Tool Alpha

Genesis, the Beginning

What the first eleven chapters say, what they do not say, and where the real arguments are.

What kind of text is Genesis 1? Before anyone argues about the days, they have already decided what sort of writing this is. Most of the fight starts there.
In the beginning, or when God began? Is verse 1 a complete sentence or the opening of a longer one, and if it is complete, is it a first act or a heading? Three readings, two questions.
What does bara do? The verb for create is used only of God. What it takes as its object is the argument.
Formless and void The starting point in verse 2 is tohu and bohu. Whether that means shapeless matter or a world not yet working changes what the days are doing.
What yom does The Hebrew word for day covers daylight, a full day, and an era, and Genesis 1 and 2 use more than one of those.
The seventh day has no evening Days one to six close with evening and morning. Day seven does not. Both poles make that silence carry weight, in different directions.
Light before the sun Light on day one, plants on day three, sun and moon on day four. Origen asked about it in the third century. Every reading has to answer him.
The two panels Days one to three make spaces. Days four to six fill them. Is that a timeline, a design, or both?
How old is the earth? The question everyone brings to Genesis 1. Both poles conclude the chapter does not answer it, for different reasons.
Functional or material origins Is Genesis 1 an account of things being made, or of things being given their place and purpose? This is the deepest split in the field.
The firmament Day two makes a raqia to separate the waters above from the waters below. Firmament, expanse, vault or dome: each translation carries a different picture of the sky.
Genesis 1 as a temple text Seven days, a climactic rest, a cosmos ordered around a throne. Walton reads the chapter as the dedication of the universe as God's temple.
Let us make God speaks in the plural and acts in the singular one verse later. Lennox and Heiser read the plural differently. Walton's argument does not turn on it.
What the image of God is Only humans are made in God's image. What the image is has been argued for two thousand years.
Who bears the image Male and female, and only humans. What the image is gets argued. Who has it does not.
Two creation accounts? Genesis 1 puts plants before people. Genesis 2 seems to put the man first. A contradiction, a different kind of order, or a sequel?
Adam: archetype, individual, or both? Formed from dust, Eve built from his side. Is that how the first man was made, or what every human is?
Cain's wife Cain marries, fears that whoever finds him will kill him, and builds a city. Who were these people?
Where was Eden? Four rivers, two of them known. Mesopotamia, a lost pre-flood geography, or a holy mountain described as a garden.
The serpent A snake that talks, more crafty than any beast. Satan, a chaos creature, or a divine being?
The tree of the knowledge of good and evil One tree, one command, no reason given. What the tree was, and why it was off limits, is read three ways.
In the day you eat of it God says they will die the day they eat. They do not die that day. Who told the truth?
Death before the fall Did anything die before Genesis 3? The two poles of this tool answer the same way. The fight is with a third position.
The genealogies and Ussher Add up the ages in Genesis 5 and 11 and you get a date for Adam. Ussher did. Does the text intend it?
The flood and its extent The whole earth, all flesh, every high mountain. Global, or the whole known world?
The sons of God and the daughters of men Genesis 6:1-4 is the strangest passage in Genesis 1 to 11. The Divine Council Index has the full treatment; this is how it sits in the primeval history.
Babel One language, a tower with its top in the heavens, and the scattering of the nations. The tower is a Mesopotamian building with a Mesopotamian purpose.
Enuma Elish and Genesis 1 A Babylonian creation epic on seven tablets, with humans made on the sixth. Borrowing, a shared world, or a reply?
Genesis 1 never says sun Day four has the greater light and the lesser light. The ordinary Hebrew words for sun and moon are not used. On that fact, every reading agrees.
Does Genesis rule on evolution? Lennox reads two "and God said" moments as lines no unguided process crosses. Walton reads the text as making no material claim at all.
John Walton Wheaton Old Testament scholar. Genesis 1 is ancient cosmology about functional origins, the inauguration of the cosmos as God's temple.
John Lennox Oxford mathematician and philosopher of science. The days are open to several readings; the text leaves the age of the universe open; God's word marks the decisive steps.
Young-earth creationism at its strongest Six consecutive 24-hour days, a recent creation, a global flood, and no death before the fall. Stated by its own advocates.
Michael Heiser Reads Genesis 1 to 11 through the divine council: the plural of 1:26, the serpent as a divine rebel, the sons of God, Babel and the nations.