The creation of the world by a single God, as depicted in the Bible, is one of the central tenets of Judaism and Christianity. The primary creation narrative is the first book of the Bible, Genesis. However, interpretations of this narrative and understandings of the creation process vary widely among believers.
The primary biblical creation texts are contained in two narratives: chapters one and two of Genesis.
The first creation narrative occupies the entire first chapter of Genesis and the beginning of chapter two. It describes the creation process as a workweek and a day off (the Sabbath). The text states that on the first day, God created light and separated it from darkness; on the second day, He created the firmament and water; on the third, dry land and plants; on the fourth, the heavenly bodies; on the fifth, birds, fish, and reptiles; and finally, on the sixth, animals and humans. The narrative concludes with the first three verses of the second chapter of Genesis, which states that the Creator “rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done,” and “God blessed the seventh day and gave it light, because in it He rested from all His work which God created and made” (see Gen. 1:1–2:3).
The second creation narrative is contained in the second chapter of Genesis, beginning with verse four. The text tells of the creation of the Garden of Eden and its two trees: the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; the first commandment given to man—not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; and the creation of Eve from Adam’s rib (see Gen. 2:4–25). God’s creation of the world is also mentioned in many other places in the Bible (in the books of the Prophets, the Psalms, Proverbs, Job, the deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament, and the New Testament), but not in as much detail as in Genesis.
The interpretation of biblical texts about creation is not only a specifically theological issue but also has direct relevance to the scientific and social realities of the modern world. How the biblical narratives are understood affects both believers’ understanding of creation and their attitude toward modern science, particularly the achievements of evolutionary science, as well as various social processes related to this topic.
Historical Interpretations
Even in ancient times, biblical texts about creation were interpreted in two ways: on the one hand, there were literal interpretations of the creation story, on the other, non-literal ones. Literal Interpretations
The most famous proponent of a literal interpretation of the creation story in the patristic era is Basil the Great, who wrote his Hexaemeron, in which he rejects allegorical interpretations. For example, he writes:
“I know the rules of allegory, although I did not invent them myself, but found them in the works of others. According to these rules, some, taking what is written not in its commonly used sense, call water not water, but some other substance, and assign meanings to plants and fish according to their own ideas, even explaining the existence of reptiles and animals according to their own concepts, just as dream interpreters give interpretations of visions in dreams consistent with their own intentions. But I, hearing about grass, understand grass, and also accept plants, fish, animals, and cattle—all by their names—as those things. “For I am not ashamed of the gospel (Rom. 1:16). <…> Shall I not rather glorify Him who has not burdened our minds with empty things [secular wisdom, the sciences of that time], but has arranged that everything should be written for the edification and improvement of our souls? This, it seems to me, has not been understood by those who, according to their own understanding, have intended to ascribe some importance to Scripture with some kind of inferences and adaptations. But this means setting oneself up as wiser than the words of the Spirit and, under the guise of interpretation, introducing one’s own thoughts. Therefore, let us understand it as it is written” [Basil the Great. Homilies on the Hexaemeron. Homilies 9 // Works of our holy father Basil the Great, Archbishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia. Part 1. – Moscow, 1891. – Pp. 5-149].
Based on a literal understanding of the biblical text, Basil the Great believes that God created the world in six days, and that the day of creation constitutes a 24-hour earthly day:
“And there was evening, and there was morning, one day. Why is it called not first, but one? Although it would be more appropriate for someone intending to speak of the second, third, and fourth days to call the day on which the subsequent ones begin first, he nevertheless called it one. Or does he thus define day and night for the world, and combine them into a single 24-hour period, because twenty-four hours fill the duration of one day, if by day we mean night. Why, although during the rotations of the sun it happens that day and night surpass each other, nevertheless the duration of day and night is always limited to a specific time. And Moses seemed to say this: the measure of twenty-four hours is the duration of one day, or the return of the sky from one sign to the same sign occurs in one day. Why is it that every time the sun’s rotation brings evening and morning to the world, this period accomplishes not for a longer period of time, but for the duration of one day” [Basil the Great. Homilies on the Hexaemeron. Homilies 2 // Works of our holy father Basil the Great, Archbishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia. Part 1. – Moscow, 1891. – P. 5-149].
The American Orthodox monk Seraphim Rose, widely known among Russian Orthodox believers, rejects allegorical interpretations of creation and also cites the statements of other Church Fathers who understood the biblical text on creation literally: Ephraim the Syrian, John Chrysostom, John of Damascus, and several others [Hieromonk Seraphim (Rose). The Orthodox View of Evolution. Question 4 // “Svetoslav,” St. Petersburg Printing House No. 6, 1997].
Similarly, Priest Daniil Sysoev cites the understanding of a number of Church Fathers to refute this interpretation of the days of creation, where the days are not literal 24-hour days on earth, but rather certain extended periods.
During the Reformation, the literal interpretation of biblical texts was actively developed by Protestant theologians. Thus, Martin Luther asserts:
“If Moses writes that God created the heavens and the earth and everything in them in six days, then admit that these were six days, and do not dare to invent that six days were one day. If, however, you cannot understand how all this happened in six days, then grant the Holy Spirit the right and the honor of being smarter than you. For you must always remember that the Holy Scriptures were written as God Himself commanded. And if God speaks to you, it is not right to wilfully direct His Word wherever you please” [Plass, E. M., 1991. What Martin Luther Says, a Practical In-Home Anthology for the Active Christian, Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, Missouri, p. 1523].
Such biblical literalism underlies the rejection of evolution by modern Protestant fundamentalists.
Other Ancient Interpretations
Non-literal forms of biblical interpretation have their roots in the pre-Christian spiritual tradition of Judaism, where allegorical interpretations had already begun to develop. This tradition continues in the books of the New Testament, with the Apostle Paul, a disciple of Rabbi Gamaliel, being a prominent representative (see, for example, Galatians 4:21-31). Later in Christianity, allegorical interpretations of biblical texts were developed in the Alexandrian theological school, particularly by the major patristic theologian Origen. In the third century, Origen, for example, expressed thoughts that sound quite modern:
“Who that has understanding will suppose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, existed without a sun, and moon, and stars? And that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky?” And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? And again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally” [Origen, De Principiis IV, 16].
In another work, Origen writes a response to the pagan thinker Celsus:
“And with regard to the creation of the light upon the first day, and of the firmament upon the second, and of the gathering together of the waters that are under the heaven into their several reservoirs on the third (the earth thus causing to sprout forth those (fruits) which are under the control of nature alone), and of the (great) lights and stars upon the fourth, and of aquatic animals upon the fifth, and of land animals and man upon the sixth, we have treated to the best of our ability in our notes upon Genesis, as well as in the foregoing pages, when we found fault with those who, taking the words in their apparent signification, said that the time of six days was occupied in the creation of the world” [Origen, Contra Celsus 6.60].
Another famous Christian theologian, Saint Augustine, argued in the 5th century that biblical texts should not be taken literally if they conflict with what is known from science and with the reasoning of God. In his work, “The Literal Interpretation of Genesis” (De Genesi ad literam), Augustine writes:
“It does not infrequently happen that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation, or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about the definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw totally how in error they are. In view of this and in keeping it in mind constantly while dealing with the book of Genesis, I have, insofar as I was able, explained in detail and set forth for consideration of the meanings of obscure passages, taking care not to affirm rashly some one meaning to the prejudice of another and perhaps better explanation” [Aurelius Augustinus. De Genesi ad literam 1:19-20, Chapt. 19].
Augustine argues that it was not the intention of the Holy Spirit to place scientific knowledge in the Holy Scriptures, since this does not pertain to matters of salvation:
“With the scriptures it is a matter of treating about the faith. For this reason, as I have repeatedly noted, if anyone, not understanding the mode of divine eloquence, should find something about these matters [about the physical universe] in our books, or hear the same from those books, of such a kind that it seems to be at variance with the perceptions of their own rational faculties, let them believe that these other things are in no way necessary for the admonitions, accounts, or predictions of the scriptures. In short, it must be said that our authors knew the truth about the nature of the skies, but it was not the intention of the Spirit of God, who spoke through them, to teach men anything that would not be of use to them for their salvation.
Augustine theologically justifies that God created the universe in an instant, and the six days of the first chapter of Genesis are not a description of the temporal duration of creation, but only a form of exposition for the reader. Augustine also does not consider original sin as the cause of structural changes in the universe and the emergence of death in the animal world. He even suggests that Adam and Eve were created mortal before the Fall (and that if they had not sinned, they would have acquired spiritual bodies and eternal life) [Davis A. Young, “The Contemporary Relevance of Augustine’s View of Creation” from Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 40.1].
In light of the above, believers who support evolution find Augustine’s ideas quite relevant today.
Modern Interpretations
As a result of scientific research into the age and origin of the universe (13 billion years) and life (3.8 billion years), many modern Christian theologians have abandoned a literal interpretation of the creation story in Genesis in favor of allegorical or poetic interpretations, such as the literary-structural view. A diametrically opposed position is held by proponents of so-called “scientific” creationism, whose goal is to popularize the idea that biblical texts about creation should be understood literally, and that science bears this out. Scientific Creationism
Scientific creationism is a school of thought within creationism that seeks to provide scientific support for a literal interpretation of the biblical creation story and to refute major accepted scientific facts, theories, and paradigms regarding Earth history, cosmology, and biological evolution, which proponents view as contradicting biblical claims.[36][37] It is one of the most active groups of Christian fundamentalists, developing in the United States and gaining some ground in other countries, and seeks to prove the absolute inerrancy of the Bible in all matters and to invalidate the scientific evidence for evolution.[38] Edward J. Larson. Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory. — Modern Library, 2004. — ISBN 978-0679642886 (English)
The main tenets of scientific creationism are the following:
• belief in creation from nothing; the assertion that the Earth was created no earlier than 10,000 years ago;
• the belief that humanity and other life forms were created as stationary, unchanging species;
• the hypothesis that fossils found in various geological layers of the Earth were deposited there by the Great Flood that completely covered the entire Earth.
As a consequence, scientific creationism also attempts to refute geological and astrophysical data regarding the age and history of the Earth and the universe that do not coincide with a literal interpretation of biblical texts [Edwards v. Aguillard, 482 U.S. 578].
Scientific creationism is virtually unanimously considered a “religious” and “pseudoscientific” rather than a “scientific” doctrine in academic circles because it lacks empirical data, provides no experimental hypotheses, and deliberately describes the history of nature in terms of unverifiable supernatural causes [Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences, 2nd edition // National Academy of Science, 1999, National Academy Press. p. 48; Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences, 2nd edition // Steering Committee on Science and Creationism, National Academy of Sciences, 1999].
Scientific creationism is supported primarily by Protestant fundamentalists, although it is sometimes adopted and used by fundamentalists of other religious denominations.
Separation of Science and Theology
Among Christians who accept the evolutionary development of the world, it is quite common to believe that biblical texts are a presentation of theological ideas in the language of ancient peoples and therefore do not contain modern scientific data. For example, Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott, in the section “The Divine Work of Creation” (pp. 92-122) of “Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma,” examines the “biblical Hexaemeron,” the creation of man, original sin, the expulsion from Paradise, and the pronouncements of the Church Fathers, saints, church councils, and popes on these issues. Ott makes the following comments about the “science” of Genesis and the Fathers:
“…as the hagiographers in profane things make use of a popular, that is, a non-scientific form of exposition suitable to the mental perception of their times, a more liberal interpretation, is possible here. The Church gives no positive decisions in regard to purely scientific questions, but limits itself to rejecting errors which endanger faith. Further, in these scientific matters there is no virtue in a consensus of the Fathers since they are not here acting as witnesses of the Faith, but merely as private scientists… Since the findings of reason and the supernatural knowledge of Faith go back to the same source, namely to God, there can never be a real contradiction between the certain discoveries of the profane sciences and the Word of God properly understood” [Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, page 92].
“As the Sacred Writer had not the intention of representing with scientific accuracy the intrinsic constitution of things, and the sequence of the works of creation but of communicating knowledge in a popular way suitable to the idiom and to the pre-scientific development of his time, the account is not to be regarded or measured as if it were couched in language which is strictly scientific… The Biblical account of the duration and order of Creation is merely a literary clothing of the religious truth that the whole world was called into existence by the creative word of God. The Sacred Writer utilized for this purpose the pre-scientific picture of the world existing at the time. The numeral six of the days of Creation is to be understood as an anthropomorphism. God’s work of creation represented in schematic form (opus distinctionis — opus ornatus) by the picture of a human working week, the termination of the work by the picture of the Sabbath rest. The purpose of this literary device is to manifest Divine approval of the working week and the Sabbath rest” [Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, page 93, cf. Exod 20:8].
Pope John Paul II writes to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences regarding questions of cosmology and the interpretation of the book of Genesis:
“Cosmogony and cosmology have always aroused great interest among peoples and religions. The Bible itself speaks to us of the origin of the universe and its make-up, not in order to provide us with a scientific treatise, but in order to state the correct relationships of man with God and with the universe. Sacred Scripture wishes simply to declare that the world was created by God, and in order to teach this truth it expresses itself in the terms of the cosmology in use at the time of the writer. The Sacred Book likewise wishes to tell men that the world was not created as the seat of the gods, as was taught by other cosmogonies and cosmologies, but was rather created for the service of man and the glory of God. Any other teaching about the origin and make-up of the universe is alien to the intentions of the Bible, which does not wish to teach how heaven was made but how one goes to heaven” [Pope John Paul II, 3 October 1981 to the Pontifical Academy of Science, “Cosmology and Fundamental Physics”].
In Protestantism there is a similar opinion about the need to separate the scientific and theological spheres. For example, Protestant author Gordon J. Glover, in Beyond the Firmament: Understanding Science and the Theology of Creation, argues for an interpretation of Genesis based on knowledge of ancient Near Eastern cosmology, which he calls creation theology:
“Christians need to understand the first chapter of Genesis for what it is: an ‘accurate’ rendering of the physical universe by ancient standards that God used as the vehicle to deliver timeless theological truth to His people. We shouldn’t try to make Genesis into something that it’s not by dragging it through 3,500 years of scientific progress. When reading Genesis, Christians today need to transport themselves back to Mt. Sinai and leave our modern minds in the 21st century. If you only remember one thing from this chapter make it this: Genesis is not giving us creation science. It is giving us something much more profound and practical than that. Genesis is giving us a Biblical Theology of Creation” [Gordon J. Glover. Beyond the Firmament: Understanding Science and the Theology of Creation. — Chesapeake, VA: Watertree, 2007. — ISBN 097871861545].
Illustration: God creating the universe with a compass. Miniature from a French Bible. 1220-1230. Austrian National Library, Vienna.
