Bible Commentaries

Genesis 1:1. This verse may be understood as a general introduction to the account of the creation, which Moses is about to give; asserting, in confutation of all who held the eternity or fortuitous formation of the world, that the Almighty God gave a beginning to it, by creating the heaven and the earth. It may also be understood as a part of the following account, expressing, that God, in the first place, created that substance in a chaotic form, out of which the regular and beautiful system of the heaven and earth arose, according to the process described in the subsequent verses.

In the beginning— i.e.. The beginning of time.

God— The Hebrew word is אלהים Elohim, which speaks, (1.) The power of God, Creator. El signifies the strong God. (2.) The plurality of persons in the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This plural name of God in Hebrew, which speaks of him as many though he be one, is to us a savour of life unto life, confirming our faith in the doctrine of the Trinity; whatever it might have been to the Gentile world.

Learn hence the object of our worship, the Creator, the Elohim, three persons, but only one and true God. His right to us is undoubted; all we have, and are, is of his bounty. Most justly, therefore, should we yield up ourselves to him, in love and adoration, by whom, and for whom are all things. Happy that heart which is thus led to answer the end of its creation!

Created the heaven— Some commentators, who could no sooner read the word heaven, than their ideas were carried into the superior realms, and peculiar residence of God, have strangely asserted, that the creation of the angels and the beatific heavens, is expressed here: whereas there is nothing plainer, from Gen 1:8 than that the heaven here meant is that firmament, with its furniture of sun, moon, stars, &c. which is the object of our immediate sight and attention.

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Genesis 1:2. And the earth was without form, and void— In its first state the earth, or the whole of the terraqueous globe, was a mere confused chaos, without any regular form, or without any of its present furniture, plants, trees, animals, &c.

Darkness on the face of the deep— Every thing was yet in a stagnant, black, and unformed state; and the whole face of the deep, or vast abyss of primordial matter, was inveloped in total darkness: there was an absolute privation of all light.

And the Spirit of God— רוח ruach, i.e.. The Holy Spirit, the third person in the Trinity; or, as some of the ancient Jews called him, the Spirit of the Messiah, who was the first mover in this creative operation: which explains the Evangelist St. John, who, in the beginning of his Gospel, says, that all things were made by the eternal ΛΟΓΟΣ, or Word of God, (the same with the νους , or mind of the ancient philosophers,) whose Almighty Spirit agitated the vast confused mass of matter, and put it into form.

Moved— The word ףּרח rechep, whence מרחפת mera-chepeth, seems properly to signify to make a tremulous or fluttering motion, such as that of an eagle fluttering over her nest; in which sense it is used, Deuteronomy 32:11 fluttereth over her young.

Face of the waters— The same with the face of the deep, the abyss just mentioned, the terraqueous unformed mass: which perhaps may the rather be called waters, as the earthy particles, being the heaviest, would naturally sink to the center; and the watery, in consequence, would occupy the superficies of the mass. It may be worth while to observe here, how much the heathens have borrowed of their theogony from the account given by Moses: Chaos and darkness, according to them, were in the beginning:

Love, or a plastic spirit, brooded over this chaos, as over an egg: and from water, many of their greatest philosophers derived the beginning of all things.

REFLECTIONS.—Such as appeared the material world before the Spirit of God quickened the lifeless lump; such is now the spiritual world, till the same Divine Power interposes. 1. The soul of man by sin, is become a heap of confusion: as dead to God, and incapable of producing any fruits of holiness, as the unformed chaos to produce trees or flowers. 2. Darkness covers it: we have neither the faculty of vision to descry, nor light to illuminate spiritual objects. We know nothing of ourselves, our God, our Saviour, our proper work, our happiness, as we ought to know. 3. The whole world, which now lieth in wickedness, presents to the enlightened mind a lively image of this original confusion and emptiness. Darkness surrounds it, no beauty appears, God is forgotten; the jarring elements of corrupt nature breed wild uproar; and universal desolation seems diffused around. The heart that hath been taught its true rest, daily cries after that new heaven and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. 4. As incapable as this chaos was, of forming itself into order; as impossible as it was for this darkness to produce the light, or kindle up the sun; so impossible is it for man, by any powers or ability of his own, to restore his fallen soul to the image of God, or to produce one beam of heavenly light, or spark of spiritual life. 5. It is the office of the Spirit of God alone to produce light and order in the dark and chaotic soul. 6. Be our mortal bodies however dissolved in earth, fire, water, air, He who first moved upon the face of the waters, can by the same energy recall the scattered particles of our dust, and from the dissipated and disjointed atoms raise up a glorious body, bright as the sun when it shineth in its strength.

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Genesis 1:3. And God said— To speak and to will, with the Almighty, is to command. His word is with power. Struck with the grandeur of this passage, the celebrated Grecian critic Longinus produces it as an instance of the true sublime. "So likewise," says he, "the Jewish legislator, no ordinary person, (ουχ ο τυχων ανηρ, ) having conceived a just idea of the power of God, has nobly expressed it in the beginning of his law. And God said—What? Let there be light: and there was light." We may here truly say with Boileau, "Whatever noble and majestic expression, elevation of thought, and importance of sentiment, can contribute to sublimity, may be found in this passage."

Said— By אמר amar, the Hebrews often express internal volition, as well as outward speaking, as both Mr. Locke and M. Le Clerc observe. So Exo 2:14 it is translated, intendest thou to kill me? 2 Samuel 21:16. He thought, designed (διενοειτο LXX) to have slain David. The Greeks also often use the word φημι, to speak, in this sense. This observation will be of frequent and general use. Moses means here, that God having purposed to create the light, no sooner willed it to shine forth, than it shone.

Let there be light: and there was light— Many have been the questions, and great the triumph of unbelievers, upon this declaration in the Mosaic account, "that there was light three days before there was any sun." But the objection is founded on a gross misconception, that light is nothing more than an emanation from the sun, or other luminaries: according to which there can be no light, where there is no sun, &c. But is it not easy to conceive, that God, the light of the world, might either sustain this light, in the first act of creation, by his own immediate power; or that, in consequence of that original motion, impressed on the chaotic mass, those particles of matter which we call fire, (whose known properties are light and heat,) being the lightest, strongest, and most active of the elements, disuniting themselves from the grosser parts, ascended, and constituted that light, which, in the fourth day, was compressed and consolidated, if we may so speak, into the body of the sun? It seems probable, that after the first vivifying motion impressed by the Spirit of God, the material atoms or elements were left, in some measure, to their natural and regular operation, under the direction of the Supreme Creator. For you observe the light first appears, as consisting of the subtlest matter; next the air or firmament; next the waters; and so the earth, the most gross of all. But after all, I may say with Le Clerc, "that it is unnecessary to philosophize too subtilly concerning the cause and nature of this light; since the solutions of the most learned are attended with difficulties; and we cannot but expect to be ignorant of various things respecting the origin of the world."

REFLECTIONS.—1. Light is the great beauty and blessing of the universe: like the first-born, it doth, of all visible beings, most resemble its great Parent in purity and power, brightness and beneficence. By beholding it therefore let us be led to, and assisted in, the believing contemplation of him who is light, infinite and eternal light, and the Father of Lights, and who dwells in inaccessible light. 2. What a striking emblem is this natural light of Christ, in whom was light, and who is the true Light, the Light of the world? Darkness had been perpetually upon the face of fallen man, if the Son of God had not come, and given us an understanding, that we might know him that is true.

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Genesis 1:4. That it was good— The word טוב tob, signifies not only what is goodly and pleasant in itself, but what is useful and fit for the end to which it is designed. And surely it could not be more properly applied than at the first, to that light, which, as Cowley calls it, is,

"Active Nature's watchful life and health, Her joy, her ornament, and wealth." The world, which now is a palace, would have been a dungeon without it. Truly light is sweet, says Solomon: it rejoiceth the heart. And if the light be so good, how good must he be who is the fountain of it, from whom we receive it, and to whom we owe all praise for it, and all the services we do by it.

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Genesis 1:5. God called the light day, and the darkness he called night— He gave them names as Lord of both, for the day is his, the night also is his. He is the Lord of time, and will be so till day and night shall come to an end, and the stream of time be swallowed up in the ocean of eternity. Let us then acknowledge him in the constant succession of day and night, and consecrate both to his honour, by working for him every day, and resting in him every night, and meditating in his law day and night.

Some have observed that the names here given to the two grand divisions of the day, are proofs of the expressiveness of the Hebrew language; יום jom, the day, expressing the tumult and business which attends it: and לילה lilah, the night, being derived from a word signifying the howling and yelling of the wild beasts, which then appear.

The evening and the morning— It is acknowledged by all, that each of these is put by a synecdoche for one half of the natural day. The darkness of the evening, or night, was before the light of the morning: it served as a foil to it, to set it off, and make it shine the brighter. It was on the ground of this and similar passages, that the Jews began both their common and sacred days with the evening. But this was not only the first day of the world, but the first day of the week. I observe it to the honour of that day, because the new world began likewise on the first day of the week in the Resurrection of Christ, as the Light of the world, early in the morning. In him the day-spring from on high hath visited the world; and happy are we if that day-star arise in our hearts.

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Genesis 1:6. Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters— After having given an account of the generation of light, the sacred writer goes on to inform us of the generation of the air, or of that expansive element which fills the space between the earth and the highest regions, and which goes under the general name of the heavens. This air, in its first created state, was intermixed with the other elements in the chaotic mass; upon which a motion having been impressed by the divine energy, and the light having emerged, the Almighty next directs the air, according to its nature, to operate amidst the waters; and by its expansive and compressing power, to carry some of these waters aloft with it, and to keep the rest in their due station below on the earth. This I take to be the meaning of the present verse; to which not only the words, but the nature of things, correspond. For rekiang (רקיע), as our translators observe in the margin, (though, after the Vulgate and LXX, they have rendered it firmament,) signifies expansion; or rather the air or heaven in a state of expansion; for expansion necessarily implies an agent to expand, and here an agent is expressed, which was to divide or separate the waters; which agent is called, Gen 1:8 heaven. As the light, which makes the day, is called day; and the darkness, night: so, that which makes the heaven, i.e.. the air, is called heaven. Those who understand the properties of the air, which is peculiarly elastic, and therefore expansive and compressing, will see the great propriety of the original, rechio, which is derived from the verb recho, to stretch forth, extend, distend, expand every way. And nothing but our being accustomed immediately to annex the idea of the regions of supernal bliss to the word heaven, when we hear or read it, could make it appear strange to us, that this agent is called heaven or heavens; since the whole space we see, and commonly call heaven, is nothing more than the air. How far this air or heaven may rise and extend, I cannot determine. But it seems to me most probable (and I have Sir Isaac Newton's authority, or at least supposition on my side) that the whole planetary space is filled with a fine and subtle ether; which, it is probable, grows finer and finer as it approaches the central fire, the sun, and becomes grosser, and grosser the nearer it approaches the center of our planet. By the firmament, therefore, I would understand all that immense space which every way surrounds our earth, and extends to the limits of our system, and which I conceive to be filled with ether, denser or finer, in proportion to its proximity to, or distance from, the sun.

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Genesis 1:7. And God called, &c.— And this expanse God called heaven, shemmim, (because waters were there placed,) from שׁם sham, there, and מים maim, waters: a derivation the rather to be approved, because, as we shall see throughout the scriptures, the Hebrew names were generally given from the actions immediately at hand.

REFLECTIONS.—1. God having made the light, a proper medium is now provided through which its rays may pass. But though this firmament is stretched over us, the way is open to the throne of God, and faith can even here enter within the vail, and prayer hath wings which mount beyond the skies. Observe, 2. the design of this firmament, to divide the waters from the waters. There are waters beneath the firmament that cover the great deep, and rivers which run among the vallies; and there are waters above the firmament, in clouds which drop down fatness, and in treasure-houses reserved for purposes of judgment.

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Genesis 1:9. And God said, Let the waters be gathered together— After the elements of light and air were appointed to their proper places, the next in density, the water, i.e.. the lower water, or that under the air, is separated, by the divine direction; and thus, at length, the earth, or dry land, emerges and appears. It is to be observed, that Moses introduces every mutation with the words God said; intimating, that the power and energy of the Divinity over-ruled and conducted each operation; and, however natural causes might work, was the primum mobile, or the first great Mover throughout the whole formation.

Unto one place— All the waters of the world have one general communication. The rivers and the fountains all return themselves into the sea; and all seas have either a visible or secret communication with each other. I have no doubt but the Caspian sea disgorges itself, by subterraneous passages, into the Euxine, or the Ocean, which may be considered as the grand reservoir (the ONE PLACE) of all the waters of the earth. This observation is confirmed by the name given Gen 1:10 to this one place, this conflux, or great receptacle, of all the congregated waters, seas, or ocean. All the waters make, in this sense, but one ocean, as all the dry land makes but one earth. How all this was brought about, how the channels were hollowed, the rocks and mountains formed, &c. it is impossible for us to determine! Only this we know, that the Divine Power continued his interposition, and by his omnipotent energy, to which all things are easy, directed the whole!

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