Genesis 1 refers to functional origins, not material
origins
To summarise what we’ve covered:
- Special creationist (and many non-theist critics) make the mistake of reading the creation narratives either as a literal account of creation in six days 6000 years ago, or a strong concordist account which can be harmonised with natural history
- This is false from both scientific and Biblical reasons, mainly because Genesis 1 reflects ancient cosmology, in which the Earth was flat, fixed and covered with a solid firmament
- Genesis 1 accommodates this ancient worldview rather than waste time trying to teach modern science to an audience. Genesis was more concerned with declaring who created the universe, rather than obsess over mechanical details unintelligible to the original audience.
One final reason for rejecting
literalism or strong concordism is that both proceed on the assumption that it
is referring to an account of material origins. OT scholars however have shown
that there is good reason that the ancient Near Eastern world was more
concerned with a functional ontology of creation, rather than material origins.
In other words, the origin of order, structure and function was of primary
concern. Accommodation of pre-scientific worldviews helps us understand the
creation narrative with respect to its apparent endorsement of patently
unscientific ideas such as a solid firmament. Only by grasping the difference
between a material and functional ontology of creation will we finally grasp
what the creation narratives are about, and why literalism, and strong
concordism have nothing to say about how to interpret Genesis.
In Genesis 1 as Ancient Cosmology, OT
scholar John Walton notes:
To create is to bring something into
existence that did not exist prior to the act of creation. Consequently, if we
are to understand ancient ideas about creation we need to gain an understanding
of ancient ideas regarding existence. This puts understanding the cosmic
ontology of ancient peoples center stage. Modern cosmic ontology—our cosmic
ontology—is primarily material, and the result is that when we think of the act
of creation, we think mostly about the origins of matter in its various forms
throughout the universe. This way of thinking is not the only ontological
option, and I will propose that it is not the option that was current in the
ancient cognitive environment…It is clear from the cosmological literature of
the ancient Near East that order in the cosmos and the control of the functions
of the cosmos were more prominent in the ancient thought world than any
consideration of the material origins of the cosmos.[1]
This doesn’t mean that the
ancient world had zero interest in material origins, but rather that their
primary concern was the origin of order, structure and function. A survey of
the ancient Near Eastern world tends to confirm this. Walton again:
- The precosmic world was understood not as a world absent of matter but a world absent of function, order, diversity, and identity.
- Depictions of the state of things before and after creation, between which the acts of creation serve as transition, focus on origins of function and order, and the verbs used to describe creation operate in the same semantic realm.
- The things created in the related realms of cosmos and culture are functions, not objects.
- In the context of creation, causes are entirely in the realm of the gods and are characterized by a teleological perspective that transcends and virtually ignores the material, physical, natural world.
- Reality and existence in the ancient cognitive environment are best described as comprising function and order, not matter and objects.
- The acts of creation were naming, separating, and temple building.
- In the ancient world, something was created when it was given a function.
- The functions of the cosmos and culture are all relative to people.
- The functions of the ordered cosmos were defined first and foremost by the MES, which, unlike the cosmic waters, did not exist prior to the gods’ creative activity; on the other hand, these functions were not instituted by the gods.
- The operational dichotomy was static (the MES) versus dynamic (the destinies).
- Decreeing destinies was both functional in nature and at the same time an act of creation and rule.
- Exercise of control over the destinies and the rule of the world, including both the gods and eventually humans, originates in the temple, which is ordained as the control room of the cosmos.
- The mes that most frequently describe the functional cosmos—time, weather, and fertility—are generally portrayed as being organized and delegated by the gods.[2]
When we look at Genesis 1, we see that the six days
naturally fall into two groups of three days:
Day 1: Separation of light from
darkness
Day 2: Separation of waters above
from waters below
Day 3a: Separation of dry land
from waters
Day 3b: Appearance of vegetation
on dry land
Day 4: Appointing of sun, moon
and stars to separate day and night and mark time
Day 5: Appearance of birds in the
air and sea creatures in the water
Day 6: Appearance of animals on the
dry land
Day 6b: Appearance of humans
The existence of this structure
alone should have been reason enough to consider whether reading Genesis 1 as a literal account of
material origins was the correct way to read the narrative. What we see here is
the creation of ‘domains’ in days 1-3 and domain inhabitants in days 4-6. The
connection between vegetation and humans in days 3b and 6b may appear forced,
but when we recognise that the ancient Hebrews were an agricultural people,
this connection becomes meaningful. This is particularly emphasised in Gen 2:5-7 where the origins of
humans and rain has a decidedly functional reason:
…when no plant of the
field was yet in the earth and no herb of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon
the earth, and there was no one to till the ground; but a stream would rise
from the earth, and water the whole face of the ground— then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the
ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a
living being. [3]
Here we see two pre-creation
problems: no wild vegetation and no cultured crops. The Divine solution is to
provide rain (weather) and humans to cultivate the ground (agriculture). The
emphasis is less here on the creation of the rain and humans, but on the
functions that they perform.
I’ve referred earlier to the role of Genesis as a polemic, that is, a sustained criticism of existing pagan cosmologies. YECs and OECs, by privileging a material account of creation ignore the fact that when one recognises the functional ontology of Genesis, the similarities and differences between Genesis and existing cosmologies become meaningful.
Absent
in Genesis is any reference to humans being created as corvee labour for the gods,
as one sees in Mesopotamian mythology. Rather:
The station of humanity in the
cosmos as portrayed in Genesis 1
is, therefore, almost precisely opposite
of the picture in Mesopotamian literature, where people are slaves of the gods
and thus involved in helping the gods do their work. In Genesis, humanity is a
partner in the work of ruling. Furthermore, people are given a role as
partners because the functional nature of humanity is identified with its
maleness and femaleness, both in the image of God…
The foregoing observations make it
clear that Genesis 1 completely
restructures the position and role of the participants on the cosmic stage.
For instance, in Genesis, humanity is granted a role that is reminiscent of the
role of some gods in Mesopotamian literature. In Enki and the World Order,
Inanna complains that she has not received any control attributes to
administer. In Inanna and Enki, she is given some. Compare this to the Genesis
account, in which God transfers some control attributes to Adam and Eve by
means of the image of God and the blessing, allowing them to decree destinies
within the purview of these control attributes—thus, for instance, naming the
animals (= decreeing the destinies?). Humanity is given a subordinate ruling
responsibility, similar to the position delegated to the lower gods by the
higher gods in Mesopotamia, a role that is
eventually also delegated to kings. Thus, Genesis 1 bequeaths to humanity a dignity that is not
attested in the rest of the ancient Near East. In Genesis, God is outside the
cosmos, not inside or a part of it, and he has no origin. He is responsible for
the origin of all the governing principles. Human beings are positioned as
rulers in the cosmos, with all of the functions of the cosmos organized on
their behalf. (Emphasis
mine)[4]
Genesis demythologises the
natural world, raises the dignity of humans from slave labour to the very image
of God and places the creator outside the natural world. For the ancient
Hebrews, the significance of this cannot be overestimated. A crude obsession
with material origins completely misses this point.
Conclusion
Evolutionary Creationism in many
ways is not the best way to describe how I and others read the creation
narratives. Genesis makes no substantive references to material origins, which
means that any attempt to reconcile the creation narratives with the natural
world (literalism or strong concordism) is missing the point. Rather, the
creation narratives:
- Describe the origin of functions such as time, weather and agriculture
- Are a polemic against ANE cosmology
Of significance is that this
completely decouples the narratives from scientific accounts of the origin of the
universe, which means that one’s views on the origin of the universe and how
the diversity of life does not affect one’s theology of creation.
The question of the literality of
Adam is a separate, but related issue. Certainly, comparative genomics and
palaeoanthropology completely rule out the possibility of Adam and Eve being
the sole ancestors of the human race given the lack of a sharp genetic bottleneck
as one would expect from recent universal human descent from two people. However,
a sensitive reading of Genesis 4
implies the existence of humans other than Adam, Eve and Cain. Certainly, the
text never bothers to explain the origin of Cain’s wife and those whom he
feared would kill him. Claims that these people are unnamed children of Adam
and Eve represent a decidedly forced reading of the text. Therefore one can
affirm a historical kernel to Gen
2-4 with Adam and Eve being the first people with whom God entered
into a covenant relationship, rather than the literal ancestors of the human
race.
