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IN THE REAR-VIEW MIRROR:

 

Edwin Yamauchi On Genesis 1: 1 (1972)

Edwin Yamauchi, The Stones and The Scriptures

(Philadelphia; J.B. Lippincott: 1972), p. 32.

 

‘Some scholars, such as Speiser and Orlinsky, have wished to translate Genesis 1: 1 in a conditional sense, “When in the beginning . . .”, to make the verse correspond to the opening line of the Babylonian creation epic.

This would radically change the sense of the initial verse of the Bible. The absolute rendering, “In the beginning . . .”, yields the sense of an ex nihilo creation which is unique in the ancient world.

It may be argued, however, that since the monotheism of the Hebrews is unique, it should hardly be surprising that their cosmogony is unique also.

Until recently scholars had supposed that the Babylonian “Genesis” went back to the time of Hammurabi in the eighteenth century and predated the biblical Genesis.

A study by Lambert has now dated this work to c. 1100 B.C., a period which would have been too late in any case to have influenced Moses.’

 

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