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Notes on Text and Translation
Оглавление1a See the following excursus on translation of Gen 1:1–3 for more discussion of the translation of Gen 1:1 as prepositional phrase, literally “at the beginning of when God created heaven and earth” that introduces Gen 1:2.
2a For more on this translation, see the commentary below.
2b This expression has been interpreted in some Christian contexts as the Holy Spirit, but this is anachronistic. For more on its translation, see the synchronic analysis of Gen 1:2 below.
3a Though it produces a bit more awkward text, I have endeavored across the translation of Gen 1:1–2:3 to translate the numerous mentions of “God,” a feature characteristic of the text, not of Hebrew.1
5a Though this commentary avoids gender-exclusive language for humans and God, the (male) pronouns are left here and in some other loci in the chapter (e.g., 1:10, 27, 31; 2;2–3) where “God” is not explicitly indicated (see comment 3a directly above).
6a See Koch, Gottes himmlische Wohnstatt, 196–98, 225 for discussion of translation of רקיע as “plate” rather than the common “firmament” or “dome.” The adjective “vast” is added initially here to convey the scale of the plate being imagined here.
6b The verb “to be” plus participle (ויהי מבדיל) appearing here expresses an ongoing function for the plate. It is not just that the waters are separated once by God in a final action, but God sets up a heavenly plate to do this job over time, hence the addition of the adverb “continually” in this translation.
7a Jacob, Genesis, 40 notes that the subject of this sentence must be the heavenly plate, not God, since God would be specified and because all of God’s other creation acts in Gen 1 are acts of speech, creation and making. Moreover, God had earlier specified in 1:6 that the plate should continually separate (using an expression with a participle ויהי מבדיל rather than ויבדל) waters from waters.
7b The Old Greek has the correspondence formula, “and it was so” at the end of 1:6, rather than at the end of 1:7 as it is translated here. For discussion of the issues surrounding the LXX edition of Gen 1 on this and similar points, see the commentary below.
8a The Old Greek also has “and God saw that it was good,” seemingly harmonizing day two with similar affirmations of goodness in the other days—1:10, 12, 18, 21, 25 and similar ones in 1:4, 31. For discussion of this and similar instances of LXX harmonization in Gen 1, see below.
9a The niphal here of קוה II also occurs in Jer 3:17 and refers there to peoples converging on Jerusalem. The translation here renders this reflexive form of assembly, thus matching the more active way that earth is involved in creation in day three, fulfilling God’s commands there (1:11–12).
9b The Masoretic text along with 4QGenb, Samaritan Pentateuch, Jub 2:5; Pseudo-Philo 15:6 reads מקום here, which better fits the description of it as “one” (אחד).2 4QGenh reads מקוה and the Septuagint reads the equivalent of it (συναγωγην) probably harmonizing this verse with מקוה in 1:10.
9c The word translated here as “dry ground,” יבשה, is distinct from the word אדמה, “ground” that is used throughout Gen 2–3 (also Gen 1:25) and subsequent parts of the primeval history to refer to arable ground. The term “dry ground” is used to indicate that the ground is potentially watered, fertile land, whereas “dry land”—which is frequently used to translate יבשה (e.g., NRSV)—can have the implication of desert. The productivity of the יבשה becomes clear here already in Gen 1:11–12.
9d The phrase “The waters … dry ground appeared” is a plus reflected in the Septuagint, and possibly in a small fragment of 4QGenk. For more discussion of this plus and other issues surrounding the Septuagint, see the commentary below.
11a As in Gen 1:20, the divine speech here starts with a joining of verb and noun constructed from the root of the verb, a common combination in Hebrew (figura etymologica) that emphasizes the linguistic connection between verb and object, here “sprout” (דשא) and green plants that are sprouted (דֶשֶׁא). Apparently the push to use this figura etymologica is enough to have דֶשֶׁא function here somewhat differently than its usual usage to refer more exclusively to the sort of low-level grassy plant eaten by animals (Jer 14:5; Job 6:5) and/or the very earliest stage (generally) of plant growth, and arising with the rain (Job 38:27) or lost when land is dry (Isa 15:6).3
11b “and” is the reading in numerous textual witnesses (e.g., SP, LXX, Syriac, Targum Jonathan, Vulgate), while the MT lacks the conjunction. Though the majority reading could be understood to be a harmonization with 1:12, it conforms better with Hebrew usage, where an asyndetic list of three items would be unusual.
11c As noted in Edward J. Young, “The Days of Genesis: Second Article,” WTJ 25 [1962/63]: 143–71 [here 158, note 96], the expression מין (translated here and throughout Gen 1 as “kind”) means mainly that the producer will produce something “essentially the same as itself,” and is thus not precisely identical to the modern concept of “species.”
14a Reading לשנים (“and for years”) with 4QGenk, Old Greek, and Samaritan Pentateuch versus שנים in Syriac and the MT. Alternatively, it is quite possible, especially in this last position in the sequence, that the preposition ל (“for”) serves double duty to characterize “for days and years.” Either way, the semantic content is the same.
20a The LXX includes another “and it was so” at the end of 1:20, matching the report of making sea and air creatures to other creation acts in Gen 1. For more discussion of this and similar ways that the LXX presents a more uniform version of the creation process, see below.
22a Standing within a blessing, the imperative form functions as a modal wish, not a prediction, hence the translation “may you be fruitful” rather than “be fruitful….” The modal force of this blessing (and, by analogy, the similar blessing in 1:28) is further indicated by the marked jussive wish relating to birds in the latter part of the verse: והעוף ירב בארץ (“may the birds multiply on the earth”). For discussion of the modal use of the imperative in such blessings see the translation note below on Gen 1:28 (28a).
26a This translation, like most, renders אדם as a collective term for humanity, but cf. James Barr, “One Man or All Humanity?” in Recycling Biblical Figures, ed. Athalya Brenner and Jan Willem van Henten (Leiden: Deo Publishing, 1999), 3–21, who argues that such an inclusive use of אדם is poorly attested and that the term refers here, as in Gen 2–3, to an individual male figure. This rendering, however, becomes difficult to sustain when the text goes on in 1:26 to have this figure made in the images (plural) of the speaker, use the plural וירדו to refer to this figure’s future rule over creatures, and (in 1:27b) describe the creation of both male and female. Indeed, in contrast to the usage in Gen 2–3, there is no broader context in Gen 1 in which a reference to an individual, “the human,” would make sense. All of the rest of Gen 1 describes God’s creation of types of living creatures, and it is natural to understand God’s creation of אדמה here in similar terms. That said, see below in the diachronic discussion of the relation of Gen 2–3 to Gen 1 for one possible explanation for the choice of האדם to refer to collective “humankind” in this context.
26b As argued in Walter Gross, “Die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen im Kontext der Priesterschrift,” TQ 161 (1981): 21–22; idem. “Die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen nach Gen 1,26.27 in der Diskussion des letzten Jahrzehnts,” BN 68 (1993): 36–37; Garr, In His Own Image and Likeness, 168–69; and Schellenberg, Der Mensch, das Bild Gottes? 76, 114–15 (among others), both literary context and Near Eastern parallels suggest that the preposition ב here is not a bet normae focused on similarity of humans to God (e.g., “in the image of God”) but a bet essentiae (“as the image of God”) that is focused on the human role as divine representatives on earth. Nevertheless, one should be careful here not to develop a false either/or, where a primary focus on human status “as” images of God excludes the idea that this status is embodied by some human similarity to a God that is conceived along anthropomorphic lines. See the commentary below for more discussion.
26c The sequence of cohortative followed by a jussive expresses purpose, “so that.”4
26d The reading translated here, “all the earth” (בכל־הארץ) is reflected in all the major early witnesses, while the Syriac has “all the wild animals of the earth” conforming 1:26 to lists in 1:24 and 25. This latter reading could be supported by the fact that having “all the earth” as the reading here gives a premature conclusion to what the humans are to rule, since this expression is followed by “and all the creeping animals that creep on the earth.” Nevertheless, “all the wild animals of the earth” is a late attested reading and may be an assimilation to lists found in 1:24 and 25, as may be the mention of “creeping animals that creep on the earth” that follows it (in all witnesses).5 Either the Syriac preserves an earlier reading than a corrupted version in all the witnesses, or the earlier witnesses preserve a slightly harmonized reading (where “creeping animals that creep on the earth” was added by an early scribe after “and the earth” to conform 1:26b to the “all the creeping animals on the earth” in 1:28) that was later harmonized in the Vorlage to the Syriac to more fully correspond to 1:24–25.
28a The blessing here, as in 1:22, is formulated in Hebrew with an imperative form. This corresponds to the rule, wherein the contents of blessings, insofar as they are formulated in verbal form, are expressed with modal verb forms. Since ancient Hebrew uses a supplitive system (first person cohortative, second person imperative, third person jussive [short form of the prefix conjugation]), the second person blessing here is formulated with the imperative form. There is, therefore, no implication of a command to multiply or rule the earth in the imperative forms of v. 28. Instead, there is the promise of powers/capabilities.6
29a The expression הנה translated here as “Look!” and in 1:31 as “indeed” is a interjecting deictic particle calling attention to what follows. Older translations render it with the now archaic “Behold.” Contemporary English lacks an exact equivalent to הנה. Therefore, the context leads to different renderings in this commentary of this particle that is difficult to precisely translate into English or German.
29b The MT and SP have פרי עץ (“tree fruits”) here possibly anticipating this expression in Gen 3:2, while this is missing from the OG, which only has an equivalent to פרי (“fruit”).
29c Emphasis is added in the translation here to reflect the front-extra position of this prepositional phrase in the Hebrew clause.
31a See note 29a on הנה in 1:29.
31b The addition of the definite article to day six is another marker that the entire day label system beginning in 1:5, but only featuring days without definite articles up to this point, is aimed to mark off the six days prior to Sabbath. The day-label system is Sabbath-oriented.
2:1a The Hebrew word here, צבא, means “army,” whether heavenly or earthly. In many translations it is commonly rendered with the archaic English word for army “host.” For more discussion of this difficult expression see the commentary below.
2:2a This translation follows the proposal in Cassuto, Genesis Pt. 1, 61–62 that the formation in Gen 2:2 follows a pattern seen elsewhere (e.g., Gen 17:22; 24:19; 49:33; Exod 40:33b–34) where an initial clause with the verb כלה (“finish”) places the event of the second clause after the completion of a given act.7
2:2b The SP, LXX, and Peshitta (also Jubilees 2:16) read (the equivalent of) השישי “sixth” here, a reading that avoids the implication that God was still working on the seventh day. Some argue that the difficult MT (and Targum) reading השביעי (“seventh”) in this locus is the accidental product of scribal assimilation of 2:2a to the description of God’s rest on the seventh day (e.g., Ronald S. Hendel, Genesis 1–11, 33; Krüger, “Schöpfung und Sabbat,” 166). Though this latter process is possible, I opt for the difficult MT and Targum reading of “seventh,” since a reading of “sixth” here would represent a step back in the narrative into the sixth day, which is concluded in 1:31 and reflected back on in 2:1. For more discussion see the commentary below.
2:2c As discussed in the commentary below, the text here and in 2:3 does not feature the word for “rest” (רוח), but the word for cease, stop—שבת.
2:3a This expression is awkward in Hebrew as well as English. Here we do have the inverted subject-suffix-verb formulation of a pluperfect expression (cf. note 2:2b), אשר ברא אלהים (“which God had created”).
Translation of Gen 1:1–3
One of the first and most important interpretive and translation issues in this chapter is the question of whether Gen 1:1 is a dependent clause introducing what follows (“when God created…”) or an independent clause (“In the beginning, God created…”). Though some traditional Jewish commentators (e.g., Rashi and Ibn Ezra) advocated the former translation of Gen 1:1 as a dependent clause, most Jews and Christians up through the last century (including the Masoretes who added vowels and punctuation to the traditional Jewish manuscript tradition) understood Gen 1:1 as an independent clause—“In the beginning, God created heaven and earth.”8 A similar understanding of 1:1 as an independent statement has helped support Christian understandings of God having created the universe ex nihilo (“out of nothing”).9
Now, even scholars advocating a translation of Gen 1:1 as an independent clause generally reject an understanding of it as an assertion of God’s creation of the universe from nothing.10 Comparable ancient Near Eastern creation accounts, most famously the above-discussed Mesopotamian Enuma Elish epic, start their account of creation with what things were like before creation:11
when on high no name was given to heaven,
nor below was the netherworld called by name …
Then were the gods formed within the(se two). (I:1–2, 9)
The creation account that follows Gen 1 in the Bible and likely predated it, Gen 2:5–3:24, likewise begins with a description of the uncreated prologue to God’s creation:
no shrub of the field was yet on the earth, and no vegetation of the field was yet sprouting up because God Yhwh12 had not [yet] caused it to rain on the earth and there was no human to work the ground…. Then God Yhwh formed the human (Gen 2:5, 7)
Genesis 1 similarly begins with a statement of what creation was like before God created. This begins properly in Gen 1:2—“the earth was an uninhabitable mass, darkness was on the surface of the primeval ocean, and the breath of God swirled over the surface of the waters.” Only after this description of pre-creation earth, ocean, and wind does the Genesis creation account truly get underway in Gen 1:3: “God said, ‘let there be light.’” In this sense Gen 1 agrees with other accounts in seeing cosmic elements that preceded God’s creative work.
The main issue to be considered now is whether Gen 1:1 was meant specifically to provide the setting for the following clause in Gen 1:2 (and possibly also 1:3) at the outset of God’s creation of the cosmos (the “hypotactic” understanding of 1:1) or whether it was meant to serve as a summary superscription indicating the overall theme of the entire following narrative (the “paratactic” understanding of 1:1). The former, hypotactic, understanding of Gen 1:1 as a temporal introduction to 1:2(–3) yields the translation “when God created [heaven and earth],” while the latter, paratactic, understanding of 1:1 as an independent clause yields the rendering “in the beginning God created [heaven and earth].”
Though much work has been done on the syntax of the verse, it appears that the text, particularly the Hebrew consonantal text, admits either interpretation. Nevertheless, the paratactic understanding of Gen 1:1 is undermined by the problem that “beginning” in בְּרֵאשִׁית is not vocalized in the Masoretic Text with the definite article (that would be בָּרֵאשִׁית). Instead, the vowels of בְּרֵאשִׁית imply a translation “in a beginning God created….”13 This datum is particularly striking, given the above-mentioned fact that the Masoretes, who added this vocalization to the Hebrew text, appear to have followed the paratactic understanding of the verse. To be sure, some have noted a similar lack of definite article in expressions meant as definite, including expressions of beginning (e.g., Isa 46:10; Prov 8:23), but all of the relevant examples come from poetry, where the definiteness of nouns is often unmarked.
Conversely, it should be noted that the hypotactic understanding of Gen 1:1—“in the beginning of when God created heaven and earth…”—presupposes, if one follows the Masoretic vocalization of the text, that Gen 1:1 contains a relatively rare grammatical phenomenon: the noun ראשית in construct with and modified by an unmarked relative clause “[when] God created heaven and earth.”14 Not only is this phenomenon uncommon (at least in terms of the present vocalization of the overall Hebrew Bible), but the examples of such phrases with unmarked relative clauses generally modify a limited range of words (יד [hand], יום [day] and ימי [days], כל [all], עת [time], and מקום [place]) and are most often found in poetry.15 Genesis 1, though seen as having poetic elements, is prose.
The verses that follow Gen 1:1 also provide data relevant to its translation. If Gen 1:1 were an independent clause labeling the following narrative, it would be the only instance in the Priestly narrative where a superscription is followed syndetically by a clause (Gen 1:2) beginning with “and” והארץ היתה (“and the earth was…”).16 Indeed, most Hebrew literary compositions do not begin with such a conjunction.17 Genesis 1:2 also presents somewhat of a problem for those who translate Gen 1:1–3 as one unit, with the three clauses of Gen 1:2 taken as a parenthesis before the main clause of 1:3. Though such an extended sentence (Gen 1:1–3) is theoretically possible in Hebrew and has some parallel in the prologue to the Enuma Elish epic, it is relatively unprecedented in length (within the Hebrew Bible) and contrasts substantially with the otherwise quite standardized beginnings of the other acts of creation through word found in Gen 1 (1:6, 9, 14, 19, 24).18
The (hypotactic) translation adopted above understands Gen 1:1 as providing the temporal setting for the description of pre-creation elements in Gen 1:2.19 The lack of temporal specificity in Gen 1:1 thus is not a problem, since the Priestly writing would not be concerned with establishing exact chronology for elements preceding God’s creation. Instead, the focus here is on how things stood at the outset, before “God created heaven and earth.” In this respect, the introduction to Gen 1 in Gen 1:1–2 parallels the function of the introduction to the following creation account (Gen 2:4b–3:24) in Gen 2:4b–5, with its temporal introduction in Gen 1:1 echoing that in Gen 2:4b. Where Gen 2:4b introduces the ground (אדמה)-focused account in Gen 2–3 with “when God Yhwh created earth and heaven” (ביום עשות יהוה אלהים ארץ ושמים), Gen 1:1 introduces the broader cosmology in Gen 1 with “at the beginning of when God created the heavens and the earth (בראשית ברא אלהים את השמים ואת הארץ).20 This is one of the closer parallels of the P and non-P histories.