Creation According to Genesis: One Account or Two?

According to arachnophilia, the verses of the second account should be read as happening in a sequence, one after the other:

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arachnophilia in Vav-Consecutive in What Genesis Two Says:

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notice that almost every verse (i've given you one per line) begins with the same letter? that letter is a vav. the story is told using a technique called the vav-consecutive. like the name implies, it means that each statement happens consecutively. another word for that might be "sequential".

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in fact, the only verses above that do not begin with a vav are verse 4 (the start of the story), verse 11 (which begins describing rivers meant in the author's present), and verse 24 (which describes "moral" of the story, meant to be presently applicable). the bits you're concerned about all happen sequentially.

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I'm reading through his other posts and his other threads; very informative!

I don't know how ambiguous tense really is, but I understand that there is no tense/aspectual difference between the verbs that begin vv. 2:6—8 and 2:19, which makes me strongly suspicious of any translation that introduces such a distinction as it does not exist in the original text.When I consider this along with the information on the waw-consecutive (see arachnophilia's post that I quoted in Message 58 and his link to the Wikipedia article), a translation that describes each event as happening after the one before it seems the most likely.When I consider both of these things along with the analysis of the plot that certainly requires Man to be created before the animals and plants, a strict chronological reading is, to a high degree of probability (close to 100%), the only sensible way to read the passage.We can add to this, interestingly, the fact that the authors of the second account used a method of indicating actions previously completed: the verb 'form' at the end of 2:8 is written in the perfect and so properly translated "had formed". If 2:19 was intended by the authors to read "had formed", as in 'previously completed', it could have been easily indicated. Likewise with the verb 'plant' in 2:8.In summary:

• All the verbs in question are in the same tense/aspect and so translating them into the same tense/aspect in English seems reasonable,
• The waw-consecutive indicates that the events of each verse take place after the events described in the verses before,
• The plot of the story requires Man to be created before plants and before animals, and
• The authors had means of indicating events completed prior to the events in consideration if, indeed, that was the story they were trying to tell, but they did not avail themselves of these means.

Taken together, these points support the KJV (and similar) translation and not the NIV (and similar) translation.Ball's all yours if you still think otherwise.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.

And I did discuss it, in three of my points. Here they are again:

• All the verbs in question are in the same tense/aspect and so translating them into the same tense/aspect in English seems reasonable,
• The waw-consecutive indicates that the events of each verse take place after the events described in the verses before, and
• The authors had means of indicating events completed prior to the events in consideration if, indeed, that was the story they were trying to tell, but they did not avail themselves of these means.

I'm not going to defend Sailhammer. What I'm going to say on the issue is what I've already said... and what you haven't responded to. I quoted the whole thing in this thread; just follow the links. Here's the waw-consecutive: וAnd here's arachnophilia's quote of the text from Gen 2:4—25 (which you can find a link to in Message 58):He posted it one verse per line, so all you have to do is count down to find the verses in question. Do you see the waw-consecutive at the beginning of each line?If not, look closer.So here again I've given my reasons to favor the KJV rendition of these verbs. It's time for you to give your reasons for favoring the NIV rendition.If you aren't planning on doing that in your next post, then, please, don't waste your time writing it or my time making me read it.

Ball's still in your court anytime you're ready to play.

This is why I keep having trouble grasping exactly what is going on with the verbs in biblical Hebrew. Everyone describes the verbs as being merely aspectual, but labels the verbs as though they contain tense information as well. It's not just you, by the way.Here is the difference:

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Wikipedia on Perfect:

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The perfect is a verb form that indicates that an action or circumstance occurred earlier than the time under consideration, often focusing attention on the resulting state rather than on the occurrence itself.

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Wikipedia on Perfective:

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The perfective aspect (abbreviated pfv), sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect used to describe an action viewed as a simple wholea unit without interior composition.
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Aspects such as the perfective should not be confused with tense; perfective aspect can apply to events situated in the past, present, or future.

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See, the perfect is a tense and denotes relative time information as tenses do (along with other information). The perfective on the other hand is an aspect and does not denote relative time information but speaks only to the completedness of the action (as you have said).Many sources I have read on this in an attempt to gain a quick understanding of the situation describe the verb system as you have: perfect/imperfect, completed/uncompleted. But these two don't really go together; only one can be true. Either biblical Hebrew has a perfect/imperfect distinction and so encodes tense information in the verb or it does not encode tense information and so has a perfective/imperfective distinction.And then it is probably more nuanced than that with the waw-consecutive and all, but even as it stands at a basic level the descriptions aren't adequate to convey the specifics of the situation.A lot of it, I am sure, boils down to the fact that all the sources are aimed at laymen looking to learn quickly and easily with little technical background (not that something you can get off Wikipedia in ten minutes should even be considered 'technical background', but hey). That with the fact that providing an English gloss pretty much ensures confusion with tenses (since all English verbs carry tense information), and it's an outright mess trying to get to the truth of it without buying some $30 peer-reviewed journal article off the Internet.So maybe you can clear this up. Is it perfect/imperfect or perfective/imperfective?ABE:Oh, and so far I have just been going with the descriptions given and assuming everyone means 'perfective' and 'imperfective' when they say 'perfect' and 'imperfect'. If indeed there is tense information in the verbinformation that denotes relative timethen 'perfect' and 'imperfect' are probably okay terms, but then we have to say that the 'tense' is not 'ambiguous'.ABE2:Maybe this explanation I just found will help: Biblical Hebrew Grammar for Beginners (PDF). I'm reading it now to find out.On second thought, that source looks pretty bad...Edited by Jon, : No reason given.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.

Of course. Of course. I was referring particularly to 2:8 which uses a different verb form for 'form'.'Plant' uses the imperfective+waw-consecutive. 'Form' is in the perfective. It's apparently the same situation with 'take' from 2:22.It also occurs in 2:2, 1:29, etc.Maybe you can explain to me what is going on in these cases. Can you provide an example?

That's exactly the information I was looking for.Thanks!I will check out those links too.

But now the question is whether that would apply to the cases in question (the verbs at the beginning of 2:8 and 2:19). I was thinking of something outside of the creation myths perhaps. And, to me at least, the simple past seems perfectly fine in 2:15. It just orients the audience back into the narrative after the rant about Eden and its relation to the author's present world.Any cases where a construction like that found in Gen 2:6—9, for example, is unarguably translated into the pluperfect? I will read it. I will respond to it. Hopefully within the next 24 hours.I will say before I read it, though, that a translation of "God had made the animals..." creates as many problems as it solves for those who believe the accounts consistent. Edited by Jon, : No reason given.

He identifies no 'grammatical clues'. His argument for the pluperfect is entirely apologetic. Where is his discussion of the 'grammatical clues' in his response to the charge that had the pluperfect sense been intended the author could easily have indicated as much?

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"The Wayyiqtol as 'Pluperfect': When and Why" (pdf) from Tyndale Bulletin:

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Perhaps the simplest explanation comes from the fact that both accounts are strongly anthropocentric: they see man as the pinnacle of God's creative work, the one for whom the earth and its animals exist. Putting the animals' formation in 2:19 directly after 2:18, where God sets about making a helper suitable for the man, reinforces this point: even though physically the animals were made before man, yet conceptually their creation was in anticipation of their subservience to his governance, and therefore in God's mind the animals were a logical consequence of the making of man. Since Genesis 1 had established the physical order so that the audience would not mistake it, the author/editor was free to use this literary device to make this theological point. (p. 139)

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If there is some particular part of Collins' argument that you think really closes the case, then go ahead and quote it and we can discuss it. But I don't see anything in that paper that forms an even half-decent argument, especially on the grounds of language, for the pluperfect in Gen 2:19.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.

I sure hope so! Okay, let's examine each of those three conditions in relation to Genesis' second creation myth. The first one:There's no evidence of this in Gen 2:19. In fact, the only way we can interpret the formation of animals in 2:19 as referring back to the creation of animals in 1:20—25 is if we assume they are a single and consistent story (i.e., that it must by necessity refer back to Gen 1 lest the stories contradict one another), which is to beg the question. Furthermore, based on several of the story's elements at this point it seems questionable that these can be considered the same event. Here are two of them:

1. For starters, a straight-forward reading of Gen 2:18—19 has the man 'alone' and the animals created specifically to remedy this problem unlike in the first creation account where the animals are already created by the time man arrives on the scene.
2. Secondly the 'fowl' in 1:20—21 are brought forth from the 'waters'. In Gen 2:19, the 'fowl' are formed 'out of the ground'.

Seeing Gen 2:19 as harkening back to the creation of animals as told in Gen 1:20—25 is thus not only fallacious on the grounds that it requires us to assume the truth of the very point in contention, but doesn't function with the storyline of the two accounts and, in fact, ignores additional contradictions (which, indeed, the use of the pluperfect alone cannot reconcile).So much for that; let's look at the second of Collins' points:Well, there's again no evidence that 2:19 is a reference, and 1:20—25 a referent, so there is little to say on this point. It rests on the first condition, and since the first condition is unsupported, so too is this one.And now the third:This is the only condition met by 2:19, but it does not offer a compelling argument. As Collins claims, satisfaction of one of these conditions only means that 'the wayyiqtol may express pluperfect time' (p. 127), not that it necessarily does, so again, the decision to use the pluperfect still must rest on other considerations. So what are those considerations? Why should 'form' in 2:19 be put in the pluperfect while other verbs that begin their respective sections are translated into the simple past? Such considerations don't seem to exist for the verbs in 2:7, or 9 for example. Collins doesn't seem to have an answer for these important questions and it's probably because Collins' reason for preferring the pluperfect is only that doing so is technically possible and facilitates a harmonized reading of the creation accounts.Collins has no language-based argument for preferring the pluperfect in 2:19. His reasonings are purely apologetic. And apologetics are pretty much useless in this venue, unless they can amount to more than an attempt at harmonization. 1 Kings 21:8—9 isn't Genesis 2:19.

I've addressed all three of his conditions. I laid out my complaints against the application of each one separately and clearly. To review:

• Condition one assumes, when applied to Gen 2:19, that the mentioned formation of animals is a reference back to the events described in Gen 1:20—25. There is no evidence that this is the case.
• Regarding condition two there is no indication, in Gen 2, that the events of v. 19 should be understood as occurring prior to the events of Gen 2:7, i.e., that the creation of animals should be considered as having been complete before the creation of man.
• Finally, condition three only makes it possible on technical grounds to interpret the verb as having a pluperfect sense, with the final consideration as to whether or not to so interpret it resting on other factors.

And it's in discussing these other factors that Collins goes into the apologetics. To interpret a verb with this sense still requires considerations external to the verb itself and Collins offers no considerations outside of his desire to harmonize the two accounts. I quoted, specifically, where he argues on these grounds including his claim that:

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"The Wayyiqtol as 'Pluperfect': When and Why" (pdf) from Tyndale Bulletin:

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Since Genesis 1 had established the physical order so that the audience would not mistake it, the author/editor was free to use this literary device to make this theological point. (pp. 23—4)

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He is reading Genesis 2 in light of Genesis 1, and any honest attempt to address the issue of whether there is inconsistency between the two accounts cannot begin with such a reading. Just because he spends 22 pages talking about Hebrew grammar doesn't mean his conclusion has anything to do with Hebrew grammar. The intents and competency of the redactor are somewhat irrelevant. But looking at the job done with, for example, the Flood story, we get a sense that resolving technical difficulties with conflicting source materials wasn't really among the redactors' priorities.

That's all that matters.If they aren't even applicable to the text in question, then the rest is irrelevant (at least in this thread). See above. Then it might be worth your while to start a thread for that discussion. As far as this thread goes, if the principles cannot be shown to apply to the creation myths, then there's really no point discussing them. It's not about what is ultimately possible under some conditions somewhere. It is about what is happening in the Gen 1 and Gen 2 creation narratives. In some of his posts, arachnophilia discusses some of those reasons. For example:

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arachnophilia in you are replying to a thread that is 11 years old. in Contradictions: Hint that Genesis 1 and 2 are Allegorical:

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genesis 1 serves primarily two functions:

1. as an etiology for the practice of shabbat, and
2. to erase J's earlier creation myth which was deemed heretical

we know about the earlier version because part of it is still present in genesis (chapters 2-4), and because other books (psalm 74, job) reference events that seem to be from the missing section, which are (again) concordant with other ancient near eastern mythology.

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If Gen 1 was meant to supplant the other portions of the Gen 2 narrative, then we should not be surprised to find the two accounts contradicting one another in certain places, especially in those places where the redactors allowed them to treat the same subject matter (the creation of man, plants, and animals, for example). The authors/redactors make mistakes all the time. If we followed your approach we'd conclude that there were no contradictions in the Bible.We have two separate stories from two separate sources. We get to look at them and decide how good of a job the redactors did in sewing them together. Did they smooth over the rough spots? Or did they leave a lot of inconsistencies behind?The fact is that the redactors here didn't fix the problems where their source materials disagreed. Their intentions are irrelevant to whether or not the contradictions exist. As I mentioned, the redactors of the Flood story probably never meant for their pieced together accounts to contain contradictory material, and they themselves might have even read the accounts as being consistent, but that doesn't change the fact that the contradictions exist. Or consider the conversion of Paul as told in Acts. Did his companions hear the voice he heard (Acts 9:7) or didn't they (Acts 22:9)?Just because the accounts were compiled into a single narrative by a redactor or group of redactors doesn't rule out the possibility of contradictions; indeed, the compilation into a single account seems to have almost no bearing whatsoever on the consistency of the finished product.

I don't recall making this claim. Perhaps you have, but you haven't provided support for interpreting Gen 2:19 as being in a pluperfect sense, which has been one of the actual points of contention running through this thread. They are two separate works; the fact that someone pasted them together doesn't change that. That's unfortunate because that discussion would be relevant to the topic.