24, 25. Seventh work: Terrestrial animals.—24. Let the earth bring forth living creatures] נפש חיה (again collectively) is here a generic name for land animals, being restricted by what precedes—‘living animals that spring from the earth.’ Like the plants (verse ¹²), they are boldly said to be produced by the earth, their bodies being part of the earth’s substance (27. 19); this could not be said of fishes in relation to the water, and hence a different form of expression had to be employed in verse ²⁰.—The classification of animals (best arranged in verse ²⁵) is threefold: (1) wild animals, חַיַּת הָאָרֶץ (roughly, carnivora); (2) domesticated animals, בְּהֵמָה (herbivora); (3) reptiles, רֶמֶשׂ הָאֲדָמָה, including perhaps creeping insects and very small quadrupeds (see Driver A Dictionary of the Bible, i. 518). A somewhat similar threefold division appears in a Babylonian tablet—‘cattle of the field, beasts of the field and creatures of the city’ (Jensen Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, vi. 1, 42 f.; King, The Seven Tablets of Creation 112 f.).—25. God saw that it was good] The formula distinctly marks the separation of this work from the creation of man, which follows on the same day. The absence of a benediction corresponding to verses 22. 28 is surprising, but it is idle to speculate on the reason.
24. The distinctions noted above are not strictly observed throughout the Old Testament. בהמה (from a root signifying ‘be dumb’—Aramaic and Ethiopic) denotes collectively, first, animals as distinguished from man (Exodus 9¹⁹ etc.), but chiefly the larger mammals; then, domestic animals (the dumb creatures with which man has most to do), (Genesis 34²³ 36⁶ etc.). Of wild animals specially it is seldom used alone (Deuteronomy 32²⁴, Habakkuk 2¹⁷), but sometimes with an addition (אֶרֶץ, שָׂדֶה, יַעַר) which marks the unusual reference. As a noun of unity, Nehemiah 212. 14. See Brown-Driver-Briggs, s.v.—חַיְתוֹ אֶרֶץ] an archaic phrase in which וֹ represents the old case ending of the nominative, u or um (Gesenius-Kautzsch, § 90 n). So Psalms 79²; חיתו in other combinations Isaiah 56⁹, Zephaniah 2¹⁴, Psalms 104¹¹; Psalms 50¹⁰ 104²⁰. In sense it is exactly the same as the commoner חַיַּת הָאָרֶץ 125. 30 92. 10 etc.), and usually denotes wild animals, though sometimes animals in general (ζῶον).—רמש and שרץ naturally overlap; but the first name is derived from the manner of movement, and the second from the tendency to swarm (Driver l.c.).
26–28. Eighth work: Creation of man.—As the narrative approaches its climax, the style loses something of its terse rigidity, and reveals a strain of poetic feeling which suggests that the passage is moulded on an ancient creation hymn (Gunkel). The distinctive features of this last work are: (a) instead of the simple jussive we have the cohortative of either self-deliberation or consultation with other divine beings; (b) in contrast to the lower animals, which are made each after its kind or type, man is made in the image of God; (c) man is designated as the head of creation by being charged with the rule of the earth and all the living creatures hitherto made.—26. Let us make man] The difficulty of the 1st person plural has always been felt.
Amongst the Jews an attempt was made to get rid of it by reading נַֽעֲשֶׂה as participle Niphal—a view the absurd grammatical consequences of which are trenchantly exposed by Abraham Ibn Ezra. The older Christian commentaries generally find in the expression an allusion to the Trinity (so even Calvin); but that doctrine is entirely unknown to the Old Testament, and cannot be implied here. In modern times it has sometimes been explained as plural of self-deliberation (Tuch), or after the analogy of the ‘we’ of royal edicts; but Dillmann has shown that neither is consistent with native Hebrew idiom. Dillmann himself regards it as based on the idea of God expressed by the plural אלהים, as ‘the living personal synthesis of a fulness of powers and forces’ (so Driver); but that philosophic rendering of the concept of deity appears to be foreign to the theology of the Old Testament.
26. בצלמנו כדמותנו] LXX κατ’ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν καὶ καθ’ ὁμοίωσιν. Mechilta (see above, page 14), gives as LXX’s reading בצלם ובדמות.—On the בְּ ‘of a model,’ compare Exodus 25⁴⁰; Brown-Driver-Briggs, s.v. III. 8.—צלם] Assyrian ṣalmu, the technical expression for the statue of a god (Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 476³); Aramaic and Syrian צַלְמָא, = ‘image’; the root is not ẓalima, ‘be dark,’ but possibly ṣalama, ‘cut off’ (Nöldeke, Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, xvii. 185 f.). The idea of ‘pattern’ or ‘model’ is confined to the Priestly-Code passages cited above; it stands intermediate between the concrete sense just noted (an artificial material reproduction: 1 Samuel 6⁵ etc.) and another still more abstract, viz. ‘an unreal semblance’ (Psalms 39⁷ 73²⁰).—דְּמוּת is the abstract noun resemblance; but also used concretely (2 Chronicles 4³, like Syrian (‡ Syriac word)); Aramaic dumyat = ‘effigy.’ The ו is radical (form דִּמְוַת, compare Aramaic); hence the ending וּת is no proof of Aramaic influence (Wellhausen Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels⁵ 388); see Driver The Journal of Philology xi. 216.—ובכל־הארץ] Insert חַיַּת with Peshiṭtå (v.s.). Other versions agree with Massoretic Text.
The most natural and most widely accepted explanation is that God is here represented as taking counsel with divine beings other than Himself, viz. the angels or host of heaven: compare 3²² 11⁷, Isaiah 6⁸, 1 Kings 2219–22 (so Philo, Rashi, Abraham Ibn Ezra, Delitzsch, Holzinger, Gunkel, Bennett, al.). Dillmann objects to this interpretation, first, that it ascribes to angels some share in the creation of man, which is contrary to scriptural doctrine;¹ and, second, that the very existence of angels is nowhere alluded to by Priestly-Code at all. There is force in these considerations; and probably the ultimate explanation has to be sought in a pre-Israelite stage of the tradition (such as is represented by the Babylonian account: see below, page 46), where a polytheistic view of man’s origin found expression. This would naturally be replaced in a Hebrew recension by the idea of a heavenly council of angels, as in 1 Kings 22, Job 1, 38⁷, Daniel 4¹⁴ 7¹⁰ etc. That Priestly-Code retained the idea in spite of his silence as to the existence of angels is due to the fact that it was decidedly less anthropomorphic than the statement that man was made in the image of the one incomparable Deity.—in our image, according to our likeness] The general idea of likeness between God and man frequently occurs in classical literature, and sometimes the very term of this verse (εἰκών, ad imaginem) is employed. To speak of it, therefore, as “the distinctive feature of the Bible doctrine concerning man” is an exaggeration; although it is true that such expressions on the plane of heathenism import much less than in the religion of Israel (Dillmann). The idea in this precise form is in the Old Testament peculiar to Priestly-Code (51. 3 9⁶); the conception, but not the expression, appears in Psalms 8⁶: later biblical examples are Sirach 173 ff., Wisdom 2²³ (where the ‘image’ is equivalent to immortality), 1 Corinthians 11⁷, Colossians 3¹⁰, Ephesians 4²⁴, James 3⁹.
The origin of the conception is probably to be found in the Babylonian mythology. Before proceeding to the creation of Ea-bani, Aruru forms a mental image (zikru: see Jensen Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, vi. 1, 401 f.) of the God Anu (ib. 120, l. 33); and similarly, in the Descent of Ištar, Ea forms a zikru in his wise heart before creating Aṣūšunamir (ib. 86. l. 11). In both cases the reference is obviously to the bodily form of the created being. See, further, Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³ 506; Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients², 167.
The patristic and other theological developments of the doctrine lie beyond the scope of this commentary;¹ and it is sufficient to observe with regard to them—(1) that the ‘image’ is not something peculiar to man’s original state, and lost by the Fall; because Priestly-Code, who alone uses the expression, knows nothing of a Fall, and in 9⁶ employs the term, without any restriction, of post-diluvian mankind. (2) The distinction between εἰκών (imago) and ὁμοίωσις (similitudo)—the former referring to the essence of human nature and the latter to its accidents or its endowments by grace—has an apparent justification in LXX, which inserts καί between the two phrases (see below), and never mentions the ‘likeness’ after 1²⁶; so that it was possible to regard the latter as something belonging to the divine idea of man, but not actually conferred at his creation. The Hebrew affords no basis for such speculations: compare 51. 3 9⁶.—(3) The view that the divine image consists in dominion over the creatures (Gregory of Nyssa, Chrysostom, Socinians, etc.) is still defended by Holzinger; but it cannot be held without an almost inconceivable weakening of the figure, and is inconsistent with the sequel, where the rule over the creatures is, by a separate benediction, conferred on man, already made in the image of God. The truth is that the image marks the distinction between man and the animals, and so qualifies him for dominion: the latter is the consequence, not the essence, of the divine image (compare Psalms 86 ff., Sirach 172–4)—(4) Does the image refer primarily to the spiritual nature or to the bodily form (upright attitude, etc.) of man? The idea of a corporeal resemblance seems free from objection on the level of Old Testament theology; and it is certainly strongly suggested by a comparison of 5³ with 5¹. God is expressly said to have a ‘form’ which can be seen (תְּמוּנָה, Numbers 12⁸, Psalms 17¹⁵); the Old Testament writers constantly attribute to Him bodily parts; and that they ever advanced to the conception of God as formless spirit would be difficult to prove. On the other hand, it may well be questioned if the idea of a spiritual image was within the compass of Hebrew thought. Dillmann, while holding that the central idea is man’s spiritual nature, admits a reference to the bodily form in so far as it is the expression and organ of mind, and inseparable from spiritual qualities.² It might be truer to say that it denotes primarily the bodily form, but includes those spiritual attributes of which the former is the natural and self-evident symbol.³—Note the striking parallel in Ovid, Metamorphoses i. 76 ff.
Man (אָדָם) is here generic (the human race), not the proper name of an individual, as 5³. Although the great majority of commentaries take it for granted that a single pair is contemplated, there is nothing in the narrative to bear out that view; and the analogy of the marine and land animals is against it on the whole (Tuch and Bennett).—fish of the sea, etc.] The enumeration coincides with the classification of animals already given, except that the earth occurs where we should expect wild beast of the earth. חַיַּת should undoubtedly be restored to the text on the authority of Peshiṭtå.—27. in his image, in the image of God, etc.] The repetition imparts a rhythmic movement to the language, which may be a faint echo of an old hymn on the glory of man, like Psalms 8 (Gunkel).—male and female] The persistent idea that man as first created was bi-sexual and the sexes separated afterwards (mentioned by Rashi as a piece of Haggada, and recently revived by Schwally, Archiv für Religionswissenschaft., ix. 172 ff.), is far from the thought of the passage.—28. A benediction is here again the source of fertility, but this time also of dominion: Gunkel regards this as another fragment of a hymn.
27. בצלמו] LXX omitted. The curious paraphrase of Symmachus appears to reflect the Ebionite tendency of that translator: ἐν εἰκόνι διαφόρῳ ὄρθιον ὁ θεὸς ἔκτισεν αὐτόν (Geiger, Jüdische Zeitschrift für Wissenschaft und Leben, i. 40 f.). See, however, Nestle, Marginalien und Materialien, 3 f., who calls attention to the ὄρθιον in LXX of 1 Samuel 28¹⁴, and considers this word the source of the idea that the upright form of man is part of the divine image. But LXX in 1 Samuel probably misread זקן as זקף.—אֹתוֹ] constructio ad formam: אֹתָם constructio ad sensum, אדם being collective: see Gesenius-Kautzsch § 132 g.—זכר ונקבה] The phrase confined to Priestly-Code except Deuteronomy 4¹⁶; נ׳ alone in Jeremiah 31²¹ (a gloss?). Although the application to a single pair of individuals predominates in the Law, the collective sense is established by Genesis 7¹⁶, and is to be assumed in some other cases (Numbers 5³ etc.). On its etymology see Gesenius Thesaurus philologicus criticus Linguæ Hebrææ et Chaldææ Veteris Testamenti, s.v., and (for a different view) Schwally, Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, xi. 181 f.—28. ויאמר להם] LXX λέγων; perhaps original.—וכבשֻׁהָ] The only instance of a verbal suffix in this chapter: a strong preference for expression of accusative by את with suffix is characteristic of the style of Priestly-Code (Wellhausen Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels⁶ 389).—הרמשת] participle with article = relative clause: see Davidson § 99, R. 1. The previous noun is defined by כל, as in verse ²¹ (The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch inserts the article).—After שמים Peshiṭtå read ובבהמה (so Ball). LXX has for the end of the verse: καὶ πάντων τῶν κτηνῶν καὶ πάσης τῆς γῆς καὶ πάντων [τῶν ἑρπετῶν] τῶν ἑρπόντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς.
29–31. The record of creation closes with another (tenth) divine utterance, which regulates in broad and general terms the relation of men and animals to the vegetable world. The plants are destined for food to man and beast. The passage is not wholly intelligible apart from 92 ff., from which we see that its point is the restriction on the use of animal food, particularly on the part of man. In other words, the first stage of the world’s history—that state of things which the Creator pronounced very good—is a state of peace and harmony in the animal world. This is Priestly-Code’s substitute for the garden of Eden.
A distinction is made between the food of man and that of animals: to the former (a) seeding plants (probably because the seed is important in cultivation, and in cereals is the part eaten), and (b) fruit-bearing trees; to the latter all the greenness of herbage, i.e. the succulent leafy parts. The statement is not exhaustive: no provision is made for fishes, nor is there any mention of the use of such victuals as milk, honey, etc. Observe the difference from chapters 2. 3, where man is made to live on fruit alone, and only as part of the curse has herbs (עשב) assigned to him.—31. The account closes with the divine verdict of approval, which here covers a survey of all that has been made, and rises to the superlative ‘very good.’
Verses 29 f. differ significantly in their phraseology from the preceding sections: thus זֹרֵעַ instead of מַזְרִיעַ (11. 12); העץ אשר בו פרי עץ זרע זרע instead of the far more elegant עץ עשה פרי אשר זרעו בו; the classification into beasts, birds, and reptiles (contrast 24. 25); נפש חיה of the inner principle of life instead of the living being as in 20 f. 24; ירק עשב instead of דשא. These linguistic differences are sufficient to prove literary discontinuity of some kind. They have been pointed out by Kraetschmar (Die Bundesvorstellung im Alten Testament 103 f.), who adds the doubtful material argument that the prohibition of animal food to man nullifies the dominion promised to him in verses 26. 28. But his inference (partly endorsed by Holzinger) that the verses are a later addition to Priestly-Code does not commend itself; they are vitally connected with 92 ff., and must have formed part of the theory of the Priestly writer. The facts point rather to a distinction in the sources with which Priestly-Code worked,—perhaps (as Gunkel thinks) the enrichment of the creation-story by the independent and widespread myth of the Golden Age when animals lived peaceably with one another and with men. The motives of this belief lie deep in the human heart—horror of bloodshed, sympathy with the lower animals, the longing for harmony in the world, and the conviction that on the whole the course of things has been from good to worse—all have contributed their share, and no scientific teaching can rob the idea of its poetic and ethical value.
29. נתתי] = ‘I give’; Davidson § 40 b; Driver A Treatise on the use of the Tenses in Hebrew § 13.—זרע (over Athnach)] wrongly omitted by LXX.—אכלה] found only in Priestly-Code and Ezekiel, and always preceded by לְ. It is strictly feminine infinitive, and perhaps always retains verbal force (see Driver The Journal of Philology xi. 217). The ordinary cognate words for food are אֹכֶל and מַֽאֲכָל.—30. ולכל וגו׳ The construction is obscure. The natural interpretation is that ³⁰ expresses a contrast to ²⁹—the one specifying the food of man, the other that of animals. To bring out this sense clearly it is necessary (with Ewald al.) to insert נתתי before את־כל־ירק. The text requires us to treat לכם יהיה לאכלה in ²⁹ as a parenthesis (Dillmann) and את־כל־ירק as still under the regimen of the distant נתתי.—רוֹמֵשׂ] LXX ἑρπετῷ τῷ ἕρποντι—assimilating.—נֶפֶשׁ] here used in its primary sense of the soul or animating principle (see later on 2⁷), with a marked difference from verses 20 f. 24.—ירק עשׂב] so 9³, = י׳ דֶּשֶׁא Psalms 37². יֶרֶק (verdure) alone may include the foliage of trees (Exodus 10¹⁵); י׳ הַשָּׂדֶה = ‘grass’ (Numbers 22⁴). The word is rare (6 times); a still rarer form יָרָק may sometimes be confounded with it (Isaiah 37²⁷ = 2 Kings 17²⁶?).—31. יום הששי] The article with the number appears here for the first time in the chapter. On the construction, see Driver A Treatise on the use of the Tenses in Hebrew § 209 (1), where it is treated as the beginning of a usage prevalent in post-biblical Hebrew, which often in a definite expression uses the article with the adjective alone (כנסת הגדולה, etc.). Compare Gesenius-Kautzsch § 126 w (with footnote); Holzinger Einleitung in den Hexateuch 465; Driver The Journal of Philology xi. 229 f.
II. 1–3. The rest of God.—The section contains but one idea, expressed with unusual solemnity and copiousness of language,—the institution of the Sabbath. It supplies an answer to the question, Why is no work done on the last day of the week? (Gunkel). The answer lies in the fact that God Himself rested on that day from the work of creation, and bestowed on it a special blessing and sanctity.—The writer’s idea of the Sabbath and its sanctity is almost too realistic for the modern mind to grasp: it is not an institution which exists or ceases with its observance by man; the divine rest is a fact as much as the divine working, and so the sanctity of the day is a fact whether man secures the benefit or not. There is little trace of the idea that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath; it is an ordinance of the kosmos like any other part of the creative operations, and is for the good of man in precisely the same sense as the whole creation is subservient to his welfare.
1. And all their host] The ‘host of heaven’ (צְבָא הַשָּׁמַיִם) is frequently mentioned in the Old Testament, and denotes sometimes the heavenly bodies, especially as objects of worship (Deuteronomy 4¹⁹ etc.), sometimes the angels considered as an organised army (1 Kings 22¹⁹ etc.). The expression ‘host of the earth’ nowhere occurs; and it is a question whether the plural suffix here is not to be explained as a denominatio a potiori (Holzinger), or as a species of attraction (Driver). If it has any special meaning as applied to the earth, it would be equivalent to what is elsewhere called מְלֹא הארץ (Isaiah 6³ 34¹, Deuteronomy 33¹⁶ etc.)—the contents of the earth, and is most naturally limited to those things whose creation has just been described.¹ In any case the verse yields little support to the view of Smend and Wellhausen, that in the name ‘Yahwe of Hosts’ the word denotes the complex of cosmical forces (Smend, Lehrbuch der alttestamentlichen Religionsgeschichte 201 ff.), or the demons in which these forces were personified (Wellhausen, Die kleinen Propheten 77).—2. And God finished, etc.] The duplication of verse ¹ is harsh, and strongly suggests a composition of sources.—on the seventh day] The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch, LXX, Peshiṭtå read sixth day (so also Jubilees, ii. 16, and Jerome, Quæstiones sive Traditiones hebraicæ in Genesim), which is accepted as the original text by many commentaries (Ilgen, Olshausen, Budde, al.).² But sixth is so much the easier reading that one must hesitate to give it the preference. To take the verb as pluperfect (Calvin al.) is grammatically impossible. On Wellhausen’s explanation, see above, page 9 f. The only remaining course is to give a purely negative sense to the verb finish: i.e. ‘desisted from,’ ‘did not continue’ (Abraham Ibn Ezra, Delitzsch, Dillmann, Driver, al.). The last view may be accepted, in spite of the absence of convincing parallels.—and he rested] The idea of שָׁבַת is essentially negative: cessation of work, not relaxation (Driver): see below. Even so, the expression is strongly anthropomorphic, and warns us against exaggerating Priestly-Code’s aversion to such representations.³—3. blessed ... sanctified] The day is blessed and sacred in itself and from the beginning; to say that the remark is made in view of the future institution of the Sabbath (Driver), does not quite bring out the sense. Both verbs contain the idea of selection and distinction (compare Sirach 36 [33] 7–9), but they are not synonymous (Gunkel). A blessing is the effective utterance of a good wish; applied to things, it means their endowment with permanently beneficial qualities (Genesis 27²⁷, Exodus 23²⁵, Deuteronomy 28¹²). This is the case here: the Sabbath is a constant source of well-being to the man who recognises its true nature and purpose. To sanctify is to set apart from common things to holy uses, or to put in a special relation to God.—which God creatively made] see the footnote.—Although no closing formula for the seventh day is given, it is contrary to the intention of the passage to think that the rest of God means His work of providence as distinct from creation: it is plainly a rest of one day that is thought of. It is, of course, a still greater absurdity to suppose an interval of twenty-four hours between the two modes of divine activity. The author did not think in our dogmatic categories at all.
The origin of the Hebrew Sabbath, and its relation to Babylonian usages, raise questions too intricate to be fully discussed here (see Lotz, Quaestiones de historia Sabbati [1883]; Jastrow, American Journal of Theology ii. [1898], 312 ff.; Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 592 ff.; Driver A Dictionary of the Bible, s.v., and The Book of Genesis with Introduction and Notes 34; Stade Biblische Theologie des Alten Testaments § 88, 2). The main facts, however, are these: (1) The name šab[p]attu occurs some five or six times in cuneiform records; but of these only two are of material importance for the Sabbath problem, (a) In a syllabary (II R. 32, 16 a, b) šabattu is equated with ûm nûḫ libbi, which has been conclusively shown to mean ‘day of the appeasement of the heart (of the deity),’—in the first instance, therefore, a day of propitiation or atonement (Jensen Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, iv. 274 ff.; Jastrow l.c. 316 f.). (b) In a tablet discovered by Pinches in 1904, the name šapattu is applied to the fifteenth day of the month (as full-moon-day?) (Pinches Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archæology, xxvi. 51 ff.; Zimmern, Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, lviii. 199 ff., 458 ff.). (2) The only trace of a Babylonian institution at all resembling the Hebrew Sabbath is the fact that in certain months of the year (Elul, Marchešvan, but possibly the rest as well) the 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th days, and also the 19th (probably as the 7 × 7th from the beginning of the previous month), had the character of dies nefasti (‘lucky day, unlucky day’), on which certain actions had to be avoided by important personages (king, priest, physician) (IV R. 32 f., 33). Now, no evidence has ever been produced that these dies nefasti bore the name šabattu; and the likelihood that this was the case is distinctly lessened by the Pinches fragment, where the name is applied to the 15th day, but not to the 7th, although it also is mentioned on the tablet. The question, therefore, has assumed a new aspect; and Meinhold (Sabbat und Woche im Alten Testament [1905], and more recently [1909], Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, xxix. 81 ff.), developing a hint of Zimmern, has constructed an ingenious hypothesis on the assumption that in Babylonian šabattu denotes the day of the full moon. He points to the close association of new-moon and Sabbath in nearly all the pre-exilic references (Amos 8⁵, Hosea 2¹³, Isaiah 1¹³, 2 Kings 422 f.); and concludes that in early Israel, as in Babylon, the Sabbath was the full-moon festival and nothing else. The institution of the weekly Sabbath he traces to a desire to compensate for the loss of the old lunar festivals, when these were abrogated by the Deuteronomic reformation. This innovation he attributes to Ezekiel; but steps towards it are found in the introduction of a weekly day of rest during harvest only (on the ground of Deuteronomy 16⁹; compare Exodus 34²¹), and in the establishment of the sabbatical year (Leviticus 25), which he considers to be older than the weekly Sabbath. The theory involves great improbabilities, and its net result seems to be to leave the actual Jewish Sabbath as we know it without any point of contact in Babylonian institutions. It is hard to suppose that there is no historical connexion between the Hebrew Sabbath and the dies nefasti of the Babylonian calendar; and if such a connexion exists, the chief difficulties remain where they have long been felt to lie, viz., (a) in the substitution of a weekly cycle running continuously through the calendar for a division of each month into seven-day periods, probably regulated by the phases of the moon; and (b) in the transformation of a day of superstitious restrictions into a day of joy and rest. Of these changes, it must be confessed, no convincing explanation has yet been found. The established sanctity of the number seven, and the decay or suppression of the lunar feasts, might be contributory causes; but when the change took place, and whether it was directly due to Babylonian influence, or was a parallel development from a lunar observance more primitive than either, cannot at present be determined. See Hehn, Siebenzahl und Sabbat bei den Babyloniern und im Alten Testament, 91 ff., especially 114 ff.; compare Gordon, The Early Traditions of Genesis, 216 ff.
1. צבא] Literally ‘host’ or ‘army’; then ‘period of service’ (chiefly military), LXX κόσμος and Vulgate ornatus look like a confusion with צְבִי. Used of the host of heaven, Deuteronomy 4¹⁹ 17³, Isaiah 24²¹ 40²⁶, where Vulgate has in the first case astra, in the others militia; LXX κόσμος in all.—2. ויכל] For the alleged negative sense of Piel (see above), examine Numbers 17²⁵, or (with מן) 1 Samuel 10¹³, Exodus 34³³ etc.—מלאכה] the word “used regularly of the work or business forbidden on the Sabbath (Exodus 209. 10 35², Jeremiah 1722. 24 al.)” (Driver); or on holy convocations (Exodus 12¹⁶, Leviticus 16²⁹ 2328 ff., Numbers 29⁷). It has the prevailing sense of regular occupation or business, as Genesis 39¹¹, Jonah 1⁸.—השביעי¹] The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch, LXX, Peshiṭtå, The Book of Jubilees., Bereshith Rabba הששי, given as LXX’s reading in Mechilta (compare page 14 above).—וישבת] The omission of continued subject (אלהים) might strengthen Wellhausen’s contention that the clause is a gloss (see page 10 above): it occurs nowhere else in the passage except possibly 1⁷. The verb שבת (possibly connected with Aramaic sabata = ‘cut off,’ or Assyrian šabātu = ‘cease,’ ‘be completed’: but see Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 593 f.) appears in Old Testament in three quite distinct senses: (a) ‘cease to be,’ ‘come to an end’; (b) ‘desist’ (from work, etc.); (c) ‘keep Sabbath’ (denominative). Of the last there are four undoubted cases, all very late: Leviticus 25² 23³² 2634 f., 2 Chronicles 36²¹. But there are five others where this meaning is at least possible: Genesis 22. 3, Exodus 16³⁰ 23¹² 34²¹ 31¹⁷; and of these Exodus 23¹² 34²¹ are pre-exilic. Apart from these doubtful passages, the sense ‘desist’ (b) is found only in Hosea 7⁴, Job 32¹ (Qal); Exodus 5⁵, Joshua 22²⁵, Ezekiel 16⁴¹ 34¹⁰ (Hiphil); of which Hosea 7⁴ (a corrupt context) and Exodus 5⁵, alone are possibly pre-exilic. In all other occurrences (about 46 in all; 9 Qal, 4 Niphal, 33 Hiphil) the sense (a) ‘come to an end’ obtains; and this usage prevails in all stages of the literature from Amos to Daniel; the pre-exilic examples being Genesis 8²², Joshua 5¹²(?) (Qal); Isaiah 17³ (Niphal); Amos 8⁴, Hosea 1⁴ 2¹³, Isaiah 16¹⁰(?) 30¹¹, Deuteronomy 32²⁶, 2 Kings 235. 11, Jeremiah 7³⁴ 16⁹ 36²⁹ (Hiphil). These statistics seem decisive against Hehn’s view (l.c. 93 ff.) that שָׁבַת is originally a denominative from שַׁבָּת. If all the uses are to be traced to a single root-idea, there can be no doubt that (b) is primary. But while a dependence of (a) on (b) is intelligible (compare the analogous case of חָדַל), ‘desist’ from work, and ‘come to an end’ are after all very different ideas; and, looking to the immense preponderance of the latter sense (a), especially in the early literature, it is worth considering whether the old Hebrew verb did not mean simply ‘come to an end,’ and whether the sense ‘desist’ was not imported into it under the influence of the denominative use (c) of which Exodus 23¹² 34²¹ might be early examples. [A somewhat similar view is now expressed by Meinhold (Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 1909, 100 f.), except that he ignores the distinction between ‘desist’ and ‘come to an end,’ which seems to me important.]—3. ברא ... לעשות] The awkward construction is perhaps adopted because ברא could not directly govern the substantive מלאכה. LXX has ἤρξατο ... ποιῆσαι.
4a. These are the generations, etc.] The best sense that can be given to the expression is to refer the pronoun to what precedes, and render the noun by ‘origin’: ‘This is the origin of,’ etc. But it is doubtful if תולדות can bear any such meaning, and altogether the half-verse is in the last degree perplexing. It is in all probability a redactional insertion.
The formula (and indeed the whole phraseology) is characteristic of Priestly-Code; and in that document it invariably stands as introduction to the section following. But in this case the next section (24b–4²⁶) belongs to Yahwist; and if we pass over the Yahwist passages to the next portion of Priestly-Code (chapter 5), the formula would collide with 5¹, which is evidently the proper heading to what follows. Unless, therefore, we adopt the improbable hypothesis of Strack, that a part of Priestly-Code’s narrative has been dropped, the attempt to treat 24a in its present position as a superscription must be abandoned. On this ground most critics have embraced a view propounded by Ilgen, that the clause stood originally before 1¹, as the heading of Priestly-Code’s account of the creation.¹ But this theory also is open to serious objection. It involves a meaning of תולדות which is contrary both to its etymology and the usage of Priestly-Code (see footnote). Whatever latitude of meaning be assigned to the word, it is the fact that in this formula it is always followed by genitive of the progenitor, never of the progeny: hence by analogy the phrase must describe that which is generated by the heavens and the earth, not the process by which they themselves are generated (so Lagarde, Orientalia ii. 38 ff., and Holzinger). And even if that difficulty could be overcome (see Lagarde), generation is a most unsuitable description of the process of creation as conceived by Priestly-Code. In short, neither as superscription nor as subscription can the sentence be accounted for as an integral part of the Priestly Code. There seems no way out of the difficulty but to assume with Holzinger that the formula in this place owes its origin to a mechanical imitation of the manner of Priestly-Code by a later hand. The insertion would be suggested by the observation that the formula divides the book of Genesis into definite sections; while the advantage of beginning a new section at this point would naturally occur to an editor who felt the need of sharply separating the two accounts of the creation, and regarded the second as in some way the continuation of the first. If that be so, he probably took ת׳ in the sense of ‘history’ and referred אֵלֶּה to what follows. The analogy of 5¹, Numbers 3¹ would suffice to justify the use of the formula before the ביום of 4b.—It has been thought that LXX has preserved the original form of the text: viz. זה ספר ת׳ וגו׳ (compare 5¹); the redactor having, “before inserting a section from the other document, accidentally copied in the opening words of 5¹, which were afterwards adapted to their present position” (Bennett). That is improbable. It is more likely that LXX deliberately altered the text to correspond with 5¹. See Field, Origenis Hexaplorum quæ supersunt; sive Veterum Interpretum Græcorum in totum Vetus Testamentum Fragmenta, ad loc.; Nestle, Marginalien und Materialien, 4.
4a. תולדות] only in plural constructs or with suffix; and confined to Priestly-Code, Chronicles and Ruth 4¹⁸. Formed from Hiphil of ילד, it means properly ‘begettings’; not, however, as noun of action, but concretely (= ‘progeny’); and this is certainly the prevalent sense. The phrase א׳ ת׳ (only Priestly-Code [all in Genesis except Numbers 3¹], 1 Chronicles 1²⁹, Ruth 4¹⁸) means primarily “These are the descendants”; but since a list of descendants is a genealogy, it is practically the same thing if we render, “This is the genealogical register.” In the great majority of instances (Genesis [5¹] 10¹ 11¹⁰ 11²⁷ 25¹² 361. 9, 1 Chronicles 1²⁹, Ruth 4¹⁸) this sense is entirely suitable; the addition of a few historical notices is not inconsistent with the idea of a genealogy, nor is the general character of these sections affected by it. There are just three cases where this meaning is inapplicable: Genesis 6⁹ 25¹⁹ 37². But it is noteworthy that, except in the last case, at least a fragment of a genealogy follows; and it is fair to inquire whether 37² may not have been originally followed by a genealogy (such as 3522b–26 or 468–27 [see Hupfeld, Die Quellen der Genesis und die Art ihrer Zusammensetzung, 102–109, 213–216]) which was afterwards displaced in the course of redaction (see page 423, below). With that assumption we could explain every occurrence of the formula without having recourse to the unnatural view that the word may mean a “family history” (Gesenius-Buhl s.v.), or “an account of a man and his descendants” (Brown-Driver-Briggs). The natural hypothesis would then be that a series of תולדות formed one of the sources employed by Priestly-Code in compiling his work: the introduction of this genealogical document is preserved in 5¹ (so Holzinger); the recurrent formula represents successive sections of it, and 24a is a redactional imitation. When it came to be amalgamated with the narrative material, some dislocations took place: hence the curious anomaly that a man’s history sometimes appears under his own Tôlĕdôth, sometimes under those of his father; and it is difficult otherwise to account for the omission of the formula before 12¹ or for its insertion in 36⁹. On the whole, this theory seems to explain the facts better than the ordinary view that the formula was devised by Priestly-Code to mark the divisions of the principal work.—בהבראם] ‘in their creation’ or ‘when they were created.’ If the literal minuscule has critical significance (Tuch, Dillmann) the primary reading was infinitive Qal (בְּבָרְאָם); and this requires to be supplemented by אלהים as subject. It is in this form that Dillmann thinks the clause originally stood at the beginning of Genesis. (see on 1¹). But the omission of אלהים and the insertion of the ה minuscule are no necessary consequences of the transposition of the sentence; and the small ה may be merely an error in the archetypal MS, which has been mechanically repeated in all copies.