Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Irene Riegner <iriegner AT concentric.net>]

> Enuma Elish: the gods used pre-existing matter to make the universe
> Genesis: ex nihilo
Genesis 1 does not express an ex nihilo creation.  Creatio ex nihilo
is a much later interpretation of Genesis 1.  In Gen 1, the material
of the cosmos was there but unformed or more correctly undifferentiated. 
It was dark and watery and the earth was "bohu" and "tohu," whatever they
mean.

Elohim "creates" through a process of separation---through separating the waters and drawing boundaries, which is implied in separation.  In Gen 1.6,7, the key word is "bdl" to separate.  "Land" is not created but emerges after the waters are gathered to one place (Gen 1.9, 10).  In other words the land already existed.

E. A. Speiser in his Anchor Bible commentary on Genesis has a interesting discussion of just this issue as well as the translation of the the opening verses.  See also Claus Westermann's commentary on Genesis.  Both discuss Gen 1 in connection with the Enuma Elish and Babylonian cosmology.

Part of the problem is syntactical:  How do the first couple of verses relate to each other?  Which are the subordinate clauses and what is the main clause?  Is verse 1 an independent or a dependent clause. Two possible translations are [and I'm sure there are others]:

        1.  In the beginning god created the heavens and the earth.  The earth
        was........
                This reading would support a creatio ex nihilo interpretation and the
                 description of the earth is that of the moment after creation.

        2.  When god began to create the heavens and the earth---the earth
        being unformed and void, with darkness over the face of the
        deep....---god said, "Let there be light."
                This reading (from the NJPS trans.) supports the idea of
                undifferentiated matter existing prior to its being separated into
                namable entites.  According to Speiser, Genesis 1 opens with the
                same structure as the Enuma Elish:  Dependent temporal clause,
                parenthetic clause, main clause.

In trying to understand biblical verses it is important to distinguish between later understandings of the text and the understanding that ancient Israelites and Judahites may have had.  Ideas of "first causes" and "prime movers" are later conceptualizations---Greek I believe---and not part of the Mesopotamian worldview from which these texts emerged.  It is more likely that a Judahite writing in exile from Babylonia would have a greater understanding of the Mesopotamian worldview than that of the Greek and incorporate this into his text rather than anything Greek---especially if part of his task is to write for an  exile Judahite audience.

irene riegner