The Bible can be read with many different levels of, shall we say, intricacy. To start with, there's the raw story - the one that has been taught in Religious Education back in school, and that is part of the general knowledge and heritage of the Western Civilisation. Thus, people will usually know the outline of the myth of creation, they will have heard about King Solomon, Moses, and know of Jesus' death on the cross. That's a first level of reading, and it is quite important, if only via the Bible's influence on Western culture.
Then there's various levels of detail that can be added to it. Passages can be taken individually, and analysed, in order to extract their message (for there is one). Every single chapter can be interpreted in a specific way. And where there is interpretation, there is the possibility for misunderstanding. Now I'm not saying there is one right way of understanding the Bible (and the variety of religions leads to think at least some common interpretations are flawed); however, discussion, I believe, leads to a better understanding of the Bible. Which is why musings, and interpretations, should be expressed and discussed - somehow the purpose of the set of entries that I am now starting.
Now on to the problems set by such an intention. Firstly, the Bible is an intricate work, and there is some back-referencing, and to a smaller degree, forward-referencing (at least foreshadowing). So there is the question of the order of reading. I'm setting out to comment it, chapter by chapter, in "chronological" order, as it seems the most logical thing to do. If some other passages seem relevant, feel free to indicate them. Secondly, the texts that are available to us are translations; and, especially in English, there are many translations. I will be using the English Standard Version (ESV), not because I believe it is particularly better than the others, but because it is the one that is available to me in printed form. All different translations can be found here.


On first reading, Genesis 1 seems a bit trivial - just another creation myth. Now, as a scientist, I cannot possibly agree with a physical six-day creation (though far-fetched reconciliations are not impossible).

(Picture from ASBOJesus)
As explained in the introductory passage, however, this is not the main point. The chapter is very notable by a repetition of processes, with a rupture at the end.
Indeed, each of the first five days is described in a similar way:

And God said (...) And God saw that it was good.

Also notable is that creation happens simultaneously with the naming (of the "big" principles), and that the said creations first occur capitalised.
The sixth day, the creation of man (uncapitalised!), shows many differences with the rest. First, And is changed into Then. Secondly, and possibly more importantly, the repeated sentence And God saw that it was good is changed into And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. There is a distinct change of perspective here.
This leads to the following statements/questions:

  • How is capitalisation consistent with the original texts? (Are there capital letters in arameic?)
  • If it is not consistent, how is it relevant of a particular way of thinking in the Church?
  • An interpretation: capitalisation is given to Godly things: the very concept sprouting forth from God's Word. This would explain that, once they have their own individual nature, they are capitalised no longer (echoed in Genesis 2, when man names the animals). But then, why is man uncapitalised? Is it a foreshadowing of the fall, or a sign of their well-known imperfection (also to be noted, man is the only item of Creation that needed blessing!)
  • Man appears at the end of creation and only makes sense after it. This would explain the Then instead of And. It fits well together with man's role as ruler over the rest of Creation, and with the idea of completion that replaces the And God saw that it was good.


So, as a summary, two lessons can already be drawn from Genesis 1: that man was conceived to rule over Creation, only as a completion to it; and that it is imperfect. How these two derive from one another is left to personal interpretation!
To finish, I'll throw in a couple more remarks:

  • Contrary to Genesis 2, man and female seem to be created simultaneously. This, again, shows that the stress is not put on the physical order of Creation, but (possibly?) on relative orders of importance. In advance on its time, females and males are put on the same level!
  • The stress is also put on the Word of God. He actually says things into existence (you've gotta love the English language which allows such constructions!) It might go with the (far-fetched) theory that the six days are concerned with God's conception of Creation, and setting the whole evolution process in motion. I'll admit it is far-fetched, but there is to my knowledge no better way to reconcile both, erm, theories.