genesis 1:1 - 1:2 !

[iluvjesus]

what happened between genesis 1:1 - 1:2 ? im just curious.. because God said that He CREATED the heavens and the earth.. but then verse two says that the earth was FORMLESS. it was without form. why does it seem reversed? thanks and Gbu!

 

[jculver]

what happened between genesis 1:1 - 1:2 ? im just curious.. because God said that He CREATED the heavens and the earth.. but then verse two says that the earth was FORMLESS. it was without form. why does it seem reversed? thanks and Gbu!

I don't know what translation you are reading, but I'm going to put up Youngs because it keeps more consistent with the tenses used in the original language:

1:1 In the beginning of God's preparing the heavens and the earth --

1:2 the earth hath existed waste and void, and darkness `is' on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God fluttering on the face of the waters,

This translation is extremely literal, and I don't see any contradictions there Young's translation is far superior to the KJV in my eyes, it clears up questions before you ask.

Here is what the KJV says:

1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

Verse 1 the tense is probably mistranslated. Even if it isn’t, formless could mean a number of things. It could mean "without forms", like formed land. Water is typically considered formless, it doesn't really form anything, but forms to whatever it is in. So the earth could have been a giant mass of water at this point in Gen. It doesn't seem like there is any land until later in Gen:

1:9 And God saith, `Let the waters under the heavens be collected unto one place, and let the dry land be seen:' and it is so.

1:10 And God calleth to the dry land `Earth,' and to the collection of the waters He hath called `Seas;' and God seeth that `it is' good.

So there is a couple ways you can view it. Both make sense, but personally I think Young's version of Genesis paints a better picture than the KJV. The only thing Young doesn't really do for you is put the sentence structure the way we usually see it today. Verse 10 would sound like this if he did:

"And God called the dry land Earth, and he called the collection of the waters seas..."

So it takes some getting used to, but I would recommend it. You can view the bible (Young's translation) online at a number of sources. Some people like to have a copy around because it is so extremely literal. It's a good tool to have

 

[Word of Life]

Thanks jculver for explaing that, it helped me to see it more clearly too.

Also I am just downloading the bible (Young's translation) to go onto my eSword program.

 

[iluvjesus]

yeahh.. thank you.. i think it's just the matter of translation n interpretation... Gbu

 

[jculver]

Thanks jculver for explaing that, it helped me to see it more clearly too.

Also I am just downloading the bible (Young's translation) to go onto my eSword program.

I just looked up eSword, That looks awesome... I must try it out Do you find it useful Word? If so maybe you should make a thread about it somewhere so people can see it I'm waiting to download one now

Youngs translation is awesome IMO. Once you get past the weird sentence structure it is just awesome. Glad to hear you are trying it out, and it is good to see you again Word

EDIT: So yeah, I downloaded that thing, and wow. Esword is an amazing tool. Word you should toally make a separate post about it somewhere You have blessed me Word, thank you!

 

[Word of Life]

Nice to see you too and God blessed you jculver, it is an amazing Bible tool. Somehow, I just thought everyone knew about this eSword program, but your right, I will do a seperate thread about it. It has certainly helped me over the months in looking up scriptures, I use that program all the time, even more so, than using my normal Bible. Its easier to do a search for things, as normally, I only remember parts of scriptures and this program helps me to get to to the right scripture, within 5 minutes. And the good news, it's free to download, just how God designed His Word.

 

[On the Path]

Here is how my mind sees it:


In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

And here is how He did it:

First of all, there was nothing (formless and void). The only thing that existed was God's spirit

Second, He said let there be light, and walla! there was light!