Reading: Genesis 1:1-25
This week for BSF, we embarked on a new study on the book of Genesis. While all textbook starts with a light introduction of what is to come, the Bible does not do that. Just the first Chapter alone brings out a large number of questions that would take some time to unpack the more times you read it. Having read Genesis 1 multiple times, I have come to realise that there are more things I did not notice previously, than what I noticed previously. Here is just a taste of a few of those things:
1. How long is one ‘day’?
2. When did God create light? Day 1 or Day 4?
3. Why did God say ‘it is good’ on all days except Day 2?
4. God address each ‘day’ with “evening” then “morning”, why is it in this order?
I can add to the list. But the point of this series is not to answer these questions but to highlight what I have learnt or gathered from my reading. It is not meant to be a Q&A session or a theological debate. So, of course, there will be some of these questions that I will not touch on because I learnt nothing from them (like question 3 and 4) or it serves no purpose in me bring out the lessons I learnt.
Many people ask how I, as a scientist (a physicist), could possibly accept the Creation story when so many things about it seems scientifically wrong? What makes it so hard to believe that there is a Creator God stems from the poor interpretation of creation itself. The impossibility of the creation account, which bears no resemblance in its understanding of the universe to modern science. This seeming contradiction eliminates the presence of a Creator God as described by the accounts of the creation story. Thus, if such a fundamental fact about creation could be incorrectly reported, then the argument for the existence of God being the one true god, in itself can be disputed. Thus, I would like to provide perspective on how I, can believe in the Big Bang and creation at the same time. I have penned some thoughts and observations, and I wish to share them with you.
Let’s turn the (figurative) clock back. How far back? Back to Genesis 1:1, “In the Beginning…”
1. First 3 verses sets the line of discussion: Form & Formless.
Let’s take a look at the text and what the narrative wants to suggest to us, and what we can infer from the passage. God created everything with form (“earth”, “waters”, “surface”) and without form (“heaven”, “empty”, “darkness”). When we look for evidence of God, we often look at evidence using the “form” yet not the “formless”. Science attempts to answer questions relating to the “form”, but it cannot answer questions pertaining to the “formless”. If we want a complete prove of the existence of God, science cannot give us the complete answer, because it only answers the former.
Conclusion 1: Using science to prove the existence of God is futile, but we can use science to disprove God.
The fact that God claims to be creator of everything leaves him very vulnerable and open for contest anytime. Any man-made religion will be careful to claim this sort of power for their god, if it can be easily dismantled by the human mind. From the start, God places himself in a “compromised” position. Not only can he be easily taken down by a simple “disprove” from science, the very thing that can take him down cannot be used to “prove” his existence.
2. Separation seems to be an important theme.
Right from the start, God makes this idea of “separation” very clear. Day 1, he separated light from darkness to create day and night, Day 2, he separated water from water to create the sea and sky, Day 3, he separated water from land to create the sea and land. ‘Separation’ seems to be a very important theme here, just based on these 3 days. Why? This is a much deeper theological idea, which I will leave for another time. This will be discussed way later in Genesis.
3. Bible should not be read as historical fact.
I would like to make a slight deviation from the discussion to answer an important question that always pops up. The question is this, did God really do all these things in 3 days? This does not correspond to what we understand from science! The universe is a few billion years old! Aha! The Bible must be wrong then! This can’t possibly be the end for Christianity, (could it?) we are not even done with the chapter. There is an explanation for that. You see, God’s time is relative, 2 Peter 3:8 acknowledges that.
The problem with us using our scientific definition of ‘day’ is that, we are bounded by this huge blob of gas (and plasma) in space called the Sun. This blob of gas has not been created yet, and so there is no fixed way to argue that the ‘day’ referred to in Genesis 1 corresponds to our perception of 24 hours. This same theme is carried on to the rest of the book of Genesis.
Conclusion 2: Genesis is written and should be read as literature conveying principles not historical facts.
The literary style of Genesis is to convey a message. It is written for a figurative purpose of telling a story and conveying principles, not an encyclopaedia or historical account. Are the accounts in Genesis literal facts? No. In fact, I would like to extend that to the entire of the Old Testament. It is not literal fact, but it is written, much like the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, to dramatise certain events in a literary way to convey certain ideas that will be beneficial for the Christian narrative in the future. There is no historical evidence for many of the characters of the Old Testament, yet there are existing evidence outside of the Bible that point to the existence of many of them as well. This does not negate anything written in the Old Testament, and specifically Genesis, because it is not meant to be read as a history textbook.
So did the Big Bang happen? As a Physicist, I cannot say no. Then why did the Bible not talk about it? It is not important to convey the messages and principles it is written to convey. Is evolution real? Thanks for asking because that allows me to segway back to the creation story.
4. (or maybe 2b.) Separation by kind, just like what Darwin told us.
God finished things off on Day 3 with vegetation, by kind. Day 5 God created creatures in the water and birds for the sky, according to their kinds. Day 6, God created wild animals, livestock and all creatures that move along the ground, according to their kinds. Their purpose? To be fruitful and increase in numbers.
I am not a biologist and therefore, may not give as convincing an answer as you would hope. But then again, remember, this is not meant to be a Q&A, but my observations and learning. Darwin observed evolution of kind, he observed birds (assumed to be of the same species) with different adaptations (or features) according to the environment – survival of the fittest. But, Darwin did not provide evidence for evolution of species, it was a theory thought up as plausible. There is a difference between the evolution of kind and the evolution of species. The former suggests adaptation and survival of the fittest, the latter suggests that we all come from a single species. The latter has few evidence that can be definitively taken to be fact. If it can be proven to be scientifically factual, this still does not put the Bible in a problematic spot, because again, it is written as literature to convey principles.
5. God prepared everything perfectly.
At the end of Day 6, God created man in His image. God did everything, and he did everything ‘good’ in his eyes before he did the final task of creation: to create man. After adding man to the list of creation, he ended by saying that it was ‘very good’.
I will say more about this next week. But the creation of man caps off 6 very productive ‘days’ of creation. Only after God added man to the list of creation did he then say it was ‘very good’. There must be something special about man that is deserving of such honour and that honour is revealed in how we are created. We are created in God’s image. Nothing else is mentioned to be created in the image of God, except man. And he is about to give man the very special honour to rule over everything on earth.
But before man could even arrive, God did everything required to create paradise, so that man could live here on earth, perfectly. A perfect creation for perfect man. But I want to go back to an earlier point I made about form and time. Have you wondered what is the difference between the light in Day 1 and Day 4? Well, to give the short answer, light was created on Day 1. It was only created on Day 1 but source is not specified, but light takes a different source on Day 4. But to give an answer that makes sense to me, this ‘light’ ties together everything that God had wanted for man. He had wanted man to have the full experience of what God considers perfection.
Conclusion 3: God turned some of the formless into form, so that man, beings with form, can experience what God experiences. This also prepares us for the formless.
The light in verse 3 (Day 1) is “formless”, its source is from God. It was the source for which time (as suggested from “In the beginning”) can be measured, according to God’s relative definition of time. However, the lights in verses 14-18 (Day 4) takes “form” through the creation of celestial bodies. Its source is no longer from God, but from physically existing objects that would then go on to allow man, to use them “them” to “separate the day from the night” and “serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years”. This “time” is not relative. Light gives the concept of time which ties the experiences of the “formless” and “relative” to the experiences of the “form” and “definitive”.
God had transformed some things that are formless to take form, so that us, beings with form, can appreciate and experience what God, who is without form, can appreciate. Creation is meant for God to enjoy. Yet God took it upon himself to separate man from other creatures, deliberately make things to take “form” so that we can enjoy creation with him. Creation allows us to experience what God also experiences. God love man so much that he gave this exclusive right to man. This perfection of creation sets the tone for what we should have been experiencing, if not for the fall of man. Regardless, we can look forward to this same perfection when we return to heaven or when the new heaven and new earth is created, as described in Revelations, the last book of the Bible.
The purpose of the creation story is not so that it becomes a source of contention between creationist and scientist. Both are incomplete in painting the full picture. The former is basing their understanding on literature, which cannot fully describe the marvel and splendour of a formless God; and the latter just don’t have the capacity of refuting literature, period. Instead, the creation story is meant to paint a picture of perfection that we can enjoy, a picture of perfection that we should be enjoying, a picture of perfection that we have given up on because of our misdeeds.
The pages between Genesis and Revelations reveal why the principles of the creation story is important to the Abrahamic faiths (in particular Christianity) and the solution of how it can be proven right. Some parts of the solution will be revealed as I progress thorough the weeks in my study of the literary book of Genesis in BSF.
Joel Lai's Webpage 