Chapter 1- The Problem Stated
Table of Contents
Chapter 2 - Why This Unusual Structure?

A new endeavor is made in the following pages to trace the Biblical creation narrative back to its source and to ascertain why it is divided by six “evenings and mornings”.
Many will doubt whether it is possible after centuries of discussion - to write anything new about this first page of the Bible. I take however the same view as Butler did when he wrote (Analogy II,iii), “Nor is it at all incredible that a book, which has been so long in the possession of mankind, should contain many truths as yet undiscovered”. There are several undiscovered truths regarding this first narrative of creation which hitherto have remained unnoticed. One of these is so important, yet so simple and unquestionable, that our failure to recognize it is all the more surprising, seeing that this oversight has created considerable difficulties resulting in continued misinterpretation, causing the narrative to be rejected by so many. This misunderstanding on our part is certainly not due to any want of clearness in the narrative itself but, as the following pages will show, to our failure to recognize its extremely ancient character. Consequently its interpretation has become fettered by speculations as to the time occupied by God in His acts and processes of creation. The most outstanding literary problem on the first page of the Bible is the precise meaning of the ‘six days’, separated as they are from each other by an “evening and a morning”. In addition there is also the problem of the rest on the seventh day. These ‘days’ have perplexed almost everyone who has read the narrative of creation. Were they days of twenty-four hours each? Or can they be interpreted as though long periods of time were intended? Why are these days separated from each other by an “evening and a morning”? In whatever way these questions are answered it is obvious that the record implies that God did something for six days and ceased doing it on the seventh day. What did God do on those six days? and why did He cease on the seventh? While the modernist rejects that account as ‘impossible’, the answer usually given by those who regard the Bible as trustworthy is that during those six days God created or re-created the world, and because He had finished it at the end of the sixth day He rested on the seventh. Whatever meaning is given to the word ‘day’, whether literal or symbolic, is such an answer in accordance with the facts? I do not think so, and this book endeavors to explain why it cannot possibly be the true interpretation. It disagrees not only with the Bible but also with science, and with all we know about the literary methods of writing in ancient times. A brief summary will make clear that the following pages endeavor to explain. It is that:
1. The six days, divided from each other by an evening and morning, cannot possibly refer to the time occupied by God in His acts and processes of creation.
2. The six days refer to the time occupied in revealing to man the account of creation.
3. God rested (lit.:ceased) on the seventh day not for His own sake but for man’s sake, and because this revelation about creation was finished on the sixth day, not because on that day (or period) the creation of the world was finished.
4. The narrative of creation was probably written on six tablets. Later it appears to have become the custom in Babylonia to write the story of creation on six tablets.
5. There is good and sufficient evidence to show that the first page of the Bible is the oldest document which has come down to us.
The evidence on which these statements are based will be stated as fully as is possible without the introduction of too much detail. Until the evidence has been read, is it too much to ask that judgment on these statements may be suspended?

It can be said with assurance that none of the explanations hitherto given either of these days or of the “evenings and mornings” have satisfied the minds of men. That proposed in the following pages is simple because the statements made in the narrative are accepted in their natural ancient sense and setting. It is an attempt to restore ‘a commonplace truth to its first uncommon lustre’.

We need a faith that inquires. There should be no need of an apology for this further investigation into the meaning of the narrative. Its importance can scarcely be over-emphasized. Estimated simply as a piece of descriptive writing, the first chapter of Genesis constantly challenges attention, for it is unquestionably unique in the world’s literature concerning the origin of things. That it is regarded both in the Old and New Testaments as the foundation of faith in God as Creator few will deny. Although the writer of these pages has no doubt that the greater and more convincing revelation of God to man was made through Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord, he has noticed that philosophers as well as thoughtful students in our universities are apt to go back, not only to Christ, but right back to the first page of the Bible in order to secure a sure foundation for their thinking and faith. Thinking men assert that the battle between belief and unbelief must be decided here; they cannot regard it as a matter of secondary importance, whether God was, or was not, in a real and definite sense the Creator of the universe and of man. Neither can they think it an inquiry of little consequence whether this narrative of creation is a revelation from God or merely a myth, or nothing more than a series of guesses made by some man at an unknown date.

My purpose is not that of reconciler of Scripture with science, important as that may be; nor is it an attempt to bring the narrative of creation into harmony with modern thought. God’s thought and modern thought are not at all the same thing; it often happens that they are not in harmony, “for My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa. 55:8,9). Modern thought about the origin of things is still in its usual state of flux, and there is nothing that can become out of date so quickly as the merely ‘up-to-date’ scientific explanation of the first chapter of Genesis. This narrative has often been ‘harmonized’ with modern scientific theories, only to find that scientists have necessarily changed their ideas, leaving the ‘explanation’ quite out of date. Mr. H.G. Wells, for instance, complained that “we do not rewrite and retell Genesis in the light and language of modern knowledge”. In a later chapter his version of the origin of life will be stated, but had the Genesis account been subjected to constant amendment in accordance with modern thought the various editions of it would make an interesting history of the changes in human thought on this subject, but it certainly would not impress us with the sum of human wisdom about origins. There is no disagreement whatever between truly scientific findings and a true interpretation of Genesis. When rightly interpreted both can look after themselves and I venture to prophesy that this Bible account of creation will see the disappearance of many scientific and philosophic theories, and yet remain in harmony with the great facts discovered by scientists.

Mine is the more modest, though not less important task of attempting to find out how the account of creation came into existence, not how the universe came to be; of ascertaining what the first chapter of Genesis says and testing the validity of current interpretations as to its meaning. The investigation began some time ago with as open a mind as was possible; certainly the conclusions reached are different from those expected.
Until the results of modern archaeological research became known it was not possible to understand fully the literary methods in use in early days. During the years the writer was living in Babylonia, time was spent in examining, on the one hand the text of Genesis, and on the other the ancient methods of writing prevailing there 5,000 years ago. It was the study of the Bible creation record in the light of these old literary methods which has made possible a more exact knowledge of other unique structure and meaning of the narrative.

We are often told that the only scientific way to study the Bible narratives is to read them in their ancient literary setting as pieces of contemporary literature. In one respect at least this advice is essential, because much of the criticism of this creation narrative betrays a lack of knowledge of the literary methods existing in ancient times. Probably no passage in the whole range of literature, ancient or modern, sacred or secular, has been subjected to such detailed, continuous and critical examination as this first page of the Bible. But strangely enough this criticism originated before scholars were aware of early literary methods. Every advance in archaeological discovery has enabled us to understand these ancient writings better. There has been a vast growth in our knowledge of the remote past, particularly about the old ways of writing, and the present reinterpretation is made in the light of methods customary in early times.

It should not therefore surprise us that at this late date there should be a new understanding of the meaning of the narrative. That there has been a constantly developing appreciation of its significance is obvious. As knowledge has advanced it has been possible to see how this ancient document agrees with the ascertained facts of science and disagrees with some scientific theories. We welcome scientific investigation and are grateful to the astronomers for what they have to tell us about the mechanism of the universe, to geologists for interpreting the record of the rocks, to biologists for telling us what they have discovered about life and its manifestations, to the philologist for a more exact knowledge concerning the origin and meaning of ancient words, and to the archaeologist for far-reaching discoveries about ancient things.

Some have imagined that the growth of scientific knowledge has already dealt a death blow to the Scripture narrative of creation. Indeed, not a few have written as if all that now remained to be done - some have already done it - is to hold a post-mortem examination as to which writer was mostly responsible for its destruction. Just when a verdict is about to be pronounced, further evidence, often that of archaeology, is produced in favor of the Scripture narrative, and it is then found to be more vitally alive and accurate than has been assumed apart from modern scientific research.

In stating the results of our inquiry it is obviously impracticable within the limits of this book to do other than accept certain reasoned convictions as a basis. These are:
1. There is a God.
2. He is the Creator of the heavens and the earth.
3. He could, if needed, reveal to man something about creation.
In other words, we begin where the narrative of creation begins. “In the beginning God created ...” and, like the Bible, accept the statement that God was the Creator. The Bible point of view that He not only could, but did reveal Himself to man is also accepted. But no assumptions are made as to His methods of creation, or speculations indulged in as to the length of time occupied by Him in His acts or processes. It is submitted that the Genesis narrative details neither the methods He used, nor the time taken; all we are told is that God commanded and ‘ it was so’; except that concerning the creation of man some details are given, and these, though few are important.

These pages do not deal with the problem of how God created the universe and life on the earth; they are limited to the literary problem of the origin of the narrative and its meaning - especially the meaning of the six days. A discussion of the ontological, cosmological, and teleological positions is outside our immediate purpose.
Sir Ambrose Fleming has said (Transactions of the Victoria Institute, 1927), “The majority of persons take their opinions on difficult subjects ready made from those they deem special authorities, and hence, when once a certain view of a subject has been broadcast and widely accepted as the right and fashionable one, it is very difficult to secure an unbiased reconsideration of it.” This first page of the Bible has suffered badly from traditional misinterpretations and misconceptions which should never have occurred, and some of these popular errors have made shipwreck of faith in God as Creator, and in the Bible account, as His revelation to man. While sufficient reasons are seen for adhering to the narrative, there are good reasons for rejecting some of the current interpretations of it. As Dr. Murray has written, “We cannot, of course, escape the necessity of theorizing, if we are to define to ourselves and to others the message which Holy Scripture conveys to us. But the abiding wonder of the gift of God to us in the Bible is the way it remains permanently ahead of all its interpreters. We are terribly prone to make idols of our theories, and to identify them with the Truth that we are trying to interpret. But as each generation of students goes back to the original deposit and tests the theories it has inherited in the light of it, the Bible seems to have an inexhaustible power to help us clear out of the way difficulties that are not inherent in the Truth itself, but have been introduced into our statement of it by a lack of proportion in our treatment of the evidence either by ignoring what we can now see to be the vital elements in it, or by overstressing the implications of earthly metaphors, which can only correspond very partially to the spiritual reality.”

It is realized that the questions raised by the narrative of creation cannot be settled on a narrow basis; it challenges some popular theories at present prevailing about man’s origin, the beginning of man’s belief in God, and the relation of this record of creation to other early accounts - particularly those recovered from Babylonia and Assyria. These problems must be considered, and unless we are content to be obscurantists, we must test the validity of current ideas. It is hoped that this wider investigation will not make a simple solution appear complex. I have abstained from any extended reference even to the second narrative (Gen. 2:5 - 4:26) lest by doing so I should obscure the problem we set out to solve. The second narrative needs a book to itself, for it contains features not mentioned in the first narrative, the geographical situation of Eden, the Tree of Life, the Tree of knowledge of good and evil, the serpent, the fall and its effects. But the second narrative confirms the conclusions reached concerning the first narrative.

Let us have the forward look and the open mind of John Robinson when he said that “he was very confident that the Lord had more truth and light yet to break forth out of His Holy Word.”

Chapter 2 - Why This Unusual Structure?