Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Alviero Niccacci <sbfnet AT netvision.net.il>]

Title: Re: Genesis 1 & 2 (Peter, Ian, etc.)

Dear list-members,

A discussion is going on concerning Gen 1 & 2. It goes without saying that one should carefully distinguish grammar and syntax, on one side, from interpretation, on the other. Interpretation should come after a correct syntactical analysis has been found. Further, speculations about the intention of the text should be sober.

        1) I may be allowed to suggest again what I think is the correct analysis of Gen 1:1-3. *Bere'$it* is the first part of a construct state, whose second part is the phrase *bara' 'elohîm 'et ha$$amayim we'et ha'arets*; literally, "In the beginning of God-created-heaven-and-earth," i.e. "When God began creating heaven and earth." The Biblical creation story begins with a temporal sentence of the type found in the creation stories of the Ancient Near East.

This analysis was already presented in my _Syntax_# 18. In the footnotes there I referred to GKC #130d, Joüon #158d, and König #337v-z, where the phenomenon of a construct state having a finite verb as the second member (nomen rectum) is illustrated. Pertinent examples are as follows: Exod 4:13; 6:28; 1Sam 25:15; Psa 65:5; 81:6; Jer 6:15 + 8:12. Syntactically, the construction *bere'$it bara' 'elohim [with qatal]* is equivalent to *beyom bero' 'elohim [with infinitive]" (Gen 5:1).

As far as I know, Rashi was the first to propose such an analysis. He says, "If you have come to explain (this text) in its plain sense, explain it thus: At the beginning of the creation of heaven and earth, the earth was chaos and void," etc.

The complete text (Gen 1:1-3) reads as follows: "When God began creating heaven and earth [sentence 1, x-qatal], the earth was chaos and void [sentence 2, waw-x-qatal], darkness was on the surface of the abyss [sentence 3, waw-nonverbal sentence], and the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the water [sentence 4, waw-nonverbal sentence with participle]. Then God said [sentence 5, wayyiqtol] etc."

Sentences 2-4 are coordinated; they are main with regard to sentence 1, which depends on them.  As a syntactic unit, sentences 1-4 depend on sentence 5, which contains narrative wayyiqtol. This wayyiqtol begins the mainline of the narrative. What precedes gives the setting of the story, i.e. it specifies how the situation was when God began creating.

        2) The question of creatio ex nihilo versus eternity of the matter is beyond the intention of the text. As in the Ancient Near East, creation is presented as a transformation of chaos into cosmos. This does not mean, of course, that the biblical writer(s) believed that God did not create the matter. Jewish reflections on the creation ex nihilo versus eternity of the matter have been collected, e.g., by S. Kamin in _Scripta Hierosolymitana_ 31 (1986) 91-132.

        3) Gen 2:4 can hardly be divided in two parts as the literary critics usually maintain. It is constructed in a chiastic way (ABCD--D'C'B'). Further, because it resumes key words of 1:1--bara' 'elohim, $amaym, 'erets--2:4 concludes the first section (or *text*) of the Bible.

Gen 1:1-24 is the *first creation story*. The second creation story begins in 2:5-6--with x-yiqtol expressing the setting, and then with wayyiqtol marking the beginning of the mainline (2:7). The second creation story concludes in 2:24 because in 3:1 a new story begins with x-qatal (setting). This third section goes on until the end of Chap. 3 because in 4:1 a further x-qatal marks the beginning of the fourth section, which extends until the end of the chapter.

In 5:1 we read the second *Toledot formula*, which marks the beginning of a new section. As is well known, the whole book of Genesis is structured by 10 Toledot formulae (see further 6:9; 10:1; 11:10; 11:27; 25:12; 25:19; 36:1; 37:2). In every case the Toledot formula begins a new section but in the first case (2:4) it concludes the first creation story.

This structure with 10 Toledot formulae means that the different materials of the book were consciously assembled in a meaningful composition. May I refer to a paper of mine (in _Rivista Biblica_ 1995, 9-29--in Italian) where the canonical organization of the Hebrew Bible as a whole is investigated on the basis of the verbforms and costructions used, especially in the beginning and end of the various books. There emerges a conscious *canonical* intention on the part of the redactors that put the biblical books together. An evaluation of this significant phenomenon is provided with the aid of relevant studies by D.N. Freedman and R. Beckwith.

Peace and all good.

Alviero Niccacci

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