THE MOSES-TIME VIEWPOINT OF GENESIS-DEUTERONOMY
THE MOSES-TIME VIEWPOINT OF GENESIS-DEUTERONOMY
Virgil Warren, PhD
The presentation in Genesis is from Moses’ viewpoint in time and place.
1. The narrowing scope from Genesis 1:1 till Moses’ time in history. See herein “The Structure of Genesis-Deuteronomy.”
2. Comment about the Sabbath. 2:1-3 comes from a day when Sabbath observance had been enacted as a memorial of the exodus (Deuteronomy 5:12-15). The purpose of the Sabbath was to serve as a memorial of the exodus, when God “created” Israel (Isaiah 43:15, “I am Yahveh, your Holy One, the Creator of Israel . . .”); the manner of observance correlated with God’s creative work: as a rest, weekly, at the end of the week.
3. Comment about marriage: 2:24. The observation about “leaving father and mother,” etc., does not come from God’s mouth; God is “he” in the nearest material (but Matthew 19:3?). As an anticipatory comment, it seems too early for Adam to be making an observation about factors not yet part of his own experience or based on anything the account gives about God’s revelation to him. That leaves Moses as the source of the commandment (example of a Hebrew “imperatival future/imperatival imperfect”).
4. Historical and geographical markers for Eden and early events in Genesis. Place names (patronymics) are given from a perspective in the Middle East (and Palestine?) at the time of writing after the flood: 2:8-17, etc. Note Havilah, where “there is gold, bdellium, and onyx”; Tigris, Euphrates, Pishon, and Gihon.
5. Use of God’s covenant name (Yahveh, יהוה) in events that by centuries preceded the revelation of that name to designate the God of Israel: 2:4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22; 3:1, 82, 9, 13, 14, 21, 22, 23; 4:1, 3, 4, 6, 9, 13, 15, 16, etc. Exodus 6:2-3 says, "God spoke to Moses, ‘I am Yahveh. I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as God Almighty ]El Shaddai[, but they did not know me as Yahveh.’”
6. Proper names are Hebrew-language labels for persons and places existing before the confusion of languages (Genesis 11:1-9). Examples include the following:
man (2:23, אִישׁ) and woman (2:23, אִשָׁה; “because she was taken out of man”); man(kind) (2:7, 20*; 3:24, 19; 5:2; “God formed man [אָדָם] from the dust of the ground” [אֲדָמָה]); Eve (3:20; “because she was the mother of all living” [חַוָּה]); Eden (2:18; 3:24; 4:6; “delight” [עֵדֶן]); Cain (4:1; “I have gotten a man with the help of Yahveh” [קַיִן]; “acquisition”); Abel (4:2-8; Cain killed Abel; “temporariness” [הֶבֶל]); Nod (4:12, 16; “wandering” [נֹד]); Noah (5:28-29; “rest/comfort” [נֹהַ]). Note also Babel (11:9; at the confusion of languages, “to confuse” [בָּבֵל]).
7. The week as a seven-point outline of God’s main creative acts. christir.org