THE EMBARRASSING GOD? YAHWIST AND PRIESTLY SOURCES IN THE GENESIS CREATION ACCOUNT

5-6 min. reading about two images of God in the beginning of the Bible and why the difference matters

2 of 4 posts in ‘Genesis’ series.

We all like Genesis 1, don’t we?

Unless you try to prove it to be a scientific account (but let’s not even go there!) it’s all clean and clear: let there be light! God says and there is. Six days unfold nicely and topically, in a relatively understandable order from less to more complex forms of life. All is good straight away, and in the end Adam and Eve are both created at once in the image of God, which nicely resonates with our modern sensitivities about gender equality.

Then the God of Genesis 1 takes some rest on day seven, right in the beginning of Genesis 2.

Too bad. While he’s apparently resting, the God of Genesis 2 creates everything from the scratch again. And boy, this time it’s messy.

From Gen. 2:4 it starts: the Earth is already ready and we don’t even know how. Then, instead of impressively talking things into existence out of nothing, God gets his hands dirty sculpting the men of dust and he breaths into his nostrils to make the thing alive.

Next God plants the garden and we get some questionable directions of where it actually was situated.

‘Oooopsie! It’s not good for the man to be alone’ – comes sudden realisation. Things actually aren’t good here, and it will take some effort to sort them out. God tries out with some animals, but the man, though slightly entertained, is still not pleased. Sorry!

‘What to do?’ – worries the Almighty. Again, he get’s his hands dirty, first removing Adam’s rib (fortunately closing up its place with flesh) and then forming Eve of it.

‘That will do’ – decides Adam. All fine, finally the drama’s over.

Or is it? No rest for God in this story: the talking snake is just around the corner, and soon we’ll see God walking in the garden and mending clothes.

It is embarrassing, let’s admit it. No one in their right mind will read it literally, but even when read metaphorically, with all its depth and space for interpretation, it still is somehow embarrassing for our taste. But is that bad?

Is it bad or embarrassing when a child prays for her ill hamster to get better? Or is bad or embarassing when you’re stuck in a traffic jam asking the Creator of the Universe not to let you get late for your holiday flight? We’ll get to that soon.

If you read both chapters in Hebrew (which you didn’t, and neither did I), you could notice that the God of Genesis 1 is referred to simply as ‘Elohim’, while in Genesis 2 we meet ‘YHWH Elohim’.

Without going into details, alongside different titles/names of God used in the two stories of the beginning, scholars find many good reasons to believe the different accounts came from two different literary sources.

Namely, the Genesis 1 story came from the later, so-called Priestly source, while Genesis 2 derives from the earlier Jahwist source.

Simplifying the long academical debate, it is believed that Genesis 1 is a later narrative layer added on Genesis 2.

So, it’s like some rabbis in Babylon, when composing the final edition of the Torah found Genesis 2 slightly embarrassing too, so they added the more refined version of events we now find in Genesis 1.

If you’re a Christian, it may bother you to read it. Maybe you already have a few good questions to ask: Who said? How exactly do we know all that? Feel free to check it, but first of all: No, it does not mean that the Scripture got corrupted. It neither means it wasn’t inspired. It’s just the process may have not looked like you imagined it and the greatness of the text isn’t in it being in perfect harmony with itself. But that’s another topic…

In Genesis 1 we see the philosophers’ great and remote God. He forms the world remotely, with his all-powerful words bringing things into existence. He’s above our reach and above our understanding. And it’s fine. It’s good. It’s awe-inspiring and amazing. It’s true.

In Genesis 2 we see the anthropomorphic God, the more human-like creator, who walks and talks with people. A creator who is with Adam through his loneliness, frustrations and search for a companion. Who gets his hands dirty for the man’s sake. Isn’t that fine? Isn’t that true? And doesn’t this God find his ultimate expression in Jesus?

That would be a good point to finish. But I want to point out one more thing.

Whoever was there composing/editing/putting together the first chapters of Genesis, they could’ve just scratched the ‘embarrassing’ bits leaving only chapter 1. They also could’ve incorporated earlier fragments into a new narrative, they could’ve smoothen and polished it all. Instead, they left it messy, odd bits standing out, ‘contradictions’ in front of our surprised modern faces.

I guess they knew better than we would. I guess they saw the value of nuance and they respected the history of how ideas developed, or, if you prefer, how the revelation progressed. Thank God they did.

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