Creation from a slightly different perspective

Greetings!

The creation account of the Hebrew Bible is repeated in a slightly different way in the Aramaic Bible known as the Peshi tta. The Rabbis interpret the Hebrew much the same way.
Adam Clarke comments on this as follows.....

eth hashshamayim. The word את eth, which is generally considered as a particle, simply denoting that the word following is in the accusative or oblique case, is often understood by the rabbins in a much more extensive sense. “The particle את,” says Aben Ezra, “signifies the substance of the thing.” The like definition is given by Kimchi in his Book of Roots. “This particle,” says Mr. Ainsworth, “having the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet in it, is supposed to comprise the sum and substance of all things.” “The particle את eth (says Buxtorf, Talmudic Lexicon, sub voce) with the cabalists is often mystically put for the beginning and the end, as α alpha and ω omega are in the Apocalypse.” On this ground these words should be translated, “God in the beginning created the substance of the heavens and the substance of the earth,” i.e. the prima materia, or first elements, out of which the heavens and the earth were successively formed. The Syriac translator understood the word in this sense, and to express this meaning has used the word yoth, which has this signification, and is very properly translated in Walton’s Polyglot, Esse, caeli et Esse terrae, “the being or substance of the heaven, and the being or substance of the earth.” St. Ephraim Syrus, in his comment on this place, uses the same Syriac word, and appears to understand it precisely in the same way. Though the Hebrew words are certainly no more than the notation of a case in most places, yet understood here in the sense above, they argue a wonderful philosophic accuracy in the statement of Moses, which brings before us, not a finished heaven and earth, as every other translation appears to do, though afterwards the process of their formation is given in detail, but merely the materials out of which God built the whole system in the six following days.

I'm not sure if this affects the Creation versus Evolution debate in any way but it certainly puts a little different spin on Genesis 1:1.
On a side note, I remember blogging with a native speaker of Assyrian Aramaic (Paul Younan) on this topic. He gave an example of a related word in the New Testament Peshi tta. The reference was Hebrews 1:3 where the King James would translate "the express image of his person" Paul Younan translated the Aramaic Peshi tta New Testament "a portrait of his ESSENCE. George Lamsa, a native Assyrian who translated the entire Bible from Aramaic Peshi tta texts, addresses this issue of God creating the ESSENCE of the heavens and the earth before creating it as we see it with our eyes today.

Any thoughts?

LawrenceRaymond

[edited quote code -nygdan]



[edit on 2-1-2006 by LawrenceRaymond]

[edit on 3-1-2006 by Nygdan]

Hmmmm.... seems like it could be an interesting perspective for Jewish and Christians who are interested in philosophizing about this kind of stuff. But I don't think it really adds too much to the debate per se. It doesn't diiffer to radically from Day-Age type theories and other Old Earth Creationist Philosophy.

I have to admit that the Fundamentalist perspectives are very intriguing to me. I don't see why people feel the need to interpret Genesis literally. I don't believe ancient Jews and Christians interpreted the stories literally. Stories such as this were part of the mythos of religion... important to the understanding of religion, but by no means meant to be interpreted literally. These stories had a lesson, and something to teach, but should not be thought of as a literal history. Ancient peoples were less concerned with what actually happened vs. how events should be interpreted. This has escaped fundamentalists from all religions, not just Christianity and Judaism.

~~

there is another point that might be significant, that is the dualistic nature of the
concept & thus the specific word specially created to pass on the knowledge of the creation.
...follow me if you will


there is a new article at; physorg.com...

it's about two researchers at Dartmouth who have discovered evidence
that our solar systems creation is the product of 2 distince Super Nova explosions

-- - resulting two completely different types of nebulous
clouds of gas & ionized elements which make up our region-in-space
(?hence the models? rocky inner planet(s) & outer gaseous planet(s)?)

the thread starter kinda revolves around the idea that 'creation'
was the result of Alpha-Omega (?or is that Tsadi?)
& that concept is very similar to other ancient & somewhat exotic concepts
like Yin-Yang
like Duality
like Gnosis

all of which are creation concepts and ongoing foundation principals of Life
which seem part of the human psyche, or collective knowledge, since the early
ancient days, even before humanity eventually grew into civilization (~12,000BCE??)

here in the 21st century, we are being presented evidence that the physics
processes which led to the evolution of our ?unique? solar system....
was told to us long ago in some ancient time, in understandable language
and metaphor [Alpha-Omega, Yin-Yang, Duality, Light-Dark, Fire-Ice, et al]

which begs the answer to...Just How did We come to Know this Secret Knowledge??
and at the time when humans were still so unsophisticated?