![]() The Genesis creation story is not concerned with scientifically determinable events. ![]() The passage says nothing that can be exploited one way or another in the tedious debate between “creationists” and “evolutionists.” Its concern is not with historiography or paleontology, and its curious chronology (water existed before heaven or earth, living things appeared on earth before creation of the sun and moon) should not trouble the minds of any but those who insist on reading the narrative as a description of cosmological or biological development. ![]() These opening verses are not meant to describe historical process or provide a scientific explanation for the appearance and development of the world and human life. And there was evening and there was morning, a third day. Then vegetation was brought forth, seed-bearing plants and fruit-bearing trees, “each according to its kind.” God saw the work of His Hands and found it to be good. From the outset there appeared distinction and separation: day from night, the waters from the firmament (heaven), and the firmament from the dry land (the physical earth). At the moment of creation, “the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters.” In that primordial moment, the Spirit moved like a great storm over the abyss, the formless void, to bring into being the cosmos, marked by order, harmony and beauty.įrom that point onward, the work of creation continued, effected by the cooperative effort of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. To make that light shine out of darkness, the Father also required His “other hand,” the divine Spirit. That light God called “Day,” and the darkness He called “Night.” During the first day of creation, God separated one from the other, Day from Night, spiritual illumination from darkness, despair and death. It relegates the primeval skotos to its own realm, removed from the sphere of light. That light, from the first moment of creation until the last, banishes the darkness. That light, which preceded the appearance of the sun (created on the fourth day), can only be understood as a reflection of the divine Light, the Light that defines the very being of God (1 John 1:5). The Father spoke, and through His creative Word He called forth light. Creation is a Trinitarian act, an act of communion, an act of love. God, the Father or generator of all things visible and invisible, created through what St Irenaeus of Lyon calls His “two hands,” the eternal Son or Word, and the Holy Spirit. Out of that beginning, God – who is Himself the arche or ultimate beginning, principle and source of all that is – brought forth the heavens and the earth. ![]() He fashioned being from non-being, space-time from non-existence. In that timeless moment, from a locus that transcends every notion of space or dimension, God created ex nihilo. Then suddenly, “in the beginning” there was something. As such, nothingness finds its closest human analogy in despair. It is non-existence, non-being, a negative power that by its very nature is devoid of all meaning, purpose or hope. It is an absolute negation, immeasurable and incomprehensible. Nothingness is not just the absence of being it is its denial, its rejection. Yet nothing existed to circumscribe that void or provide contrast to that emptiness. “Nothingness” suggests a void, an emptiness, bounded by something. The concept of “nothingness” is impossible for us to grasp. There were no galaxies, no stars or planets nor were there molecules, atoms, or any of the vast array of subatomic particles that constitute physical reality as we know it. There was neither time nor space, neither matter nor energy, neither life nor death. In the very beginning, there was nothing. Work of the Church Liturgical Music & Texts, News, Media, Reflections, Publications.Directories Dioceses, Parishes, Clergy, Monasteries, Seminaries.The Orthodox Faith Feasts & Saints, Readings, Q&A, Prayers.Fellowship of Orthodox Christians in America.About the OCA Holy Synod, Administration, Organizations, Archives.
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