Comment by Tom Smith on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 11:59am

I find it hard to separate Chap. 1 from Chap. 2 in Genesis. The belief that these are two stories from two different sources makes sense, but why did these two stories get put together and actually run together (even though the separation into Chaps and verses wasn't there originally.) I see the first story as a description of the physical world that is observed. The fact that Light comes before sun and moon indicates a belief in a power/energy behind the observed. The fact that the order of living things approximates evolutionary development indicates a keen observation of simple to more complex organisms, more or less depending on observations made at the time. The fact that there are male and female of each species and that is what is required to continue the species seemed quite logical. The culmination of the "image of God" seems to me to complete the sweep of the story from the beginning of Light to the fullest expression of God's interaction with "us." 

The second chapter, I don't want to get ahead of this study but feel it necessary to tie the two together, seems to be much more a description of the "social" world as observed as "of course" this is different than the physical order.

Comment by Irene Lape on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 12:18pm

So happy to see your comment. I wonder how quickly to proceed. My thought was to wait about a week and see what comes up and perhaps discuss comments back and forth a little. I haven't done this before, but it is so wonderful to get other thoughts. And it will go a lot faster - more chapters at a time - after we get through the dense stuff here at the beginning.

Comment by QuakerQuaker on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 12:38pm

Hi Irene: so is the idea for this to be a series that goes through the Bible step-by-step. Sounds fabulous! Thank you so much, I love it when people take ownership in QuakerQuaker and do things like this!

I'd like to think of a way to feature it more, maybe I'll drop you an email about it. In the meantime, when writing a post, if you give it a tag of "bible" it will automatically show up in the Friends and the Bible page (I just now added the tag). And not to give you more work, but you might consider also adding a link to the relevant Quaker Bible Index listing for the passage, e.g.: Genesis 1-3. It's something I like to cross-reference when I have the extra time. Thanks again,
Martin

Comment by Forrest Curo on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 12:45pm

Tom's question... Should read 'Secret Origins' for full story, but basically you've got refugees from both conquered Hebrew kingdoms, living in Babylon, salvaging all that they can from differing sacred traditions, written and/or unwritten. Even the "written" stuff is more like sheet music for a recital than an English text; if you don't already know what it says from hearing it aloud, you'd have a hard time working it out!

 

This part doesn't necessarily see God as utterly other... It depends on how you conceive that "image". In childhood I heard this Methodist preacher talking about how this couldn't be our physical form, which is different in everybody. So, I understood, it's our mind and heart and soul that are "like" God, though confined within in our limited domain.

 

Later I started thinking of this from a (not successful) novelist's perspective... "We" create an imaginary world, but actually it's something within us that makes us want to create, and does the creating. "We" have unlimited power over our creation-- but for it to remain what it it, we have to limit our exercise of power, leave it to work out its own nature, in tune with the Spirit that creates.

Comment by Forrest Curo on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 1:03pm

"Projecting our own nature onto God."

 

We do instinctively project our own nature onto everything, including God. (Much bad theology stems from this!)

 

But truly it is God's nature that has been "breathed into" (next chapter) us.

 

As a favorite Pendle Hill teacher put it, you can understand Christ truly by

1) 'a high Christology and a low anthropology' [Christ is God but we aren't intrinsically, only via grace]

or

2) 'a low Christology and a high anthropology' [Christ is a man, and people are intrinsically embodied forms of God]

 

and of course, 'high & high' would be much like #2.

 

So in 'projecting our nature onto God', we are able to do this correctly to some extent, because there is this core Life in us that actually is "the same 'stuff'. " (& how does thee like the first chapters of 'John'?)

Comment by Irene Lape on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 2:33pm

This is going to be fabulous - I'm so excited!

Comment by Rickey D. Whetstone on 4th mo. 15, 2011 at 10:44pm

What does it mean to you that we are "created in God's image"?

Irene

I'm writing . . . to give you . . . my experience . . .  of  your question.  

When I was 12 . . . I was a big fan of Moses.  And when Moses died . . .  I sat on the edge of my bed and cried.  

 

When I was 21 . . . I spent seven months of intense prayer seeking God . . .  while praying . . .  seeking God . . . Jesus appeared and I spent time on his lap . . . he answered all of my questions that I had at that time.   He showed me . . . my beginning . . .   I saw myself come out of God.   I was totally amazed.    

 

When God looks at any human . . . he sees himself.  

 He has a wonderful plan for everyone . . . when we give up everything and return to where we came from.

 

When I was 12 the Bible was number 1.   When I was 21 God became number 1. 

Comment by Irene Lape on 4th mo. 16, 2011 at 8:40am

The comparison you make, Forrest, between God and yourself as the creator of a narrative of your own, is so true. I too have written a novel, and it was an amazingly wonderful experience. But it is true what you say. I thought I knew what I was going to create, but by the time I'd worked my way through the story to the end, the characters had grown separate from me to a certain extent, and I had to go back and make the story's early chapters more consistent with where it ended. My "vision" of God is very much shaped by my own strengths, my own particular imagination. I remember sitting around a faculty lunch table at the school where I was working and talking about how we "saw" God differently depending on our area of expertise. For me God was very much an "author" and creator of history. For the science and math teachers, God was so much more a creator of laws and systems. We denigrate "imagination" but it is an important faculty in us. My imagination and my human capacity to see the universe and seek to grasp truths about it, my capacity to love in a very large way makes me feel that something "like" me, like "us," is utterly necessary - these realities cannot be without a larger context. 

 

Comment by Steven Davison on 4th mo. 16, 2011 at 12:15pm

I think the most important question raised by the first chapter of Genesis is, what does it mean to be created "in the image of God"? In God's proposal to do this, in verse 26, and then in the next verse, where he actually does it, being created in the image of God is associated with dominion, rulership over all the earth. It seems to be a shadow of God's sovereignty that is conferred by his "image". 

 

In our modern technological mastery, we often take this dominion for granted and are surprised when an earthquake/tsunami or a hurricane comes along—forces that we actually cannot control. But when these words were written, the occasional and tentative triumphs of human mastery of "all the creatures that move along the ground" must have seemed like more of a promise and a surprise than a given.

 

Probably written during the Babylonian exile, certainly this story is based on the Baylonian creation myth, the enemu elish. But it's a radical re-write: the plot is basically the same but the characters are completely different and so is the narrative meaning. Instead of creating the world and its gods through copulation, as the Babylonian version has it, there is only God (one god) and his creation, the human; creation is effected through speech, the word of God; and all that he creates is essentially 'secular'—the creations (the sun, moon, oceans, etc) have no gods associated with them, they have no spiritual animation or identity, there is nothing sacred about them, except their "goodness", conferred upon them by the Word. They are just what they are, desacralized and 'natural.'

 

All of this was truly revolutionary at the time.

Comment by Cian O'Connor on 4th mo. 16, 2011 at 5:43pm

<i> and all that he creates is essentially 'secular'—the creations (the sun, moon, oceans, etc) have no gods associated with them, they have no spiritual animation or identity, there is nothing sacred about them, except their "goodness", conferred upon them by the Word. They are just what they are, desacralized and 'natural.'</i>

 

That's a really good point. Thank you.

 

I interpret it slightly differently. I subscribe to a panentheistic view of god, where (s)he penetrates and co-exists with creation. So following John's gospel, I guess, I would see this as God animating the world through (his/her) presence. Creation is animated through speech, and through the breath. So the creations have no gods, but are interpenetrated by God. All of creation is sacred, but its a sacredness of unity.

 

If that made any sense at all...

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