Genesis 1:2

_AND THE EARTH WAS WITHOUT FORM, AND VOID; AND DARKNESS WAS UPON THE FACE OF THE DEEP. AND THE SPIRIT OF GOD MOVED UPON THE FACE OF THE WATERS._ And the earth was without form, and void. The relation of this to the preceding verse has been the subject of much discussion; some considering that there is but a very loose and remote connection between them, while others maintain that the two verses cannot be separated, because they both refer to the pre-Adamite earth-the former asserting that it owed its origin, in common with all things else in the universe, to the fiat of Almighty power, and the latter declaring what was its condition prior to the establishment of the present terrestrial order of things. But, whether the connection between the two first verses be immediate and close, or loose and remote-whether the statements contained in the second verse refer to events directly continuo...

2._And the earth was without form and void. _I shall not be very solicitous about the exposition of these two epithets, תוהו, (_tohu,_) and בוהו, (_bohu._) The Hebrews use them when they designate anything empty and confused, or vain, and nothing worth. Undoubtedly Moses placed them both in opposition to all those created objects which pertain to the form, the ornament and the perfection of the world. Were we now to take away, I say, from the earth all that God added after the time here alluded to, then we should have this rude and unpolished, or rather shapeless chaos. (44) Therefore I regard what he immediately subjoins that “darkness was upon the face of the abyss,” (45) as a part of that confused emptiness: because the light began to give some external appearance to the world. For the same re

1,2 The first verse of the Bible gives us a satisfying and useful account of the origin of the earth and the heavens. The faith of humble Christians understands this better than the fancy of the most learned men. From what we see of heaven and earth, we learn the power of the great Creator. And let our make and place as men, remind us of our duty as Christians, always to keep heaven in our eye, and the earth under our feet. The Son of God, one with the Father, was with him when he made the world; nay, we are often told that the world was made by him, and nothing was made without him. Oh, what high thoughts should there be in our minds, of that great God whom we worship, and of that great Mediator in whose name we pray! And here, at the beginning of the sacred volume, we read of that Divine Spirit, whose work upon the heart of man is so often mentioned in other parts of the Bible. Observ...

Verse Genesis 1:2. _THE EARTH WAS WITHOUT FORM AND VOID_] The original term תהו _tohu_ and בהו _bohu_, which we translate _without_ _form and void_, are of uncertain etymology; but in this place, and wherever else they are used, they convey the idea of _confusion_ and _disorder_. From these terms it is probable that the ancient Syrians and Egyptians borrowed their gods, _Theuth_ and _Bau_, and the Greeks their _Chaos_. God seems at first to have created the elementary principles of all things; and this formed the grand mass of matter, which in this state must be without _arrangement_, or any distinction of parts: a vast collection of indescribably confused materials, of nameless entities strangely mixed; and wonderfully well expressed by an ancient heathen poet: - Ante mare et terras, et, quod tegit omn

- II. The Land היה _hāyah_, “be.” It is to be noted, however, that the word has three meanings, two of which now scarcely belong to our English “be.” 1. “Be, as an event, start into being, begin to be, come to pass.” This may be understood of a thing beginning to be, אור יהי _y__e__hiy_ _'ôr_, “be light” Genesis 1:3; or of an event taking place, ימים מקץ ויהי _vay__e__hı̂y_ _mı̂qēts_...

EXPOSITION I. THAT this initial section is not _history _is apparent from the circumstance that the occurrences it describes belong to a period of time which antedates the dawn of history. That it is not _science_ is evinced by the fact that, in some, at least, of its particulars, it refers to a condition of our globe concerning which even modern research has attained to no definite conclusions, while in all of them it claims to be regarded not as uttering the findings of reason, but as declaring the course of nature. That still less can it be _myth _must be obvious to any who will carefully contrast it with those heathen cosmogonies which it is said to resemble. Only the most absolute devotion to preconceived opinion can render one oblivious of its immense superiority, to them in respect of both simplicity of construction and sublimity of conception. The absurdities, puerilities, and mo...

AND THE EARTH WAS WITHOUT FORM, AND VOID,.... It was not in the form it now is, otherwise it must have a form, as all matter has; it was a fluid matter, the watery parts were not separated from the earthy ones; it was not put into the form of a terraqueous globe it is now, the sea apart, and the earth by itself, but were mixed and blended together; it was, as both the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem paraphrase it, a waste and desert, empty and destitute of both men and beasts; and it may be added, of fishes and fowls, and also of trees, herbs, and plants. It was, as Ovid k calls it, a chaos and an indigested mass of matter; and Hesiod l makes a chaos first to exist, and then the wide extended earth, and so Orpheus m, and others; and this is agreeably to the notion of various nations. The Chinese make a chaos to be the beginning of all things, out of which the immaterial being (God) mad...

Genesis 1:1. _In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth._ When that «beginning» was, we cannot tell. It may have been long ages before God fitted up this world for the abode of man, but it was not self-existent; it was created by God, it sprang from the will and the word of the all-wise Creator. Genesis 1:2. _And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep._ When God began to arrange this world in order, it was shrouded in darkness, and it had been reduced to what we call, for want of a better name, «chaos.» This is just the condition of every soul of man when God begins to deal with him in his grace; it is formless, and empty of all good things. «There is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understandeth, there is

WITHOUT FORM AND VOID; (Jeremiah 4:23); (Isaiah 24:1); (Isaiah 45:18) clearly indicate that the earth had undergone a cataclysmic change as the result of divine judgment. The face of the earth bears everywhere the marks of such a catastrophe. There are not wanting imitations which connect it with a previous testing and fall of angels. See (Ezekiel 28:12); (Isaiah 14:9) which certainly go beyond the kings of Tyre and Babylon....

ANALYSIS AND ANNOTATIONS I. THE CREATION ACCOUNT The manner in which the book of Genesis begins leaves no doubt that it is the revelation of God. The creation account is historical truth. The question is how was it given? An answer to this question claims that the Jews obtained the account from the records of other nations concerning the origin of the universe and that they altered it according to their own religious ideas. This is an impossibility. The ancient heathen nations considered God and the universe one and had absolutely no knowledge of the existence of God independent of the universe, nor did they know anything of a creation of the world. Here is something wholly different from all the theories, mythologies and other inventions of the human race. How then was it given? By revelation of God is the only answer. No human being knew anything about the origin of the heavens and t...