Genesis 1:7 Kommentar

The foundation of all religion being laid in our relation to God as our Creator, it was fit that the book of divine revelations which was intended to be the guide, support, and rule, of religion in the world, should begin, as it does, with a plain and full account of the creation of the world - in answer to that first enquiry of a good conscience, "Where is God my Maker?" (Job 35:10). Concerning this the pagan philosophers wretchedly blundered, and became vain in their imaginations, some asserting the world's eternity and self-existence, others ascribing it to a fortuitous concourse of atoms: thus "the world by wisdom knew not God," but took a great deal of pains to lose him. The holy scripture therefore, designing by revealed religion to maintain and improve natural religion, to repair the decays of it and supply the defects of it, since the fall, for the reviving of the precepts of the law of nature, lays down, at first, this principle of the unclouded light of nature, That this world was, in the beginning of time, created by a Being of infinite wisdom and power, who was himself before all time and all worlds. The entrance into God's word gives this light, Psa 119:130. The first verse of the Bible gives us a surer and better, a more satisfying and useful, knowledge of the origin of the universe, than all the volumes of the philosophers. The lively faith of humble Christians understands this matter better than the elevated fancy of the greatest wits, Heb 11:3. We have three things in this chapter: - I. A general idea given us of the work of creation (Gen 1:1, Gen 1:2). II. A particular account of the several days' work, registered, as in a journal, distinctly and in order. The creation of the light the first day (Gen 1:3-5); of the firmament the second day (Gen 1:6-8); of the sea, the earth, and its fruits, the third day (Gen 1:9-13); of the lights of heaven the fourth day (Gen 1:14-19); of the fish and fowl the fifth day (Gen 1:20-23); of the beasts (Gen 1:24, Gen 1:25); of man (Gen 1:26-28); and of food for both the sixth day (Gen 1:29, Gen 1:30). III. The review and approbation of the whole work (Gen 1:31).

This chapter contains an account of the creation of the universe, and all things in it; asserts the creation of the heaven and earth in general, and describes the state and condition of the earth in its first production, Gen 1:1 and then proceeds to declare the work of each of the six days of creation, and to give an account of light, its separation from darkness and the names of both, the work of the first day, Gen 1:3 of the firmament, its use and name, the work of the second day, Gen 1:6 of the appearance of the earth, and the production of grass, herbs, and trees in the earth, the work of the third day, Gen 1:9 of the sun, moon, and stars, their situation, and use, the work of the fourth day, Gen 1:14 of the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea, the work of the fifth day, Gen 1:19 of all kinds of cattle, and beasts, and creeping things, Gen 1:24 and then of man, created male and female, after the image of God, having a grant of dominion over the rest of the creatures, the fruit of divine consultation, Gen 1:26 and of a provision of food for man and beast, Gen 1:29. And the chapter is concluded with a survey God took of all his works, and his approbation of them; all which were the work of the sixth day, and closes the account of the creation in that space of time, Gen 1:31.

And God made the firmament,.... By a word speaking, commanding it into being, producing it out of the chaos, and spreading it in that vast space between the heaven of heavens and our earth (z), And divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; the lower part of it, the atmosphere above, which are the clouds full of water, from whence rain descends upon the earth; and which divided between them and those that were left on the earth, and so under it, not yet gathered into one place; as it now does between the clouds of heaven and the waters of the sea. Though Mr. Gregory (a) is of opinion, that an abyss of waters above the most supreme orb is here meant; or a great deep between the heavens and the heaven of heavens, where, as in storehouses, the depth is laid up; and God has his treasures of snow, hail, and rain, and from whence he brought out the waters which drowned the world at the universal deluge. Others suppose the waters above to be the crystalline heaven, which for its clearness resembles water; and which Milton (b) calls the "crystalline ocean", And it was so: the firmament was accordingly made, and answered this purpose, to divide the waters below it from those above it; or "it was firm" (c), stable and durable; and so it has continued. (z) ------and God made The firmament, expanse of liquid, pure, Transparent, elemental air, diffused In circuit to the uttermost convex Of this great round.------ Milton, Paradise Lost, B. 7. l. 263, &c. (a) Notes and Observations, &c. c. 23. p. 110, &c. (b) Ibid. l. 291. (c) "et factum est firmum", Fagius & Nachmanides in ib.

And let it divide between water and water: and it was so. And God made the firmament; and God divided between the water which was under the firmament, and the water above the firmament: and it was so. As the excessive volume of water bore along over the face of the earth, the earth was by reason thereof "invisible" and "formless." When the Lord of all designed to make the invisible visible, He fixed then a third part of the waters in the midst; and another third part He set by itself on high, raising it together with the firmament by His own power; and the remaining third He left beneath, for the use and benefit of men. Now at this point we have an asterisk. The words are found in the Hebrew, but do not occur in the Septuagint.

The firmament was created on the evening of the second night, just as the heavens came to be on the evening of the first night. But when the firmament came into existence, the covering of clouds that had served for a night and a day in the place of the firmament dissipated. Because [ the firmament ] had been created between the light and the darkness, no darkness remained above it, for the shadow of the clouds was dispelled when the clouds themselves were dispelled. Nor did any of this light remain there, for its alotted measure of time had come to an end and so it sank into the waters that were beneath [ the firmament ]. The wind could not have remained there, either, because it did not even exist there. It was on the first night that Moses said "it hovered" and not on the second night. If the firmament had been created on the first night when [ the wind ] was blowing there could then be some debate. But, since it is not written that [ the wind ] was blowing when the firmament was created, who would say that the wind was there when Scripture does not say so? After the wind hovered on the first day, manifested its service by its blowing and returned to its stillness, then the firmament came to be. It is evident, therefore, that [ the wind ] neither remained above nor descended below, for how can one seek in any place or spot for something whose very substance only exists at the moment of its service and whose service comes to an end when it ceases to blow? The wind underwent three things on the day of its creation: it was created from nothing, it blew in and through something, and it reverted to being hidden in its stillness. After the wind had undergone these three things, the firmament was created on the evening of the second day. There was then nothing that rose along with it, because there was nothing that remained above it. It made a separation between the waters that it was commanded to separate, but not between the light, the wind or darkness, for this had not been commanded. There was no light, therefore, on the first night. On the night of the second and third day, it sank into the waters beneath the firmament and sprang forth as we said [ above ]. But on the fourth day, when the waters were gathered into one place, they say that the firmament was formed and that the sun, the moon, and the stars were formed from the firmament and from fire, and there were places set apart for the lights. The moon would rise in the west of the firmament, the sun in the east, and at the same moment, the stars were dispersed in orderly fashion throughout the entire firmament.

Before laying hold of the meaning of Scripture let us try to meet objections from other quarters. We are asked how, if the firmament is a spherical body, as it appears to the eye, its convex circumference can contain the water which flows and circulates in higher regions? What shall we answer? One thing only: because the interior of a body presents a perfect concavity it does not necessarily follow that its exterior surface is spherical and smoothly rounded. Look at the stone vaults of baths, and the structure of buildings of cave form; the dome, which forms the interior, does not prevent the roof from having ordinarily a flat surface. Let these unfortunate men cease, then, from tormenting us and themselves about the impossibility of our retaining water in the higher regions. Now we must say something about the nature of the firmament, and why it received the order to hold the middle place between the waters. Scripture constantly makes use of the word firmament to express extraordinary strength. The Lord my firmament and refuge. I have strengthened the pillars of it. Praise him in the firmament of his power. The heathen writers thus call a strong body one which is compact and full, to distinguish it from the mathematical body. A mathematical body is a body which exists only in the three dimensions, breadth, depth, and height. A firm body, on the contrary, adds resistance to the dimensions. It is the custom of Scripture to call firmament all that is strong and unyielding. It even uses the word to denote the condensation of the air: He, it says, who strengthens the thunder. Scripture means by the strengthening of the thunder, the strength and resistance of the wind, which, enclosed in the hollows of the clouds, produces the noise of thunder when it breaks through with violence. Here then, according to me, is a firm substance, capable of retaining the fluid and unstable element water; and as, according to the common acceptation, it appears that the firmament owes its origin to water, we must not believe that it resembles frozen water or any other matter produced by the filtration of water; as, for example, rock crystal, which is said to owe its metamorphosis to excessive congelation, or the transparent stone which forms in mines. This pellucid stone, if one finds it in its natural perfection, without cracks inside, or the least spot of corruption, almost rivals the air in clearness. We cannot compare the firmament to one of these substances. To hold such an opinion about celestial bodies would be childish and foolish; and although everything may be in everything, fire in earth, air in water, and of the other elements the one in the other; although none of those which come under our senses are pure and without mixture, either with the element which serves as a medium for it, or with that which is contrary to it; I, nevertheless, dare not affirm that the firmament was formed of one of these simple substances, or of a mixture of them, for I am taught by Scripture not to allow my imagination to wander too far afield. But do not let us forget to remark that, after these divine words let there be a firmament, it is not said and the firmament was made but, and God made the firmament, and divided the waters. Genesis 1:7 Hear, O you deaf! See, O you blind!— who, then, is deaf? He who does not hear this startling voice of the Holy Spirit. Who is blind? He who does not see such clear proofs of the Only begotten. Let there be a firmament. It is the voice of the primary and principal Cause. And God made the firmament. Here is a witness to the active and creative power of God.

But as far as concerns the separation of the waters I am obliged to contest the opinion of certain writers in the church who, under the shadow of high and sublime conceptions, have launched out into metaphor and have seen in the waters only a figure to denote spiritual and incorporeal powers. In the higher regions, accordingly, above the firmament, dwell the better; in the lower regions, earth and matter are the dwelling place of the malignant. So, say they, God is praised by the waters that are above the heavens, that is to say, by the good powers, the purity of whose soul makes them worthy to sing the praises of God. And the waters that are under the heavens represent the wicked spirits, who from their natural height have fallen into the abyss of evil. Turbulent, seditious, agitated by the tumultuous waves of passion, they have received the name of sea, because of the instability and the inconstancy of their movements. Let us reject these theories as dreams and old women’s tales.

Someone may ask this: Why does the Scripture reduce to a command of the Creator that tendency to flow downward which belongs naturally to water?… If water has this tendency by nature, the command ordering the waters to be gathered together into one place would be superfluous.… To this inquiry we say this, that you recognized very well the movements of the water after the command of the Lord, both that it is unsteady and unstable and that it is borne naturally down slopes and into hollows; but how it had any power previous to that, before the motion was engendered in it from this command, you yourself neither know nor have you heard it from one who knew. Reflect that the voice of God makes nature, and the command given at that time to creation provided the future course of action for the creatures.

The waters were divided so that some were above the firmament and others below the firmament. Since we said that matter was called water, I believe that the firmament of heaven separated the corporeal matter of visible things from the incorporeal matter of invisible things.

The matter was separated by the interposition of the firmament so that the lower matter is that of bodies and the higher matter that of souls.

Firmament: Not that in which the stars are set, but the part of the atmosphere where the clouds are collected, and which has received the name firmament from the firmness and density of the air. "For a body is called firm," that is dense and solid, "thereby differing from a mathematical body" as is remarked by Basil (Hom. iii in Hexaem.). Above the firmament: The waters above the firmament must rather be the vapors resolved from the waters which are raised above a part of the atmosphere, and from which the rain falls. As to the nature of these waters, all are not agreed. Origen says (Hom. i in Gen.) that the waters that are above the firmament are "spiritual substances." Wherefore it is written (Psalm 148:4): "Let the waters that are above the heavens praise the name of the Lord," and (Daniel 3:60): "Ye waters that are above the heavens, bless the Lord." To this Basil answers (Hom. iii in Hexaem.) that these words do not mean that these waters are rational creatures, but that "the thoughtful contemplation of them by those who understand fulfils the glory of the Creator." Hence in the same context, fire, hail, and other like creatures, are invoked in the same way, though no one would attribute reason to these. We must hold, then, these waters to be material, but their exact nature will be differently defined according as opinions on the firmament differ.

First day's work - Creation of the heavens and the earth, Gen 1:1, Gen 1:2. Of the light and its separation from the darkness, Gen 1:3-5. Second day's work - The creation of the firmament, and the separation of the waters above the firmament from those below it, Gen 1:6-8. Third day's work - The waters are separated from the earth and formed into seas, etc., Gen 1:9, Gen 1:10. The earth rendered fruitful, and clothed with trees, herbs, grass, etc., Gen 1:11-13. Fourth day's work - Creation of the celestial luminaries intended for the measurement of time, the distinction of periods, seasons, etc., Gen 1:14; and to illuminate the earth, Gen 1:15. Distinct account of the formation of the sun, moon, and stars, Gen 1:16-19. Fifth day's work - The creation of fish, fowls, and reptiles in general, Gen 1:20. Of great aquatic animals, Gen 1:21. They are blessed so as to make them very prolific, Gen 1:22, Gen 1:23. Sixth day's work - Wild and tame cattle created, and all kinds of animals which derive their nourishment from the earth, Gen 1:24, Gen 1:25. The creation of man in the image and likeness of God, with the dominion given him over the earth and all inferior animals, Gen 1:26. Man or Adam, a general name for human beings, including both male and female, Gen 1:27. Their peculiar blessing, Gen 1:28. Vegetables appointed as the food of man and all other animals, Gen 1:29, Gen 1:30. The judgment which God passed on his works at the conclusion of his creative acts, Gen 1:31.

Genesis 1:1 THE CREATION OF HEAVEN AND EARTH. (Gen 1:1-2) In the beginning--a period of remote and unknown antiquity, hid in the depths of eternal ages; and so the phrase is used in Pro 8:22-23. God--the name of the Supreme Being, signifying in Hebrew, "Strong," "Mighty." It is expressive of omnipotent power; and by its use here in the plural form, is obscurely taught at the opening of the Bible, a doctrine clearly revealed in other parts of it, namely, that though God is one, there is a plurality of persons in the Godhead--Father, Son, and Spirit, who were engaged in the creative work (Pro 8:27; Joh 1:3, Joh 1:10; Eph 3:9; Heb 1:2; Job 26:13). created--not formed from any pre-existing materials, but made out of nothing. the heaven and the earth--the universe. This first verse is a general introduction to the inspired volume, declaring the great and important truth that all things had a beginning; that nothing throughout the wide extent of nature existed from eternity, originated by chance, or from the skill of any inferior agent; but that the whole universe was produced by the creative power of God (Act 17:24; Rom 11:36). After this preface, the narrative is confined to the earth.

The Creation of the World - Genesis 1:1-2:3 The account of the creation, its commencement, progress, and completion, bears the marks, both in form and substance, of a historical document in which it is intended that we should accept as actual truth, not only the assertion that God created the heavens, and the earth, and all that lives and moves in the world, but also the description of the creation itself in all its several stages. If we look merely at the form of this document, its place at the beginning of the book of Genesis is sufficient to warrant the expectation that it will give us history, and not fiction, or human speculation. As the development of the human family has been from the first a historical fact, and as man really occupies that place in the world which this record assigns him, the creation of man, as well as that of the earth on which, and the heaven for which, he is to live, must also be a work of God, i.e., a fact of objective truth and reality. The grand simplicity of the account is in perfect harmony with the fact. "The whole narrative is sober, definite, clear, and concrete. The historical events described contain a rich treasury of speculative thoughts and poetical glory; but they themselves are free from the influence of human invention and human philosophizing" (Delitzsch). This is also true of the arrangement of the whole. The work of creation does not fall, as Herder and others maintain, into two triads of days, with the work of the second answering to that of the first. For although the creation of the light on the first day seems to correspond to that of the light-bearing stars on the fourth, there is no reality in the parallelism which some discover between the second and third days on the one hand, and the third and fourth on the other. On the second day the firmament or atmosphere is formed; on the fifth, the fish and fowl. On the third, after the sea and land are separated, the plants are formed; on the sixth, the animals of the dry land and man. Now, if the creation of the fowls which fill the air answers to that of the firmament, the formation of the fish as the inhabitants of the waters ought to be assigned to the sixth day, and not to the fifth, as being parallel to the creation of the seas. The creation of the fish and fowl on the same day is an evident proof that a parallelism between the first three days of creation and the last three is not intended, and does not exist. Moreover, if the division of the work of creation into so many days had been the result of human reflection; the creation of man, who was appointed lord of the earth, would certainly not have been assigned to the same day as that of the beasts and reptiles, but would have been kept distinct from the creation of the beasts, and allotted to the seventh day, in which the creation was completed - a meaning which Richers and Keerl have actually tried to force upon the text of the Bible. In the different acts of creation we perceive indeed an evident progress from the general to the particular, from the lower to the higher orders of creatures, or rather a steady advance towards more and more concrete forms. But on the fourth day this progress is interrupted in a way which we cannot explain. In the transition from the creation of the plants to that of sun, moon, and stars, it is impossible to discover either a "well-arranged and constant progress," or "a genetic advance," since the stars are not intermediate links between plants and animals, and, in fact, have no place at all in the scale of earthly creatures. If we pass on to the contents of our account of the creation, they differ as widely from all other cosmogonies as truth from fiction. Those of heathen nations are either hylozoistical, deducing the origin of life and living beings from some primeval matter; or pantheistical, regarding the whole world as emanating from a common divine substance; or mythological, tracing both gods and men to a chaos or world-egg. They do not even rise to the notion of a creation, much less to the knowledge of an almighty God, as the Creator of all things. (Note: According to Berosus and Syncellus, the Chaldean myth represents the "All" as consisting of darkness and water, filled with monstrous creatures, and ruled by a woman, Markaya, or ̔Ομόρωκα (? Ocean). Bel divided the darkness, and cut the woman into two halves, of which he formed the heaven and the earth; he then cut off his own head, and from the drops of blood men were formed. - According to the Phoenician myth of Sanchuniathon, the beginning of the All was a movement of dark air, and a dark, turbid chaos. By the union of the spirit with the All, Μώτ, i.e., slime, was formed, from which every seed of creation and the universe was developed; and the heavens were made in the form of an egg, from which the sun and moon, the stars and constellations, sprang. By the heating of the earth and sea there arose winds, clouds and rain, lightning and thunder, the roaring of which wakened up sensitive beings, so that living creatures of both sexes moved in the waters and upon the earth. In another passage Sanchuniathon represents Κολπία (probably פּיח קול, the moaning of the wind) and his wife Βάαυ (bohu) as producing Αὶών and πρωτόγονος, two mortal men, from whom sprang Γένος and Γενεά, the inhabitants of Phoenicia. - It is well known from Hesiod's theogony how the Grecian myth represents the gods as coming into existence at the same time as the world. The numerous inventions of the Indians, again, all agree in this, that they picture the origin of the world as an emanation from the absolute, through Brahma's thinking, or through the contemplation of a primeval being called Tad (it). - Buddhism also acknowledges no God as creator of the world, teaches no creation, but simply describes the origin of the world and the beings that inhabit it as the necessary consequence of former acts performed by these beings themselves.) Even in the Etruscan and Persian myths, which correspond so remarkably to the biblical account that they must have been derived from it, the successive acts of creation are arranged according to the suggestions of human probability and adaptation. (Note: According to the Etruscan saga, which Suidas quotes from a historian, who was a "παῤαὐτοῖς (the Tyrrhenians) ἔμπειρος ἀνήρ (therefore not a native)," God created the world in six periods of one thousand years each: in the first, the heavens and the earth; in the second, the firmament; in the third, the sea and other waters of the earth; in the fourth, sun moon, and stars; in the fifth, the beasts of the air, the water, and the land; in the sixth, men. The world will last twelve thousand years, the human race six thousand. - According to the saga of the Zend in Avesta, the supreme Being Ormuzd created the visible world by his word in six periods or thousands of years: (1) the heaven, with the stars; (2) the water on the earth, with the clouds; (3) the earth, with the mountain Alborj and the other mountains; (4) the trees; (5) the beasts, which sprang from the primeval beast; (6) men, the first of whom was Kajomorts. Every one of these separate creations is celebrated by a festival. The world will last twelve thousand years.) In contrast with all these mythical inventions, the biblical account shines out in the clear light of truth, and proves itself by its contents to be an integral part of the revealed history, of which it is accepted as the pedestal throughout the whole of the sacred Scriptures. This is not the case with the Old Testament only; but in the New Testament also it is accepted and taught by Christ and the apostles as the basis of the divine revelation. The select only a few from the many passages of the Old and New Testaments, in which God is referred to as the Creator of the heavens and the earth, and the almighty operations of the living God in the world are based upon the fact of its creation: In Exo 20:9-11; Exo 31:12-17, the command to keep the Sabbath is founded upon the fact that God rested on the seventh day, when the work of creation was complete; and in Psa 8:1-9 and 104, the creation is depicted as a work of divine omnipotence in close adherence to the narrative before us. From the creation of man, as described in Gen 1:27 and Gen 2:24, Christ demonstrates the indissoluble character of marriage as a divine ordinance (Mat 19:4-6); Peter speaks of the earth as standing out of the water and in the water by the word of God (Pe2 3:5); and the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, "starting from Gen 2:2, describes it as the motive principle of all history, that the Sabbath of God is to become the Sabbath of the creature" (Delitzsch). The biblical account of the creation can also vindicate its claim to be true and actual history, in the presence of the doctrines of philosophy and the established results of natural science. So long, indeed, as philosophy undertakes to construct the universe from general ideas, it will be utterly unable to comprehend the creation; but ideas will never explain the existence of things. Creation is an act of the personal God, not a process of nature, the development of which can be traced to the laws of birth and decay that prevail in the created world. But the work of God, as described in the history of creation, is in perfect harmony with the correct notions of divine omnipotence, wisdom and goodness. The assertion, so frequently made, that the course of the creation takes its form from the Hebrew week, which was already in existence, and the idea of God's resting on the seventh day, from the institution of the Hebrew Sabbath, is entirely without foundation. There is no allusion in Gen 2:2-3 to the Sabbath of the Israelites; and the week of seven days is older than the Sabbath of the Jewish covenant. Natural research, again, will never explain the origin of the universe, or even of the earth; for the creation lies beyond the limits of the territory within its reach. By all modest naturalists, therefore, it is assumed that the origin of matter, or of the original material of the world, was due to an act of divine creation. But there is no firm ground for the conclusion which they draw, on the basis of this assumption, with regard to the formation or development of the world from its first chaotic condition into a fit abode for man. All the theories which have been adopted, from Descartes to the present day, are not the simple and well-established inductions of natural science founded upon careful observation, but combinations of partial discoveries empirically made, with speculative ideas of very questionable worth. The periods of creation, which modern geology maintains with such confidence, that not a few theologians have accepted them as undoubted and sought to bring them into harmony with the scriptural account of the creation, if not to deduce them from the Bible itself, are inferences partly from the successive strata which compose the crust of the earth, and partly from the various fossil remains of plants and animals to be found in those strata. The former are regarded as proofs of successive formation; and from the difference between the plants and animals found in a fossil state and those in existence now, the conclusion is drawn, that their creation must have preceded the present formation, which either accompanied or was closed by the advent of man. But it is not difficult to see that the former of these conclusions could only be regarded as fully established, if the process by which the different strata were formed were clearly and fully known, or if the different formations were always found lying in the same order, and could be readily distinguished from one another. But with regard to the origin of the different species of rock, geologists, as is well known, are divided into two contending schools: the Neptunists, who attribute all the mountain formations to deposit in water; and the Plutonists, who trace all the non-fossiliferous rocks to the action of heat. According to the Neptunists, the crystalline rocks are the earliest or primary formations; according to the Plutonists, the granite burst through the transition and stratified rocks, and were driven up from within the earth, so that they are of later date. But neither theory is sufficient to account in this mechanical way for all the phenomena connected with the relative position of the rocks; consequently, a third theory, which supposes the rocks to be the result of chemical processes, is steadily gaining ground. Now if the rocks, both crystalline and stratified, were formed, not in any mechanical way, but by chemical processes, in which, besides fire and water, electricity, galvanism, magnetism, and possibly other forces at present unknown to physical science were at work; the different formations may have been produced contemporaneously and laid one upon another. Till natural science has advanced beyond mere opinion and conjecture, with regard to the mode in which the rocks were formed and their positions determined; there can be no ground for assuming that conclusions drawn from the successive order of the various strata, with regard to the periods of their formation, must of necessity be true. This is the more apparent, when we consider, on the one hand, that even the principal formations (the primary, transitional, stratified, and tertiary), not to mention the subdivisions of which each of these is composed, do not always occur in the order laid down in the system, but in not a few instances the order is reversed, crystalline primary rocks lying upon transitional, stratified, and tertiary formations (granite, syenite, gneiss, etc., above both Jura-limestone and chalk); and, on the other hand, that not only do the different leading formations and their various subdivisions frequently shade off into one another so imperceptibly, that no boundary line can be drawn between them and the species distinguished by oryctognosis are not sharply and clearly defined in nature, but that, instead of surrounding the entire globe, they are all met with in certain localities only, whilst whole series of intermediate links are frequently missing, the tertiary formations especially being universally admitted to be only partial. The second of these conclusions also stands or falls with the assumptions on which they are founded, viz., with the three propositions: (1) that each of the fossiliferous formations contains an order of plants and animals peculiar to itself; (2) that these are so totally different from the existing plants and animals, that the latter could not have sprung from them; (3) that no fossil remains of man exist of the same antiquity as the fossil remains of animals. Not one of these can be regarded as an established truth, or as the unanimously accepted result of geognosis. The assertion so often made as an established fact, that the transition rocks contain none but fossils of the lower orders of plants and animals, that mammalia are first met with in the Trias, Jura, and chalk formations, and warm-blooded animals in the tertiary rocks, has not been confirmed by continued geognostic researches, but is more and more regarded as untenable. Even the frequently expressed opinion, that in the different forms of plants and animals of the successive rocks there is a gradual and to a certain extent progressive development of the animal and vegetable world, has not commanded universal acceptance. Numerous instances are known, in which the remains of one and the same species occur not only in two, but in several successive formations, and there are some types that occur in nearly all. And the widely spread notion, that the fossil types are altogether different from the existing families of plants and animals, is one of the unscientific exaggerations of actual facts. All the fossil plants and animals can be arranged in the orders and classes of the existing flora and fauna. Even with regard to the genera there is no essential difference, although many of the existing types are far inferior in size to the forms of the old world. It is only the species that can be shown to differ, either entirely or in the vast majority of cases, from species in existence now. But even if all the species differed, which can by no means be proved, this would be no valid evidence that the existing plants and animals had not sprung from those that have passed away, so long as natural science is unable to obtain any clear insight into the origin and formation of species, and the question as to the extinction of a species or its transition into another has met with no satisfactory solution. Lastly, even now the occurrence of fossil human bones among those of animals that perished at least before the historic age, can no longer be disputed, although Central Asia, the cradle of the human race, has not yet been thoroughly explored by palaeontologists. If then the premises from which the geological periods have been deduced are of such a nature that not one of them is firmly established, the different theories as to the formation of the earth also rest upon two questionable assumptions, viz., (1) that the immediate working of God in the creation was restricted to the production of the chaotic matter, and that the formation of this primary matter into a world peopled by innumerable organisms and living beings proceeded according to the laws of nature, which have been discovered by science as in force in the existing world; and (2) that all the changes, which the world and its inhabitants have undergone since the creation was finished, may be measured by the standard of changes observed in modern times, and still occurring from time to time. But the Bible actually mentions two events of the primeval age, whose effect upon the form of the earth and the animal and vegetable world no natural science can explain. We refer to the curse pronounced upon the earth in consequence of the fall of the progenitors of our race, by which even the animal world was made subject to φθοπά (Gen 3:17, and Rom 8:20); and the flood, by which the earth was submerged even to the tops of the highest mountains, and all the living beings on the dry land perished, with the exception of those preserved by Noah in the ark. Hence, even if geological doctrines do contradict the account of the creation contained in Genesis, they cannot shake the credibility of the Scriptures. But if the biblical account of the creation has full claim to be regarded as historical truth, the question arises, whence it was obtained. The opinion that the Israelites drew it from the cosmogony of this or the other ancient people, and altered it according to their own religious ideas, will need no further refutation, after what we have said respecting the cosmogonies of other nations. Whence then did Israel obtain a pure knowledge of God, such as we cannot find in any heathen nation, or in the most celebrated of the wise men of antiquity, if not from divine revelation? This is the source from which the biblical account of the creation springs. God revealed it to men - not first to Moses or Abraham, but undoubtedly to the first men, since without this revelation they could not have understood either their relation to God or their true position in the world. The account contained in Genesis does not lie, as Hoffmann says, "within that sphere which was open to man through his historical nature, so that it may be regarded as the utterance of the knowledge possessed by the first man of things which preceded his own existence, and which he might possess, without needing any special revelation, if only the present condition of the world lay clear and transparent before him." By simple intuition the first man might discern what nature had effected, viz., the existing condition of the world, and possibly also its causality, but not the fact that it was created in six days, or the successive acts of creation, and the sanctification of the seventh day. Our record contains not merely religious truth transformed into history, but the true and actual history of a work of God, which preceded the existence of man, and to which he owes his existence. Of this work he could only have obtained his knowledge through divine revelation, by the direct instruction of God. Nor could he have obtained it by means of a vision. The seven days' works are not so many "prophetico-historical tableaux," which were spread before the mental eye of the seer, whether of the historian or the first man. The account before us does not contain the slightest marks of a vision, is no picture of creation, in which every line betrays the pencil of a painter rather than the pen of a historian, but is obviously a historical narrative, which we could no more transform into a vision than the account of paradise or of the fall. As God revealed Himself to the first man not in visions, but by coming to him in a visible form, teaching him His will, and then after his fall announcing the punishment (Gen 2:16-17; Gen 3:9.); as He talked with Moses "face to face, as a man with his friend," "mouth to mouth," not in vision or dream: so does the written account of the Old Testament revelation commence, not with visions, but with actual history. The manner in which God instructed the first men with reference to the creation must be judged according to the intercourse carried on by Him, as Creator and Father, with these His creatures and children. What God revealed to them upon this subject, they transmitted to their children and descendants, together with everything of significance and worth that they had experienced and discovered for themselves. This tradition was kept in faithful remembrance by the family of the godly; and even in the confusion of tongues it was not changed in its substance, but simply transferred into the new form of the language spoken by the Semitic tribes, and thus handed down from generation to generation along with the knowledge and worship of the true God, until it became through Abraham the spiritual inheritance of the chosen race. Nothing certain can be decided as to the period when it was committed to writing; probably some time before Moses, who inserted it as a written record in the Thorah of Israel.