Genesis 2
b. The universe, and the planet on which we live, was organized by this same God. c. Humanity was created by God in his image. d. All humanity is descended from Adam and Eve. e. God promised to provide a solution by which humanity would be restored. f. As a result of their sin, Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden.
How do we verifiy the truthfulness of what the writer states?
- Is there a credible naturalist or materialist account of the same events?
- Science now leads us to understand the universe had a beginning.
- Science points us to the complexity of life, refuting the idea of evolution.
- Human distinction from all other forms is only explained by its special creation.
- Scientific discovery points to the origin of creation being an intelligent God.
- Human experience is witness to the truth fo humanity’s fall recorded in Genesis.
- If Genesis isn’t correct, a similar story must be, and no one has yet to produce it.
v.3
And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
The authors of Scripture were well aware that the theology of paganism was chained to the natural rhythms of time, even to the celestial deities, personified as Sun, Moon, Stars, and Constellations, which lorded it over the cycles of days and nights, months, and seasons and years; personified powers which are demoted in Genesis to mere artifacts, lamps rising and setting on command of the One Creator.
We can therefore conclude that the seven-day cycle gave Israel a foundation for their calendar that operated independently of all the objects and functions of the created world (i.e., cycles of the moon or sun; seasons) and linked them to a recognition of God and his role. At the same time, it put the creation narrative in the context of an enthronement/temple dedication-type of setting.
v.4
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that Yahweh God made earth and heaven.
When the author has finished his account of the seven days of creation (2:3), he then goes back to the word with which he began about God creating the heavens and earth and he repeats them (2:4). The author purposely expands the name of God. The reason he does it is because his focus in the next segment of what he’s writing is going to be the beginning of God’s covenant with Israel. That’s why God has to be identified as YHWH.
v.5-6
and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the LORD God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground, 6but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground—
Verses 5 and 6 give us the background: no bush or plants had yet sprung up. The verbs are in a “background” tense—similar to verses 1 and 2 in chapter 1.
v.7
the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the groundand breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
Verbs are in a “historical narrative” tense.
v.8
Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.
Humanity’s creation did not take place in Eden, but in the barren land outside it.
v.9
And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
v.15
the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
The author had already noted that God “put” (GK 8492) man into the garden (v.8b). Now he gives the purpose for this. Two important points are in danger of being obscured by the English translations. The first is the change from the Hebrew word for “put” to a term that the author elsewhere has reserved for God’s “rest” or “safety” (GK 5663), a safety that he gives to people in the land (e.g., Ge 19:16; Dt 3:20; 12:10; 25:19), and the “dedication” of something in the presence of the Lord (Ex 16:33-34; Lev 16:23; Nu 17:4; Dt 26:4,10). Both senses appear to lie behind the word here. Man was “put” into the garden where he could “rest” and be “safe,” and he was “put” into the garden “in God’s presence” where he could have fellowship with God (3:8). A second point is the specific purpose for which God put man in the garden. Most translations have “to work it and take care of it.” Although that translation is as early as LXX (2d cent. B.C.), there are serious objections to it. For one, the suffixed pronoun in the Hebrew text rendered “it” in English is feminine, whereas the noun “garden” is masculine. Only by changing the pronoun to a masculine singular, as the LXX has done, can it have the sense of the EVs, namely “to work” and “to keep.” Moreover, later in the same narrative (3:23) “to work the ground” is said to be a result of the Fall, and the narrative suggests that the author had intended such a punishment to be seen as an ironic reversal of the man’s original purpose. If such was the case, then “working” and “keeping” the garden would not provide a contrast to “working the ground.” In light of these objections, a more suitable translation would be “to worship and to obey.” Man is put in the garden to worship and obedience; he was a priest, not merely a worker and keeper of the garden.
v.16-17
And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”
The inference is that God alone knows what is good for the man and what is not good for him. To enjoy the “good” man must trust God and obey him. If he disobeys, he will have to decide for himself what is good and what is not good. To people today such a prospect may seem desirable, but it is the worst fate that could have befallen the human race; for only God knows what is good for them.
v.18
The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
At the close of ch.2, the author puts the final touch on his account of what it means for man to be “in God’s image and likeness.” In the first chapter the author intimated that the creation of the human race in the “image of God” somehow entailed being male and female (v.27). In the narrative of the creation of the woman in ch.2, the author returns to develop this theme by showing that man’s creation “in God’s image” also entails a “partnership” (NIV, “a suitable helper [GK 6469]”) with his wife. The “likeness” that the man and the woman share with God in ch.1 finds an analogy in the “likeness” between the man and his wife in ch.2. For the first time since the account of the creation of the man and the woman in ch.1, there is divine deliberation. The plural “Let us make” is replaced by the singular “I will make,” perhaps because only the woman is being created. In ch.1 the divine plurality found its analogy in the creation of “male and female,” whereas here the divine singular appears to be a curious reflection of man’s being alone.
v.21
So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh.
Just as at other crucial points when a new relationship is initiated (e.g., 15:12; 28:11), the recipient of God’s provision sleeps while God acts. The purpose of the sleep is not merely anesthetic but portrays a sense of passivity and acceptance of the divine provision (cf. Ps 127:2). A homiletic midrash says that “just as the rib is found at the side of the man and is attached to him, even so the good wife, the rib of her husband, stands at his side to be his helper-counterpart, and her soul is bound up with his.”
v.22
Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.
The use of Adam’s rib for the creation of Eve may find illumination in the *Sumerian language. The Sumerian word for rib is ti. Of interest is the fact that ti means “life,” just as Eve does (3:20). Others have suggested that a connection should be seen with the Egyptian word imw, which can mean either clay (out of which man was made) or rib.
v.24
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
v.25
The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.