3.

GOD CREATES ORIGINAL HARMONY

The Yahwist Creation Story the second creation account in

the Bible (Genesis 2:4b25)
The following table summarises the Yahwist Creation Story and its key teaching points.

The story

What does the story teach?

God shaped human beings from

the soil and breathed in them
the breath of life (v 7)

God created human beings and loves each one

personally. The breathing in of Gods breath is the
giving of life to humans.

God created a garden in

Eden (v 8)

God created the human environment in which people

would be happy in themselves. God called human
beings to cultivate and care for the earth.

God forbade the fruit of the

tree of knowledge (vv 89,
1617)

God alone can decide what is good and what is evil.

People owe obedience to their Creator who knows
what is best for them.

God created animals and birds

from the soil (v 19)

God created all other living things. God is the author

of all life.

God brought each for the

human to name (vv 1920)

The human was superior to the rest of creation, for

he named the rest (naming being the task of someone
of superior rank in those days). The human was
created to work with God in bringing creation
to its completion (God bringing the creatures
to the man to complete their creation by
naming them).

God created the woman as

companion not from the soil
(vv 2123)

The woman shares the same nature as the

man. In some ancient languages of the
Near East rib is the same as
life. God created women equal
in dignity to men.

they become one fleshboth

of them were nakedbut they
felt no shame (vv 2425)

People need to see themselves and

each other as God does to relate
properly with each other. The human
body is the means of expressing what
is within a person. Men and women
achieve wholeness in
relationship with each
other. Marriage was created
by God.

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3. GOD CREATES ORIGINAL HARMONY

The Yahwist Creation Story

2:4b At the time when Yahweh God made earth and heaven 5 there was as yet no wild
bush on the earth nor had any wild plant yet sprung up, for Yahweh God had not sent
rain on the earth, nor was there any man to till the soil. 6 Instead, water flowed out of
the ground and watered all the surface of the soil. 7 Yahweh God shaped man from the
soil of the ground and blew the breath of life into his nostrils, and man became a living
being.
8 Yahweh God planted a garden in Eden, which is in the east, and there he put the man
he had fashioned. 9 From the soil, Yahweh God caused to grow every kind of tree,
enticing to look at and good to eat, with the tree of life in the middle of the garden, and
the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
10 A river flowed from Eden to water the garden, and from there it divided to make four
streams. 11 The first is named the Pishon, and this winds all through the land of Havilah
where there is gold. 12 The gold of this country is pure; bdellium and cornelian stone are
found there. 13 The second river is named the Gihon, and this winds all through the land
of Cush. 14 The third river is named the Tigris, and this flows to the east of Ashur. The
fourth river is the Euphrates.
15 Yahweh took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden to cultivate and take care
of it. 16 Then Yahweh God gave the man this command, You are free to eat of all the
trees in the garden. 17 But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil you are not to eat;
for, the day you eat of that, you are doomed to die.
18 Yahweh God said, It is not right that the man should be alone. I shall make him a
helper. 19 So from the soil Yahweh God fashioned all the wild animals and all the birds
of heaven. These he brought to the man to see what he would call them; each one was to
bear the name the man would give it. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, all the
birds of heaven and all the wild animals. But no helper suitable for the man was found
for him. 21 Then, Yahweh God made the man fall into a deep sleep. And, while he was
asleep, he took one of his ribs and closed the flesh up again forthwith. 22 Yahweh God
fashioned the rib he had taken from the man into a woman, and brought her to the man.
23 And the man said:
This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh!
She is to be called Woman, because she was taken from Man.
24 This is why a man leaves his father and mother and becomes attached to his wife,
and they become one flesh.
25 Now, both of them were naked, the man and his wife, but they felt no shame
before each other.
(Genesis 2:4b25)

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3. GOD CREATES ORIGINAL HARMONY

God teaches that human beings come

from the earth. They are not created and
then placed upon the earth. Nor do they
come from somewhere else as the human
body is made up of elements of the
earth.

For your information

The forbidden fruit, wa
s not an apple.
The Bible simply calls it
the fruit of the
tree of life. Over the yea
rs people have
come to represent this wit
h an apple.

Nowhere in the Bible does God teach

precisely how or when human beings
were created from the earth.

The Priestly Creation Story the first creation account in

the Bible (Genesis 1:12:4a)
The first creation story found in the Bible is called the Priestly account. Its authors were
priests from the newly restored Temple in Jerusalem around 500BC.

Why the priestly account was written

The Priestly creation story was written so that God could reveal answers to the
questions of those who remained faithful to God.
Just over four centuries after the Yahwist author lived, the Jewish nation was conquered
by the army of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon in 587BC. To destroy their identity as
a nation, much of the population of Israel was driven into exile. They were scattered
across the Babylonian empire. The city of Babylon is located in what is now called
Iraq.
This exposed the Jews to pagan religions which had ideas about God, people and the
rest of creation that conflicted with what God had previously taught. Most Jews gave
up their faith in God and began to follow other religions. A small number of Jews,
the remnant, remained faithful to their covenant with God. (cf. Isaiah 10:20; 28:5;
Jeremiah 31:7; Micah 5:6)
The exile lasted fifty years. Then in 539BC the Babylonian empire was conquered by
the army of Cyrus of Persia. Cyrus allowed the Jews to return to their homeland. The
faithful group did this in 537BC. As a result of their exposure to pagan religions, they
now had new questions about God and creation.
God revealed answers to these questions and inspired the writing of another creation
story to help people remember these answers. The questions can be reconstructed from
the answers God revealed:
How powerful is God in comparison to the gods of other religions?
The religions of all the lands surrounding the Jews, such as Egypt and Babylon,
treated women as inferior to men. Was this Gods original intention?
Many of these religions had gods in the forms of animals and birds. What
relationship did God originally intend between human beings and the rest of
creation?
Many of these religions also thought their gods competed with negative supernatural
forces. Where did God fit into this idea?

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3. GOD CREATES ORIGINAL HARMONY

The Priestly Creation Story

The following table summarises the Priestly Creation Story and its key teaching points.

The story

What does the story teach?

In the beginning God created

heaven and earth (v 1)

God created everything that exists. God existed

before creation and brings order and purpose to all
creation.

Let there be (v 3)

God creates by a simple command.

God created light, water,

plants, creatures and birds in
the first five days (vv 325)

God created light, water, plants and every living

thing. God controls darkness and is more powerful
than any natural force. God is the sole creator of
everything even those things, such as the sun, that
other ancient religions mistakenly thought of as gods.

God created man and woman

in Gods own image and
likeness (vv 2631)

God created male and female equal and they equally

have a special relationship with God. God created
each to reflect God in a special but different way.
Male and female are the closest of all living things in
creation to God and were created in harmony with
God.

Be fruitful and multiply

be masters (vv 22, 28)

God created human beings capable of having

children. God gave people the responsibility of
developing creation in ways that reflect Gods
mastery God in creating the universe, lovingly
cares for it. People are also called to be stewards of
creation.

God saw all he had made and

indeed it was very good (v 31)

The author is preserving Gods teaching that Gods

goodness can be discovered in everything, even if
people cannot see this. He also corrects the mistaken
ideas of ancient religions that evil forces existed equal
to the forces of good. God is greater and more
powerful than all other forces.

So ended the sixth day

(vv 31, 2:1)

God had completed heaven and earth with all their

finery.

God rested on the seventh day

(v 2:4a)

God blessed the seventh day and made it holy,

because on that day he had rested after all his work
of creation. Rest recreation is an important part
of Gods action. In the ancient world, the number
seven symbolised perfection and completeness.

God created everything that exists. God existed

before creation and brings order and
purpose to all creation.
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3. GOD CREATES ORIGINAL HARMONY

The Priestly Creation Story

1:1 In the beginning God created heaven and earth. 2 Now the earth was a formless void,
there was darkness over the deep, with a divine wind sweeping over the waters.
3 God said, Let there be light, and there was light. 4 God saw that light was good, and
God divided light from darkness. 5 God called light day, and darkness he called night,
Evening came and morning came: the first day.
6 God said, Let there be a vault through the middle of the waters to divide the waters in
two. And so it was. 7 God made the vault, and it divided the waters under the vault
from the waters above the vault. 8 God called the vault heaven. Evening came and
morning came: the second day.
9 God said, Let the waters under heaven come together into a single mass, and let dry
land appear. And so it was. 10 God called the dry land earth and the mass of waters
seas, and God saw that it was good.
11 God said, Let the earth produce vegetation; seed-bearing plants, and fruit trees on
earth, bearing fruit with their seed inside, each corresponding to its own species. And so it
was. 12 The earth produced vegetation: the various kinds of seed-bearing plants and the
fruit trees with seed inside, each corresponding to its own species. God saw that it was
good. 13 Evening came and morning came: the third day.
14 God said, Let there be lights in the vault of heaven to divide day from night, and let
them indicate festivals, days and years. 15 Let them be lights in the vault of heaven to
shine on the earth. And so it was. 16 God made two great lights: the greater light to
govern the day, the smaller light to govern the night, and the stars. 17 God set them in
the vault of heaven to shine on the earth 18 to govern the day and the night and to
divide the light from darkness. God saw that it was good. 19 Evening came and morning
came: the fourth day.
20 God said, Let the waters be alive with a swarm of living creatures, and let birds wing
their way above the earth across the vault of heaven. And so it was. 21 God created
great sea-monsters and all the creatures that glide and teem in the waters in their own
species, and winged birds in their own species. God saw that it was good. 22 God blessed
them, saying, Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters of the seas; and let the birds
multiply on land. 23 Evening came and morning came: the fifth day.
24 God said, Let the earth produce every kind of living creature in its own species:
cattle, creeping things and wild animals of all kinds. And so it was. 25 God made wild
animals in their own species, and cattle in theirs, and every creature that crawls along the
earth in its own species. God saw that it was good.
26 God said, Let us make man in our own image, in the likeness of ourselves, and let
them be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven, the cattle, all the wild animals
and all the creatures that creep along the ground,

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