Genesis 1.1-3

[Apolo]

Gen 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Gen 1:2 And the earth became waste and void...

Grammatically, this is an impossible translation. The disjunctive clause at the beginning of v. 2 cannot be translated as if it were relating the next event in a sequence. If v. 2 were sequential to v. 1, the author would have used the "vav consecutive" followed by a prefixed verbal form and the subject, not the "vav disjunctive" that we find prefixed to the noun "earth" in v. 2. Unfortunately "gap" theorist either don't understand this or they're playing "footsie" with the science of "naturalism."

[Churchwork]

Apolo,

No footsies with science or naturalism, just the truth and simple plain language without making Moses have to understand these big words when he wrote the first two sentences of Genesis. Once upon a time an "and" use to be an "and".
:hilarious

To understand the first chapter of Genesis, it is of utmost importance that we distinguish the “earth” mentioned in verse 1 from the “earth” spoken of in verse 2. For the condition of the earth referred to in verse 2 is not what God had created originally. Now we know that “God is not a God of confusion” (1 Cor. 14.33). And hence when it states that in the beginning God created the earth, what He created was therefore perfect. So that the waste and void of the earth spoken of in verse 2 was not the original condition of the earth as God first created it. Would God ever create an earth whose primeval condition would be waste and void? A true understanding of this verse will solve the apparent problem. “Thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else” (Is. 45.18). How clear God’s word is. The word “waste” here is “tohu” in Hebrew, which signifies “desolation” or “that which is desolate.” It says here that the earth which God created was not a waste. Why then does Genesis 1.2 state that “the earth was waste”? This may be easily resolved. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1.1). At that time, the earth which God had created was not a waste; but later on, in passing through a great catastrophe, the earth did become waste and void. So that all which is mentioned from verse 3 onward does not refer to the original creation but to the restoration of the earth. God created the heavens and the earth in the beginning; but He subsequently used the Six Days to remake the earth habitable. Genesis 1.1 was the original world; Genesis 1.3 onward is our present world; while Genesis 1.2 describes the desolate condition which was the earth’s during the transitional period following its original creation and before our present world.


Such an interpretation cannot only be arrived at on the basis of Isaiah 45.18, it can also be supported on the basis of other evidences. The conjunctive word “and” in verse 2 can also be translated as “but”: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, but the earth was waste and void.” G. H. Pember, in his book Earth’s Earliest Ages, wrote
that the “and” according to Hebrew usage—as well as that of most other languages—proves that the first verse is not a compendium of what follows, but a statement of the first event in the record. For if it were a mere summary, the second verse would be the actual commencement of the history, and certainly would not begin with a copulative. A good illustration of this may be found in the fifth chapter of Genesis (Gen. 5.1). There the opening words, “This is the book of the generations of Adam,” are a compendium of the chapter, and, consequently, the next sentence begins without a copulative. We have, therefore, in the second verse of Genesis no first detail of a general statement in the preceding sentence, but the record of an altogether distinct and subsequent event, which did not affect the sidereal [starry] heaven, but only the earth and its immediate surroundings. And what that event was we must now endeavour to discover.* *G. H. Pember, Earth's Earliest Ages, New Edition, edited with additions by G. H. Lang (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1975), p. 31. (The original work of Pember, under the same title, was initially published in 1876 by Hodder and Stoughton. Later editions were issued by Pickering and Inglis and the Fleming H. Revell Co.)

Over a hundred years ago, Dr. Chalmers pointed out that the words “the earth was waste” might equally be translated “the earth became waste.” Dr. I. M. Haldeman, G. H. Pember, and others showed that the Hebrew word for “was” here has been translated “became” in Genesis 19.26: “His wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.” If this same Hebrew word can be translated in 19.26 as “became,” why can it not be translated as “became” in 1.2? Furthermore, the word “became” in 2.7 (“and man became a living soul”) is the same word as is found in Genesis 1.2. So that it is not at all arbitrary for anyone to translate “was” as “became” here: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, the earth [B]became waste and void.” The earth which God created originally was not waste, it only later became waste.

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1.1) and “in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is” (Ex. 20.11). Comparing these two verses, we can readily see that the world in Genesis 1.1 was quite different from the world that came after Genesis 1.3. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. In the Six Days God made the heaven and earth and sea. Who can measure the distance that exists between “created” and “made”? The one is a calling into being things out of nothing, the other is a working on something already there. Man can make but cannot create; God can create as well as make. Hence Genesis records that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, but later on the earth had become waste and void due to a tremendous catastrophe, after which God commenced to remake the heaven, earth and sea and all the creatures in them. 2 Peter 3.5-7 expresses the same thought as well: the heavens and the earth in verse 5 are the original heavens and earth referred to in Genesis 1.1; the earth mentioned in verse 6 that was overflowed with water and which perished is the earth covered with water which became waste and void as mentioned in Genesis 1.2; and the heavens and the earth that now are as spoken of in verse 7 are the restored heavens and earth after Genesis 1.3. Hence the works of God during the Six Days are quite different from His creative work done in the beginning.

The more we study Genesis 1, the more we are convinced that the above is the true interpretation. In the first day, God commanded light to shine forth. Before this first day, the earth had already been existing, but it was now buried in water, dwelt in darkness, and was waste and void. On the third day, God did not create the earth. He merely commanded it to come out of water. F. W. Grant has stated that “the six days’ work merely sets the earth into a new program; it does not create it out of nothing.”* On the first day, God did not create light, He instead commanded light to shine out of darkness. The light was already there. Neither did God create heaven on the second day. The heaven here is not the starry heaven but the atmospheric heaven, that which surrounds the earth. Where, then, did all these come from if they were not created during the Six Days? The one answer is that they were created at the time of the first verse of Genesis 1. So that subsequently, there was no need to create but simply to remake.

To read the rest of the proof ----> http://www3.telus.net/trbrooks/moc12.htm

What becomes something did not exist before. Before, the earth was not waste and void. Before, it was created perfect as well as its inhabitants. Only after this took place did sin enter the frey. "And the earth became waste and void" because of the judgment on the inhabitants of earth's earliest ages. This is similar to the purpose of the flood, which God would never do again.

As Pember points out, the first verse cannot be a compendium, since the second verse starts with "And". If it is not a compedium, then it must be the first event in a sequence. The second event, thus, begins with "And" to show the second event using a copulative. Copulatives don't initiate the history of the world. It ought to be non-copulative.

The way to make sense of the use of the vav disjunctive in v.2 is since what happened was so far removed from us, it is not unreasonable that the disjunctive is used to distinquish it from the vav consecutive used for the restoration in v.3ff, which is closer in proximity to our time now. It has the effect of separating the two as distinct periods.

Someone wrote: the Jewish scholars who wrote the Massoretic Text, incorporated "indicators" to guide the reader to correct punctuation. One such mark is called "Rebhia," which is classified as a "disjunctive accent" intended to notify the reader to pause before proceeding to the next verse because there is a break in the text. The initial waw which introduces verse 2 should be rendered "but" rather than "and", a dis-junctive rather than a con-junctive, because the last word of verse 1 is separated from verse 2 by means of the disjunctive accent Rebhia, which implies that we are to let our thoughts dwell upon it before passing on to verse 2.

The word "was" in verse 2 can also be translated as "became", implying that between the first two verses of Genesis 1, some sort of catastrophe must have occurred, causing the earth to fall into the formless and void state of which the latter part of verse 2 makes mention.

I am grateful there are others also who, humbly, have a heart of understanding. God considered it more important to create a significant pause than to produce a vav consecutive which was more appropriate for verse 3 instead. It flows better that way.

Another writes, "To the Lord 1,000 years is as one day and one day as a thousand years as He has told us in the Bible. See Psalm 90:5 and 2 Peter 3:8. I think that God could quickly skip over a gap of time which to Him is a miniscual delay in His eternal economy though it would seem not so to us as human beings. Since the gap is unspecified I cannot tell how short or long it is taught to be in the Bible."

Do not human beings often have a limited view? Let us not have such a limited view towards God's accumalitive working between Gen. 1.1 and 1.2. We should look to additional evidences to help support God's accumulative working. That is what Pember and Nee did which would seem more prudent. I favor this approach which has more substance. They were fully aware of the pettiness to derive an almighty decision based on a pronoun.

“Thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else” (Is. 45.18).

This is such a vital principle in the Word. When two things seem contradictory, God is trying to show you something, which you would not often be receptive to otherwise. What better way to accomplish this task. It is very effective because it causes you to think. And God does not cater to our flesh and expectations of how we think something should be said. I love that about God.

I like the definition of disjunctive: "serving to separate or divide". Gen. 1.2 is divided or separated from Gen. 1.1 because it came after. I don't think words like vav consecutive and vav disjunctive should be our guiding principle. I don't think Moses was thinking about vav consecutives and vav disjunctives. He was thinking about how the earth was not made desolate, waste and void when He wrote Gen. 1.1 and 1.2.

Praise God! Amen.

[Churchwork]

Machinations writes,

Looking up th word "disjunctive" in the dictionary will not help you. If I were you I would toss whatever "reference" works you are using right out the window.

I think it is careless to overassume Moses' view. For him likely an "and" was an "and" without all these new rules you are making up introduced sometime later for just your purposes to excite your petty self. As language goes, the first event in a record doesn't start with "and" in any language at least that I know of. This goes against the Hebrew language as well. Despite your desire that I throw this proof out the window, here it is again.

As Pember said,

that the “and” according to Hebrew usage—as well as that of most other languages—proves that the first verse is not a compendium of what follows, but a statement of the first event in the record. For if it were a mere summary, the second verse would be the actual commencement of the history, and certainly would not begin with a copulative. A good illustration of this may be found in the fifth chapter of Genesis (Gen. 5.1). There the opening words, “This is the book of the generations of Adam,” are a compendium of the chapter, and, consequently, the next sentence begins without a copulative. We have, therefore, in the second verse of Genesis no first detail of a general statement in the preceding sentence, but the record of an altogether distinct and subsequent event, which did not affect the sidereal [starry] heaven, but only the earth and its immediate surroundings. And what that event was we must now endeavour to discover.

“Thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else” (Is. 45.18).

It is most troubling that "presbyterians" (the denomination of Machinations) have no faith to believe that God did not create the earth a waste.

[gluadys]

To understand the first chapter of Genesis, it is of utmost importance that we distinguish the “earth” mentioned in verse 1 from the “earth” spoken of in verse 2. For the condition of the earth referred to in verse 2 is not what God had created originally. Now we know that “God is not a God of confusion” (1 Cor. 14.33). And hence when it states that in the beginning God created the earth, what He created was therefore perfect. So that the waste and void of the earth spoken of in verse 2 was not the original condition of the earth as God first created it. Would God ever create an earth whose primeval condition would be waste and void? A true understanding of this verse will solve the apparent problem. “Thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else” (Is. 45.18). How clear God’s word is. The word “waste” here is “tohu” in Hebrew, which signifies “desolation” or “that which is desolate.” It says here that the earth which God created was not a waste. Why then does Genesis 1.2 state that “the earth was waste”? This may be easily resolved. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1.1). At that time, the earth which God had created was not a waste; but later on, in passing through a great catastrophe, the earth did become waste and void. So that all which is mentioned from verse 3 onward does not refer to the original creation but to the restoration of the earth. God created the heavens and the earth in the beginning; but He subsequently used the Six Days to remake the earth habitable. Genesis 1.1 was the original world; Genesis 1.3 onward is our present world; while Genesis 1.2 describes the desolate condition which was the earth’s during the transitional period following its original creation and before our present world.

Hello, Troy

I am new here and I am not particularly familiar with the teaching you are outlining here. So I have some questions.

1. What do you mean when you say the earth was created perfect?

2. Why can the earth of vs. 1 not be a perfect seed or embryo of the completed earth of vs. 31?

3. You lay a lot of stress on "waste" as the translation of "tohu" in vs. 2. I won't dispute that "waste" and "desolation" are legitimate translations of the Hebrew here. (I don't know Hebrew well enough for that.) But I note that most biblical translations of vs. 2 translate it as "without form, formless".

This translation suggests to me that vs. 1-2 are speaking of an embryonic earth just newly come into existence which is yet to be formed and filled. And this seems consistent with a perfect creation. For a seed or embryo is perfect as the initial stage of what will become a mature adult.

Do you reject "formless" as a legitimate translation of "tohu" in this context? If so, why?

[Churchwork]

1. What do you mean when you say the earth was created perfect?
Without being stained by sin.


2. Why can the earth of vs. 1 not be a perfect seed or embryo of the completed earth of vs. 31?
Because, of the sin of the inhabitants of earth's earliest ages. Therefore, v.1 was created perfect, sin entered, God made desolate in v.2, and restored in the 6 summary days of restoration, fulfilling v.31.



3. You lay a lot of stress on "waste" as the translation of "tohu" in vs. 2. I won't dispute that "waste" and "desolation" are legitimate translations of the Hebrew here. (I don't know Hebrew well enough for that.) But I note that most biblical translations of vs. 2 translate it as "without form, formless".

Often the most popular or palatable will be accepted.


This translation suggests to me that vs. 1-2 are speaking of an embryonic earth just newly come into existence which is yet to be formed and filled. And this seems consistent with a perfect creation. For a seed or embryo is perfect as the initial stage of what will become a mature adult.
This is the common teaching, but the truth of this mistsaken assumption is Lucifer fell with the fallen angels to rule over demons between Gen. 1.1 and v.2 which required God in His righteousness to made desolate. Some call this the gap theory. It is interesting to note that day 2 was the only day not called a good day because when the firmaments were split, the water above and below, up came some of those demons that were cast down into the deep in Gen. 1.2. One of those demons went into the serpent.


Do you reject "formless" as a legitimate translation of "tohu" in this context? If so, why?
I just consider it a less accurate word, which we can be more precise.