Week 3 Genesis LG
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Genesis 2
Genesis 2
Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
Let’s notice the differences
There is no “God Said” He is finished with his creation, his creative word is not needed
Next there is no ‘There is evening there is morning” the seventh day.
There is a bigger point in this that this can be seen as the eternal day. A day without end.
The literary pattern of 6+1 is intended to highlight the 7th day showing its importance and its own uniqueness
This day is literally set apart from the rest pf the days
Theologians have been debating about whether or not this chapter break is even appropriate and there are a few thoughts as to why it is even in there
First it is the 6+1 idea. Th highlight the set apartness of the day
Second, there is a theory that the garden scene that we will see next happens all on the 7th day..>And that it was on the 7th day that Man sinned
Note that God is not resting because he is fatigued. He is resting because he is done with his work.
When God Blessed the day, it was the 10th word that God would have spoken in cretion. We do not specifically know what he said only that he blessed it.
But later There will be 10 commandments sometimes known as the 10 words
And there were 10 Plagues sent on Israel that some connect to 10 acts of de-creation…So in 10 words God makes creation and in 10 plagues he brings judgment on it….
Genesis 1–11:26 3. Seventh Day—Day of Consecration (2:1–3)
In the Babylonian creation stories the gods are freed from their labors after the creation of humans, who were formed for the sole purpose of serving the deities’ needs. God’s sabbath, however, is not aversion to labor but the celebrative cessation of a completed work, whereby he expresses his mastery over time by sanctifying it. The observance of Sabbath was unique to ancient Israel. Whereas in the Hebrew calendar (and those of other peoples) the days, months, and years were related to the solar and lunar cycles, the Sabbath is not tied to any celestial movement. “The Sabbath thus underlines the fundamental idea of Israelite monotheism: that God is wholly outside of nature.”230
Experiencing God’s sabbath rests means to embrace a sense of completeness…Like you rest and you just rest in the fact that under heaven everything is complete,.
The sabbath did not become a mandate until the exodus
The Rabbis
"One day out of seven the Israelite is to renounce dominion over his own time and recognize God's dominion over it”
..."Keeping the Sabbath is acceptance of the kingdom and sovereignty of God."
-Matitiahu Tseva
Rabbi Abraham Heschel wrote one of the greatest books on sabbath that I have ever read and I want to read you this quote from the book
“To gain control of the world of space is certainly one of our tasks, the danger begins when in gaining control over the realm of space that we forfeit all aspirations to the realm of time. There is a realm of time where the goal is not to have but to be, not to own but to give ,not to control but to share, not to subdue but to be in accord. Life goes wrong when the control of space, the acquisition of things of space, becomes our soul concern”
and then he says
“God is not in things of space but moments of time”
Again Rabbi Abraham Hershel
“It was a vision of the Messianic day in which the hope of restoring the unity of all men was won.”
God cares that his sabbath is followed: ‘
First regulations around sabbath were about collecting Mana in the dessert….Collect 2x as much as needed the day before the sabbath
Do no work on the sabbath.
Then it is the 10 commandments
Then there is a Sabbath year
Then there there are 7 sets of sabbath years +1 is the Year of Jubilee.
Israel never took seriously this command to allow the land to rest.
Therefore In Leviticus 26 there are punishments for not following the sabbath years
I will scatter you among the nations and will draw out my sword and pursue you. Your land will be laid waste, and your cities will lie in ruins. Then the land will enjoy its sabbath years all the time that it lies desolate and you are in the country of your enemies; then the land will rest and enjoy its sabbaths. All the time that it lies desolate, the land will have the rest it did not have during the sabbaths you lived in it.
This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place.
Many serious scholars see the 70 years of exile as God’s punishment for not taking the sabbath years and the Jibilee
What is Jesus’s first sermon on?
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
The year of the Lord’s favor and everything he is talking about is Jubilee. Jesus is saying that his ministry, his life is ushering in a new Jubilee. It is the true start to it.
Then Jesus would later say
Then Jesus said to them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
This is all very huge stuff
Now as we go on to Eden, what I want us to do is to sort of keep in mind that there is some idea out there that Eden is all 7th day activity
Wait…A new account?
Wait…A new account?
This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.
I wouldn’t fault you for thinking that we had just in depth read an account for the heavens and the earth
IS this a new account that we are reading?
Let me first point out that it says…This is the account for when the LORD God
Yahweh Elohim
First time the proper name of God is mentioned
The Phrase “This is the account” ends up being a concequencial phrase
It denotes a section that has a purpose and that purpose is to sort of zero in on human life before the creation of man and after sin
Genesis 1–11:26 (1) Creation of the First Man (2:4–7)
Elohim is appropriate for the majestic portrayal of God as Creator of the universe since it properly indicates omnipotent deity, whereas Yahweh is the name commonly associated with the covenant relationship between deity and his people, Israel
Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground
There was no one to work the ground. The idea is that God is looking for a human partner
Someone who will work the ground.
God’s role in creation is to cause life to spring up…Man’s role is to steward that life
One of the important things to note here is that Genesis 2:5 can be compared to the judgment oricles of chapter 3. Chapter three talks about man eating the plants of the field by the sweat of his brow.
We have to remember there is no Eden yet in our reading…In wont appear for a few more verses. So are we inside the garden right now or outside of it?
The streams of the ground are interesting…They are subterranean waters that give life to the earth
Sort of again from chapter 1. When water is chaotic it is Tohu and Bohu but when the waters are under God’s control they actually have a purpose on the earth and they bring fourth life
Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
The word Formed that is used here is a potter’s activity…It is a word that is used in pottery and in wood working. It is used for humans here and for Israel that God is making
Example Usage:
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”
Genesis 1–11:26 (1) Creation of the First Man (2:4–7)
A second play on the words “man” (ʾādām) and “ground” (ʾădāmâ) becomes apparent: man is related to the “ground” by his very constitution (3:19), making him perfectly suited for the task of working the “ground,” which is required for cultivation (2:5, 15). Because of man’s sin, however, his origins also became his destiny
This passage offers a great look at the human body.
The Human Body is cared for by God
The Human Body was crafted by God
Breath was given to us from God’s breath. We are valuable before him
The foundation of Life is God’s divine breath
Breathing into the nostrils is warmly personal…
It literally gives the picture of kissing someone face to face
It has the signifcance of self giving life…
Like we live at God’s breath
We are animated by the breath of God, otherwise our bodies would lie dorment
Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.
In the East, in Eden
So Eden is not only the name of the garden but also suggest that Eden is a larger geographic region
Later in the Bible it will be called the “Garden of the Lord”
Indicating that God is the owner of the garden
Eden is often seen by the later prophets as a land where salvation is found
If you look at the description of the earth before hand the earth had no one to work it…It was baren and then God planted a Garden where life flourished
The Lord will surely comfort Zion
and will look with compassion on all her ruins;
he will make her deserts like Eden,
her wastelands like the garden of the Lord.
Joy and gladness will be found in her,
thanksgiving and the sound of singing.
They will say, “This land that was laid waste has become like the garden of Eden; the cities that were lying in ruins, desolate and destroyed, are now fortified and inhabited.”
In Hebrew the name Eden means abundant waters but another common tranlastion of Eden is delight
Then what does this garden mean that it is to the east? East of what?
When you say something is to the east, it is to the east of whoever you are standing or in this case where you are writing from
Also how did they know what was North, South, East and West?
So when we say the garden was planted in the East, the assumption is that the author centralizes the torah on Israel. So It would have been to the east of ISrael. This would make sense because Genesis 2 mentions rivers that still exist today that are in the east
The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. (The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.) The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Ashur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.
The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
First, it doesnt say it here, but in other text in the Bible it is clearly understood that Eden is a mourtain and that God is at the top of the mountain (Ezekiel 28)
The Tree of Life is unique to this garden it gives eternal life
And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”
There are other trees of life in the Bible that will go all the way to the new testament
First and foremost God says there are all kinds of trees but there are also these two trees, The tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life
Notice how God says you are free to eat from any tree but not the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
So eating from any tree would allow the humans to eat off of what tree? The tree of life! It just says not to eat off the tree of knowing good and evil
So lets talk about the tree of knowing good and evil
This tree is the symbol of doing what is right in your own eyes
In many ways this tree specifically is not talked about again but you see all through the story of the Bible that Israel has been eating off this tree:
In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit.
When humans do this it is a bad thing
The tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil in Hebrew is the tree of Tov and Ra…Tov meaning Good Ra meaning Evil.
Up until now in creation all of the Days that God made were Tov. There was no Ra!
But this tree introduces it
So here is the deal with this tree. It is a false tree of life…It is not in the Middle of the garden like the tree of life but it is
So when humans eat from the tree of life they are Banished from the garden
Which brings up a really important question.
Will humans ever get back to the tree of life?
And it turns out that there are mini-trees of life all though the old testament
Moses Encounters a tree on a mountain and this tree is glowing, it is on fire but not burning up…And who is standing in the middle of the tree? Oh yeah the Angel of the Lord
So God says bring your people to this mountain so that they can worship me…So lets follow that story out…
There are 10 plagues
God lets Israel go, he defeats egypt…he brings them to the mountain and what do they do?
They make a golden calf! They make a false tree of life
They choose to define good and evil on their own terms..they truly are the eating from the wrong tree
Jesus claims to be a vine that brings God’s life into the world…and he invites us to eat from his body
Jesus is led up to the top of a hill where he dies upon a tree
The cross is the sad and violent result of a humanity that is eating from the tree of good and evil
It would seem like Jesus died and the tree of knowledge of good and evil wins
But jesus said that he was a seed that would die be buried in the ground and then turn into a tree that would bear much fruit
Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
So to defeat death, Jesus passed right through it
And now Jesus is alive and he is this new tree of life….But in order to eat from that tree you have to pass through death as well…
This is what communion is. Taking the life of Jesus but laying yours down in the process
This is what communion is. Continually consuming the tree of life
The tree in the middle
Genesis 1–11:26 (2) The Man’s Life in the Garden (2:8–17)
D. Bonhoeffer rightly observed that symbolically the middle of Adam’s world was not himself but life, the very presence of God; the tree of knowledge as a prohibition signifies that man’s limitation as a creature is in the “middle of his existence, not on the edge
Genesis 1–11:26 (2) The Man’s Life in the Garden (2:8–17)
The Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, for example, depicts its hero recovering the “plant” of life, only to lose it to the water serpent
Genesis 1–11:26 (2) The Man’s Life in the Garden (2:8–17)
When the garden setting is read against the backdrop of the Mosaic tradition, there are remarkable similarities to Israel’s experience. As has been pointed out by commentators, the two garden trees are comparable to those elements in the tabernacle that represent life and the law of God
The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
It has been pointed out many times before that this is the first time that God said something was not good
Whether or not man felt alone is not stated. How can we know what man was feeling, it was God’s initiative to create Eve
There is an idea that man can not live without loving…Its not really true life without love
In what way would Eve become a “helper” to the man? The term means “help” in the sense of aid and support and is used of the Lord’s aiding his people in the face of enemies (Pss 20:2 [3]; 121:1–2; 124:8).
Moses spoke of God as his “helper” who delivered him from Pharaoh (Exod 18:4), and it is often associated with “shield” in describing God’s protective care of his people.
There is no sense derived from the word linguistically or from the context of the garden narrative that the woman is a lesser person because her role differs (see more at 2:23).
In the case of the biblical model, the “helper” is an indispensable “partner” required to achieve the divine commission.
“Helper,” as we have seen from its Old Testament usage, means the woman will play an integral part, in this case, in human survival and success.
What the man lacks, the woman accomplishes. As Paul said concisely, the man was not made for the woman “but the woman for the man” (cf. 1 Cor 11:9). The woman makes it possible for the man to achieve the blessing that he otherwise could not do “alone.” And, obviously, the woman cannot achieve it apart from the man.
In what tangible ways is eve eventually a helper to Adam? It is her offspring that will eventually crush the head of the serpent
The use of the term helper does not dimish the person who holds the office, as we see in the rest of the Pentateuch it actually adds to the persons prestige
Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.
But for Adam no suitable helper was found.
As we have talked about before God Parades all of these animals before Adam to “See what he would name them”
Naming again signifies dominion and ownership
But God is also building up the tension, he is preparing man to meet his mate
So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.
The man said,
“This is now bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ‘woman,’
for she was taken out of man.”
That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.
Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.
The woman is made by God through what is essentially surgery
The man is put into a deep sleep
And while he was sleeping God took a rib out. This is actually misleading in hebrew, there is no word for Rib in hebrew.
The word is Side
A Commentary on the Book of Genesis: Part I, From Adam to Noah (Genesis I–VI 8) Fourth Paragraph Creation of Woman (2:18–25)
Then He took one of his ribs] He did not take the bone alone, as the exegetes usually understand the verse; the hard bone would not have been suitable material for the fashioning of the tender and delicate body of the woman. The meaning of the text is that the Creator took together with the bone also the flesh attached to it, and from the flesh He formed the woman’s flesh, and from the bone her bones (see also the commentary of Abravanel). Proof of this we find in the words of the man (v. 23): This at last is bone of my bones AND FLESH OF MY FLESH.
I am not a huge fan of the message bible but I really like this commentary
23–25 The Man said,
“Finally! Bone of my bone,
flesh of my flesh!
Name her Woman
for she was made from Man.”
The symbolic situation with this statement is that Man and woman are perfectly fit for one another
This is clearly the pinnacle of the chapter because man is now speaking for the first time when it was only God before
This role relationship of leader and follower is indicated directly and implicitly. First, the participant structure of Genesis 2–3 shows implicitly the hierarchy of creation: God, the man, woman, and animal (serpent). But this was reversed in the fall: the woman listens to the serpent, the man listens to the woman, and no one listens to God.
Man Names woman. In the same way that he names one of the animals. But he also notes the distinction of the woman, that she is bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh ]
Monogamy is clearly indicated here with leave and cling, Polygamy will show up in the bible later but I do not believe that this was ever God’s plan
Leaving your father and mother must be metaphorical in this passage because eve did not have a father and mother
Genesis 1–11:26 (3) The Man’s Companion, the First Woman (2:18–25)
Monogamous heterosexual marriage was always viewed as the divine norm from the outset of creation
Genesis 1–11:26 (3) The Man’s Companion, the First Woman (2:18–25)
Finally, this “leaving” and “uniting” involves a public declaration in the sight of God. Marriage is not a private matter. It involves a declaration of intention and a redefining of obligations and relationships in a familial and social setting
Naked and no shame
This is a picture of sexual union with Adam and Eve
In the rest of the Bible Nakedness is shameful
Uncovering Noah’s nakedness was shameful
In Leviticus being made to be naked is a prohibition outside of your spouse
It would be shocking to the Hebrew mind that someone could be naked
Also this verse anticipates the fall in the next chapter, the Hebrew word for Naked is a play on the word “Crafty” this is what the serpent was
The glowing person theory
