The two myths of creation in Genesis

      Genesis contains doublets, the same story told twice in different ways, and is not a text book for Creation science. Genesis includes two conflicting stories of creation, which suggests that it is an oversimplification to insist that it was Moses who was the single author who wrote the Bible, and who wrote the history of creation in Genesis, as a kind of scientific text book to be used by Creation science. Doublets are found throughout the Torah. The famous story of creation (or I should say, both of them) is another example of the same sort of thing. It is obvious that we do not have a single source here, but rather two divergent myths. That mythology if found to diverge is not a concern, since the meaning of myth is found in that it is a myth, but when 'history' diverges this is a problem. This is important to keep in mind if one wishes to do creation science or have the book of Genesis taught in schools as history or as an alternative to the theory of evolution. First one must scientifically analyze the source materials in Genesis objectively, and determine whether or not it is possible to base any theory of science upon such a book. A myth has religious meaning, and the meaning of mythology is emotional and spiritual, and a myth has no value to science, or to history, never having been historical, but rather a religious myth. Sometimes people react to the word myth as though it was a dirty word like falsehood or a lie, but a myth is just a means of usings symbols to communicate in religion, which does not make a myth false, but it does not make a myth true in any historical or scientific sense. A myth is a subjective interpreation of reality while science and history require objective facts, and that is something altogether different.

      The way the debate about creation is engaged it seems to be the case that certain people believe that if they can ‘destroy the theory of evolution' then the Biblical story of creation will be proved correct by default. As well, it is possible to believe in creation, without being what is termed a biblical creationist. Indeed, being a biblical creationist who believes in creation as described literally in the book of Genesis in the Bible, leads to bad science, for it is always bad science to start an investigation after coming to a foreordained conclusion, and it is particularly bad science to base science on a pre-scientific faulty ancient manuscript in the first place. (Based on conflicting genealogy in a contradictory book one declares the world to be ‘6,000 years old' and then begins to look for evidence which must support the truth, the truth in this case being foreordained. Biblically based creation science is not based on the Bible, but rather on traditional religious beliefs, which themselves are not based on the Bible in many cases, instead appearing out of thin air or consisting of selective appropriating and nullifying of scriptures, which is the only way one can construct doctrine from the contradictions in the Bible.)

     Before looking for evidence to support the Biblical account of creation (on the grounds that Moses heard it from God) one should first verify the source material. There are two stories of creation, and they conflict.

      The first version of creation (the priestly version with its echoes of the religious Sabbath tradition) is found in chapter one of Genesis and it is followed by the populist myth in chapter two. The order of creation in Chapter chapter 1 is:

     On the first day the sky, earth, and light is created.
     On the second day water is created with both an ocean on earth and a second ‘ocean' in the sky.
     On the third day the plants are created.
     On the fourth day the sun, moon, and stars are created to assist in navigation and for the purposes of establishing a calendar.
     On the fifth day the creatures of the oceans, and the birds are created.
     On the sixth day the animals and ‘creeping things' are created. With this done human beings were created (male and female they were created). No distinction is made between the creation of man and woman. They are apparently created at the same time. This is echoed in another fragment of this tradition woven in at the beginning of chapter five, which mimics the language used in the first chapter (they were 'created in God's image; male and female God created them').

      In this version it is interesting to note that days, with morning and evenings are created before the sun exists. As well there are traces of a polytheistic tradition in that Elohim (gods) plural is a term used. Elohim is usually translated 'God' in the bible, although a literal translation would be 'gods' (plural), but for theological reasons there are only a few times in the Bible when Elohim is translated in the plural (only when the term was used in a context which did not refer to God, the term having different meanings depending on the context in which it was used.)

      In the second tradition found in Genesis chapter two, God is referred to as Yahweh, usually translated 'YAHWEH'. This is similar to the division found between the two stories of Noah's Ark and the flood, where in each separate version, there are not only differences in detail, but also different names of God used, which corresponds neatly to the differences in detail, and thus both the story of creation and the story of Noah's Ark and the flood, are excellent examples of using the technique of source criticism and redaction criticism in the Bible. In the Yahweh version of creation, creation is not described as a sequence of days. The order of creation is self evidently different. First Yahweh creates the earth and the heavens. Then Yahweh creates Adam who lives on a barren earth, ‘for Yahweh had not yet sent any rain.' Up to this time, we are told, moisture used to seep up from under the ground to water the earth. We are also specifically told that Yahweh had not yet created any plants for there was not yet anyone to till the ground. To rectify this Yahweh created Adam, and then went about the task of creating the first plants. After deciding that the man was lonely, Yahweh created all the animals one by one, and brought them to Adam to be named, but none of these animals were found to be suitable for mating with Adam. Therefore Yahweh put Adam to sleep, performed what would appear to be surgery, removed a rib, and created Eve.

      The conflicts between this version of events and the former are obvious. Humans were created last in the version in Genesis chapter one, and humans were created immediately after a barren earth was formed in Genesis chapter two. They exist before the plants, animals and rain exist, all of which are described as preceding them in Genesis chapter one.

      Contrasting the following passages should make the matter abundantly clear.

"And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind ... And the evening and the morning were the third day ... Let the waters teem with life and let birds fly above the earth ... it was the fifth day ... And God said, Let us make man in our image ... And the evening and the morning were the sixth day." (Genesis Chapter 1 verse 12)

      So in the priestly tradition the order was plants (third day), birds (fifth day), and the on the sixth day the animals (first) followed by humanity. In the alternate tradition you will notice that plants, rain, and birds are said to follow after the creation of Adam.

"There was neither plant nor shrub growing on the earth, for YAHWEH God had not sent any rain, and there was not a man to till the ground. . . And YAHWEH God formed man of the dust of the ground . . . And YAHWEH God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground made YAHWEH God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food." (Genesis Chapter 2 verse 5)

      It follows that if birds and plants were created before Adam, then Adam could not have existed before birds and plants and rain, but it just this impossible to harmonize account of events that appears in the second tradition. In mythology you can have such inconsistencies, but they have no place in history or science.

"And YAHWEH God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. And out of the ground YAHWEH God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof." (Genesis Chapter 2 verse 18)