Thoughts on Creation in Genesis

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Genre and Literature Categorization

• Genesis 1, likely the later addition, has a rhythm to it like a song. It is very likely that the original text was sang like a song in the temple to reenact it like as was typical of mystery cults of the ancient world.
  • Genesis 1 is concerned as well with the organization of non-objects, giving them their function, and commanding them to play their role. It answers the question of "what roles did God give his creation"? There is no indication that Genesis 1 was about the manufacturing of materials. It is a poem that talks about the council of Gods creating the world and giving things their functions.
• Genesis 2 is the older creation tradition, and it likewise is about giving roles to organized things.
  • Genesis 2 is different than Genesis 1 because instead of assigning roles to animals and then humans, Adam is given a role first and then the animals come to him so that He can assign names (roles) to them.

Literary format

Genesis 1 seems to follow the following rhythic format:

A. Elohim assigned roles to the sky and the land because it was empty and it was all in chaos so the wind of Elohim settled upon the water (1:1 to 1:2)
 A1. Day 1 - Elohim separates (1:3-5)
  a. light
  b. dark
 A2. Day 2 - Elohim separates (1:6-8)
  a. water
  b. sky
 A3. Day 3 - Elohim separates (1:9-13)
  a. land
  b. Plants spring up from the land

 B1. Day 4 - Elohim fills (1:14-19)
  a. the light with the sun
  b. the dark with the moon
 B2. Day 5 - Elohim fills (1:20-23)
  a. fills the water with fish
  b. fills the sky with birds
 B3. Day 6 - Elohim fills (1:24-31)
  a. the land with animals and man
  b. Plants are given as food
B. Elohim finishes his separating and filling of the sky and the land and respects the seventh day because in it he did his occupation (2:1-3)

Chiastic subsections

Gathering of the Waters (Genesis 1:9-10)

A. And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place,
 B. and let the dry land appear”.
  C. And it was so.
 B’. God called the dry land Earth,
A’. and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.

Plants Yielding Fruit (Genesis 1:11)

A. And said God Let bring forth the earth grass,
 B. the herb yielding seed,
  C. and tree the fruit
   D. yielding [making]
  C’. fruit after his kind,
 B’. whose seed is in itself,
A’. upon the earth: and it was so.

The Lights in the Dome (Genesis 1:14–19)

A. "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night;"
 B. "Let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:"
  C. "Let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth:"
   D. "And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also."
  C’. "And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,"
 B’. "And to rule over the day and over the night,"
A’. "And to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day."

Seventh Day (Genesis 2:2-3)

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
  And on the seventh day¹ God ended his work which he had made;
A. and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
 B. And God blessed the seventh day,
 B’. and sanctified it:
A’. because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.