Therefore by this word the perfection of our whole nature is designated, as it appeared when Adam was endued with a right judgment, had affections in harmony with reason, had all his senses sound and well-regulated, and truly excelled in everything good. May we seek to be taught more and more His truth, leaning on His grace! 11 Then God said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that . Not but that God wrought in His grace with individuals. Infidelity takes increasingly an apostate form, and those that used to revere both Old Testament and New are abandoning the truth of God for the dreamy but mischievous romances of so-called modern science. Genesis 9:6; 1Corinthians 11:7; James 3:9.) By reason we apprehend concrete things in perception and consciousness, and cognize abstract truth, both metaphysical and moral. Of the trillions of snowflakes that fall every year, God just likes variety so much. Being made in Gods image, human beings are unique in Gods creation. Carmen Memorial. Man was formed especially from the ground and given the breath of life from God. But, it doesn't seem to matter, cause a couple of weeks later, their kids take off and they fly right to Hawaii. I must be permitted here to say a word on a subject which, if it has called out enormous discussion, betrays in its course, I am sorry to say, no small amount of evident infidelity. But they were different from all other animals and were given power over them; for they alone, of all Gods creatures, were made in Gods image (24-31; sixth day). It was not necessary nor wise to reveal it by Moses. *It seems almost too trivial to notice what Dr. Davidson and Bishop Colenso (or their German sources) say of Genesis 2:5-6, as if inconsistent with Genesis 1:9-10. In another sense man is the image of God (e.g., he rules and creates [procreates] as God does, thus reflecting God). It should seem that of the rest of the creatures God made many couples, but of man did not he make one? Genesis 1:24). (Genesis 2:1-3). May we confide not only in scripture, but in Him who gave it! What dispensation or age was there here? Put them out of their order, and all becomes confused; receive them as God has written them, and there is perfection in the measure in which you understand them. Man alone therefore has what is commonly called an immortal soul. So, I think of my ears when I think of hearing.Now, I know that God can hear, but it doesn't necessarily follow that God has ears. God is here styled Jehovah-Elohim; and so uniformly to the end of the chapter. Genesis 2:18; Psalm 12:5; Isaiah 33:10). And this we may safely say, That he by whom God made the worlds, not only the great world, but man the little world, formed the human body, at the first, according to the platform he designed for himself in the fulness of time. It is the beauty and the blessedness of scripture that it is as much above man's science as above his ignorance. The change of designation springs from distinct truths, not from different fabulists and a sorry compiler who could not even assimilate them. The process of creation, as Moses described it, typically follows this pattern for each day of creation: announcement, commandment, separation, report, naming, evaluation, and chronological framework. He set it apart for man's acknowledging of God. Man's present experience would have suggested neither; yet his heart and conscience, unless rebellious, feel how right and becoming all is in such a state of things none other so good. I love to go snorkeling over in Hawaii. of I affirm then that, when God thus made man, when He put him in Eden, the actual test was the interdict not of a thing which was in itself evil, but simply and prescriptively wrong for man because God had forbidden it. Likewise when it says that God made man from the dust of the earth (Genesis 2:7), it does not mean that he took in his hands a ball of clay and formed it into a human shape as a baker makes a gingerbread man, but that he made man out of common chemicals. The strict import of the term is that which to my mind is most suitable to the context; the week in which God made the heaven and earth for man seems alone appropriate in introducing the revelation of God. [It's your food.] His affections were all regular, and he had no inordinate appetites or passions. He appears most consistently and in season, when man's earth is about to be brought before us. It is man as the head of creation. The next chapter (Genesis 3:1-24) shows us the result of the test which we have seen laid down by Jehovah-Elohim. It remains yet to be seen whether he will be good in act and habit. But into the proof of this we cannot now pause to enter. Swept back wing design, and their ability to just hover, and then almost to fly backwards. "By the law is the knowledge of sin," and until the law was brought in there was, as far as scripture tells us, no such discrimination, if any, between the offerings. The six days fall into two threes, corresponding to each other in the course of events. said, "I was as one brought up with him (or an artificer with Old Testament Reading: Genesis 1:26-31. The first and fourth days refer principally to the darkness on the face of the deep; the second and fifth to the disorder and emptiness of the aerial and aqueous elements; and the third and sixth to the similar condition of the land. And day unto day they utter their speech; night unto night their voice goeth forth. Answer (1 of 4): > 26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness. If in the first chapter the true God shows Himself in creative power and glory, and in the perfect beneficence which marks too that which He had made; if in the second special relations display yet more His moral way and will, so the serpent does not fail to manifest his actual condition and aim not of course the condition in which he was made, but that to which sin had reduced him. Nizzachon, p. 5. There is no one more miserable than the man who has no object before him. In his original estate man was created in God's image, but he had not the knowledge of good and evil. Not at all. Now what did He set the seventh day apart for? If they were not, it could not be said, in OUR image, and it does not appear from any part in the sacred writings that any creature but man was made in the image of God. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.". "The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." They may want to, and may bring disaster upon themselves as a result (as seen in the story of their original disobedience; see notes on 2:8-17, 3:1-24 below), but they cannot destroy the image of God. But in Genesis 6:1-22 we have a very solemn statement the apostacy of the ancient world. Most appropriately it is to Jehovah now. The author passes on from the cattle to the entire earth, and embraces all the animal creation in the expression, "every moving thing () that moveth upon the earth," just as in Genesis 1:28, "every living thing upon the earth." Hence, wherever man enters he makes his sway to be felt. It is the soul which gives the unity, and which accounts for the personal identity. Genesis 1:27. They may indulge in speculations of the mind, or visions of the imagination a substitute for what is real, and a cheat of the enemy. The word of God is always right. This was made in the image and likeness of God. He prepared every thing for his subsistence, convenience, and pleasure, before he brought him into being; so that, comparing little with great things, the house was built, furnished, and amply stored, by the time the destined tenant was ready to occupy it. These are proofs of the evergrowing sway of man. Nebuchadnezzar, "I have dreamed" Daniel 2:3. Enoch brings both these lessons before us. Thus holy, thus happy, were our first parents, in having the image of God upon them. But if God had such care for us before we existed, he will by no means leave us destitute of food and of other necessaries of life, now that we are placed in the world. p. 108. apud Wagenseil. Verse Genesis 1:26. But inGenesis 2:1-25; Genesis 2:1-25, beginning with verse 4, where we have special position and moral responsibility coming to view for the first time, the compound term which expresses the Supreme putting Himself in relation with man, and morally dealing with him here below, is first used, and with the most striking appropriateness. It has been gathered from the varying names of God, etc., by speculative minds that there must have been different documents joined together in this book. As we saw God Himself the Creator and the moral Governor, so further we find the enemy of God and of man in exact accordance with the latest word that God speaks. Where all was bright and good around man in innocency the scope for labour would not have its place. And Jehovah had respect unto Abel, and to his offering. Check out this great listen on Audible.com. But the chapter does not close until we find Seth, whom God* substituted (for this is the meaning of the name), or "appointed," as it is said, "instead of Abel, whom Cain slew." Truly there are many things in this corrupted nature which may induce contempt; but if you rightly weigh all circumstances, man is, among other creatures a certain preeminent specimen of Divine wisdom, justice, and goodness, so that he is deservedly called by the ancients , a world in miniature. But since the Lord needs no other counsellor, there can be no doubt that he consulted with himself. Alas! You've got something over me. Centuries ago people thought that the sun moved round the earth, but when one scientist suggested that the earth moved round the sun, he was condemned for not believing the Bible. You cannot, as a rule, anticipate facts; you cannot discern the truth beforehand. 7. Cosmic order consists of clearly demarcating the various elements of the universe. But this is not the meaning of verses 1 and 2. It is not, but rather of moral relationship. See his Works, vol. It substantially accords with the present state of astronomical science. Every subject that comes before us is dealt with in a new point of view suitably to the new name given to God the name of God as a moral governor, no longer simply as a creator. And you just look around, God'll speak to you through the grass, through the vegetables, through the flowers, through the trees. It is hopeless to attempt any derivation of the name, as it must have existed before any of the verbs and nouns from which commentators attempt to give it a meaning; and the admh, or tilled ground, of which we shall soon hear so much, evidently had its name from Adam. The heavens were in no such state of chaos: the earth was. If we did not see it at once, this was merely because of our dullness. 2. Cain was born, and the fallen mother gave the name: but, oh, what a mistake! And may I not put it to the conscience of every soul whether such an event is not exactly where it should be, according to the internal and distinctive features ofGenesis 1:1-31; Genesis 1:1-31; Genesis 2:1-25? [Note: The NET Bible note on 1:26.] The Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us. But it is the more important because, when it is a question of the guilt of taking man's life, the ground is that he was made in God's image. This explains why adherents of the Abraham religions express a spiritual craving for God or . Was it a state for a promise? The rest of the world exists through the word of God; man through His own peculiar breath. Many commentators opine that these words, "image" and "likeness," are essentially synonymous in Hebrewmeaning that human beings generally look like Godbut doing so limits God's creativity to the merely physical. It would be carried across the ocean and be thrown up on a beach somewhere. I don't know. As we might have expected, the Genesis account of creation is from the viewpoint of the ordinary person. So that, they are for signs, for times, for seasons and so forth; and so this becomes very interesting.Now, if this is a process of "re-creation," then it would mean that on the fourth day, actually God did not create the sun and the moon on the fourth day, but He had now allowed them to be in their present, current positions in their relationship to the Earth, and he removed the shroud of fog, and all, from the Earth so that you can finally see the sun and the moon.Now, we have evening and mornings, where we don't see the sun, cloudy days, cloudy all day long. When a compendious statement of what follows is intended, the "and" is never put. Not only giving me the capacity of choice, He also respects the choice that I make. And let them have dominion Hence we see that the dominion was not the image. Check out this great listen on Audible.com. And so, even the tri-unity of God is expressed in the first verse, "in the beginning God," Elohim. Isaiah 40:26 tells us that God made the stars and calls them by name. All evil is due to this as its spring; it begins with God as the object attacked or undermined. You may be, as Isaiah said, astonished, when you see Him. Finally, it has the singular and superlative merit of drawing the diurnal scenes of that creation to which our race owes its origin in the simple language of common life, and presenting each transcendent change as it would appear to an ordinary spectator standing on the earth. And I wouldn't mind the final chapter being written up there anyhow. #1 "Then God said,". Ed. God divided light and darkness, waters and dry land, the world above from the world below. To the end of the third verse of that chapter it was always God (Elohim) as such. Yes, Jehovah is in question. Some think they have some kind of device that tunes on the magnetic field of the earth. It doesn't necessarily mean a source of light. It put a waterproof husk around itself. Those who enter on them had better be cautious, and well weigh alleged facts, and above all their own conclusions, or those of other men. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the fowl multiply in the earth. Here we have the general review and approval of everything God had made, at the close of the six days work of creation. On the first the darkness on the face of the earth is removed; on the fourth that on the face of the sky. But then, pretty soon, as the glue dries completely, it falls off and it has propagated itself. And chapter one was written by the "Elohistic"; chapter two by the "Jehovistic." ], As a husband and wife demonstrate oneness in their marriage they reflect the unity of the Godhead. I am sure, not that she was exactly entitled to give the name, but that it can be proved that she gave a singularly inappropriate one. He begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness. He therefore restricts the image of God to government, in which the man has superiority over the wife and certainly he meant nothing more than that man is superior in the degree of honor. Yet we still thank God, for we know that he is the provider of all things. God was now producing a spirit, and a spirit, too, formed after the perfections of his own nature. Man will rise and live again. If she possesses all along with Him, it is because of her union with Him, not intrinsically. I form the sounds by the expelling of air and the movement of all of these things in coordination, so that the sounds come forth in a way, that because we have agreed that particular sounds mean particular things, I'm able to communicate intelligibly to you through sounds that I can form in my mouth. We should not have known anything of paradise from the first chapter. The history supposes man thenceforward allowed to act without external law or government to control though God did not fail to work in His merciful goodness in His own sovereignty. "The earth was without form and void." No such interval, however, could be absolutely necessary, as the Creator could as easily establish the luminous connection of the different orbs of heaven as summon into being the element of light itself. he", that is, (hyha) , "I To me it appears that all is in perfect keeping; and that the omission of Jehovah here is equally natural on the part of the serpent and Eve, as it is appropriate to the inspired history of the transaction. This is the highest honor with which he has dignified us; to a due regard for which, Moses, by this mode of speaking would excite our minds. It is not only what he is doomed to, but the wisely ordered place for fallen man here below. Creation and redemption bear witness to His glory, instead of communicating aught of His own dignity. For all scripture was given by inspiration of God. Chapter Overview: The holy scripture, being designed to maintain and improve natural religion, to repair the decays of it. But there is no word coupling the introductory statement of verse 1 with what follows. Chapter 13 Lot's choice and Abram's part. But now, although some obscure lineaments of that image are found remaining in us; yet are they so vitiated and maimed, that they may truly be said to be destroyed. New King James Version. Thanks be to God, One has come who is before Him in unfailing sweet savour, so that if sin be in the background, there cannot but be also what He introduces of His own free grace. In his nature and constitution, not those of his body (for God has not a body), but those of his soul. The sons of God chose the daughters of men. In the statement given by Moses every minute point beautifully exemplifies the propriety of the word of God. It is very simply a measure for perpetuating the creature by God the Creator, in spite of imminent judgment. God does not give such knowledge by direct revelation. The wisdom of the inspired writer's silence will be evident to a spiritual mind, and the more, the more it is reflected on. The whole person is in Gods image. Unfortunately, this has not been made clear enough. The genealogy of Shem, with gradually decreasing age among his seed, follows down to Abram, the remainder of the chapter being thus the link of transition from the history of the world as it then was, and in its principle still is. Ed. This daring evil against God, we know from Joshua 24:1-33 was then spread far and wide, even among the Shemitic race, although never heard of in scripture, whatever man's lawlessness in other ways, before the deluge. "Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus". And it is able to take out of the soil just the necessary chemicals to support that particular plant; able to tell the difference between the chemicals, knows just the chemicals that it needs out of the soil to feed the particular plant that it's coming from, to bring the moisture up out of the soil and all. 12:1 ) and Philo the Jew acknowledges that these words And God rested on the seventh day from His work of creation.Now as we get into chapter two, we find a recapitulation that will emphasize the creation of man, because of this recapitulation we have now, because man is being emphasized. He offers of the firstlings of his flock that which passed under death to Jehovah. The presumption is that there was a reasonable consistency of thought in his mind during one effort of composition. 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