Second Story of Creation Sheet Genesis 2:4-10
In the second account, all creation seems to be happening in a very short time, unlike the first account when creation lasted for
7 days or 6 days
D is for the source called
Deuteronomist
In addition to the Priestly and Yahwist sources, there are two other sources which contributed to the writing of the first five books of the Bible. (The first five books are known as the Torah, a Hebrew world which means "law" and refers t othe books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.) These two other sources are the Elohist and the Deuteronomist. The Deuteronomist obviously wrote the book of
Deuteronomy
E is for the source called
Elohist
The Priestly source calls God by the term
God
In the second account of creation, God is referred to by the title of
Lord God/Lord
The Priestly source likes to include family trees called genealogies in their writings. For instance, an ancestor list can be seen in Genesis 10. The Yahwist source likes to speak of God in anthropomorphic terms. This means that they give God human qualities even through God is not human. Two actions in the second account of creation that make God appear to act as a human:
Lord plants the Garden of Eden, God walks in the garden, He blows the breath of life into the nostrils of Adam and He did not know the perfect mate for Adam, molds Adam of clay
The Yahwist sources calls God by the term
Lord/Yaweh
P is for the source called
Priestly
The theory that the four sources are responsible for the writing only applies to the first five books of the Bible known as the
Torah
J is for the source called
Yawhist
In the second account, God seemed to have difficulty in creating the right mate for the man. None of the animals was suitable. It almost seemed as if God did not know what to do. This is not typical divine behavior but is more characteristic of
a human
A third difference in this creation story, is to bring the man to life, God blew into his nostrils the
breath of life
Creation was not done in a chaotic or haphazard way but with great
care
In the second account of creation, God does not seem far away from the work of creation, but rather
close by
The Yahwist source describes God as being involved and
close to creation/close by
Each writing source has a ............... for easy reference.
code letter
From the first account, we learn that our God is all-powerful and can create with just a
command
God does not give ........ in the second account to create things.
commands
From the second account, we learn that our God is a caring God, who is not far away, but intimately involved with
creation
Perhaps the stories were left in the Bible side by side because each story contains some, but not all of the truth we are to learn about
creation
Elohists like to use ..............................................in their writings to show a way God communicates to people
dreams and visions
A second difference in this account of creation is, like a sculptor, God himself molded the man out of the
dust of the ground
In Genesis I, man and woman are created together. In Genesis 2, woman is created from the same material as man. Both show that in terms of respect and dignity, men and woman are
equal
The Priestly source portrays God as being distant or
far away
This second account of creation contradicts the first account in several ways. For instance, in the second account, in relation to the other living things, human beings are not created last, but
first
The Deuteronomists use a literary style which includes
long speeches
Now, if there are two different versions of the story of creation in the Bible, which is the true one? But perhaps this is the wrong question to ask. Remember, the stories are not intended to teach literal, scientific truth, but to present a deeper
meaning
One of the differences in this account of creation is, for his creatures, God created a garden called Eden by actually
planting it
In fact, the first account of creation was written by a group called the Priestly writers. The second account was written by a group known as the Yahwist writers. These two groups wrote two different stories of creation because each group wanted to emphasize its own
point of view/perspective
Chapter 2 of Genesis gives another account of the story of creation. Despite its obvious contradictions to the first story of creation, the Biblical authors must have put this story next to the story in chapter 1 for a special
reason
and to create a woman, God fashioned her from the man's
rib
God finally crated a mate for the man by casting a deep sleep over him and removing one of his
ribs
The generally accepted date for the priestly writers account is c. 500 B.C.E. (which means Before the Common Era and is the term preferred in religious studies). The Yahwist writes generally accepted date is c. 950 B.C.E. Notice that although the Yahwist writers composed their story first, the version comes
second
Why must we study both accounts of God's creation?
to grasp the full meaning of God's creation of the world
Two very different accounts of creation suggest that the biblical story of the beginning of the world was not written by one author or group of authors, but by at least
two authors
By examining the two accounts, we can see the different characteristics of the
two writing sources