Another interpretation of Biblical Creation -

Tenbones · (#1 (**permalink**))

God is not the Creator, claims academic

Interesting...

Quote:

Professor Ellen van Wolde, a respected Old Testament scholar and author, claims the first sentence of Genesis “in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth” is not a true translation of the Hebrew.

She claims she has carried out fresh textual analysis that suggests the writers of the great book never intended to suggest that God created the world — and in fact the Earth was already there when he created humans and animals.

Prof Van Wolde, 54, who will present a thesis on the subject at Radboud University in The Netherlands where she studies, said she had re-analysed the original Hebrew text and placed it in the context of the Bible as a whole, and in the context of other creation stories from ancient Mesopotamia.

She said she eventually concluded the Hebrew verb “bara”, which is used in the first sentence of the book of Genesis, does not mean “to create” but to “spatially separate”.

The first sentence should now read “in the beginning God separated the Heaven and the Earth”

According to Judeo-Christian tradition, God created the Earth out of nothing.

Prof Van Wolde, who once worked with the Italian academic and novelist Umberto Eco, said her new analysis showed that the beginning of the Bible was not the beginning of time, but the beginning of a narration.

She said: “It meant to say that God did create humans and animals, but not the Earth itself.”

She writes in her thesis that the new translation fits in with ancient texts.

According to them there used to be an enormous body of water in which monsters were living, covered in darkness, she said.

She said technically “bara” does mean “create” but added: “Something was wrong with the verb.

“God was the subject (God created), followed by two or more objects. Why did God not create just one thing or animal, but always more?”

She concluded that God did not create, he separated: the Earth from the Heaven, the land from the sea, the sea monsters from the birds and the swarming at the ground.

“There was already water,” she said.

“There were sea monsters. God did create some things, but not the Heaven and Earth. The usual idea of creating-out-of-nothing, creatio ex nihilo, is a big misunderstanding.”

God came later and made the earth livable, separating the water from the land and brought light into the darkness.

She said she hoped that her conclusions would spark “a robust debate”, since her finds are not only new, but would also touch the hearts of many religious people.

She said: “Maybe I am even hurting myself. I consider myself to be religious and the Creator used to be very special, as a notion of trust. I want to keep that trust.”

A spokesman for the Radboud University said: “The new interpretation is a complete shake up of the story of the Creation as we know it.”

Prof Van Wolde added: “The traditional view of God the Creator is untenable now.”

**arthra** · (#2 (**permalink**))

God did create some things, but not the Heaven and Earth. The usual idea of creating-out-of-nothing, creatio ex nihilo, is a big misunderstanding.”

Actually that concept seems close to the idea of the Gnostics that the creator God was different from a higher God..also in Zoroastrianism, Ahriman the opposite of God supposed to have created evil creatures while Ahura Mazda only created good ones..

In the Baha'i Writings it says that there was always a universe and a Creator.. "something" was always there and the "creation" is always in process..

metis · (#3 (**permalink**))

Some of the Jewish commentators wrote that the creation account we see in Genesis is actually God's seventh creation, with parts of the previous creations left at least partially in place. Now, please don't ask me where they got that from.

Chaitanyananda · (#4 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by metis

Some of the Jewish commentators wrote that the creation account we see in Genesis is actually God's seventh creation, with parts of the previous creations left at least partially in place. Now, please don't ask me where they got that from.

We have a local Christian minister who teaches it is the second creation.

Hawk · (#5 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by metis

Some of the Jewish commentators wrote that the creation account we see in Genesis is actually God's seventh creation, with parts of the previous creations left at least partially in place. Now, please don't ask me where they got that from.

Wow, that is amazing, I too would like to know how they managed to get to that conclusion....

metis · (#6 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chaitanyananda

We have a local Christian minister who teaches it is the second creation.

By chance do you know where his idea comes from?

metis · (#7 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hawk

Wow, that is amazing, I too would like to know how they managed to get to that conclusion....

There's a person who I frequently talk with who teaches both Jewish and Christian classes down in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, and I posed this question to him. He states that it is not found in the Talmud but that it comes from another tradition, but he's not certain what the source originally was. I do know that this concept is very popular with the Lubavitchers.

metis · (#8 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by metis

By chance do you know where his idea comes from?

Just by coincidence, when I went to another website that both my friend and I are invovled with, here's what he wrote in response to a similar question:

In the 14th, 15th, 16th and 17th centuries, the age of faith and miracles, Jewish life, as much of central European and eastern European life in general was horrific by our standards today. The Thirty Years War, the Northern Wars, and the Chmielnitzky massacre of the 17th century capped several centuries of Jewish death and destruction that amounted to as much as 30% of the European Jewish population. The chief response to that terrible era was the Jewish turn to mysticism and messianism as a way to explain the horror. One of the products of that era, although its adherents claimed it went back to the 2nd century CE, was Kabbala and Hasidism. The Lubavitcher Chassids that Metis mentioned were part of that movement that began in 1750.

I can certainly research the details about the prior creations and earlier humans, but I can barely get my head around HaShem at Sinai much less these mystical concepts of prior creations, multiple heavens, the imprisoned soul of Adam, the fracturing of and the spreading of the Divine sparks, etc. I am just missing the mystical gene.

Chaitanyananda · (#9 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by metis

By chance do you know where his idea comes from?

He has studied many of the older Christian mystics, but not sure.

Here's a link to book he wrote and a link to his ministry site (he has a page called preacher's notebook with different odds and ends. Haven't checked to see if he gets into that there or not, but maybe.

http://www.amazon.com/Sanctuary-View...g-Mystery-God/

Crown of Life Ministries

metis · (#10 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chaitanyananda

He has studied many of the older Christian mystics, but not sure.

Here's a link to book he wrote and a link to his ministry site (he has a page called preacher's notebook with different odds and ends. Haven't checked to see if he gets into that there or not, but maybe.

http://www.amazon.com/Sanctuary-View...g-Mystery-God/

Crown of Life Ministries

Thanks Chai, I checked it out but I can't find any of the reference I was looking for.

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