CHAPTER I
The Introduction--The Creation Account (1:1-2:3)
The object of this double title is to indicate that on the one hand, this is the Introduction which Moses has provided for the entire book of Genesis as well as, on the other hand, that this Introduction is given in the form of an account of creation.
It requires no deep insight to discern the basic character of this Introduction, both for the book as well as for all revelation. Man will go back in his thinking to the point where the origins of all things lie; he will desire to know how the world as well as all that is in it, and, most particularly, how he himself came into being. Here is the record, complete and satisfactory from every point of view, even if it does not perhaps answer every question that a prying curiosity might raise. He, however, who will ponder sufficiently what is here actually offered, will find facts of such magnitude as to stifle unseemly curiosity as to secondary matters.
Enthusiastic have been the comments of all who have read this account in an attitude of faith. Believing hearts are moved to devout praise of God and to adoration of His unbounded wisdom, power and mercy. Over against the criticism of our day even moderately critical writers offer comments such as Skinner (p. 11): "It is a bold thing to desiderate a treatment more worthy of the theme, or more impressive in effect, than we find the severely chiselled outlines and stately cadences of the first chapter of Genesis." Proksch, contrasting the basic thought of the chapter with all other literatures, advances the claim: "That the universe rises out of nothing by the almighty creative power of God is a thought so broad in its poetic as well as in its theological scope found nowhere in such clear-cut outlines in world literature before P."
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2 comments:
Indeed, there is no bolder or broader origins story to be found than what we find in Genesis.
I am currently reading through C S Lewis's complete works and making notes on his views on the creation/evolution controversy, hoping to pull some throughts together and produce an essay on Lewis' words on the subject. He was not exactly a YEC, but was very sound on the entire inadequacy of all pagan origins stories, which had all sorts of fairytale like elements.
Of course, our modern pagan origins story, Darwinism, is as evidently fantastickal and lacking as any of the ancient pagan stories, with the differences that it is much less picturesque, and also can be readily falsified, especially on the molecular biological evidence where we see a level of interdependent and finely adjusted intricacy at the most fundamental level of all life, none of which works unless all of it is perfect, ruling out the idea of gradual ascent by natural selection acting on random mutations.
One of the saddest aspects of the church swallowing the Darwin mythos is that we are cheated of the beauty of the Genesis creation story.
PS I discovered only weeks ago, while studying Dawkins' new book, that the bishop of Portsmouth, my diocese, Kenneth Stevenson (recently retired, and a sick man) was one of the bishop signatories to a letter put together by Dawkins to protest against Evolution being allowed to be questioned at the Immanuel college school Gateshead. So this Anglican Pom knows how you feel mates.
Dissenter, I am sure I speak for all here in saying we would like to read what you put together on C.S. Lewis.
Neil
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