Genesis: origins, themes, and literary significance

GENESIS

CREATION ACCOUNTS in the Book of Genesis

In the Book of Genesis as found in the Holy Bible (King James Version), there are two creation accounts -- the first occurs in Genesis, Chapter 1, verses 1-31, while the second occurs in Chapter Two, verses 4-25, both of which seem to contradict one another while relating two creation stories, the first being the creation of the heavens and the earth and ending with the creation of man, and the second being another version relating the same story but in a different context. Generally speaking, biblical scholars tend to agree that Moses wrote the Book of Genesis as part of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Holy Bible. Yet after reading both of these accounts, it is clear they are simply different versions of the same story with the second account being "filler" for the first account. Whether or not Moses was the sole author of the Book of Genesis remains unknown.

In the first version, the author begins by describing how God separated the light from the darkness, thus creating the first day and night. God then created the firmament (heaven), water (the seas) and the dry land, then grasses and herbs "yielding fruit" and seeds, the sun and the moon (and the stars), and then "every living creature," both on the land, in the sea and in the air ("the beasts of the earth"). Finally, God creates man "in his own image" and tells him to be "fruitful and multiply" and to "replenish the earth and subdue it." This version concludes with God seeing that everything He made "was good," "and the evening and the morning were the sixth day."

In the second version as found in the Book of Genesis, after God "rested on the seventh day," he set about creating man (Adam) "from the dust of the ground" and he became "a living soul." From this point on, God seems to have examined everything he had created in the first version to make certain that it was fit and good for man. He also created the tree of knowledge of good and evil which man was not to touch -- "Thou shalt not eat of it" or else face certain death. God then decides to create a helper for man in the form of a woman (Eve), created by taking "one of his ribs," whereby Adam proclaims that Eve is the "bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" and that she is his wife ("they shall be one flesh").

Thus, the only differences between these two versions is that the creation of the earth and the heavens serves as a centerpoint for the first and the creation of Adam and Eve serve as the focus for the second version. As to the religious truths to be found in these versions, the most basic truth is that God created everything, from the earth to the sky to water to the "beasts of the field" and lastly man and woman in the form of Adam and Eve. All of this was of divine creation, meaning that God and only God created the heavens and the earth from nothingness and made the world as a home for mankind. Also, God made man "in his image," meaning that man is the spiritual equivalent of God on earth.