{"id":4862,"date":"2018-09-09T12:05:18","date_gmt":"2018-09-09T09:05:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/?p=4862"},"modified":"2018-09-09T12:55:10","modified_gmt":"2018-09-09T09:55:10","slug":"meaning-of-genesis-1-1-2-in-its-hebrew-and-greek-septuagint-form","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/4862\/meaning-of-genesis-1-1-2-in-its-hebrew-and-greek-septuagint-form\/","title":{"rendered":"Meaning of Genesis 1: 1-2 in its Hebrew and Greek (Septuagint) form"},"content":{"rendered":"

Interpretations of Genesis 1: 1\u20132<\/a> varied with the version of the Bible that was used. The Hebrew version begins with a relative clause: \u201cIn the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void . . . .\u201d (New Revised Standard Version), much like the parallel Hebrew construction in Genesis 2:4<\/a>. So the Hebrew version of Genesis began with the primordial materials of formless earth, water, and darkness (Genesis 1:2). <\/p>\n

From J. Wentzel Vrede van Huyssteen, Encyclopedia Of Science And Religion<\/a><\/pre>\n
Various interpretations of this \u201cbeginning\u201d were possible. Some rabbis accepted the inference that God began with a pre-existent chaos and then created an ordered cosmos (Genesis Rabbah 1:5). <\/p>\n
Others brought in texts like Proverbs 8:22\u201324<\/a> to demonstrate that God had created the water and the darkness and that the \u201cbeginning\u201d of Genesis 1:1 was God\u2019s own wisdom as encoded in the Torah ( Jubilees 2:2\u20133; Genesis Rabbah 1:1, 9). <\/p>\n
Still others argued that God must have created worlds before this one (Genesis Rabbah 3:7; 9:2).<\/p>\n
Most Diaspora Jews and early Christians, however, used the Greek translation of the Old Testament, known as the Septuagint<\/a>. This text begins with the absolute statement: \u201cIn the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,\u201d which implied an absolute beginning for this universe. <\/p>\n
It also implied that the unformed earth and water were included in the initial act of creation. This reading was followed by pioneering theologians like Basil of Caesarea<\/a> (c. 329\u2013379) and Augustine of Hippo<\/a> (354\u2013430) and became the standard interpretation for Christians.<\/p>\n
The meaning of the six days of Genesis 1 was also debated. Some exegetes thought there was a temporal sequence of days without specifying their exact length ( Jubilees 2:2; Genesis Rabbah 1:3). <\/p>\n
For those who accepted the idea of an absolute beginning, this implied that God created the cosmos in two stages: God made the building materials (unformed earth, water, etc.) at the beginning of the first day; then God illuminated and formed those materials as described in the narrative (Wisdom of Solomon 11:17<\/a>; 4 Ezra 6:38\u201340; Justin Martyr<\/a>).<\/p>\n
J. Wentzel Vrede van Huyssteen, Encyclopedia Of Science And Religion<\/a><\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Interpretations of Genesis 1: 1\u20132 varied with the version of the Bible that was used. The Hebrew version begins with a relative clause: \u201cIn the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void . . . .\u201d (New Revised Standard Version), much like the parallel Hebrew construction in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_disable_autopaging":false},"categories":[6702,13,11,5766,10],"tags":[332,94,100,101],"class_list":["post-4862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thechrist","category-greek-history","category-elpenor-greek-library","category-greek-religion","category-orthodox-christianity","tag-bible","tag-new-testament","tag-old-testament","tag-septuagint"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4862"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4862\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ellopos.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}