Now that we have read the first creation story, let’s move on to the second.  Yes, that’s what I said, the second creation story.   Genesis 2:4b and following is not an expansion of the first account, but a second, different account of God’s creation of the world.  So why two stories?  The traditional academic answer is that these are from two different sources.  I think that is true, but the point for me is that now they are both here in a text that I believe to be inspired by God.  So if one is “true” does that make the other one “false?”

I would argue that both are God-inspired and both say something important about God and God’s relationship to creation.  Since I believe both are gifts of God, I don’t think it is a matter of which is “true” and which is “false” – I don’t think either is intended to give a “scientific” explanation of how God creates, but a theological interpretation of what it means for God to be Creator and for us (and everything else) to be part of creation.

The first account emphasizes creation through the Word of God, God’s transcendence, the ordering of life, things like that.  The second account emphasizes that God is intimately involved in creation; that God “gets God’s hands dirty” so to speak.  Both those things are true about God, but they are hard to say in one story.

What is interesting to me is that, even though these are from two different sources, I think that in the juxtaposition we see both commonalities and contrasts that enhance our understanding of God. I will show you what I mean in a little bit.

Question for reflection: Does it bother you to think about 2 creation stories? 

As you read Genesis 2, look for the following things:

            What is the order of creation?  How and why is it different from that in Genesis 1?

            What does God think about God’s creation?

            What other similarities and differences do you see in the two accounts?

So – on to the text . . .

Verse 2:5 starts back at the beginning.  There is not one to work the ground, so no plants, animals, etc. yet.  God causes a little rain to fall on the dust, takes some of the resulting clay and forms a little clay person.  There is a play on words in the Hebrew in 2:7:  the adam (person) is formed from the adamah (ground).  In English we might say the earthperson is formed from the earth.  The image (and verb) used is that of a potter working on a wheel.  But the little clay person isn’t alive until God blows into the person’s nostril’s the breath of life.  I personally love this way of expressing God’s imparting of life.

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A brief excursus on life and death, living and non-living:

When I was in the science lab, I sometimes watched organisms die under a microscope when we added certain substances to the slide they were on.  It was odd to think that one moment this little organism was what we call “living” and that the next moment it was what we call “dead.”  Physically the change was very small.  Some processes stopped working at the molecular level and that is what caused the death, but at some level the living organism and the dead one were exactly alike.

As a pastor, I have been with people as they die and that sense of the breath leaving them is very real.  I understand on a scientific level that breath is not the only indicator of life, but I also understand why ancient peoples talked about the breath of life.  That is the visible expression of the difference between life and death.  But I also am struck by the fact that there really is very little difference between a living human body and a dead one.

We have a lot of trouble defining the boundary between life and death (or between living and non-living) on a medical or scientific level. We also have trouble on an ethical/moral level – we struggle with abortion because we are not sure if the fetus, while clearly living human tissue, is considered a live human.  We struggle with when to “pull the plug” because it is not clear that maintaining the “breath of life” artificially is the same thing as really keeping somebody alive.

All of these issues are raised for me when I contemplate what it means for God to make us out of the substance of the ground and to breathe into us the breath of life.  I don’t have answers for all the questions raised, but I am convinced of the need to wrestle with the issues.

When you think about being made in the image of God, when you think about having the “breath” of God, what do you think it means?  Do you think it makes a difference for our morality or ethics if we think of people in these ways as opposed to being merely the random products of a meaningless universe?

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Back to the text:

When God breathes into the clay person the breath or spirit of life, the clay person becomes a living person or nephesh.  In Hebrew a nephesh, which often gets translated as “soul” is a word that means a being full of passions and appetites, a “self” in the deepest sense of the word – maybe the “essence” of self.  It is a word used of both humans and animals.

Now that God has made a living being, God can plant a garden because now there is someone to take care of it (Genesis 2:15).  (Note how the verbs in this creation story are action verbs; God is doing, not speaking.)  This garden is a wonderful, beautiful place and in the middle of this garden God plants, not one, but two trees – the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life.  We will talk about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the next post.  What is important for now is that God gave the person a job – humans were created for a purpose – and God gave the person a command – don’t eat the tree in the middle!

Did you notice that in Genesis 2, in contrast to Genesis 1, the first comment that God makes about God’s work in creation is that “it is NOT good.”  Specifically – it is not good for a person to be alone.  God sees that the person needs a suitable or fit helper or partner.  Sometimes that word “helper” or ezer in Hebrew, is seen as a subordinate person.  However, in most cases in the Hebrew bible the word refers to God, so this is clearly not a reference to a subordinate!  (If you want some references, look at:

^NRS Deuteronomy 33:29 Happy are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the LORD, the shield of your help, and the sword of your triumph!

^NRS Psalm 10:14 But you do see! Indeed you note trouble and grief, that you may take it into your hands; the helpless commit themselves to you; you have been the helper of the orphan.

^NRS Psalm 30:10 Hear, O LORD, and be gracious to me! O LORD, be my helper!”

^NRS Psalm 33:20 Our soul waits for the LORD; he is our help and shield.)

The making of the animals is God’s first attempt to provide a helper.  Nothing suitable is found, but the person gets to name the animals, just as God has named things in Genesis 1.  So God causes a deep sleep to fall upon the person -  the kind of deep sleep that in Hebrew connotes a religious experience.  And God takes a side (or rib) from the person and forms another person.  This time the verb conjures up the image of a toolbox – God “builds” the woman.  Now, for the first time, the words used are those that are specifically male and female.  The ishah (or woman) is taken from the ish (or man).  You can see that the words are related in something of the same way that they are in English.  So the adam was taken from the adamah, and now the ishah is built from the ish.  Kind of a nice parallel.

When God gives the woman to the man, the man is overjoyed and breaks into song (as Dr. Bill Power used to say):  “Here at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.”

Reflect on this statement for a while.  What do you think that this says about:

the relationship between men and women?

the difference in the human-human relationship and the human-animal relationship?

The text also comments that a man leaves his mother and father and clings to his wife.  Now we know that is not true in the physical sense.  Sociologically (or maybe anthropologically?) speaking, women were the ones who left home when married, not men.  This is because women’s skills were transportable and men’s were not. Men were tied to a particular plot of land, but women could take the products of the land and turn them into food, clothing, housing, etc. in any setting.  So, if men do not leave physically, what is the sense in which they leave?  Those of you who have heard my sermon on marriage already know what I think about this, but it is worth pondering.

The last thing this account says is that the man and woman were naked and not ashamed.  The word for naked also means “vulnerable” or “open to harm.”   What does this say about the nature of  “ideal” male-female relationships? Or do you think it says anything at all?

[I asked you at the beginning of this post to think about the similarities and differences between Genesis 1 and 2.  So let’s talk for a moment about how this version of the creation of humanity relates to that of Genesis 1.  In Genesis 1, humans are made in the image of God; here the emphasis is on the close relationship of humanity with the earth and with the animals.  In both, humanity is given a purpose – to care for the earth and everything in it.  In both the need for male and female humans to be in relationship is a strong theme – in Genesis 1 because they are made at the same time in the image of God; in Genesis 2 because God notices that it is not good for the person to be alone and so makes a unique partner. In both God gives the humans a command, in Genesis 1 in the form of a positive command – be fruitful and multiply – in Genesis 2 in the form of a prohibition – don’t eat the fruit!  In the stories that follow, humanity fails at keeping both of these commands.]

Notes for First Installment of Bible Study on Genesis – Genesis 1:1-2:4a

So, here is the first installment of the actual bible study on Genesis.  First of all read Genesis1:1-19 in several different versions.  (If you haven’t read or listened to my post on Translations, you might want to do that first.)  If you don’t have hard copy of different translations, you can find online versions at:   http://www.biblestudytools.com/,  http://www.biblegateway.com/ , http://www.catholic.org/bible/ , http://net.bible.org/ .    I particularly suggest, the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), the New International Version (NIV), the Common English Bible (CEB – very new), and the New Jerusalem Bible (NJB).  If you can find a copy of the Jewish Publication Society English translation of the Hebrew Bible (otherwise called the TANAKH) then that would be worthwhile to read as well.

Genesis actually contains two versions of the creation story.  The first is found in Gen 1:1 – 2:4a.  In Historical-Critical terms, it is from the priestly tradition.  In some ways it is similar to the Babylonian creation story called the Enuma Elish. (if you are really interested, click here: http://www.ancient.eu.com/article/225/) However, there are also some major differences in the two stories.  In the Enuma Elish, creation happens through conflict and violence.  In the Genesis creation story, creation takes place through the spoken word of God.

What I think is amazing about Genesis 1 is that it was probably written while the Israelites were in exile in Babylon.  They watched the yearly festivals of the powerful Babylonians celebrated the Babylonian creation myths.  Yet, even though the Israelites were a small group of people that had been overcome by the Babylonians, they had the audacity and faith to say, “Our God is not just more powerful than your God; our God is the only  God and the creator of the whole universe.  Most people would have said that the Israelite God had been overcome as well, but not these people!  We can’t even begin to imagine the boldness of that claim, today.  But whoever wrote down this story of creation had an amazing faith.

 Gen 1:1 – 2:4a

From the priestly tradition; a concern with order.  Looks similar to the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian creation story.

1:1       “When God began to create . . .”

1:2       images of chaos, confusion, emptiness, waste “tohu wevohu”  See Isaiah 34:11;

^NRS Isaiah 34:11 But the hawk and the hedgehog shall possess it; the owl and the raven shall live in it. He shall stretch the line of confusion over it, and the plummet of chaos over its nobles.

^NRS Isaiah 40:17 All the nations are as nothing before him; they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.

See also Jer 4:23

“The earth was chaos and confusion”

Wind from God – not so much the spirit hovering as a “god-awful” wind blowing the water around.

The darkness ( hoshek) is that same darkness that comes upon the land of Egypt during the last plague.

NRS Exodus 10:21 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward heaven so that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness that can be felt.”

This is the darkness of chaos that only the light of God can overcome.

NRS Psalm 18:28 It is you who light my lamp; the LORD, my God, lights up my darkness.

NRS Proverbs 2:13 who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness,

1:3       We see here that creation is through the word, (see John 1:1-18)

Full of verbs: God speaks, sees, separates and calls

In Gen 2 we will see that the man acting in the image of God as he is the one who calls each animal by name, just as God calls each part of creation by name

1:4       Note the goodness of creation, “tov” means not just “good” but also “right, appropriate, fortunate, agreeable”  Creation is redemption, saving the world from chaos.

1:6-8    The Hebrew view of the world, indeed the view of the world held by all Ancient Near Eastern peoples –  was that there were literally waters above and water below, the earth rests on pillars that might be shaken by the sea monsters

This is the view reflected in the creation texts in Genesis and elsewhere in the bible.

This doesn’t make the stories wrong or untrue, it just means that God spoke the language of the people to whom the stories were first given.  The particular cosmology isn’t the point of the story, however, and we shouldn’t get too caught up in it.  The text transcends the cosmology.

In the first three days, God has made the basic structure of the earth and heavens.  We now have earth, water, light, dark, and food.  Finally God sets up the seasons – creates time, as it were.

An interesting note:  God has to make the firmament and the lights – explicitly.  1:14-18  The sun, moon and stars are not deities, but are themselves works of creation; therefore they are not named.

And now God is happy with the basic structure and moves on to life of greater complexity.  God makes swarming things and the great sea monsters.  I think this last bit is a way of reassuring people who were quite nervous about the sea, that even the monsters of the deep, which some worship as gods, are simply another part of God’s creation.  Therefore they are not to be feared.

1:21  The “great sea monsters” here are made by God. If you want other references to the sea monsters (sometimes called dragons or snakes) look at a few of these passages:

Gen. 1:21

Exod. 7:9

Exod. 7:10

Exod. 7:12

Deut. 32:33

Job 7:12

Ps. 74:13

Ps. 91:13

Ps. 148:7

Isa. 27:1

Isa. 51:9

Jer. 51:34

Ezek. 29:3

Ezek. 32:2

1:26  God  creates “in our image”

Each thing is created after its kind; humanity is created after its kind-the image of God.

1:27

NRS Genesis 1:27 So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

1:28 God’s blessing

Important points about Genesis 1:26-31

Why does God say let “us” make humankind in “our” image?

Four potential answers:

1.  The royal we.  God is speaking as the great ruler/creator.
2. God could be speaking to the divine court; we see this divine court in books like Job and Isaiah.
3. God is speaking as the Trinity.  This is a Christian view imported into the text.
4. The one I think most likely – when God creates human beings God is creating as a relational God.  Even if you don’t think that the Hebrew text is explicitly speaking about the Trinity, God still seems to be speaking as one whose nature is relational.  Therefore, when God creates humans, God creates them as a relationship – male and female.  Both are in the image of God.  Both are needed for the image of God.

Once God has created humans, God gives them a command: be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, have dominion.

So let’s think about what it means to be made in the image of God:

1. We are made in relationship, for relationship.
2. We are made to be fruitful, creative – as God is creative.  Originally fruitfulness was in the tilling of the ground for men, the bearing of children for women.  But Paul, in Galatians, talks about the fruits of the Spirit.  That gives us a new understanding of what it means to be fruitful.
3. We are made to have dominion.  We are stewards under the High King, not rulers on our own.  The  words indicate that it will be difficult to bring fruitfulness out of the earth.

Humankind is not the “pinnacle of creation” – that is true of the Sabbath.  That is what creation is headed towards.

THE FLOW OF ISRAELITE HISTORY

Family Tree

These are some of the things that I began with: First, how we interpret Genesis as Christians.

1) The first way to look at Genesis is to say that “Day” means a 24 hour period of time.  “Young earth creationists” hold this view, also believing in a literal fall, no animal death before the fall and a flood that covered the entire earth.  The problems with the 24 hour period are overwhelming from a scientific point of view, and the adherents of this position agree that the scientific evidence is against them.  But there are also problems from a biblical point of view.  This text reads like poetry or like liturgy, not like a science textbook.  Is it reasonable to interpret literally a text that was meant to make a theological point?  If you want other texts where “day” means something other than a 24 hour period you can look at 2 Peter 3:8 where it says that to the Lord, a thousand years is like a day.  And certainly in the numerous texts in the Old Testament that talk about the “Day of the Lord” there is no question that “day” means something like the beginning of a new age.  Some have pointed out that it is difficult to talk literally about a day being 24 hours when the sun and moon had not yet been invented.

2)  Another way to look at Genesis one is to say along with 2 Peter, that the day refers to an undetermined period of time and that the basic order of creation in Genesis 1 is correct, but that we do not understand the time frame.  The “Old-earth creationists” hold this point of view.  In other words, the “days” simply mark the phases of God’s creating work.  (Some with this point of view believe that the formless void was the time of the dinosaurs and the fall of Lucifer and that the account in Genesis 1 talks about God’s redemptive work in creation.  In other words, God had to save the world from chaos and recreate it after it got messed up.)  Old-earth creationists point to the fact that the basic order of creation is quite similar to the one that the evolutionists come up with – starting in the sea and moving upward, so to speak.

3)  The third way to read Genesis 1 is theologically.  This is to say that the most important point is that the text itself is not concerned with time-frame but with asserting that God is creator, not just of the people of Israel, but of the whole universe.  It uses the language of poetry and worship, not the language of science and we should not confuse the two.  Genesis addresses the fact of God’s creation, but not the how.

Most of those who take this view of Genesis are called theological evolutionists.  They accept the theory of evolution and either believe that God used evolution as a method of creation or that God put into creation in the beginning all that it needed to evolve into what we have today.

Having looked at the ways of understanding the biblical text, let’s look briefly at the science.   There are really two kinds of evolution that people talk about: microevolution and macroevolution.  Microevolution has been seen by anyone who has ever done experiments with fruit flies in biology lab or anyone who has ever had to take several different kinds of antibiotics, because whatever bug they have has become immune to the one they started with.  Everybody, and I mean everybody, accepts microevolution; it is clear to all that species do change over time in response to their environment, that genetic mutations are responsible for those changes and that some of the changes are more useful for survival than others.  So far, no problem.  The problem arises with macroevolution—the theory that we all come from a common ancestor, that natural selection and survival of the fittest can account for all the diversity and complexity of life and that one species can evolve into another.  Evolutionists believe that random mutation, natural selection and “deep time” can also account for the structures of society as well as the biology.

While it is widely held, the standard theory of macroevolution has been called into question by some scientists who are biochemists and physicists.  They argue that we have not been able to show in the fossil record that one species has actually developed into another.  They see new life forms coming in jumps, not gradually as one would expect with evolution.  They find it improbable from a statistical point of view that random mutations could account for the complexity of the systems that they study.  They argue that we need a theory of intelligent design, not from the standpoint of theology, but in order to more adequately explain the science.  John Haught, on the other hand, does not agree that “intelligent design” is science, but is still in the realm of theology.  He argues that we need to develop a theology of evolution.  I am still reading and wrestling with Haught’s books; he is not an easy read!

Where is the big argument between science and religion?  I would argue, along with others, that there are two arguments: not between science and religion, but one argument on the scientific level between scientists with different points of view and  another argument on the philisophical or theological level between people with vastly different ways of looking at the world.

The science I can adress.  If we (as Christians) are people who believe in the truth, and we are, then we should be open to whatever good science discovers, understanding that good science is always sceptical of its own answers.  Don’t ever believe a scientist that tells you that he or she is completely convinced of the validity of a theory.  At that point he stops being a scientist.  The truth will never hurt us and will always be a positive. In fact, I discovered that even some of those who hold to the literal interpretation of Genesis 1 are more concerned with the truth and are willing to change their position if they are convinced by the science that they are wrong because they serve the truth.

What those in the creationist camp are really concerned about, however, is not the science of evolution, but the world-view of evolutionists.  This is a world-view that does not allow for God’s action in the world, that does not even accept that God exists.  But do not be misled into thinking that just because a scientist makes a statement that the statement is about science.  For instance, Carl Sagan says at the beginning of his series on the Cosmos something to the effect that “the universe is all there is and all there ever has been and all there ever will be”.  That is not a statement of science, but a statement of faith.

So these are some consequences of what I believe:

1)  We must do our science while holding firmly to our theology of creation.  We cannot give that up and we must insist that the question of God’s action be left open.  This is not only good theology, but possibly good science as well.

2) We must do our theology while taking full account of the best science.  In order to maintain our credibility as rational people, we must not give in to a world-view that no longer makes sense.  In this case, taking a fair look at evolution is not only good science but good theology as well.  After all, if we truly believe that God created the world, then discovering how God created and continues to create is an act of praise and worship.

3) We cannot allow God to become a “God of the gaps.”  If God is only useful for explaining what science hasn’t discovered yet, then we have a poor theology and a weak view of God.

Finally, I want to tell you why I think this whole issue is important—because it has deep implications for how we live our day to day lives and how we make decisions as a society.

1)  Darwinism on the level of biology, particularly the notion of survival of the fittest, becomes a horror when applied at the social level.  Marx, Hitler, and the Eugenics researchers all believed in what was called Social Darwinism; that the “fit” will survive and should be encourage and that the “unfit” will be less functional and should be discouraged from reproducing or even gotten rid of.  This view leads to a belief in a superior race, that some races are less highly evolved than others.  It leads to forced sterilization of the “unfit” (with the government deciding who is unfit), and in the end to subjugation of peoples and to extermination.  This world-view has no point of contact with Christian beliefs.   If Genesis 1 says anything, it is clear that humanity as a whole has been given the image of God and that no human is to be set above another human in the cosmic scheme of things.

2)  Darwinism is a miserable and illogical foundation for an ethical system. If our selves and our societies are simply the random result of natural forces then it is possible to come up with a theory of why we take care of those to whom we are related-after all they also carry our DNA.  But it is difficult to explain self-sacrifice and compassion for the widows, orphans and aliens among us.  It is difficult to see how we could love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.  And yet that is what we are called to do as Christians.

3)  Lastly, those who do not accept God as the agent of creation are left without a good explanation of our purpose and meaning in life.  We are left with a universe swirling around us and the only purpose we seem to have is to make sure our DNA gets continued.

This is basically where I started from for my sermon.  I will be posting more on how I read Genesis.  And I hope in the future, as I develop a deeper understanding of the theology of evolution, to be able to write more about that as well.

A few more notes and definitions:

1.  Some background on Genesis:

Scholars often refer to Genesis 1:1-2:4a as the first creation story, finding a second creation story beginning in Genesis 2:4b.  They separate these two stories because the name used for God is different in each and because they seem to give us two different pictures of the order of creation.  For instance in the “first” story, human beings are created after the plants and animals.  In Genesis 2:5-7, on the other hand, it says that there were no plants yet when God created Adam, the person.  The usual explanation for there being two stories is that they came from two different groups of people among the Israelites; when the scriptures were collected, they kept both stories since both were inspired and each one contained an important truth about God that needed to be included.  Theologically, we need both of these stories in order to have a full view of how God works in creation.

2. Terms used in the debate over creationism versus evolution.

Three kinds of creationists:

a) Young earth creationist:  One who believes that the earth is no more that 10,000 years old, that no animal death occurred before the fall (which they take to be literal) and that the flood covered the entire earth and can account for the whole of the fossil record.

b)  Old earth or “Progressive” creationist:  One who believes that the earth is several billion years old, that a “day” in Genesis refers to a long period of time, that the flood only covered part of the earth.

c)  Theistic evolutionist:  One who believes in the doctrine that God created the earth but that evolution can be used to explain how creation happened.  Some believe that God gave nature everything it needed to evolve and others believe that God has been involved on a continuing basis in evolution.

Intelligent design:  The scientific theory that the evidence for creation (and evolution) can best be explained by assuming that it is the result of a purposeful design and not simply random.

Microevolution:  The observable fact (with which no one disagrees) that living things do evolve (or adapt) in response to their environment using the mechanism of genetic mutation.

Macroevolution: The theory that all life has a common origin, that species evolve gradually over time with a gradual process, that natural selection and survival of the fittest plays a role in which organisms survive to pass on their genes.

Evolutionism:  (also called naturalism or atheistic evolution) The world-view that all matter and all life is the result of completely natural processes, that no God or other designer exists, and that macroevolution explains not only all biological complexity and diversity, but the complexity and diversity of society as well.

Good books on the subject:

Three Views on Creation and Evolution edited by J.P. Moreland and John Mark Reynolds and published by Zondervan.

Evolution From Creation to New Creation: Conflict, Conversation , and Convergence by Ted Peters and Martinez Hewlett, published by Abingdon Press.

The Origin of Species by Darwin (if you want to go back to the source that caused all the fuss)

God After Darwin: A Theology of Evolution, and Making Sense of Evolution: Darwin, God and the Drama of Life  both by John Haugh

Sorry for the length of this post!  Just wanted to get it all said.

Audio:

Okay, we have been through the idea of hermeneutics and exegesis.  I have asked you to think about your own presuppositions and assumptions and your own social location.  We have talked about different translations and the importance of reading several. Now let’s talk about actual techniques of reading or interpretation or exegesis, or whatever you want to call it.

In reading the bible we use a variety of techniques to try to understand what the original authors were trying to communicate.  We call these techniques “historical criticism.”  We are general trying to understand things like the historical context out of which the text came, the cultural context that the earliest hearers or readers of the story lived in, etc.

One of the techniques that has been used extensively is what has come to be called the “Documentary Hypothesis.”  Those of you who have had Disciple Bible Study  may remember this.  In its original form it applied only to the Pentateuch (the first five books) but the basic idea has been applied to almost every book of the Bible, Old and New Testaments alike.  So let’s take a closer look.  I have never tried to do this online before, so please ask if something doesn’t make sense.

When people really started reading the bible again for themselves, and started looking at the original Greek and Hebrew texts, they began to notice certain things about the text. For instance, a French fellow named Jean Astruc noticed that different sections of the Old Testament, in particular the first five books, used different names for God.  If you want to look at that for yourself, then read Genesis 1 and 2. (BIG HINT: When the English translations write ‘Lord’ in small caps then that word is translating the actual Hebrew word for the personal name of God which in English we transliterate as Yahweh.  When it writes the word ‘Lord’, in regular letters, it is translating the Hebrew word Adonai, which literally means Lord. When the English text has the word ‘God’ it is generally translating the Hebrew word “Elohim.”)

Astruc he thought he saw a pattern to how the names were used.  Other people noticed that the bible seemed to repeat stories with only slight variations and that sometimes those variations used the different names.  [Read Genesis 6 and 7; and Genesis 12:10-20 and 20:1-18.] Without going into excruciating detail (which, once again, you can find in your friend and mine, Wikipedia) scholars came to the conclusion that there were four basic strands of stories in the Torah, coming from four different original documents. They labeled these documents J (for Jahwist); E (for Elohist); D (for Deuteronomist) and P (for Priestly).

This theory, most clearly stated by a German named Julius Wellhausen, was called the “Documentary Hypothesis.”  Each of the four documents had characteristics and could be traced to a particular time in Israelite History. For instance, the Jahwist called God Yahweh, anthropomorphized God and presented a God that talked directly to human beings, tended not to moralize, but was interested in the origins of the family of David, i.e. in the tribe of Judah.  The Jahwist was generally dated to about 1000 B.C. (or B.C.E.) or essentially the reign of King David.  The Elohist used Elohim as the name of God, presented a God who appeared in dreams and visions, was concerned with a “prophetic” point of view and focused on the Mosaic tradition.  This is usually dated from about the 750’s B.C. and people think that it was brought to the Southern Kingdom when the Northern Kingdom was taken into exile.  The D strand was basically Deuteronomy. The Priestly tradition is usually dated from the time of the exile, uses the name Elohim for God, reflects the concerns of those who were responsible for worship and the cultic traditions of Israel, things like a concern with order, with dates and names, with sacrifices and worship.

These are only a few of the characteristics that Wellhausen and others thought they saw in the different documents but you get the idea.  Someone, maybe those priests, put these documents together into the final form of the text that we have today.  This theory can get very complicated and some scholars see a whole lot more different documents.  Also, a lot of people in the more conservative Christian traditions, think Wellhausen was sort of like the anti-Christ because he was the one who made all of this famous.  But the scholars were really just trying to answer questions that they had about the text and the documentary hypothesis seemed to answer those questions pretty well.  Now we see problems with this hypothesis, at least in its details; but I think it is fair to say that most modern scholars in the mainline Christian traditions accept that the bible has developed over time from multiple documents and contains multiple voices.  For those of us who think that God inspired the bible, this is no problem, because we think that God also inspired those who wrote down, edited, redacted and shaped these stories into their final form.  We think that these multiple voices are a gift from God to show us all the many ways that human beings have heard the voice of God and responded to it; both in good ways and in less admirable ways.

So, just knowing this much, if I tell you that Genesis 1 and 2 come from different strands, that Genesis 6 and 7 have the strands all mixed together and that Genesis12:10-20 and 20:1-18 come from different strands, could you take a guess as to what strand matches which part?  Try it!  Which text comes from what strand? (You can use a strand more than once)

So, here is the procedure so far;

1) Read both alone and together with others (whether in a group or with books).

2) Recognize your own assumptions and presuppositions in reading.

3) Read in multiple translations

Now for the next, and in some ways most important step:

4) Ask questions:

a.      All critical techniques have grown out of people asking questions.

What is the literary context of this passage? What comes before and after in the text?

b.      What are the actually words used; not the words I think should be used, or the words the preacher sticks in there to make it easier to understand, but the actual words of the text?

c.      Why is the story told exactly this way, and not another way?

d.      Who are the characters in this story?  Or is it poetry and I need to ask why these particular images are use

A     Are there stories in other religious traditions that are similar? Or in other places in the bible?

Well, maybe you get the idea.  I usually tell my seminary students that if they have no questions about the passage they are preaching on, they should find another passage for the week!  This sounds basic, but you would be surprised at how many people leave out the question part.  They assume that the text means one thing and one thing only and once they have learned that meaning from an “expert” they have no more need to question.

If you want to know the academic underpinnings for all of this, you should know that I am influenced by Paul Ricoeur.  His talks about  a cycle of reading: reading “naively,” then doing the work on a text, and reading once again in a fresh way.

Another way to look at the issue of questions, is that questions give the Holy Spirit space to work in you.  The overarching question for me is always, What is God trying to say to me in this passage? but I find that out by asking lots of other questions.

And the type of questions that you ask determine the type of resources that you go to in order to find the answer to your questions, as well as the type of critical techniques that you use.

As we will talk about, different forms of biblical criticism grew out of different kinds of questions that people asked about the text.

One more issue in reading the biblical texts: because they were written in other languages, in order to read them at all most of us have to read in translation.  Now comes MMR number three:

Every translation is an interpretation, so you must read more than one translation.

Try to read this sentence:

Ilkrdbks

What does this say?

I like red bikes.

I like to read books.

I look at rude books.

I lick your databanks.

How do you know?

The Old Testament was written in Hebrew and a little bit of Aramaic.  The New Testament was written in Greek. The ancient Hebrew was written with only a few vowels and mostly consonants.  The consonants were not added until a long time after the texts began to be written down.  Thankfully the proper readings were also handed down orally, so we do know how to read the texts—mostly. I say mostly because in some cases, there are discrepancies in how the vowels got added.  Some folks read it one way and added the vowels to match their reading; some read another way and, consequently, came out with a different set of vowels.  It isn’t necessarily a terrible problem, but it is one that you should know exists.

Just remember: Nobody had word processors, lots of storage space and spell check back then.  Even in the Greek, which does have nice things like vowels, those who copied manuscripts triedtosavespacebyrunningthewordstogether. (Think of text messaging these days.  Do you know what a BFF is?  Or what it means to ROTFLOL? If not, ask your local teenager.)

When folks started to translate the Hebrew and Greek into other languages, they ran into other problems.  If you are from East Texas you might know what it means to say that something is the “cat’s meow,” but if you are not you probably have no clue.  Even though I know what someone means (specifically my father) when he says that, I would have trouble translating it.  “Well if that ain’t the cat’s meow” means something like, “Well, isn’t that amazing—I have never seen anything like it before.”  You can see that an exact translation into something like French, or Spanish would not capture the essence of what was really being said.  So do I translate word for word and then footnote, or do I translate the sense of what is meant?

Some translations are more likely to translate word for word (what is known as “formal equivalence”) and others are more likely to get the sense of what is said (“dynamic equivalence”).  But then you have to ask yourself: Would another person from East Texas even agree with my interpretation of that sentence in English?  If someone different translated according to the sense of the sentence, he/she might translate according to a little bit different understanding of the sense of the English.

Do you see the problem? Translating the text is partly science and partly art, and there is just no way around that.  So, as I said before: Every translation is an interpretation.

Most translations will tell you in their introductions what their guiding principles were in making the translation.  They will tell you if a committee did the translation or if it was all done by a single person.  For instance, the NRSV, the NIV, and the NJB are all committee translations, the Living Bible and the Message are both done by individuals.  It is helpful to read from the different families of translation.  Look at this Wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_English_Bible_translations for different translation families and more information on them.  Also skim the introduction to your own bible that you read.  What does it say about who translated, why and how?

When you read one text in several different translations you start to see where the translators have disagreed.  You can be sure that is a place to look more closely at what the text says.

Now for a look at the real text of the bible!   Read Genesis 1:1 in multiple translations (I suggest at a minimum the NRSV, NIV, NJB, and Tanakh). Also, look at the footnotes in the NRSV translation. See any differences?  Comment if you like!

Here is a little test—read the following sentence out loud to yourself:

a woman without her man is nothing

Now, how did you punctuate that sentence as you read it? Like this?

A woman without her man is nothing.

Or like this:

A woman: without her, man is nothing.

Do you see the difference?  (warning: English grammar lesson to follow)

In the first example the subject of the sentence is ‘woman’ and the predicate would be ‘is nothing’.  Another way of saying this sentence would be: A woman is nothing without her man.

In the second example, the subject of the sentence is ‘man’, indicating that it is the man who is nothing without the help of a woman.

How you read this sentence depends on one of two things:

1.   Your own hermeneutic—what presuppositions you make about the world

2.      Your assumptions about my hermeneutic—what presuppositions you think I make about the world.

Our hermeneutic is our set of presuppositions about the world, our “world-view” you might say.  It is how we put together and order the otherwise disordered scenes of life in order to make sense out of what we see.  In the example above, some of us might see the world as dominated by men and thus any statement made, we automatically assume has a bias toward men and against women.  This could be true whether we are male or female (though how we feel about that might be different based on our gender).  Some of us might think that women rule, or that as a woman, I might think women rule.  That might lead you to the second way of reading.

Or you might have no clue and simply be waiting for more information.  If so—good for you! The more information you can learn about a text, and about the context in which the text was produced, the better you are able to make an educated guess at the hermeneutic of those for whom the text was written.  Learning about the hermeneutic of a particular era in the church’s history might help you understand why a text has been read in a particularly way. Understanding your own set of assumptions and presuppositions—your own hermeneutic—will lead you to understand your own reading.

We cannot know how the original writer intended a text to be read without knowing the hermeneutic of that writer, though we can make some guesses.  However, in interpreting the text—in doing our exegesis—we can and do know certain things about the text.  In the above example, we know what each of the words mean, as long as we know English.  We know that in some way it concerns the relationship between men and women.  If we are able to learn the perspective of the author, then we might be able to make those guesses, but we also have to know the context: Is the author quoting someone else?  Is the author expressing his/her point of view or that of a particular character? Is the author speaking “tongue-in-cheek” as it were? By reading other texts written by the same person, we might gain some of that perspective that we seek.  By reading the text in which this snippet is placed, we might find out if it is in a play about male-female relationships, a hate-filled speech written by a man seeking to deny women the right to vote, or a dissertation about how words are used!

People of radically different hermeneutics can use the same techniques of exegesis and come out with different understanding.  After learning more about where this snippet of text comes from, you might learn that it does in fact come from a speech by a man seeking to deny women the right to vote.  If you agree with that stance, and you believe the speaker to be a fount of wisdom, then you might interpret the statement as a pearl of wisdom and quote it as justification for some point that you want to make.  If you think that the speaker was an old-fashioned and out-moded thinker and that the world has thankfully moved on, you might interpret it as a bit of foolishness.  My point here is not to argue about the relative merits of men and women, but to get you to see that point of view makes a difference in interpretation.

I hope I haven’t lost you by now!  I also hope you are getting a sense of the complexities that we have in reading the biblical text—well, really in reading any text.  Most of the time we just do all of this automatically, and that works fine for us.  But if we really want to study a text, especially an ancient text, and get the most out of it, then we have to take these things into consideration.  Really, we don’t even need to think about all this every time we read the bible; sometimes we can just read devotionally and let God speak to us.  But other times, we need to struggle with the text and see if God is speaking in a different way.