So I was reading through Genesis and noticed a contrast in sequence of events in Genesis 1 compared to Genesis 2. I’ll pick out the parts where the contrast was evident in the comparison below.

Genesis 1
1) God produces living creatures (Gen 1.24)
2) God produces male and female (Gen 1.27)

Genesis 2
1) God produces man (Gen 2.7)
2) God produces living creatures (Gen 2.19)
3) God produces woman (Gen 2.22)

So there appears to be a different sequence of events in terms of making man, living creatures and woman if you compare Gen 1 to Gen 2.

Why would there be a different sequence of events? Help anyone?

Simon Rose - 15 June 2008 03:28 PM

So there appears to be a different sequence of events in terms of making man, living creatures and woman if you compare Gen 1 to Gen 2.
Why would there be a different sequence of events?

Hi Simon. Yes, this is only problematic if you read the creation accounts literally. However, if you understand these creation accounts as metaphor, then it’s reasonable to assume that they are simply emphasizing different things. Chapter 1 seems (to me) to emphasize a singular God as the author of everything in a good and ordered creation. However, in Chapter 2 the emphasis is on mankind and our special relationship with God within that created order.

If you want more thought provoking reading about this, have a look at this blog (http://www.heardworld.com/higgaion/?p=253 ) and in particular section 2 - The Bible tells multiple creation stories.

I personally believe the compilers of Genesis knew of several creation accounts and rather than pick one decided that the two together would be better as they each emphasized different but nevertheless important theological truths about God and why we’re here (as opposed to any specific explanation as to how we got here which I suspect was of little importance to them - apart from the general explanation that God made us).

Edit: To reinforce the point that Genesis is almost certainly a compilation from multiple sources, another example of two event ‘histories’ being recorded together is the flood narrative where two quite evidently separate accounts have been interwoven into one.

Angus Johnson - 15 June 2008 05:02 PM

Simon Rose - 15 June 2008 03:28 PM

So there appears to be a different sequence of events in terms of making man, living creatures and woman if you compare Gen 1 to Gen 2.
Why would there be a different sequence of events?

. . . this is only problematic if you read the creation accounts literally. However, if you understand these creation accounts as metaphor, then it’s reasonable to assume that they are simply emphasizing different things.

Hi Simon

Many Christians do not view the Genesis creation accounts as metaphor, and do read them ‘literally’ as opposed to ‘literalistically’ (which may be what Angus meant).  I.e., the accounts are meant to be read as the kind of literature they are, which is, as Angus’ comment suggests, descriptive and theological accounts, but not chronological or sequential accounts.  This is not at all unusual.  In the same way we will sometimes tell stories of actual events out of chronological sequence because this helps to emphasise some particular aspect of the story.  Just by the by, this also accounts for why some of the events of the life, ministry and death of Jesus are in different sequence in the different gospels.
Regards,

Bob

I agree with some of what Angus said but am not entirely happy with the concept that the Bible has “multiple” creation stories if that implies that they are inconsistent with each other (Angus, you don’t say this but the webite you linked to seems to.)
That is, I take it that we are meant to read Gen 1 and 2 together and that they are in fact consistent, even if clearly they are emphasising different things (and I agree, the focus of Gen 2 is specifically humans.) I would suggest that the apparent difference in order can be explained by the author’s desire in Gen 2 to focus in on humans in particular. When in Gen 2:19 the text suggests that God at that point created animals, I think it is perfectly legitimate for the ESV and other translations to see this as a “flashback” and use a pluperfect along the lines “now God had created animals”, as a reminder to the reader, and then to relate how those animals were brought to Adam to test their suitability as a “helper”.
It is in no way illegitimately reading this into the text if the original language relied on context and content to signal “flashbacks” in this way (lacking the “fuzzy transitions” or eery music of TV shows and movies!)
John Woodhouse in his new and excellent commentary on 1 Samuel notes a number of points where the text only makes sense if you realise that certain things which are dealt with textually in the sequence A-B actually happened chronologically B-A.
Regards
Neil Foster

Simon
The text of Genesis 2 is not in conflict with the order of Genesis 1 as a careful reading will see that the order of creation is consistent in both chapters.

Genesis 2 says that no plant appeared because there was no rain, but then God made streams come out of the ground to water the earth.  So this is when the plants could survive.  This is before the creation of man.

Then after God mentions the creation of Man he says that, prior to this Genesis 2:8 He “had’ planted a garden in the East.  So when he formed the Man that is where God put him.

Likewise in Genesis 2:19 God describes the forming of the beasts as being prior to the creation of Man by saying; The Lord God “had” formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field.

In both of these verses God describes the formation of plants and animals as past tense while the formation of Man and Woman as present tense.

Genesis 2:7 The Lord God Formed the Man (Present tense).
Genesis 2:22 The Lord God made a woman from the rib (present tense).

As a historical account chapter 2 is consistent with chapter 1.  God mentions the creation events in a different order but He does not say they happened in a different order.

I hope this is helpful.
Thax <><

Craig
Are you basing your discussion of past and present tenses on the English text or on a knowledge of Hebrew?  I think Neil’s post has given some help in this regard, but we need to allow for the fact that the two accounts may not be ‘sequentially’ parallel, without feeling that somehow compromises their accuracy or truthfulness.
Bob

My explanation is based on the NIV translation.  Sorry I don’t know Hebrew, so if it isn’t present in the original I’ll withdraw my comments.

Thax <><

Hi there Craig,
Even if we take the NIV & read from 2:4b we find that your hypothesis falls to the ground.

2v5 no shrub had yet appeared on the earth… In 1:9 that occured on day 3
2v7 says Lord God made Adam (flowing on from v5-6, before any plant or shrub had come up). There was water through the rivers v6. So appealing to a time delay due to rain doesn’t fit. In fact, some would say there was no rain until the flood when the windows in heaven opened up.
2v8 can be understood as “previously planted”, but that denies the obvious meaning of v4-6. The better way is to leave the “had Planted” to being “planted” as in the RV.
When do the animals appear? In ch1 it is early on day 6 before man, but in chapter 2 it is after Adam, but before Eve.

To me the difference is God inspired. It shows us to tread carefully in the way we understand the scriptures. A 7-day literalistic approach is contradicted by chapter 2, which sends a massive hint to all of us to understand the text carefully. If we want to accept a 7-day literalistic chapter 1 view, then we have to explain away the variations in chapter 2.
To me it seems a lot better to understand this as a guidance not to be so literalistic.

It is precisely these kinds of questions that drove the development of the various critical methodologies that have been applied to the texts of the Scriptures.  As a result, it is widely understood in some circles that Genesis 1:1-2:4a is the product of Priestly tradition and that 2:4b -25 is a product of what is called the Yahwistic tradition.

When they speak of “tradition” they simply mean the circles in which these stories existed as oral tradition for generations before they were written down.

The result is that the two stories, both relating to God’s agency in the beginning of all things, have both a different purpose and a different audience.  Some have suggested that the first account had a place in the temple ritual - it has a cyclical pattern like some liturgies - and the second account is one that mothers told their children, since women were both the child-bearers and faith-bearers; they were the ones in the family who passed on the faith to the children.

Some in the church have created a dichotomy of world-views by which on the one hand the Scriptures have to be understood as complete and consistent, thus requiring us to shape our interpretation of the world completely by that understanding; and on the other hand there are those who accept modern historical and scientific method who are constantly trying to contradict and undermine the Scriptures.

Both sides of this dichotomy, in my view, do a disservice to the Scriptures.

Bob Cameron, above, used the word “literalistically” by which he seems to mean that we have to do justice to the text by seeking to understand the literary form and historical context of the original texts so as to allow us to “rightly divide” the meaning of the Scripture.

It is only when we do this that we can allow what appear, on the surface meaning of the text, to be “contradictions” without them undermining our faith in the veracity of the Scriptures.

Robert wrote;

Even if we take the NIV & read from 2:4b we find that your hypothesis falls to the ground.

However nothing you said challenges my hypothesis.

After closer inspection of other translations however the word ‘had’ does not seem to be included, so I’ll withdraw my comments unless some Hebrew expert says otherwise.

I’d like to respond to John’s comments but I can’t make sense of them.  I’m sure it’s just me though.

Thax <><

Bob Cameron, above, used the word “literalistically” by which he seems to mean that we have to do justice to the text by seeking to understand the literary form and historical context of the original texts so as to allow us to “rightly divide” the meaning of the Scripture.

Hi John

A slight correction to the above - what you have described is what I would call a proper ‘literal’ understanding of the text, whereas a ‘literalistic’ approach would be to interpret the text in a more rigid way that accounts only for its apparent surface meaning and does not take into account matters of context, genre, etc.

I would also add that I think one can approach the text taking into account those factors without accepting the hypotheses of tradition criticism and the like.

Regards,

Bob

Hey Craig,

The Hebrew doesn’t back you up on this one. Where the NIV renders ‘had’ I think it is fudging for exactly the reason that this thread was raised. From my (inexperienced, I admit) understanding of Hebrew I don’t even think rendering ‘had’ is an option at all. Hebrew has a perfectly good way of doing that, and this isn’t it (except in 2:5).

I don’t really see a problem, mind you, reconciling the two accounts. Gen 1 is talking about the creation of both men and women, and in my opinion should be rendered ‘mankind’:

“So God created man(kind?) in his image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.

According to Gen 1, the creation of ‘man(kind)’ is complete only upon the creation of both the man and the woman. Thus the complete creation of ‘man’ happens after the animals in both Gen 1 and Gen 2. This is indicated in 2:18 (contrast 1:31).

Thats my take for what its worth. [And its lucky that I am studying for a Hebrew exam at the moment so replying to this thread doesn’t count as procrastination!]

It’s interesting that this month we are studying the the reformation at Church, and we are up to the concept of Bible alone.  The reformers were convinced that having the Scriptures in ones own language would be a powerful tool to win converts and reform the church, which it was.

However there are flaws in trusting in a translation because every translation has someones doctrine shaping the work.  This is a good example where the NIV has smoothed over the text to make it easier to understand, but has added concepts that were not in the original, but probably fits nicely with the translaters doctrine.

It makes me wonder how any Christian can trust what is written in the Bible when there are many ways to translate any passage?

Sorry, but I don’t like it when I find my doctrine has been shaped by poor translations.  I don’t even think knowing the original language would help as I would need to make my own translation to explain it to anyone, and that wouldn’t be anymore accurate than someone elses translation.

This has left me wondering?

Don’t wonder… rejoice, because the wonder of it all is that we can study the text & point to it to clarify how we get what we get. Even if there are some times when things might look a bit dodgy with translations, God did not preserve the originals for us. The important thing is to look at the writings & discuss & learn.

Craig Thacker - 16 June 2008 09:00 PM

This has left me wondering?

I wouldn’t let it worry you too much Craig. When two native English speakers sit down and read (even very carefully) a document written in English, they wont necessarily agree on what it says. This is the whole point of legal jargon - to make language, which is otherwise often ambiguous, less ambiguous. But, legal jargon aside, that is the nature of language.

Just because we can look at the Hebrew (or Greek) doesn’t mean we undo all the ambiguity. It just gives us the original ambiguities to work with, rather than the ones in our translations. (Even then there are textual variants to consider so that you may not even be able to establish what the original said in the first place.) You aren’t missing much by having to work from the ESV or NIV.

Rather, I think, we should be confident in our English bibles. In the end, God’s word is translatable and transmittable - even in the face of human error and ambiguity - because God is a God who is able to communicate with us, in fact he is very good at it.

If you put all the ambiguity and transmission errors and translation problems together, then the margin for error really is only about as big as the margin of error that you have in reading this post.

Hope that helps :)

Craig Thacker - 16 June 2008 09:00 PM

Sorry, but I don’t like it when I find my doctrine has been shaped by poor translations.

Yes, I think everyone is subjected to that bias, and even when reading the texts in their original languages we still bring our own worldviews to how we interpret and understand them. Fortunately, the fundamental gospel message about Jesus seems unambiguous.