Genesis 2:7

_AND THE LORD GOD FORMED MAN OF THE DUST OF THE GROUND, AND BREATHED INTO HIS NOSTRILS THE BREATH OF LIFE; AND MAN BECAME A LIVING SOUL._ The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground. The Hebrew verb х_ WAYIYTSER_ (H3335)], to form, is used of a workman who carves statues in wood and metal, or of a potter who moulds clay. It must be considered as used in the anthropomorphic style as applied to the Creator; but it is an appropriate term, as expressive of the artistic skill which is so strikingly displayed in the organic mechanism of the human frame. _ HAA'AADAAM_ (H120), not "man," as in our version, but 'the man,' from _ HAA'ªDAAMAAH_ (H127), the ground, vegetable earth or mould; and hence, arose the generic term Adam, denoting 'redness,' or of "the earth, earthy" - a derivation much more natural than others w

7._And the Lord God formed man _He now explains what he had before omitted in the creation of man, that his body was taken out of the earth. He had said that he was formed after the image of God. This is incomparably the highest nobility; and, lest men should use it as an occasion of pride, their first origin is placed immediately before them; whence they may learn that this advantage was adventitious; for Moses relates that man had been, in the beginning, dust of the earth. Let foolish men now go and boast of the excellency of their nature! Concerning other animals, it had before been said, Let the earth produce every living creature; (113) but, on the other hand, the body of Adam is formed of clay, and destitute of sense; to the end that no one should exult beyond measure in his flesh. He must be excessively stupid who does not hence learn humility. That which is afterwards added from...

4-7 Here is a name given to the Creator, "Jehovah." Where the word "LORD" is printed in capital letters in our English Bibles, in the original it is "Jehovah." Jehovah is that name of God, which denotes that he alone has his being of himself, and that he gives being to all creatures and things. Further notice is taken of plants and herbs, because they were made and appointed to be food for man. The earth did not bring forth its fruits of itself: this was done by Almighty power. Thus grace in the soul grows not of itself in nature's soil, but is the work of God. Rain also is the gift of God; it came not till the Lord God caused it. Though God works by means, yet when he pleases he can do his own work without them; and though we must not tempt God in the neglect of means, we must trust God, both in the use and in the want of means. Some way or other, God will water the plants of his own p...

Verse Genesis 2:7. _GOD FORMED MAN OF THE DUST_] In the most distinct manner God shows us that man is a _compound_ being, having a body and soul distinctly, and separately created; the body out of the dust of the earth, the soul immediately breathed from God himself. Does not this strongly mark that the soul and body are not the _same thing_? The body derives its origin from the _earth_, or as עפר _aphar_ implies, the _dust_; hence because it is earthly it is decomposable and perishable. Of the soul it is said, _God breathed_ _into his nostrils the breath of life_; נשמת חיים nishmath chaiyim, the breath of LIVES, i.e., animal and intellectual. While this breath of God expanded the lungs and set them in play, his inspiration gave both spirit and understanding....

- Part II. The development - Section II - The Man - X. The Field 4. תולדות _tôl__e__dôt_ “generations, products, developments.” That which comes from any source, as the child from the parent, the record of which is history. יהוה _y__e__hovâh_. This word occurs about six thousand times in Scripture. It is obvious from its use that it is, so to speak, the proper name of God. It never has the article. It is never changed for construction with another noun. It is never accompanied with a suffix. It is never applied to any but the true God. This sacred exclusiveness of application, indeed, led the Jews to read always in place of it אדוני...

§ 2. THE GENERATIONS OF THE HEAVENS AND OF THE EARTH (Genesis 2:4-1). EXPOSITION THE subject handled in the present section is the primeval history of man in his paradisiacal state of innocence, his temptation and fall, and his subsequent development, in two diverging lines, of faith and unbelief, holiness and sin. On the ground of certain obvious, well-defined, and readily-explained characteristics which distinguish this from the preceding portion of the narrative, it is usual with the higher criticism to allege diversity of authorship; and, indeed, these same characteristics, magnified by misapplied ingenuity into insoluble contradictions, are the chief buttress of the documentary hypothesis of Astrue, Hupfeld, Tuch, Ewald, and others. Now the hypothes

AND THE LORD GOD FORMED MAN OF THE DUST OF THE GROUND,.... Not of dry dust, but, as Josephus h says, of red earth macerated, or mixed with water; the like notion Hesiod i has; or out of clay, as in Job 33:6 hence a word is made use of, translated "formed", which is used of the potter that forms his clay into what shape he pleases: the original matter of which man was made was clay; hence the clay of Prometheus k with the Heathens; and God is the Potter that formed him, and gave him the shape he has, see Isaiah 64:8, there are two "jods", it is observed, in the word, which is not usual; respecting, as Jarchi thinks, the formation of man for this world, and for the resurrection of the dead; but rather the two fold formation of body and soul, the one is expressed here, and the other in the following clause: and this, as i

Genesis 2:1. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a...

II. THE GENERATIONS OF THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH Man in Innocency before the Fall Genesis 2:4-45 _ 1. The earth his abode (Genesis 2:4)_ 2. The creation of man (Genesis 2:7) 3. The garden of Eden (Genesis 2:8) 4. Man in the garden. His commission (Genesis 2:15) a. To keep the garden b. The commandment 5. No helpmeet for Adam found (Genesis 2:18) 6. The formation of the woman (Genesis 2:21) 7. The un

J'S STORY OF CREATION AND PARADISE LOST. This story does not belong to P, for it is free from its characteristics in style, vocabulary, and point of view. It is distinguished from P's creation story by differences in form and in matter. The regular and precise arrangement, the oft-repeated formulæ, the prosaic style are here absent. We have, instead, a bright and vivid style, a story rather than a chronicle. The frank anthropomorphism would have been repugnant to the priestly writer, and a marked difference is to be observed between the two accounts. P starts from a watery chaos, this narrative from a dry waste. P represents the development of life as moving in a climax up to the creation of man and woman, while here man seems to be created first, then plants and animals, and woman last of all. The use of Yahweh, the anthropomorphism, and several characteristic expressions combine to sho...