Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Joel Stucki" <joel AT stucki.ws>]

On 7/10/06, George Athas <george.athas AT moore.edu.au> wrote:
> Yes, Karl Randolph is right. It would be best if we considered how THWM (or,
> Tehom) is used elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. However, at the same time, we
> must allow each occurrence to have the nuance it has.
>
> When we do look beyond Gen 1.2, we see that THWM is often used in opposing
> parallelism with $MYM ('heavens'). Since the heavens do no seem to be divine
> in Genesis, or elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, it's reasonable to propose
> that THWM is not seen as a divine being, but rather is a label to describe
> the depths of the earth/oceans.
>
> At the same time, we must recognise that in Gen 1 we have an ancient
> cosmology. The juxtaposition of this account with other creation accounts
> which do present THWM as divine is quite telling. That is, when Gen 1 is
> contextualised in its own world, things jump out at us. Gen 1 could have
> used the word YaM ('sea'), which is also divinised in other cultures (eg,
> Ugaritic), but the author of Gen 1 chose THWM. This juxtaposes directly with
> the THWM or Tiamat who is slain in a cosmic creative act in other ancient
> creation accounts. There seems to be a deliberate connection. Furthermore,
> since there is no parallelism in Gen 1.2 to oppose THWM with $MYM, it seems
> reasonable to suggest that Gen 1 has deliberately chosen the word THWM to
> present a specifically non-divine THWM which is nothing more than a "depth".
> Thus, one is struck by the very non-conventional (from the point of view of
> the ANE) creation account in which only one deity features. Thus, the THWM
> is not slain, as though it were a living being, but is rather 'separated' as
> a simple physical mass.

I don't think anyone can rightly argue against monotheism in the
Genesis account and I certainly hope no one thinks my earlier comments
are suggesting that. I would think the relationship is more like the
relation of Greek mythology to Shakespeare. These things had imagery
and symbolism associated with them that the people understood.
Elsewhere in the Tanakh and the Christian New Testament there is
specific mention of dragons and monsters being subdued by Deity. So
even if this does refer to a personified entity like Tiamat, it should
disturb us no more than Leviathan or St. John's dragon. Nor should we
assume that these fanciful creatures were deities by Moshe's
understanding.
What I do find surprising is the fixation on this single word. A
multitude of scholars of all persuasions have examined Enuma Elish and
Genesis and found many similarities tying the text. I agree that this
single word is not a strong enough tie but when all the similarities
are taken together it seems unavoidable that significant influence
exists between the texts.

Joel Stucki