Creatio Ex Nihilo [Genesis 1:1–3 Study]
An introduction to the book of Genesis and an examination of Genesis 1:1–3. God created everything out of nothing (creatio ex nihilo).
Introduction to Genesis
- Genesis is the first book of the Torah or Pentateuch
- Torah is viewed as one literary piece
Author of the Pentateuch
- OT passages attribute the Torah (Law) to Moses
- “Book of Moses” (2 Chronicles; Nehemiah 13:1)
- “Law of Moses” (Kings; Ezra; Daniel)
- Early Jewish and Christian sources accept Moses authorship
- Luke 24:27; John 7:22-23; Acts 15:1
- Philo, Josephus, Talmud and Mishnah
- Three evangelical views on authorship
- Moses is the exclusive author of Genesis
- Moses is substantial author of Genesis (Our View)
- Anonymous final compiler of Genesis using sources written by Moses
- Moses wrote narrative, law, and poetry in Torah, but he was not the final author or compiler.
- Conclusion: Moses is the substantial author, and God is the ultimate divine author.
Date of the Pentateuch
- before Moses’ death in 1405 BC
- after book of Job (written by Elihu, Eliphaz, or Job himself in 2000 BC)
- some argue Israelites were not literate until 8th century BC
- writings on walls of Egyptian Turquoise Mines by slaves in 1900 BC.
Genre of Genesis
- Primarily prose narrative
- Genesis 1 is not poetry
- Lacks parallelism
- Not the grammar of Hebrew poetry
- Poetry does not commonly use of Hebrew definite article.
- Poetry has limited use of relative pronoun “which.”
- Poetry has limited use of sequential verb forms
- Hebrew word Wayyiqtol relatively infrequent in poetry.
- accusative marker relatively infrequent in poetry.
- No metaphors
- No imagery except in Genesis 1:2
- We believe and assume the divine inspiration and the inerrancy of Scripture
- We believe that Genesis 1-11 is history, not myth.
- We believe Genesis 12-50 is history, not legend.
Ancient Near East Worldview vs. Hebrew worldview
- polytheism vs monotheism
- Physical images vs iconoclasm
- Eternal matter vs eternal spirit
- Low view of god vs high view of god
- Low view of humanity vs high view of humanityœ
- Everlasting conflict between good and evil vs no conflict
- No uniform standard of ethics vs one standard of ethics
Geography of Genesis
- 1-3: Eden
- 4-6: East of Eden
- 7-9: Ark and Mountains of Ararat
- 10-11: Babel and Babylon
- 12-36: Ur and Canaan
- 37-50: Egypt
Structure of Genesis
- Introduction with creation of mankind (1:1 to 2:3)
- 11 Toledot sections
Outline of Genesis
- Genesis 1-11: Primeval history
- Creation (Genesis 1-2)
- Fall (Genesis 3-5)
- Flood (Genesis 6-9)
- Babel (Genesis 10-11)
- Genesis 12:50: Patriarchal history
- Narrative of Abraham (Genesis 12-24)
- Narrative of Abraham’s descendants (Genesis 25-36)
- Narrative of Jacob’s descendants (Genesis 37-50)
Creation
Genesis 1:1
- Biblical Christianity vs atheism, naturalism, humanism
- Beginning
- There was the beginning. Time has a beginning.
- History has a beginning point. History and time is linear.
- Myth of eternal recurrence (Ancient Greek philosophy)
- cyclical view of time
- “the sun sets, and the sun also rises.”
- No purposeful beginning or end point in history
- All is vanity. All is meaningless.
- There was a time when the universe did not exist.
- Question: How did the universe get started? What was its origin?
- Contrast between creaturely existence and its author
- There was a time when nothing existed, but there was not a time when no one existed.
- God
- There is no argument for the existence of God.
- There is the simple bold assertion of the existence of God.
- There is the necessity of something that preceded the universe that is self existence.
- “ultimate reality”
- Created
- God does the fantastic work of creation.
- Man has a mediated creativity using medium that is already in existence.
- God created without the existence of a medium.
- ex nihilo
- The active power that God alone possess, creating something out of the nothing.
Genesis 1:2
- Barrick - disjunctive clause that is parenthetical
- static stative perfect verb (to be - Hebrew verb hyh)
- without form (formlessness)
- chaos
- void (emptyness)
- imagine not just an empty house but an empty universe
- darkness
- pure negative term (absence of light)
Genesis 1:3ff
- active imperfect verb (becoming - Hebrew verb hyh)
- The voice of God speaks for the first time, “Let there be light.”
- Literally, “Let light come to be.”
- Mode of creation: Divine Fiat (divine command, divine imperative)
- God’s transcendent majestic holy command
- God speaks into the void: “Let there be…”
- Jesus called out to Lazarus saying, “Lazarus, come forth.”
- Jesus calmed the storm saying, “Peace, be still.”
- God is the author of creation, and He has authority.