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Genesis Chapter Two (Verses 1-17)
Preface
In this chapter a principle of revelation occurs for the first time in the Bible. It is called the “law of recurrence” or the “law of recapitulation,” which is the restatement with or without amplification (elucidation) for a specific purpose of various selected events that have been stated previously in or out of the chronological order in which they occurred. Here the Holy Spirit chooses some of the proceedings discussed in Genesis 1 and elaborates on them. The same principle is seen in Deuteronomy in which is given the interpretation of the Law after 40 years of experience with it in the wilderness, i.e., the recapitulation of the Law combined with an interpretation of it. This same principle of revelation may be seen by the various accounts of specific events contained within the four gospel records (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), all being seen from a slightly different angle (viewpoint) and contributing to the overall details of the events.
It is often said that Gen. 2:4-25 is a second account of creation differing from that in Gen. 1:1-2:3. In point of fact, however, Gen. 1 tells of the creation of the whole universe, including man and woman; while Gen. 2 specifically describes the origin of man and woman without repeating the story of the creation recorded in Gen. 1. Thus Gen. 2 says nothing of the creation of light, of the separation of the waters, or of the formation of sun, moon, and stars. Nor does it actually describe the creation of vegetation or of animals. (The New Scofield Reference Bible, Oxford University Press, Inc., 1967)
Of great importance in this chapter is the spiritual process in which man is made special—the pinnacle or crown of God’s Creation. But proceeding any remarks on this a few comments are warranted regarding the introduction of life in general to the universe—a fact for which no evolutionist has a creditable answer. To the billions upon billions (scientists appear to agree that there are about 10 to the 84th power) of subatomic “pieces” (baryons) that make up the universe, and after all these pieces finally arrived in the right place at the right time, something occurred to add life. The following comments from Ralph O. Muncaster in his book, Dismantling Evolution—Building the Case for Intelligent Design, is germane to this issue.
Assuming that all the components have properly bonded in a way that would support life, something needs to then “trigger” it—like the winding of a watch. All of the materials of a watch might be in the right place at the right time, but until it’s wound, it’s useless. Perhaps life could have started with an electrical discharge. Perhaps it could have started some other way. But this is the second major step in the evolutionary bridge.
Fine, so where did the “electrical discharge” originate? If this was the case, was it a fluke or did it come from a Designer? The beginning of “life” is probably the most significant hurdle in the “theory of evolution,” for which the evolutionist simply has no logical answer. Mr. Muncaster goes on:
Some contend that life started at a place other than planet earth. Beyond the fact that this scenario is unlikely, the steps still remain the same. Life still had to be somehow “injected” into “stuff” that was somehow put together properly. Furthermore, whatever transport mechanism that would have brought that life to planet earth (the only known place in the universe that supports life) would have had to enable it to survive the trip. (In spite of complete lack of evidence, it has been suggested that aliens brought the first life forms to earth. But even if that were the case, we would still be faced with determining what started the aliens’ evolution.)
The only creditable, logical, coherent and reasonable answer to the introduction of life to the universe is the concept of God. And Mr. Muncaster goes on:
Every source of information about evolution or intelligent design—books, films, media presentations, and so on—tends to minimize the most important issue that needs to be addressed:
The critical question is— How do inanimate molecules come to life in the first place?
Think about the first book or article you ever read on the evolution-design issue. What did it focus on? Fossils? Mutations? The artificial development of amino acids? The “anthropic principle”? Gene sequencing? The Cambrian explosion? Do books or articles ever deal with the most basic question of all—that of the infusion of life into chemical compounds?
Why do researchers and authors spend so little time discussing how life was generated in chemicals? In all likelihood, it’s because that is the topic researchers know the least about. It’s also a topic that, almost by definition, requires speculation—be it from evolutionists or creationists. For someone who accepts intelligent design, such speculation is straightforward—a supernatural being (such as God) generated life supernaturally. For the evolutionist, who insists upon naturalistic explanations, the question is unanswerable. Further, the consideration of God is often repulsive. However, cutting through all other aspects of the study of origins, the infusion of life remains, by far, the most fundamental question of all.
. . . This issue, raised by the ability of modern medicine to “bring people back to life,” has caused the medical profession to change the definition of death from “the cessation of heartbeat” to “the cessation of brainwaves.” And now, even that is being called into question. So what is death, really? And what is life, really?
Most evolutionists would argue that life is a combination of chemical and electrical impulses acting on the physical parts of an organism to produce the actions associated with life. . . .
This begs the question. Is life something natural? Or is it something supernatural? If it is natural, we would expect that evolution could create life. We might then ask, why can’t we bring something back to life immediately after it dies by repairing the problem? Why doesn’t this “inject” life back into it? After all, all the atoms and molecules are still essentially in the right place.
But once life has definitely left the body, it cannot, barring a supernatural event from the Creator Himself, be restored. And Mr. Muncaster goes on:
There is another major problem evolutionists must answer if they deem the essence of life merely “natural.” Everyone recognizes that the human body is made up of chemicals commonly found in dirt. But dirt can’t perform the functions of a human being. Chemicals alone can’t perform the functions of any living organism—without something else. So where does life “live”?
To further complicate the question, it is an accepted scientific fact that a human body has a total change of atoms about every five years. Author Richard Swenson, who is a medical doctor, notes in his book “More Than Meets the Eye,”
According to isotope studies, 90 percent of our atoms are replaced annually. Every five years, 100 percent of our atoms turn over and become new atoms. . . . In the last hour, one trillion trillion of your atoms have been replaced.
Others express this process in different terms. David M. Baughan, MD, says,
We are continually being recreated from dust and returning to dust. . . We are not objects or machines that endure, we are patterns that have the capacity to perpetuate ourselves. We are not things; instead we are processes.
Physicist John Tyndall states,
Life is a wave, which in no two consecutive moments of its existence is composed of the same particles.
So if the material of our body is constantly “turning over,” with a total changeover every five years, how can we account for a person’s staying the same? How do all the new cells have a memory of the past? How is the personality of an individual maintained? How are emotions transferred to new cells? Naturalistic evolution—indeed, any materialistic philosophy—has no answers to these most basic questions about life itself.
Life is clearly something more than just chemicals—chemicals that can be dug out of the ground. We can’t measure it, we can’t experience it directly, and we certainly can’t manufacture or create it. . . .
The only answer, if man is not too proud to accept it, is a Designer, the Creator—the God of the Bible! Genesis 2:1-3 Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
There are two Hebrew words used in these three verses that carry essentially the same meaning. One is kalah, which is translated “finished.” The other is shabath, which is translated “rested.” The meaning for both most nearly reflects the phrase, “to bring a process to completion.” When God finished His creative and refining work upon “the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them” (“host of them” refers to all the things that God created, as opposed to stars in Nehemiah 9:6 and angels in 1 Kings 22:19), He rested. The word for “rested” (shabath) employs the root for “Sabbath” that later relates to Israel in Exodus and Deuteronomy. Its meaning is that God ceased or desisted from His creative (bara) and refining (ahah) work. Weariness is not suggested, and, in fact, is impossible with God. In fact, John 5:17 clearly indicates that God is always at work.
Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made. The word for “blessed” in the Hebrew is barak, which carries a variety of meanings. In this case, it indicates that something is “made special.” God pronounced the seventh day as special by sanctifying it or “setting it apart” from the other days of Creation. It was special because it marked the cessation or completion of God’s greatest work—a work in which he created man who was the only being of God’s Creation made in His image. Because of this, God would have a sentient being that would, by freedom of choice, be able to fellowship with Him. And this is the primary reason for man’s existence, even though he does everything to deny it—to his eternal peril.
God here lays the foundation for the principle of resting one day out of seven. At this time He did not command man to adhere to it, but he set the example. It is a principle that contains both natural and spiritual compensation for mankind—recuperation and regeneration for the natural and strengthening and growth for the spiritual parts of his nature. Genesis 2:4-6 This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the LORD God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground; but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.
The word translated “history” literally means “generations;” although, the word “history” or the phrase “historical account” probably catches its meaning more accurately. The words “in the day” are idiomatic, conveying the entire creation process.
It is interesting that in verse 4 the name “LORD God” is first used in the Bible. In Hebrew this is YHWH Elohim. As previously seen, Elohim (or Elohym) is the plural name for God and refers to His omnipotent (all-powerful) attribute. YHWH appears without vowels, and the exact pronunciation is uncertain; although Yahweh is most probable. The meaning of the divine personal name, YHWH, relates to the verb “to be.” It translates “I am who I am” (Exodus 3:14). The meaning of this is best described as the “Self-existent One or Eternal One.” Another slant on the name is that it relates to God’s personal relationship with man. In other words, as Elohim, God is the all-powerful Creator. As Yahweh (Jehovah), He is in covenant relation with man. This usage comes after the first account of the creation of man in verses 1:27. It is believed that the significance for this is that now the covenant relationship between God and man is the primary focus.
Yahweh . . . is the most significant name for God in the Old Testament, appearing 6,823 times. The name refers to God as the self-existent active One, as it is related to the verb “to be” in Exodus 3:14. It also indicates Israel’s Redeemer in Exodus 6:6. This name is associated with God’s holiness in Leviticus 11:44, 45, His hatred of sin in Genesis 6:3-7, and His graciousness in providing redemption for all in Isaiah 53:1, 5, 6, and 10. God (Elohim), which is used to the exclusion of other names for God in chapter 1, indicates His omnipotence, whereas this name emphasizes His care and personal concern for His Creation and His intimate and close relationship to it. (The King James Study Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers)
Starting in verse 4 the narrative centers on the earth’s surface, and in particular the “garden,” prior to the creation of man. Prior to the creation of man God watered the ground not by rain but by means of what is translated a “mist.” Some relate the Hebrew word translated “mist” to an Akkadian (eastern Semitic language, now extinct, of Assyria and Babylonia written in cuneiform script) root meaning “canals,” “subterranean waterways,” or “floodways,” and not “mist,” which is conjecture. But a review of the Hebrew and Chaldee Dictionary and The New Strong’s Complete Dictionary of Bible Words both indicate that it should be translated as either “mist,” “fog,” or “vapor.” The important issue to note is that at this time rain was not a factor, but God brought water from below to nourish the earth. Genesis 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.
There is much information to be conveyed by this very key verse. Note first that the Holy Spirit uses “YHWH (Yahweh) Elohim” as the name of God, stressing the close and personal (intimate) relationship with this portion of His Creation. Note second that it does not say that God “created” man, but that He “formed” man from the dust of the earth (just as He did the animals, vs. 2:19). The created elements were already present in the very ground that composed the earth. In fact, science has shown that a human body if reduced to its basic 15 or 16 chemical elements will mirror the same chemical elements of dirt. Genesis 3:19 is even more lucid regarding this matter when as pertaining to man it states, “. . . till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” This verse clearly indicates that man was not evolved through some slow and long process. Man was taken directly from dirt and was fashioned to form by God.
The word translated “formed” (Hebrew: yatsar) means to form, to fashion, to devise or to frame. It is a word that is used in the Old Testament upon occasion for the “potter” (Jeremiah 18:2). It expresses the relation of a craftsman to his material, connoting skill (Psalm 94:9) and a sovereignty, which man forgets at his peril ( Isaiah 29:16; 64:7; Jeremiah 18:4). God is the Divine Potter in the formation of man, His crown and pinnacle of His Creation (Genesis 2:7, 8, 19; Isaiah 45:18; Jeremiah 10:16; 33:2; 51:19; Amos 4:13; Psalm 33:15; 74:17; 94:9; 95:5; Zechariah 12:1).
But “formed man” out of the “dust of the earth” (the corporeal part of man) is nothing without life (the non-corporeal part of man), and this is the very special part of man that completely separates him from all other aspects of God’s Creation. Why? Because this non-corporeal or incorporeal (non-physical or non-material) part of man includes a special spiritual element the likes of which is in no other living creation of God (the one exception possibly being angelic created beings). This special element is what is known as “spirit.” Animals have both a body and a soul (used in this sense to indicate non-spiritual life, the ability to think and feel, the seat of emotions), but man has body, soul and spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:23)—that part which can link with God.
Just as God is sovereign over all, man has been granted sovereignty in the area of choice. This is a distinctive aspect of God’s image that truly separates man from animals, who respond instinctively to surrounding stimuli. It is in the use of this special “sovereignty” that man can best honor his Creator. Not robotically, but as a free and willing sentient being, man brings honor and pleasure to God by choosing by faith alone in Christ alone to properly recognize and worship Him.
This very special part of man came from God’s breath as He breathed into man’s nostrils the “breath of life.” Here the Hebrew word translated “breath” is ruach, which means “spirit.” Here the word translated “life” is a plural noun and may in fact indicate that God created/formed man in His triune image. And man became a “living soul,” or is better translated, a “living creature” or “living being.”
The word “soul,” as used in the Old Testament, often refers to the whole person. It indicates something that cannot be defined materially and is therefore distinct from the body (Isaiah 10:18). The “soul” is that part of man that is “life.” It is incorporeal existence.
At the creation of Adam, man did not have a soul but he became a soul, and the life-principle was the breath or Spirit of God (v. 7). Death is described as the soul’s departing from the body (35:18). . . The fundamental desire of a Christian’s soul should be for a deeper fellowship and communion with God (Ps. 25:1). (The King James Study Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers)
The Hebrew word adam is translated “man.” Since this has not been previously commented on, the following passage from the “Lexical Aids to the Old Testament,” out of the Special Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible, Spiros Zodhiates and AMG Publishers, 1984, is reproduced for the edification of the reader.
120 “Adam;” this noun usually refers to mankind in the collective sense. It is also a proper noun, the first man whom God created. It is translated “persons” in Num. 31:28, 30, 35, 40, 46. Sometimes in Heb. it means an indefinite “someone.” It generally corresponds to “anthropos” (444). . . . It is very similar to “homo” in Latin. There is probably some original connection to the ruddiness of men’s complexion; see “Adam” (119). “Adam” (120) refers to generic man as the image of God, the crown of His creation, distinct from the rest of creation. God created human beings by a special, immediate act in His own image (Gen 1:26, 27) from two distinct elements (Gen. 2:7). Genesis 2:8-14 The LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground the LORD God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Now a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it parted and became four riverheads. The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which skirts the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good. Bdellium and the onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one which goes around the whole land of Cush. The name of the third river is Hiddekel [Tigris]; it is the one which goes toward the east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
This passage is not the account of the creation or formation of vegetation; it is only the account of the planting of a particular garden. One should remember that in accordance with the “law of reoccurrence” or “law of recapitulation” the chronology of specific events need not of necessity be followed. For instance, verse 19 is often misinterpreted as establishing the creation of animals after the creation of man in contrast to before as in Genesis 1:20, 21. But the verse only refers back to the creation of animals that were brought before Adam.
In verse 8 the chronological planting of the garden is not the issue and cannot be determined. It serves as simply a reference as to why it was planted, i.e., for the occupancy and benefit of man. In both cases (the planting of the garden and the formation of the animals) the Hebrew verb could be more correctly translated by the English “had planted” and “had formed.”
The actual site of the Garden of Eden cannot be determined; although, many locations for it have been suggested. This is primarily due to the reshaping by the Flood of many of the contours and formations of the earth from their antediluvian beginning. A likely site for the Garden is in the area of Babylon, where the Tigris and Euphrates come close together and the Diyala flows into the Tigris from the north and a large wadi drains into the plain from northern Arabia (Havilah?). But the consensus appears to be that the Garden was most likely in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), since two of the four rivers mentioned in the passage are there.
The word translated “Eden” (Hebrew: Eden) means “delight, enjoyment or pleasure. It is associated with “paradise” in Revelation 2:7. Eden is a symbol of great fertility in Isaiah 51:3, Ezekiel 36:35, and Joel 2:3. On a metaphysical level it may represent a state of unbroken fellowship between God and man. But for certain it was a literal location in which God placed man for his residency (home) and benefit.
God placed trees within this Garden that were both pleasant to look at and good for food. The word translated “pleasant” is from the root that is translated “covet” in the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20:17. Man has a tendency to covet that which is “pleasant to the eyes,” compare vs. 3:6 where in referring to the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” it is said, “it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise.” Genesis 2:15-17 Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to tend and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
God intended for man to work, which is to say He intended man to have purpose, direction and productivity in life. This is seen by His placement of man in the Garden of Eden with the distinct purpose of “tending” and “keeping” it. Work was both useful and joyful at first; it only became drudgery after the fall of man (in sin), Genesis 3:17-19. The Hebrew word for “tend” is from the root meaning “to serve or work” and may be translated “till” (vs. 5) or “cultivate.” The Hebrew verb translated “keep” means to “take care of” or “guard” (in this context, guard does not mean to “guard from danger or Satan;” it means to “guard its sanctity”).
In this passage is God’s first commandment to the first man, who at this time and in this perspective represented the entire human race. Although God may have given other commandments to Adam, the Bible doesn’t convey them. God’s commandment embodied three parts:
The Hebrew construction of the translated phrase “you shall surely die,” is best and literally translated “dying you shall die.” This is the first mention of death within the Bible and it begs the question, “What is death?”
The Bible teaches three deaths, which follow:
Note. In each case the assumption is made that there is no evidence of hypothermia or the use of central nervous system depressants such as barbiturates.
Yet the above doesn’t completely satisfy medical science regarding the question of physical death. This is because that with the above present conditions a person may in fact be clinically and legally dead, but not biologically dead. This reasoning is based on the fact that there have been a number of cases in which a person has met all of the above criteria (e.g., when frozen), but has been through various means resuscitated back to normal life. Thus a man is clinically dead when normal means of detecting the four signals of life produce no measurable response. But heroic measures could, in some cases, probably resuscitate some individuals who have been pronounced clinically dead. Whenever such measures fail, it may be assumed that life has indeed fled and the individual is now biologically dead.
A further complicating factor which is becoming increasingly apparent is that a body does not die at the same time everywhere. Some parts of the body may die while other parts remain alive. This is the difference between necrosis, which is death of tissue, and death which commonly applies to the decease of the whole organism. It is usually the necrosis of some vital tissue which brings about the death of the whole. Experiments with animals have shown that even after the death of the whole, many tissues can be kept alive when isolated from the body. The heart of a frog can be kept beating long after the frog has died as a result of its removal. A human heart can be kept alive and will record characteristic electrocardiograph (ECG) waves for sometime after its former owner has ceased to live. (43) Such a preparation was maintained by a group of surgeons at the University of Amsterdam and continued to beat on the laboratory bench for six hours, during which time hundreds of measurements were made of the electrical activity accompanying each cardiac contraction. Dr. Harold Hillman in the Department of Physiology at the University of Surrey, observed that an excised perfused kidney can go on producing urine, and even an excised udder will continue to give milk. (44) (The Seed of the Woman by Arthur C. Custance, www.custance.org)
So now, to legal, clinical and biological death, the concept of cellular death must be considered. But the fact is that a person may in fact truly be dead, in terms of God’s definition of physical death, even though his body and cellular structure remains functional, with or without external interference.
Biblical physical death takes place when the spiritual part of man, which God introduced into man (Genesis 2:7) by His breath (Spirit), departs man.
Then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and the spirit will return to God who gave it. (Ecclesiastes 12:7)
If He should set His heart on it, if He should gather to Himself His Spirit and His breath, all flesh would perish together, and man would return to dust. (Job 34:14, 15)
. . . Thus says the LORD, who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him. (Zechariah 12:1)
It is when God irreversibly removes the spirit of man from him that he is truly and physically dead. God may of course reintroduce man’s spirit back into to him, as He did with several individuals both in the Old (2 Kings 4:18-37; 13:20) and New Testaments (Luke 7, 8 & John 11); but once He does it with finality, the person is dead.
Accordingly, I propose that the physical death of a person really involves two factors. The first is the departure of the spirit back to God who gave it (an event) which presumably would be followed at once by complete electrocerebral silence indicating the total absence of consciousness: and the second would be the progressive breakdown (a process) of all functions of the body unless artificial means are used to prevent it. Where artificial means are used and recovery of true consciousness follows (beyond mere reflex activity) I would presume that the spirit has returned. This is the kind of revival recorded on a number of occasions in the Bible . . . . Those who have been clinically dead can obviously recover their personal identity when they are resuscitated. Presumably such recovery is only possible because God has been pleased to return the spirit to the revitalized body, thus reconstituting the whole person again. This must surely have happened in the case of the widow of Nain's son (Luke 7:11-15) and of Lazarus (John 11), and of all others who were truly dead and yet were brought back to life by the Lord. Indeed, Luke 8:55 tells us, in the case of a young girl brought back to life, that "her spirit came again and she immediately rose up." Moreover, in these three cases at least, there is no indication that the individual suffered any change in identity. Any brain damage that might have been done must have been miraculously repaired, or never occurred. (The Seed of the Woman by Arthur C. Custance, www.custance.org)
Certainly there is nothing unreasonable about these very ancient records of unusual longevity in the early chapters of Genesis. They have not been taken seriously enough, either by those in the Life Sciences (which is a pity) nor even by Christians (which is a tragedy). From these records we may learn a great deal about the potential life span of man, as well as about the origin of death as it relates specifically to man by contrast with other species.
As we have already noted, death for man comes as a tragedy, a violent rending asunder of his being in a way that does not seem equally true in the animal world. It all began with an event which theologians associate with original sin. By an act of disobedience Adam introduced to all his descendants an inheritable disease in the form of a transmissible agent of death both biological and spiritual. Its biological effects can be explored as one would explore the effects of any other genetically determined pathological condition.
The very concept of an acquired mortogenic factor which can be passed on by inheritance has particular significance for the geneticist. And the fact that Adam and Eve acquired mortality which was then inherited by their descendants is just such a case, as Sir Gavin de Beer was astute enough to recognize. (63) Yet, to my knowledge, no Christian writer with a background in genetics seems to have recognized its implications.
Death has been imposed upon man as a penalty. At first its effects were delayed, but after the Flood those effects were greatly accelerated for reasons now understood in part. Today we die at an age which to them would have seemed comparable to the death of a mere infant. While we may expect to live for three score and ten, they did not even reach the child-bearing stage till they were one hundred and thirty years old or thereabouts!
This death of which we speak involves the separation of two components, and takes place when the spirit leaves the body irretrievably. The departure of the spirit is best described as an event. The dissolution of the body is best described as a process. Death is therefore both event and process. (The Seed of the Woman by Arthur C. Custance, www.custance.org)
To this process and event of physical death, the Bible clearly conveys that man is subject to spiritual death at birth, which will continue into the “second death” or the eternal separation from God in the “lake of fire” should he not by faith alone in Christ alone receive God’s free gift of salvation.
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