E2 Modern Biblical Commentary
The Book of Genesis, Chapter 1
The first chapter of Genesis presents most of the story of creation, and thus is a controversial chapter in the perspective of the creation versus evolution debates.
Overview
It is an eternal human question: how did the world come to be? Here we have the Biblical answer to that very question. In this first chapter of Genesis, God creates everything, and then makes man in his own image. We don't know the mechanisms of how this was done, but this chapter states clearly that God did create all life. The action of creation shows God's authority over people, but at the same time demonstrates God's love for people.
Five Key Verses
Genesis 1:1 - In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
This simple statement opens the Bible, and in it is one of the most challenging statements for the human mind. When one considers the vastness of the universe (i.e., the heavens) and then looks again at the complexity of the earth we live in, this statement is truly incredible.
We have no modern scientific explanation for how all of these things came into being. We have the big bang theory, but it is far from provable and is vociferously debated. The only thing that is clear scientifically is that things are not clear. There is no real science-based explanation for the creation of the universe.
We will likely never know the answer to how the universe was created. The only real biblical statement on the matter is from Genesis 1:1, that God created it.
Genesis 1:2 - And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
This statement says that the universe was empty and void of life and form. This statement is important in that it matches well with the science; most theories have the universe's creation coming in a formless chaos; the cooling process and arrangements of chemicals resulted in the production of living things.
Also important here is the idea of the spirit of God moving on the face of the waters. This theme of God's spirit on the face of the water, actively involved in the world's creation, repeats itself later in the Bible, most notably at Job 33 and Psalm 104.
Genesis 1:5 - And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
What exactly is a "day" here? Some might see it as meaning a period of twenty four hours. Others can interpret it as an indefinite period, perhaps billions of years, whereas other "days" in Genesis last for a million years or less.
The Bible is unclear on this. To meditate on this concept, though, it is worthwhile to note that the author of Genesis is Moses, who intended to retell the story of creation and of the early world for the people of Israel. The goal of the story was not to explain the mechanisms, but to make clear only that God created the world in an orderly fashion, with mankind coming last. This matches roughly the order of events in the creation of the universe in terms of physical science and evolutionary theory, meaning that perhaps there isn't such a huge gap between evolution and creation as once thought.
Genesis 1:26 - And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
An interesting meditative point about this verse is God's use of us in Let us make man in our image.... Who constitutes the us in that verse? One could believe that this is in reference to the Holy Trinity. Another possibility is that the word us is used here to denote majesty, in the style of monarchs.
Another question is in what way are we made into the image of God? We obviously aren't the same in a physical sense, so we must turn to the non-physical attributes. It is likely that in our capacities for love, caring, and cognition that we reflect God, as Genesis describes all of those traits in God.
Genesis 1:27 - So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
This verse makes it clear that man and woman were both created in the image of God, neither one more so. Both men and women are the final creation of God, one is not more exalted than the other.
Genesis 1:27 makes it clear from the earliest point that in the eyes of God, the sexes are equal.
Modern Perspective on Genesis 1
The first chapter of Genesis is one of the most controversial in the Bible, if for nothing else than the creation story. But once one digs into the creation story, only two megathemes appear: one, this was God's work; and two, God had an orderly plan for creation and executed that plan.
If you have a belief in God and a belief that He was involved with the process of creation, then the first chapter of Genesis aligns with modern thinking quite well. The order of events in Genesis align with the order of events in the physical sciences. Perhaps even more noteworthy is the noted equality of the sexes, as noted in Genesis 1:27 and discussed above. Men and women are equal and are the creations in the image of God on earth.
The first chapter of Genesis sets the stage for what is to follow: Adam and Eve's trials in the Garden of Eden. These begin in the next chapter.