committee or contractor.
Naming the light and darkness occurs immediately after dividing them from each other. This again suggests a sequentiality to the verses. However, mentioning the evening at the point suggests a quick jump backwards. The last phrase, then, can be considered a summary of everything that went before. We now have a completed description of the first day after The Beginning.
Light from the darkness
1:4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
God sees; again, this suggests a God with eyes; a physical, human-like God.
Ignoring modern metaphorical meanings, which I assume don't apply here, "saw the light" is a pretty odd phrase in some ways. Technically, eyes are essentially photon detectors; everything seen is light. But, usually, we talk of seeing something which is reflecting light (or occasionally, generating it). That is "When I turned on the light, I could see the sofa, dusty under the gray dim bulb." But here we have light, without any particular source ("and there was light"), and that's what God is looking at.
One last, minor point on the first phrase. This again is suggesting a strong, solid sequentiality to these events. Make the earth, describe the earth. Make the light, see the light.
More interesting is what the next phrase seems to tell us about God. God saw that the light was good. This implies to me that before that, God didn't know that the light would be good. That the light could have been flawed. If God was the creator of the light, this means that God was half-expecting himself to screw up.
Alternately, this could again be interpreted as God hiring a contractor. God said to the contractor, Let there be a kitchen. And the contractor made a kitchen, and God saw the kitchen, and the kitchen was awful. And God said, small-claims court. And the kitchen got better.
Or, from the committee viewpoint, after the action subcommittee made the light, the quality assurance subcommittee signed off on the light being good.
Regardless of whether God was expecting himself to ruin the light, or some committee to ruin it, this is distinctly a God who is not all-powerful, all-knowing. This is a God with limitations, with the potential for imperfection or failure.
On to the second clause. I'm going to refrain from using the phrase "God divided" to try to argue that God was a mathematician.
Darkness was mentioned a couple verses back, and I wrote that I consider darkness to be an absence of light. But this seems like a darkness which is more real, more of an equal of the light. It also suggests that light can be somehow mixed with darkness, which seems just as odd. I'm not clear on what that could even mean.
Further, we have a two step process: creating light, and then separating it from darkness. (Checking that it's good may be a third step.) Again, at best this is a God who can make light from nothing, but who can't make it already separated from the darkness.
So, in these 4 verses we have a portrait of God, speaking and seeing, powerful but insecure, impressive but imperfect.
God sees; again, this suggests a God with eyes; a physical, human-like God.
Ignoring modern metaphorical meanings, which I assume don't apply here, "saw the light" is a pretty odd phrase in some ways. Technically, eyes are essentially photon detectors; everything seen is light. But, usually, we talk of seeing something which is reflecting light (or occasionally, generating it). That is "When I turned on the light, I could see the sofa, dusty under the gray dim bulb." But here we have light, without any particular source ("and there was light"), and that's what God is looking at.
One last, minor point on the first phrase. This again is suggesting a strong, solid sequentiality to these events. Make the earth, describe the earth. Make the light, see the light.
More interesting is what the next phrase seems to tell us about God. God saw that the light was good. This implies to me that before that, God didn't know that the light would be good. That the light could have been flawed. If God was the creator of the light, this means that God was half-expecting himself to screw up.
Alternately, this could again be interpreted as God hiring a contractor. God said to the contractor, Let there be a kitchen. And the contractor made a kitchen, and God saw the kitchen, and the kitchen was awful. And God said, small-claims court. And the kitchen got better.
Or, from the committee viewpoint, after the action subcommittee made the light, the quality assurance subcommittee signed off on the light being good.
Regardless of whether God was expecting himself to ruin the light, or some committee to ruin it, this is distinctly a God who is not all-powerful, all-knowing. This is a God with limitations, with the potential for imperfection or failure.
On to the second clause. I'm going to refrain from using the phrase "God divided" to try to argue that God was a mathematician.
Darkness was mentioned a couple verses back, and I wrote that I consider darkness to be an absence of light. But this seems like a darkness which is more real, more of an equal of the light. It also suggests that light can be somehow mixed with darkness, which seems just as odd. I'm not clear on what that could even mean.
Further, we have a two step process: creating light, and then separating it from darkness. (Checking that it's good may be a third step.) Again, at best this is a God who can make light from nothing, but who can't make it already separated from the darkness.
So, in these 4 verses we have a portrait of God, speaking and seeing, powerful but insecure, impressive but imperfect.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Light
1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
Can you imagine walking into a dark room, and with hardly any effort (as easy as, say, flipping a switch) causing the room to become brightly illuminated? Ok, sure with modern technology....
Still, it's an awesome line. Speak and it is done; word into deed. Again, God is seeming mighty impressive.
So, we now have God having created 3 things: heaven, earth, light. But here's an interesting point. God didn't say, "Let there be the heaven." God didn't say, "Let there be the earth." But God created the heaven and the earth. So it raises this odd question: did God not create the light?
Also, this gives us another data point about God. He speaks. He gives commands. This doesn't sound like an abstract non-corporeal God; not like the sort of God who might be around before The Beginning. This seems more like a human God, albeit a regal and powerful one. This seems like a God with lungs, vocal cords, tongue, teeth, lips.
So, let's try some parallels. The king said, "Build me a castle."; and they built him a castle. Kennedy said, "Let's go to the moon." And we went to the moon.
Taken that way, God seems powerful in some sense, but not quite as impressive. In this interpretation, it's not much better than: God looked up "Lighting" in the Yellow Pages. God called a specialist who gave him an outrageous estimate, but they bargained down to something more reasonable. The specialist drove his pickup truck to the Home Depot, and loaded up on fluorescent bulbs. With a couple of assistants who probably weren't technically legal, the job was done in a few hours.
You can almost interpret this as: God is the leader of a group, or even the group itself. God is a committee. The planning subcommittee said, Let there be light; and the action subcommittee made the light. Think about it this way: why speak unless you're communicating to someone?
Ok, we've gotten this far without bringing Philip K. Dick into it at all. But now I'm obligated to quote from his classic book VALIS. For a little background, Fat is one of two characters in the book who are Phil Dick himself. Dick was (as you can read below) into German, in which "dicke" means "fat".
Can you imagine walking into a dark room, and with hardly any effort (as easy as, say, flipping a switch) causing the room to become brightly illuminated? Ok, sure with modern technology....
Still, it's an awesome line. Speak and it is done; word into deed. Again, God is seeming mighty impressive.
So, we now have God having created 3 things: heaven, earth, light. But here's an interesting point. God didn't say, "Let there be the heaven." God didn't say, "Let there be the earth." But God created the heaven and the earth. So it raises this odd question: did God not create the light?
Also, this gives us another data point about God. He speaks. He gives commands. This doesn't sound like an abstract non-corporeal God; not like the sort of God who might be around before The Beginning. This seems more like a human God, albeit a regal and powerful one. This seems like a God with lungs, vocal cords, tongue, teeth, lips.
So, let's try some parallels. The king said, "Build me a castle."; and they built him a castle. Kennedy said, "Let's go to the moon." And we went to the moon.
Taken that way, God seems powerful in some sense, but not quite as impressive. In this interpretation, it's not much better than: God looked up "Lighting" in the Yellow Pages. God called a specialist who gave him an outrageous estimate, but they bargained down to something more reasonable. The specialist drove his pickup truck to the Home Depot, and loaded up on fluorescent bulbs. With a couple of assistants who probably weren't technically legal, the job was done in a few hours.
You can almost interpret this as: God is the leader of a group, or even the group itself. God is a committee. The planning subcommittee said, Let there be light; and the action subcommittee made the light. Think about it this way: why speak unless you're communicating to someone?
Ok, we've gotten this far without bringing Philip K. Dick into it at all. But now I'm obligated to quote from his classic book VALIS. For a little background, Fat is one of two characters in the book who are Phil Dick himself. Dick was (as you can read below) into German, in which "dicke" means "fat".
"That's the existential position," Fat said. "Based on the concept that We are what we do, rather than, We are what we think. It finds its first expression in Goethe's Faust, Part One, where Faust says, `lm Anfang war das Wort.' He's quoting the opening of the Fourth Gospel; `In the beginning was the Word.' Faust says, `Nein, Im Anfang war die Tat.' `In the beginning was the deed.' From this, all existentialism comes." Maurice stared at him as if he were a bug.In case you weren't paying attention, that was me quoting Dick supposedly quoting Fat quoting Goethe supposedly quoting Faust quoting a bible. Ta-da!
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Void and darkness
1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
A couple of minor structural points. This is one verse, but two sentences. The division into verses, while newer than the text, is still old, traditional, oddball and unimportant. The text predates modern concepts of punctuation; I think the division into sentences is also newer than the text.
More interesting is the business of starting sentences with "And". And not just sentences, but independent clauses start with "and" as well. My elementary school teachers told me not to do this, but I quite like it here. It makes for a strong sense of continuity. It's not quite as powerful as starting the whole thing off with "In the beginning", but it's still strong.
Ok, the earth was created in the first verse, and the newly-created earth is being described. It is "without form, and void". I believe the correct interpretation of "void" here is "empty"; not yet populated with people or animals or plants. What "without form" means is less clear. Not yet spherical? Maybe it's a repetition of "void" and just means not covered in plants and animals.
The next bit is fairly mysterious: "darkness was upon the face of the deep". What's "the deep"? Is it the formless earth? Is it "the heaven", also created in the first verse, but not obviously mentioned here. I'll take "face" just to mean "surface", and even that to be vague. I consider "darkness" to simply be the absence of light; but perhaps something else is intended here.
Now we come to "the Spirit of God". Is this an odd way to describe God? Is it a part of God? Is it something belonging to or working for God? Surely not clear to me. But "moved" I understand, at least somewhat. "Moved" is nice and physical, motion, action, changing position. While the first verse suggests that God is non-physical, this one suggests that the Spirit of God is physical, that it has a position, and that position changes.
Finally, "upon the face of the waters." Trivial note: one verse, two uses of the word "face". Again, "surface" seems the right interpretation; even better here, since "waters" actually can have a surface, while who knows if "the deep" does. And "the waters" is the most interesting bit. That's something we understand, something physical, concrete, and wet. We've touched water, drunk it, swam in it. Still a bit mysterious: is it part of "the earth"? Definitely in my image of Earth seen from the Moon, but it contrasts with another sense of "earth": dirt, ground. Were the waters created with the earth? Were they there before the beginning?
Well, this was a wholely unsatisfying verse. Raised a lot of questions. I only learned from it, I think, two things, both pretty minor. First, we seem to be progressing sequentially in time (albeit slowly), telling a story, by describing the earth as empty after it was created. Second and weaker, we're implying some physical reality for the Spirit of God, if not for God himself. Besides that, not much but some cool-sounding phrases.
Ok, maybe one more thing, which becomes even clearer later: God created the earth, which is pretty impressive; but didn't create it fully formed and fully populated, which would be still more impressive. Which implicitly puts a limitation on God: not all-impressive, just very impressive.
A couple of minor structural points. This is one verse, but two sentences. The division into verses, while newer than the text, is still old, traditional, oddball and unimportant. The text predates modern concepts of punctuation; I think the division into sentences is also newer than the text.
More interesting is the business of starting sentences with "And". And not just sentences, but independent clauses start with "and" as well. My elementary school teachers told me not to do this, but I quite like it here. It makes for a strong sense of continuity. It's not quite as powerful as starting the whole thing off with "In the beginning", but it's still strong.
Ok, the earth was created in the first verse, and the newly-created earth is being described. It is "without form, and void". I believe the correct interpretation of "void" here is "empty"; not yet populated with people or animals or plants. What "without form" means is less clear. Not yet spherical? Maybe it's a repetition of "void" and just means not covered in plants and animals.
The next bit is fairly mysterious: "darkness was upon the face of the deep". What's "the deep"? Is it the formless earth? Is it "the heaven", also created in the first verse, but not obviously mentioned here. I'll take "face" just to mean "surface", and even that to be vague. I consider "darkness" to simply be the absence of light; but perhaps something else is intended here.
Now we come to "the Spirit of God". Is this an odd way to describe God? Is it a part of God? Is it something belonging to or working for God? Surely not clear to me. But "moved" I understand, at least somewhat. "Moved" is nice and physical, motion, action, changing position. While the first verse suggests that God is non-physical, this one suggests that the Spirit of God is physical, that it has a position, and that position changes.
Finally, "upon the face of the waters." Trivial note: one verse, two uses of the word "face". Again, "surface" seems the right interpretation; even better here, since "waters" actually can have a surface, while who knows if "the deep" does. And "the waters" is the most interesting bit. That's something we understand, something physical, concrete, and wet. We've touched water, drunk it, swam in it. Still a bit mysterious: is it part of "the earth"? Definitely in my image of Earth seen from the Moon, but it contrasts with another sense of "earth": dirt, ground. Were the waters created with the earth? Were they there before the beginning?
Well, this was a wholely unsatisfying verse. Raised a lot of questions. I only learned from it, I think, two things, both pretty minor. First, we seem to be progressing sequentially in time (albeit slowly), telling a story, by describing the earth as empty after it was created. Second and weaker, we're implying some physical reality for the Spirit of God, if not for God himself. Besides that, not much but some cool-sounding phrases.
Ok, maybe one more thing, which becomes even clearer later: God created the earth, which is pretty impressive; but didn't create it fully formed and fully populated, which would be still more impressive. Which implicitly puts a limitation on God: not all-impressive, just very impressive.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
In the beginning
I've grown bored waiting and waiting for the one with a clever blog name to actually do some blogging. And I've come up with a name of my own. "Beret" as in hat. And "Sheet" as in a document. As in a particular document which is old hat to many of us. Ok, not that clever. Sorry.
That's right, in Nathan's honor, I'm going to be writing about that infamous book. The Book. The one which was originally published in that awesome white-fire-on-black-fire font. Yeah, the Judeo-Christian Bible. Specifically, the beginning of it, the first parts of Genesis.
From what I've heard, the first few chapters of Genesis are not the oldest part of the Bible. Apparently Job has that distinction. But, it does come first, in the internal chronology, and when you open the book. It seems like the logical place to begin. After all, they always say, "Begin at the beginning." And, in fact, it begins "In the beginning...". How cool is that? It sounds so authoritative.
1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
By the way, by default I'm going to quote the King James Version. It's probably not the best translation, and I'll refer to others as needed, but it's the one that sounds familiar to me.
Ok, we're reading a text, and this is how it starts. We're full of prejudices, but we're trying to set them aside as we try to understand the text. What does it say? What does it mean? What was the author trying to tell us? What did the author tell us?
"Last Monday Kevin built a doghouse and a bird feeder." To me, this tells a little story. On Sunday there was no doghouse or bird feeder, but Kevin was at Home Depot buying wood, saws, hammers. On Monday, Kevin was sweaty, industrious and inhaling sawdust. On Tuesday the doghouse and bird feeder were happily housing dogs and feeding birds in Kevin's back yard.
But "Last Monday" is hardly the same as "In the beginning". In the beginning of what? Well, that gets answered pretty quick: in the beginning of the heaven and the earth. Now, I'm not ready to interpret what "heaven" means in this sentence; "heaven" is something people disagree on. But we all pretty well know what "earth" is. We've all seen pictures of Earth taken from the Moon; inevitably, that's what I imagine when I hear "the earth". That's probably not exactly the image the authors had in mind, as the passage is generally considered to have been written before the Moon landing. But still, we've all been to the earth; most of us live there. Er, here. So, the beginning of the earth. Definitely before my time. Way way back. It's pretty reasonable for most purposes to call that the beginning, full stop. "The Beginning." With a capital letter, and all.
So, ok, we're talking about what happened in The Beginning. This is a story with scope. In fact, this is a sentence with scope. Pretty exciting stuff. And two things happened in The Beginning: God created the earth; and God created the heaven. Still setting heaven aside, we all know that the earth is pretty big. Even if we haven't seen pictures of it from space, or looked up its circumference, we've taken some very long walks on it without reaching the end of it. Ok, sure, it's roughly spherical, so there isn't really an end, but still, it's a big sphere. So, creating it is quite a task. You'd need a pretty good project manager for it. So, Kevin must be a pretty impressive person. Oops, sorry. I mean, God must be a pretty impressive person. After all, he created the earth.
So this first sentence doesn't tell us much about what the author means by heaven, but it does get started on what is meant by "God". We learn two things about God, other than that he's likely to be a main character in the text. One: he created the earth (and the heaven), so he's impressive. Two: he was already around at The Beginning, and presumably Before The Beginning.
A note: I'm using "he" as a pronoun for "God". Apologies to those who would prefer "He" or "she" or something else. For now, I also want to leave open the "it" option; when a beaver creates a dam, we still call it "it".
The fact that God existed before the heaven or the earth suggests to me that God isn't a person. That God doesn't walk and breathe and eat and sweat.
Now, there's the possibility that The Beginning is even more capitalized: THE Beginning. THE Beginning of the universe, THE Beginning of time. That would make God pretty clearly non-corporeal, non-physical, abstract. It's not even clear what "before the beginning of time" means, so "abstract" is an understatement. But, if it's just (just!) The Beginning of the earth, then it's less clear.
Ok, let me suggest that there's one hint in this sentence about "heaven", although it's clearly debatable. "The heaven" is parallel to "the earth"; they were both created in the beginning by God. We all know that the earth is a nice physical real place we all visit occasionally. That suggests that "the heaven" here is intended to be something physical, tangible.
Some other things should be clear by now. One, I can ramble on a lot, even talking about a single sentence. Two, when I say I'm trying to set my prejudices aside, part of what I mean is that I'm trying very hard not to read anything in the words "God" and "heaven" that are not intended.
Here's a beginning for you: We all have, floating around in our heads, our own personal concepts of what "God" and "heaven" mean. For most of us, directly and indirectly, those concepts derive from this text. Now, this text was not the beginning of those concepts; the concepts are older, probably much older. But in cultures which are predominantly Christian, at least historically, the concepts largely come through this Bible. So, there's something interesting about trying to understand what the author intended.
Another aside: I'm saying "author", but I really mean "author or authors". And probably "authors". This story was probably told and retold and rethought and redesigned for many generations before being written down. But that's a prejudice of mine, most likely. Regardless, we can treat the text as having an author; and try to understand the author through the text.
That's right, in Nathan's honor, I'm going to be writing about that infamous book. The Book. The one which was originally published in that awesome white-fire-on-black-fire font. Yeah, the Judeo-Christian Bible. Specifically, the beginning of it, the first parts of Genesis.
From what I've heard, the first few chapters of Genesis are not the oldest part of the Bible. Apparently Job has that distinction. But, it does come first, in the internal chronology, and when you open the book. It seems like the logical place to begin. After all, they always say, "Begin at the beginning." And, in fact, it begins "In the beginning...". How cool is that? It sounds so authoritative.
1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
By the way, by default I'm going to quote the King James Version. It's probably not the best translation, and I'll refer to others as needed, but it's the one that sounds familiar to me.
Ok, we're reading a text, and this is how it starts. We're full of prejudices, but we're trying to set them aside as we try to understand the text. What does it say? What does it mean? What was the author trying to tell us? What did the author tell us?
"Last Monday Kevin built a doghouse and a bird feeder." To me, this tells a little story. On Sunday there was no doghouse or bird feeder, but Kevin was at Home Depot buying wood, saws, hammers. On Monday, Kevin was sweaty, industrious and inhaling sawdust. On Tuesday the doghouse and bird feeder were happily housing dogs and feeding birds in Kevin's back yard.
But "Last Monday" is hardly the same as "In the beginning". In the beginning of what? Well, that gets answered pretty quick: in the beginning of the heaven and the earth. Now, I'm not ready to interpret what "heaven" means in this sentence; "heaven" is something people disagree on. But we all pretty well know what "earth" is. We've all seen pictures of Earth taken from the Moon; inevitably, that's what I imagine when I hear "the earth". That's probably not exactly the image the authors had in mind, as the passage is generally considered to have been written before the Moon landing. But still, we've all been to the earth; most of us live there. Er, here. So, the beginning of the earth. Definitely before my time. Way way back. It's pretty reasonable for most purposes to call that the beginning, full stop. "The Beginning." With a capital letter, and all.
So, ok, we're talking about what happened in The Beginning. This is a story with scope. In fact, this is a sentence with scope. Pretty exciting stuff. And two things happened in The Beginning: God created the earth; and God created the heaven. Still setting heaven aside, we all know that the earth is pretty big. Even if we haven't seen pictures of it from space, or looked up its circumference, we've taken some very long walks on it without reaching the end of it. Ok, sure, it's roughly spherical, so there isn't really an end, but still, it's a big sphere. So, creating it is quite a task. You'd need a pretty good project manager for it. So, Kevin must be a pretty impressive person. Oops, sorry. I mean, God must be a pretty impressive person. After all, he created the earth.
So this first sentence doesn't tell us much about what the author means by heaven, but it does get started on what is meant by "God". We learn two things about God, other than that he's likely to be a main character in the text. One: he created the earth (and the heaven), so he's impressive. Two: he was already around at The Beginning, and presumably Before The Beginning.
A note: I'm using "he" as a pronoun for "God". Apologies to those who would prefer "He" or "she" or something else. For now, I also want to leave open the "it" option; when a beaver creates a dam, we still call it "it".
The fact that God existed before the heaven or the earth suggests to me that God isn't a person. That God doesn't walk and breathe and eat and sweat.
Now, there's the possibility that The Beginning is even more capitalized: THE Beginning. THE Beginning of the universe, THE Beginning of time. That would make God pretty clearly non-corporeal, non-physical, abstract. It's not even clear what "before the beginning of time" means, so "abstract" is an understatement. But, if it's just (just!) The Beginning of the earth, then it's less clear.
Ok, let me suggest that there's one hint in this sentence about "heaven", although it's clearly debatable. "The heaven" is parallel to "the earth"; they were both created in the beginning by God. We all know that the earth is a nice physical real place we all visit occasionally. That suggests that "the heaven" here is intended to be something physical, tangible.
Some other things should be clear by now. One, I can ramble on a lot, even talking about a single sentence. Two, when I say I'm trying to set my prejudices aside, part of what I mean is that I'm trying very hard not to read anything in the words "God" and "heaven" that are not intended.
Here's a beginning for you: We all have, floating around in our heads, our own personal concepts of what "God" and "heaven" mean. For most of us, directly and indirectly, those concepts derive from this text. Now, this text was not the beginning of those concepts; the concepts are older, probably much older. But in cultures which are predominantly Christian, at least historically, the concepts largely come through this Bible. So, there's something interesting about trying to understand what the author intended.
Another aside: I'm saying "author", but I really mean "author or authors". And probably "authors". This story was probably told and retold and rethought and redesigned for many generations before being written down. But that's a prejudice of mine, most likely. Regardless, we can treat the text as having an author; and try to understand the author through the text.
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