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Robert_Sock
Guest
Does it intrigue anyone that the second day of creation is not called ‘good’ by God?
Does it intrigue anyone that the second day of creation is not called 'good' by God?
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Pug
Guest
I don’t view all those “and God saw that it was good” as being remarks about each day being good. I take them as remarks about creation. For example, on the sixth day, it is all the animals, etc. that are called good. I don’t think it is a time-span that is called good. At the end, it is all that he had made that is called very good.
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Robert_Sock
Guest
In Judaism, ‘very good’ connotes ‘evil.’
NATURAL IMPULSE
THE good impulse (yetser tov) and the evil impulse (yetser ra) are pictured in Jewish literature as wrestling in perpetual conflict within the heart of man. Satan is usually identified with the yetser ha-ra, the evil impulse. In the book of Job, Satan’s function is described as that of testing the sincerity of men’s characters. In Talmudic literature, Satan’s function is to strengthen man’s moral sense by leading him into temptation. It has been said that every man living shall assuredly meet with an hour of temptation, a certain critical hour, which shall more especially try his mettle.
According to a midrashic statement (Genesis Rabbah 9:9), the existence of the yetser ha-ra in the heart of man and the struggle to overcome it lends high value to the good that emerges from the inner battle. The two conflicting impulses, the good and bad tendencies, are said to be implanted in man as a consequence of his having been formed from the dust and endowed with a soul (Genesis 2:7).
According to rabbinic thinking, the evil impulse is to be found in man at birth; the good impulse begins to develop when he is thirteen years old. The teachings of the Torah are referred to as the antidote to the yetser ha-ra. Similarly, Ben Sira (21:11) states: “The man who keeps the Law controls his natural tendency.”
In commenting on the two yods in the word " ", (Genesis 2:7), the rabbis declare that God created both the yetser tov and the yetser ra (Berakhoth 61a). The command to love God “with all your heart” they interpret to mean “with both your impulses” (Berakhoth Ma), since both human elements can be employed in the service of God. “Were it not for the yetser ha-ra, no man would build a home or get married or follow an occupation” (Genesis Rabbah 9:9). The phrase “very good” (Genesis 1:31) is therefore explained, as alluding to the yetser ha-ra, frequently used in the sense of the productive urge.
Taken from the Encyclopedia of Jewish Concepts
Genesis 1:31
“And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day.”
meltzerboy
New member
You’re becoming a real Judaic scholar, Robert! As far as G-d’s not calling the second day “good,” Rashi states it is because the creation of water was not completed until the third day, at which time G-d reiterates the word “good” twice. Others suggest it may be because of the splitting of the water, which symbolizes strife and misfortune, as well as the creation of Gehinnom (hell or purgatory) on that day. Maimonides points out that the earth covered with water is of little use to mankind, so G-d refrains from calling this part of His Creation good.
One point of uncertainty about your remarks concerning the two natures of humanity: I wonder if the yetser tov does not appear at birth in the form of potential goodness. After all, man is created in the image of G-d and inspired with a soul at birth.
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thistle
Guest
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BrunoMaria
Guest
I don’t quite get why so many insist so literally on Genesis and creation “within so many days” and so on. So I often answered like:
It’s surprising, how many study the Genesis, before they perused the New Covenant. Actually the Genesis - Old Testament - Old Covenant can never be understood correctly without knowing Jesus Christ and His teaching in the New Covenant. Though the whole Bible is actually “One” - it can’t be read and understood without intensive knowledge of (not so much the exact New Testament) but BELIEF.
He who believes firmly and convinced in God - in Jesus Christ, is given understanding as a gift out of God’s grace.
An atheist for instance, will burst of laughing, when he reads the hare is a ruminant - in Deut 14,7: Yet of those that chew the cud … the … hare, and the rock badger, because they chew the cud …
He who based his biblical “intellect” on such irrelevances, skips the whole Bible, doesn’t understand a thing about God’s reality. So let’s never get caught by things like the question of this thread. It must never intrigue anyone that the second day of creation is not called ‘good’ by God!
If we do a good job altogether, we won’t name every single part of the whole work as “good” either
And besides; What is a day, before God created the space of time we call “day” - the period our earth takes to turn around 360°; so our light, the sun, reached all sides of the world ball. A fact actually not too many years ago, the world (and the Church) thought vice versa; - the sun rushing around the globe. Now doubters say; since the Church made so many mistakes at this and that time in history, all ecclesiology is nonsense. Same we could just as well say: Human awareness is altogether nonsense, for in history our science believed things that where absolutely nuts!
Of course people as well as the authors of the Old Testament, couldn’t but interpret things at the highest level of science of their time. And to think, that God even took “His Time” (where a second might be somet like a billion years) was out of reach of the time then. So; the six days of creation, are never “days”, (couldn’t even be before the daylight was created) but periods of divine time; whereas “TIME” with God owns a very different dimension anyhow, than what we consider to be “time”.
But anyhow. All we read in the Holy Bible - here the Old Testament - is 100% true. But is must be understood against the background of Jesus Christ’s teaching. Otherwise we go astray! For Jesus Christ alone is the truth, the way and the life! (John 14,6) Without Jesus Christ, we not only are nothing, but we won’t understand a thing either.
Yours
Bruno
It’s surprising, how many study the Genesis, before they perused the New Covenant. Actually the Genesis - Old Testament - Old Covenant can never be understood correctly without knowing Jesus Christ and His teaching in the New Covenant. Though the whole Bible is actually “One” - it can’t be read and understood without intensive knowledge of (not so much the exact New Testament) but BELIEF.
He who believes firmly and convinced in God - in Jesus Christ, is given understanding as a gift out of God’s grace.
An atheist for instance, will burst of laughing, when he reads the hare is a ruminant - in Deut 14,7: Yet of those that chew the cud … the … hare, and the rock badger, because they chew the cud …
He who based his biblical “intellect” on such irrelevances, skips the whole Bible, doesn’t understand a thing about God’s reality. So let’s never get caught by things like the question of this thread. It must never intrigue anyone that the second day of creation is not called ‘good’ by God!
If we do a good job altogether, we won’t name every single part of the whole work as “good” either
And besides; What is a day, before God created the space of time we call “day” - the period our earth takes to turn around 360°; so our light, the sun, reached all sides of the world ball. A fact actually not too many years ago, the world (and the Church) thought vice versa; - the sun rushing around the globe. Now doubters say; since the Church made so many mistakes at this and that time in history, all ecclesiology is nonsense. Same we could just as well say: Human awareness is altogether nonsense, for in history our science believed things that where absolutely nuts!
Of course people as well as the authors of the Old Testament, couldn’t but interpret things at the highest level of science of their time. And to think, that God even took “His Time” (where a second might be somet like a billion years) was out of reach of the time then. So; the six days of creation, are never “days”, (couldn’t even be before the daylight was created) but periods of divine time; whereas “TIME” with God owns a very different dimension anyhow, than what we consider to be “time”.
But anyhow. All we read in the Holy Bible - here the Old Testament - is 100% true. But is must be understood against the background of Jesus Christ’s teaching. Otherwise we go astray! For Jesus Christ alone is the truth, the way and the life! (John 14,6) Without Jesus Christ, we not only are nothing, but we won’t understand a thing either.
Yours
Bruno
L
Lost_and_Found_1
Guest
These are Scott Hahn’s words…
“What is the real purpose behind the creation account and how can we relate that to the new covenant that we are called upon to live today? The contextual meaning of Genesis is really rooted in a few phrases that we find in the opening versus. In the beginning God created the Heaven and Earth. The Earth was without form and void. When he creates the Heavens and Earth, the Heavens are complete in a certain sense but the Earth was without form and void. The Hebrew expression was tohu waw bohu, literally meaning, without form and without inhabitants. In other words, there’s no structure and there are no beings to fill it. This sets the stage for the rest of the creation account in the next six days. Think of the next six days as two series of three days each. Days one, two and three resolve the first problem of tohu, without form. And the second three days, four, five and six resolve the second problem of waw bohu, or emptiness. Day one, God creates the day and the night. Second day, he creates the sky and the sea. The third day he creates the land and vegetation. He has just provided the threefold form of earthly life. Day and night is time, sky and sea is space, land and vegetation introduces life. Time, space and life then provide the threefold form in which the earth will be experienced. Then the second problem, that of emptiness is resolved in the second three days because in day number four we see God creating the sun , moon and stars, the greater light to rule the day, the lesser light to rule the night so what God created on day four corresponds to what was created on day one, there’s overlap. Likewise on day five, we see the birds and the fish are created to fill the skies and to fill the seas. So what was created on day five corresponds to what was created on day number two. Then day number six, God creates the beasts of the field and then man as well. That corresponds to what was made on the third day, the land and vegetation. So in the first three days, God has established a form, three realms and then on days four, five and six, he creates the rulers over each of those respective realms. He has taken care of the twofold problem of the earth being without form and it’s emptiness. The text of Genesis 1 provides us a framework for understanding the order and design and purpose of God’s creation.”
“What is the real purpose behind the creation account and how can we relate that to the new covenant that we are called upon to live today? The contextual meaning of Genesis is really rooted in a few phrases that we find in the opening versus. In the beginning God created the Heaven and Earth. The Earth was without form and void. When he creates the Heavens and Earth, the Heavens are complete in a certain sense but the Earth was without form and void. The Hebrew expression was tohu waw bohu, literally meaning, without form and without inhabitants. In other words, there’s no structure and there are no beings to fill it. This sets the stage for the rest of the creation account in the next six days. Think of the next six days as two series of three days each. Days one, two and three resolve the first problem of tohu, without form. And the second three days, four, five and six resolve the second problem of waw bohu, or emptiness. Day one, God creates the day and the night. Second day, he creates the sky and the sea. The third day he creates the land and vegetation. He has just provided the threefold form of earthly life. Day and night is time, sky and sea is space, land and vegetation introduces life. Time, space and life then provide the threefold form in which the earth will be experienced. Then the second problem, that of emptiness is resolved in the second three days because in day number four we see God creating the sun , moon and stars, the greater light to rule the day, the lesser light to rule the night so what God created on day four corresponds to what was created on day one, there’s overlap. Likewise on day five, we see the birds and the fish are created to fill the skies and to fill the seas. So what was created on day five corresponds to what was created on day number two. Then day number six, God creates the beasts of the field and then man as well. That corresponds to what was made on the third day, the land and vegetation. So in the first three days, God has established a form, three realms and then on days four, five and six, he creates the rulers over each of those respective realms. He has taken care of the twofold problem of the earth being without form and it’s emptiness. The text of Genesis 1 provides us a framework for understanding the order and design and purpose of God’s creation.”
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marian_love
Guest
Never noticed it.
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Joe_Kelley
Guest
Thanks for this explanation. I always enjoy, and appreciate, learning how much the Jewish scholars can extract from Scripture.
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Robert_Sock
Guest
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Crumpy
Guest
No. When God surveys all creation, he then declares that it is good.
Jewish scholars point out that all the verses in this first creation account have seven Hebrew words, or multiples of seven words. (Sure, there were no verse numbers for centuries. Still the pattern was evident to the writer.)
Maybe, this was some poetic license editing to fit the pattern.
There are seven days in the creation account, as seven was the usual number of days for anything important, like weddings, funerals, coronations, etc. See the book of Ester for the opening celebration. People usually travelled a long way for such a celebration, and a day just wasn’t worth the trouble, but seven days celebration was.
Seven is the number of things in lists that appear later in Genesis.
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BrunoMaria
Guest
Well - to have a tohu waw bohu, there must be some kind of matter. Material. Since nothing was before it was created, it must be created first. If we say there was a “tohu waw bohu” (which actually is German >Jiddish< but often used for any kind of a mess) - we admit that there was something in the universe, before God’s creation. This however is not so. The silly “big bang”-theory of atheists, results of that tohu waw bohu and a giga atomic explosion that started it all with that stupid “big bang”. OK - when God decided to create heaven and earth for to be created Angels and later humans, God needed no material to do so, but God created the necessary material. Since no proper craftsman starts his work in a tohu waw bohu (I know it’s a very poor sample and hardly legal) God certainly didn’t start His creation in a tohu waw bohu. But well. The authors where not wrong, for they couldn’t think other, but while creating (what so ever) the to be created (at least with people crating something) isn’t in the very first split second the finished thing (Earth, Adam etc)
As said before - every single word in the Bible is true. But we have to understand by heart - less by our routine-thinking. Divine things stand high above all earthly reason. (Phil 4,7)
Yours
Bruno
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Pug
Guest
I’d never thought about the two yod’s at the start of Gen 2:7.
I still think that “very good” can just mean “very good”. But following your line of reasoning, when Dan (the tribe) in the book of judges is going to find some land, maybe when the 5 men call it “very good”, they mean prosperous, with the urges well regulated in that area? (Judges 18:9) Is that how it would be interpreted in this scheme?
One thing in the beginning of Genesis that often strikes my eye is the counting evening and morning before the sun exists to count days. The sun is commanded to be on the fourth “day”.
I agree with Meltzerboy about the waters not being done until day 3.
L
livingwordunity
Guest
This might be overly simplistic, but I tend to believe that the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity knew ahead of time what it would be like to be human. And no one I know likes Mondays.
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patg
Guest
No. This is reading way too much into an ancient myth.
F
farpinho
Guest
I don’t quite get why so many insist so literally on Genesis and creation “within so many days” and so on. So I often answered like:
It’s surprising, how many study the Genesis, before they perused the New Covenant. Actually the Genesis - Old Testament - Old Covenant can never be understood correctly without knowing Jesus Christ and His teaching in the New Covenant. Though the whole Bible is actually “One” - it can’t be read and understood without intensive knowledge of (not so much the exact New Testament) but BELIEF.
He who believes firmly and convinced in God - in Jesus Christ, is given understanding as a gift out of God’s grace.
An atheist for instance, will burst of laughing, when he reads the hare is a ruminant - in Deut 14,7: Yet of those that chew the cud … the … hare, and the rock badger, because they chew the cud …
He who based his biblical “intellect” on such irrelevances, skips the whole Bible, doesn’t understand a thing about God’s reality. So let’s never get caught by things like the question of this thread. It must never intrigue anyone that the second day of creation is not called ‘good’ by God!
If we do a good job altogether, we won’t name every single part of the whole work as “good” either
And besides; What is a day, before God created the space of time we call “day” - the period our earth takes to turn around 360°; so our light, the sun, reached all sides of the world ball. A fact actually not too many years ago, the world (and the Church) thought vice versa; - the sun rushing around the globe. Now doubters say; since the Church made so many mistakes at this and that time in history, all ecclesiology is nonsense. Same we could just as well say: Human awareness is altogether nonsense, for in history our science believed things that where absolutely nuts!
Of course people as well as the authors of the Old Testament, couldn’t but interpret things at the highest level of science of their time. And to think, that God even took “His Time” (where a second might be somet like a billion years) was out of reach of the time then. So; the six days of creation, are never “days”, (couldn’t even be before the daylight was created) but periods of divine time; whereas “TIME” with God owns a very different dimension anyhow, than what we consider to be “time”.
But anyhow. All we read in the Holy Bible - here the Old Testament - is 100% true. But is must be understood against the background of Jesus Christ’s teaching. Otherwise we go astray! For Jesus Christ alone is the truth, the way and the life! (John 14,6) Without Jesus Christ, we not only are nothing, but we won’t understand a thing either.
Yours
Bruno
I
InJesusItrust
Guest
Wow Judaism makes sense. I had no real conception or feel for good and evil until I accepted God.
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