Torah Pearls #1 – Bereshit (Genesis 1:1-6:8)

Torah Pearls Bereshit (Genesis 1:1-6:8)

This inaugural episode of The Original Torah Pearls, Bereshit (Genesis 1:1-6:8), kicks off with a “Portion101” and then game on. Gap theory, hyper-literalism, parallelism, something from nothing or something from something? Old earth or young earth? Cosmic battle or crafty animal just doing his thing? What hovered . . . an angel, wind, the “Holy Spirit”? Interpretations abound, but to Gordon, sometimes an “et” is just an “et.” What was hot-wired into the sun and moon on the fourth day? Despite chapter manipulations by an Archbishop of Canterbury what climaxes the creation story—mankind or Shabbat? Moving away from theories and interpretations, Johnson shares his own take on the creation story—where the original language speaks to him in such a way that he sees and feels the darkness flee and the light be.

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Transcript

Bereshit (Genesis 1:1-6:8)

You are listening to The Original Torah Pearls with Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson, and Jono Vandor. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon's Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

Jono: G’day to everybody listening around the world, wherever you may be, it’s good to have your company. Joining me this hour are Nehemia Gordon and Keith Johnson. Keith is the co-author with Nehemia Gordon of the book, A Prayer to Our Father: The Hebrew Origins of the Lord's Prayer. And of course, Nehemia Gordon is the author of The Hebrew Yeshua vs the Greek Jesus, along with The Hebrew Yeshua vs the Greek Jesus live teaching DVD. I highly recommend all of these products. Gentlemen, welcome back to the program.

Nehemia: Hi. Shalom, Jono.

Keith: Shalom, Jono. How are you doing?

Jono: I'm doing very well, and I'm so happy that you have made time to come back on the program. Now, Sukkot is over. It’s finished for another year. It was fun, particularly for those in Israel, but it’s come and gone. Now, what happens, Nehemia? Fill us in; what happens once Sukkot comes and goes?

Nehemia: Well, today actually over in Israel is Shemini Atzeret, which is the Eighth of Assembly. It's the eighth day of Sukkot, although when it says to live in the sukkah, to dwell in the sukkah, it’s only for seven days. So this is kind of this extra day tacked on. “Atzeret” is an assembly, so it's the eighth day of assembly. Technically we're supposed to be assembling at the Temple, ideally. If not, then just with whoever you can assemble with. Well, I guess we are assembling here online.

Jono: We’re assembling here online, and we've got one in Jerusalem, one in Australia, one in the States, and here we are.

Nehemia: So this is actually an international assembly, is what you’re saying.

Jono: This is an international assembly.

Keith: This is actually an international assembly. That's what I was looking forward to.

Nehemia: Yes. I don't know if you can hear it in the background… what I hear in the background is the hammering, and that’s the hammering of the people taking down their sukkahs all over the city, or my neighborhood, anyway.

Jono: Sure.

Keith: Can you describe for us what it looks like, Nehemia, when it's the middle of the festival? Can you tell us what that’s like?

Nehemia: Well, you walk around the city and all over - on sidewalks, in entrance ways, in courtyards, and just any open space - you'll see these sukkahs, these booths. Some of them are wood, some of them are made of cloth, but all of them have on top the s'chach, which is where you get the word “sukkah” from, and s'chach is the covering of vegetation. What that commemorates, of course, is when they were in the desert it was very, very hot, and they would sit all day in these booths that had covering of palm branches and various other things. Keith and I went down to Nuweiba in the Egyptian occupied Sinai, and we were actually just hanging out in these sukkahs. They weren't built for the Feast of Sukkot, that's just how people spend their days because it's so miserably hot there.

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: We were sitting on the beach in one of these, in a sense, an authentic sukkah, because it's still being used for what the original sukkahs were used for, covered in palm branches down there.

Jono: And so, after the eighth day - correct me if I'm wrong - but it is the beginning of the new reading of the Torah portion, is that correct? We start anew?

Nehemia: Right. Of course, that part is a tradition. In fact, there are actually two separate traditions in Jewish history of how to cycle the reading of the Torah. The actual reading of the Torah in the Book of Deuteronomy is once every seventh year on Sukkot itself, where the entire nation gathers at the Temple, or in the vicinity of the Temple, and they read the Torah throughout that seven-day period. They break it up and read it throughout the seven-day period, the entire Torah. Well, since we don't do that anymore, being scattered in the diaspora… also even now back in Israel, that's just not done.

What the tradition became is to read it throughout the year so that you finish reading it on Sukkot, or actually on the eighth day. That's where that comes from. But there were actually two traditions. One was to begin and end it on the eighth day once a year, on the eighth day of Sukkot. The other tradition is to read the cycle every three and a half years, between three and three and a half years, and that, of course, varies in that sense because of... or in that system that varies whether it's three to three and a half years because of the leap years.

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: In Hebrew leap years you'll have an extra month, and in a three-year period you would definitely have one leap year, possibly two. But anyway, that was a three-and-a-half-year cycle. The three-and-a-half-year cycle they say is the Land of Israel Cycle, that's what they originally did in Israel. The one that is more common today, that I guess we're doing, is of reading... we're going to do, discussing the portion, is called the Babylonian Cycle, which is a one-year cycle, beginning and ending on the eighth day of Sukkot - Shemini Atzeret.

Jono: Right. So here we are, and this is what we're going to do.

Nehemia: Yes.

Jono: And so, yes, Yah willing, we would like to go through the Torah portion, within the space of about an hour each week. Hopefully, we can find the time to do that. This, of course, is the first one, I'm so happy to be able to do this with you guys, and so once again I thank you for coming on.

Now, Bereshit. This is where we are. Now, we've got an hour. “Bereshit bara Elohim et hashamayim ve'et ha'aretz.” This is the first verse which we could probably spend one hour on just in itself, couldn’t we, Nehemia?

Nehemia: Well, an hour? I thought Keith was also going to speak.

Jono: Equal time, Keith, equal time.

Keith: Jono, listen when you read those first seven words in the Hebrew Bible, and you read them in perfect Hebrew…

Nehemia: Yes, that was beautiful.

Keith: I have to tell you, I was really... man, oh, man, I mean, I was quite impressed. How long have you been reading?

Jono: Hey, look, as long as you don't ask me to read anything else, I'll sound really smart. No, really, Yoel ben Shlomo - you guys know him. He's my Hebrew teacher, I will tell you he's a much better Hebrew teacher than I am a student - but he's been taking me through, and he's such a great guy. I really do... actually, you know what? I just want to make a point here, but I just want to remind everybody that his email, if you would like to get Hebrew lessons from Yoel, it is hebrewinisrael@gmail.com. He's such a great guy. I want to take just a moment to be controversial. Is that okay, fellas?

Nehemia: Uh-oh, yes.

Jono: All right, very quickly for the listeners. We are going to be doing the Torah portion. Now, I just want to remind everybody, of course, Nehemia is a Karaite Jew, he's not a Christian, he is not a Messianic. He doesn't believe in Yeshua or Jesus as the Messiah. Is that fair to say, Nehemia?

Nehemia: Yes, absolutely.

Jono: I can say that?

Nehemia: Although, it's kind of a strange way to introduce me, but I think that's appropriate in the context. But just bear in mind, if you were introducing me to a Muslim audience, you would say, “Nehemia Gordon is a Karaite Jew, he doesn't believe in Muhammad as the chosen prophet,” which is also true.

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: Go on, okay.

Jono: And the reason why I throw that into the mix... of course, Yoel is also not a Christian, he's not a Messianic, he's a Torah observant Jew that does not believe in Yeshua as the Messiah. Now, the reason why I throw that into the mix, my friends, is because now, dear listeners, you have the opportunity to continue to listen and to glean Pearls from the Torah Portion. If you don't want to do that, that's okay, you may be able to find... I don't know if Jews for Jesus have a radio program then maybe you can find out.

Nehemia: Probably, they do.

Jono: But if you want to listen and you want to learn, and you want to enjoy these conversations, praise Yah. You are more than welcome, and I'm so glad that you've joined us today. Keith, any thoughts?

Keith: Well, I would say one of the things that happened with us is that... We've had people that get very concerned over the fact that, whether it's with me as the Methodist that they make assumptions about, or Nehemia that they make assumptions about. I'm sure now they will make some assumptions about you. But I think one of the things that we've been inviting people to do is be willing to come together with us on common ground. Now, of course, during this Torah portion, the common ground is going to be the Hebrew Bible, and we are going to be looking at the Bible. And I think most people that would be listening to you, whether they’d be Christian, Messianic or other, have some interest in truth, and I would also assume that they would have some interest in Scripture. I'm not sure they’re going to get a better opportunity to interact with Scripture than being able to have a person like Nehemia, who lives in Jerusalem, the Hebrew Bible is his text; it's the text that he attempts to live by. It's also something that a lot of people don't get a chance to hear someone who actually is fluent in Hebrew and is able to study at the depth that he has been able to study and apply the Scripture.

So I hope even for those that do have those theological questions and they have those issues, that maybe they would normally send a comment. I hope that they would not leave listening because of that, but that they would look for where we have some common ground. So that's why I'm looking forward to doing this.

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: Yes, Amen.

Jono: So, where do we begin? We begin in the first verse. Nehemia, how would you like to do this?

Nehemia: Well, you read the first verse. Can we have Keith read the second verse, and I’ll read the third one?

Keith: Oh, I would never want to read, I'm not very good at Hebrew.

Nehemia: Bevakashah. Keith. Methodist, read verse two. You don’t have to read the whole thing, but let's just each of us read a verse.

Keith: Okay. “Ve-ha'aretz haytah tohu va-vohu, ve-choshech al pnei tehom, ve-ruach Elohim merachefet al pnei ha-mayim.” And let's see, and the land was a tohu va-vohu, and I'm not even sure how we can translate that. “And darkness was upon the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of Elohim was hovering over the face of the waters.”

Nehemia: Amen. “Va-yomer Elohim yehi or va-yehi or.” “And God said, “Let there be light, and there was light.” Or as Keith likes to say, “And light was. There was no argument.”

Keith: I have a question.

Jono: Now, there is an enormous amount of questions there. Keith, what's yours?

Keith: Yes. So my question is this - so when folks are doing the Torah portion, I just want to ask more because I obviously, having a Methodist background, our Torah portion is Sunday morning based on the Lectionary. So here is what they tell us we should... if we go by the Lectionary, here are the verses they tell us to look at and to read or to preach from. I never really went by the Lectionary. I always tended to see what the spirit would lead throughout the week or what was going on in the congregation before we'd speak. But my question is, Nehemia, when this portion is unrolled, I mean people would say, “Okay, we're going to do this.” What would they actually do? Would they simply read it, what actually happens?

Nehemia: Well, the most basic thing they would do is they'd actually read it. Today a lot of times when they read it, for most people, I would say, it's more of a ritual, because if they want to read it, they'll read it at home or they'll read it with their families or by themselves. But back then, people didn't have access to books as easily as we do, so when they were reading it in public, it was so that people would understand it. There are even discussions about how in certain periods, when the people no longer spoke Hebrew, the language of the Gentiles became predominant among the Jews. They would read a verse, or sometimes three verses, and then they would pronounce an Aramaic translation of it, and they'd read another three verses and then you would read the Aramaic translation of it. Then that became a ritual when people no longer spoke Aramaic. If you go to a Yemenite synagogue, they still do that, in some Yemenite synagogues.

Originally, though, when they read it, they understood the words and they were reading it just to hear it, and then afterward there probably was a discussion of some kind. Exactly how, we don't know. We do know there were various types of… like we have a body of literature called “Midrash,which are rabbinical homilies, basically like sermons, and it was usually based on something in a Torah portion. There would be a word or something, probably like they do in a lot of Methodist churches, they spin an entire yarn based on that word, sometimes it has very little to do with the actual word. Sometimes the word is just an excuse to talk about something else. Then other times, they're actually having substantive discussions about that Torah portion. For those who don't know, by the way, the first Torah portion begins in Genesis 1:1 and goes through chapter 6, the beginning of chapter 6, where it introduces Noah.

Jono: That's right up to 6 verse 8, I do believe. And so once again, it's an enormous portion of Scripture, and obviously we're not going to cover everything. But just in the verses that we've just read in the beginning... Now, there's an enormous amount of discussion - books have been written just on these verses, Nehemia, and...

Nehemia: Right. Actually, just on the first verses, there have been books written.

Jono: Yes, that's right, so we need to obviously focus, at least, spend a little bit of time here because what happens is that there are people who believe that within this first couple of verses there are thousands or millions or billions of years. There's also a literal interpretation of six actual days. Where do you lie with that?

Nehemia: Let me backup before we go into that, and point out that if you look very carefully at the details of this creation account, which runs throughout chapter 1 and the first few verses of chapter 2, I believe it's the first three verses of chapter 2, what you find is that there's quite a bit of repetition. If you took it hyper-literally, you would say, “Oh, things were created twice.”

Let me just give you an example. So in the first verse, it says, “In the beginning, God created, Elohim created the heavens and the earth.” “The heavens” let’s assume that means the sky or anything above the earth. Well, you have that being created on the second day. And then the earth, which is the dry ground, that's then created on the third day. So which one is it? And it's not just those things, we also have light - light is created on the first day. But then on the fourth day, you have the heavenly bodies, meaning, the sun, the moon, and the stars, as those things that give light, being created. That seemed repetitive to some people.

What they've said about verse 1 is that... and there are two views on it. One, is that “In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the earth,” and then what happens in verse two is insequential, and after that, “the earth was void and without form,” and so, “He fashioned the earth and He fashioned the heavens,” which is what happens in the following days.

The other interpretation is that - and this is actually supported by the Hebrew, as well, you could read it either way - is that verse 1 is, “In the beginning of God creating the heaven and the earth, the earth was void and without form.“ Meaning, God came along, according to that interpretation, and came to this chaotic universe and fashioned it into an orderly universe. I guess the problem with that interpretation for many people is that it implies the universe already existed when God came to perform the acts of creation, and all He did was fashion it.

The first one is like what they call “yesh me'ayin”, or “creation ex nihilo”, creation out of nothing. The second one is more that God created something from something, meaning there was a universe already and He fashioned it.

Jono: Which obviously still leaves the question where did that come from? Did He create that earlier? Is there a higher power? It opens up all sorts of possibilities. Where do you lie with that?

Nehemia: Well, let's hear the Methodist, and then I'll give my opinion.

Jono: Methodist?

Keith: Well, it’s interesting, when I was in school, back in the day, a long time ago, at Trinity Seminary, we were reading Hebrew, and the thing that jumped off with me was this first line. And before I got into the whole discussion of which option it was, Nehemia and I were having this great long conversation, he probably doesn't remember because it was over wine, but I said to him...

Nehemia: On the dock, I remember.

Keith: Yes, you remember. And I said, what I loved about the first seven words - being the numbers guy, seven words, seven being the number of completion - that when I read that it was like saying, “In the beginning, Elohim created the heavens and the earth,” okay, that's a fact. When was that? I don't know. Then, now the earth was formless and void and dark, and so the idea being that He created everything, what was the time between the start of that creation? And then the discussion of all of the specifics, sort of the general statement, here's the title, “In the beginning, He created everything,” that's what I believe. I believe that He created everything. Everything we see, everything we understand in the universe, He created it. Now, let's talk about the earth. The earth was formless and void, and then it goes through this process. So that's kind of the way I look at it.

Jono: Right. Now, is this what you would refer to as the Gap Theory?

Keith: I've done something radical, and I want to say specifically, I've let the Tanakh sort of answer where it can answer, and I found a really radical thing - sometimes it doesn't answer.

Jono: Sometimes it's not so specific, and you allow it to...

Keith: Sometimes I let it be that it is exactly what it is that I read, and that's what I love about interacting with it, is that there are some things that seem to answer as I go through, and my little term now that I use is “keep reading”, that if you keep reading you find things that come up and answer things later, but then there are other things that aren't answered. What I don't like, to be honest with you, is to use terms that are still not exhaustive. So like I say, when I look at those seven words, I'm like, “Wow, in the beginning, He created it. Sounds good to me.” Now, let's talk about how.

Jono: Nehemia?

Nehemia: Yeah, so my take on it is that I tend to take it pretty literally in this passage. I think that... well, let me even back up before that and say that I think Christians and the Christian tradition tends to be very dogmatic about belief, about what exactly you believe and the specifics of what you believe. In the Jewish tradition, we definitely don't have that. Coming from that perspective, I would say there's a number of possibilities of how to understand this, and you mentioned one of them, which is the Gap Theory, which you mentioned to me before, so I'll let you explain what that is.

But basically, you have two ways of looking at it, I think for most people, which is what they call Young Earth creationism, that is a literal 6,000 years since creation approximately, give or take, and an Old Earth creationism which is that the world is billions of years old according to modern science. I tend to be a Young Earth creationist, but more specifically, there are nuances within that - one of them is, as you mentioned, the Gap Theory, that there were six literal days with gaps between them which amounts to essentially billions of years, is that correct?

Jono: Yes. Well, specifically between, as Keith mentioned, between verse one and verse two, there is the possibility, one wonders, how long was the time between those two verses? “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth,” how long was it before verse 2, “The earth was formless, and void; and darkness was over the face of the deep”? There is the theory, anyhow, that perhaps billions of years passed in the creating. Now, it can be argued that in the same way that was created at a particular age, I mean He was brand new, obviously, but He was, if you like, created at a particular maturity. There's also the theory that Yah can obviously create the earth and probably needed to create the earth at a particular maturity. That doesn't require a gap theory, obviously, but there are these different theories around.

Nehemia: Right. And like I said, I tend to be a literalist in this passage. I tend to think that there were actually six literal days because it does say at the end of that section in verse 5, “And there was evening and there was morning and one day.” I understand that to be describing everything that elapsed in verses 1 through 4, or even the first half of 5. I tend to think that it was actually six literal days that God created it and look, He could have done it in a split second if He wanted to, so He didn't even need billions of years.

How do I then explain the dinosaurs and things like that? Well, my answer is what you had mentioned - the mature earth creationism, that it's 6,000 literal years. I don't need to then explain away, like many Young Earth creationist do, how it is that we have geological layers and then force everything there into the paradigm of the flood and things like that. If it appears to be billions of years old, I'm fine with that because, as you said, when God created Adam, he probably looked like a 30-year-old man or maybe a 14-year-old boy, but he didn't look like a baby, presumably. When He created the trees in the Mariposa Grove in California, some of those trees probably looked like they were a thousand years old on that day that He created them. I have no problem with viewing it that way, but my main point is that, within the Jewish tradition, we're fine with saying that if you want to believe the world's billions of years old or if you want to believe it's 6,000 years old, neither of those really affect your relationship with the Creator of the universe. It's just a question of what you believe, and as long as you believe that the Creator created the universe, how you interpret this particular passage is... maybe it is important, but it isn't like a fundamental issue. We should be able to tolerate different opinions on this.

I have no problem accepting... or I have no problem with somebody who says that the world's billions of years old, and maybe it is billions of years old, I don't really know, I wasn't there. Like I said, though, I tend to be a literalist there and think it's 6,000 years old, but I'm fine with billions of years too. It makes absolutely no difference to my faith, either way. I know for a lot of people it does, which I think goes back to this whole Christian idea of “you have to believe these exact things or you're going to burn in hellfire forever with the Jews.” I think they're just jealous because they want to be down there with us. That's a joke. No, they're jealous because we're going to get left behind and get all their stuff.

Jono: That's right, and that's meant to happen today too, isn't it? It's the 21st. Let's not get into that.

Nehemia: Uh-oh.

Jono: Okay, so, “the earth was without form, and void.” Now, I have a question. Keith, I have a question. I've always had a question about this...

Keith: Wait a minute.

Jono: You got a point? You want to make a point?

Keith: Jono, are you telling me that today's the second day? You mean is this day where I’m left behind?

Jono: Keith, this is why I'm talking so fast because I want to get this all done before you float away.

Keith: Oh, okay. Go ahead.

Nehemia: If I had known that I wouldn't have gotten an iPad when I was in the US because I would then get Keith’s iPad.

Jono: You just get Keith's.

Nehemia: There you go.

Jono: Now, my understanding is Harold Camping has reappointed the day to the 21st. So in any case, I think we're safe. But this is my question, all right, Keith, you have a go at this, “darkness was on the face of the deep.” Why? Was not darkness everywhere? I mean in the next verse, verse 3, “God says, ‘Let there be light.’” Why is darkness on the face of the deep? Why do we have a locality? What's going on there?

Keith: Okay, so let me give you my simple little opinion. Darkness is on the face of the deep so that we can get to verse 3 where He can say, “Light be.” I love, “light be.”

Jono: It's just setting the stage, is what you're saying? It's setting the stage.

Keith: Listen, the image that is so powerful to me is the big picture and then the small picture - the big creation picture and then the picture for our lives. That even when there's darkness, He can just speak a word and when that word is spoken darkness has to flee. In my house, when there's darkness in my house and I turn a light on, darkness never wins over the light. As soon as the light comes, darkness flees. So here, we got this image of darkness over the face of the deep, and then all the Father has to do is speak, and when He speaks, light, you know, darkness has to flee. I think there's a bunch of images that are really, really powerful, and I guess I could stay on this verse all day.

But I guess the thing, like I said earlier, that's been so beautiful for me, is to read the Tanakh and to let it minister to me in its language and the way that it flows and the way that it's presented. It's just a beautiful picture. Even the word, merachefet, let's see if I get it. You guys got to forgive me because my eyes are getting old, and it says, “And the ru’ach of Elohim was hovering over the face of this deep,” and this idea that there's the hand, the covering, it's like, “I'm watching over this chaos, I'm watching over this darkness, I'm over it, and at any time I could simply say, ‘Enough is enough of the chaos. Let there be order, or let there be light.’” And when I read that, when I read it even in the language, it's almost like it calls to me, so that's just me. I really love the language, and I love the way that it's presented.

Jono: That’s beautiful. And so, “darkness was on the face of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering on the face of the waters.” This suggests to me, Nehemia, that darkness is on the face of the surface under the water, and the Spirit of God is on the surface of the water, is this what I'm...?

Nehemia: No, I wouldn't take it that way. Very often in biblical writing you'll have what's called parallelism, where it'll say the same thing twice, usually in different wording. That's what we have here - “upon the face of the deep,” and “upon the face of the water” I think is the same exact thing. But anyway, why is it the water and why not the earth? And the answer is in verse 2, that the water and earth are intermixed. They're chaotic. There isn't like a dry land and seas in a distinct place.

Keith: Come on with that.

Nehemia: Everything is, as we say in Hebrew, a balagan. Everything is just intermixed and chaotic.

Jono: It’s only until verse 6 that we see that remedied.

Nehemia: Right. In verse 2, a little story, if we have time. I remember the day that I first read these verses, and it was the first time I actually sat down and read the Torah. I was between first and second grade, and my father hired a tutor, a rabbi, to teach me to read the first chapter of Genesis, just the beginning chapters. I remember we sat down, we were in a park on a bench, which looking back now all these years later, I suspect it wouldn't be done that way today, but back then was a more innocent age.

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: So I was sitting alone in a park on a bench with a rabbi, because he didn't have any place to teach me. We were just sitting there with the book, and he would read, “Bereshit bara Elohim et hashamayim ve'et ha'aretz,” you know, with his Ashkenazic accent, and then translate. Then I remember in verse 2, I asked him, and this has, I think, been my character ever since, that if somebody says something that I don't understand, I don't let him get away with it. They might not understand it, either. But in verse 2, I remember him say, “And the spirit of God hovered upon the face of the waters,” and I said, “What does that mean, ‘hovered’? I don't know what that word is.” And he was from New York, so he said, “hahverd.” And he said, “Like a helicopter hahvers,” and I had no idea what that meant. Probably until years later, I guess, I just didn't know that word in the English language, and certainly with his pronunciation, I had no idea what it meant. So that's a little story, I remember sitting in a Chicago park on a bench with a rabbi and reading these verses.

Keith: Here's what I thought he was going to say Jono. No, no, I thought he was going to say, “And in first grade, even then I knew, I was going to be at the Hebrew University.”

Nehemia: No, I didn’t.

Keith: What does merachefet mean? I knew that there had to be some important grammatical connection with that word. So Nehemia, you mean you were just like a regular first grader?

Nehemia: No, I went to... It's a long story. But I went to a school. In the school, we learned Hebrew, but we didn't actually get through the Torah at that point. Anyway, it's a long story. But anyway, it does raise some interesting questions on “the Spirit of God hovered upon the face of the waters.” When we talk about God's spirit, or God is a spirit, my understanding of it is that He is infinite. So how could He then hover upon the face of the waters?

I'll let you guys give your opinions on that, but just two points. One is that maybe we shouldn't take it so literally. Although I say it’s six literal days, I'm very comfortable admitting that there are things in the Tanakh that are not meant to be literal, and even with these 24 hour periods, the sun wasn't created until the fourth day. You could very legitimately argue that when it says “day”, it doesn't have to be taken to be a literal day. I'm fine with that, even though I think it was, but if you want to say that, it's fine.

The second point is that this phrase, “Spirit of God” could be two different things in Hebrew. One is it could be God's personal spirit. Like if, you know, Nehemia's soul, okay, that's me. Whereas the other possibility in Hebrew is that a spirit of God could be a spirit from God, meaning that He sent an angel that was then hovering over the face of the waters. There were actually some Jews in the eighth century AD, who said that “the spirit of God hovering upon the face of the waters,” referred to a spirit that God sent, an angel, and that angel then created the universe, and that God used that angel as an intermediary, and of course, all the other Jews jumped down his throat and said, “No. That's blasphemy. You can't say that.” On that particular issue, they said, “Here belief actually is important.” But the fact is, that this was an opinion in Jewish history. I tend to think this was God's personal spirit, and saying it's limited to the area just above the water is taking it a little bit literally. But either way, those are the possibilities. Go ahead.

Jono: Nehemia and Keith, could it also mean a wind, a breath or a wind?

Nehemia: Absolutely.

Jono: So it doesn't necessarily have to be the personal spirit, right?

Nehemia: Right. Ru’ach is both wind and spirit, so it could be either.

Jono: Okay. It could be either.

Keith: Well, I...

Nehemia: It's really a matter of opinion which it is.

Jono: Keith?

Keith: Yes, so based on my 33 days to 18 cities, 22 times on tour with Nehemia, I think a lot of people that I've actually been speaking with would say that spirit, they'd say, “Now, look, Nehemia, that God sent an angel or sent a spirit, and if that's Jesus, that’s Yeshua right there in chapter 2.”

Jono: Oh, yeah.

Keith: Nehemia, or Jono, could you tell me what you think about that?

Jono: Can I just say, all right, I'm already in the bad books because I started with the controversial thing so let me rattle on some. I'm not a fan... personally, I'm not a fan of going back through the Tanakh and finding little bits and pieces and then trying to find some sort of parallel by which we can then declare, “Well, there's Jesus.” Now, let me give you an example while we're here, “et”.

Nehemia: Uh-oh.

Jono: The Aleph and the Tav. While we're here, this is the first place that it's mentioned, “Bereshit bara Elohim et ha-shamayim.” “Et,” has a very specific purpose. Nehemia will you fill us in because my goodness I'm going to explode if I hear it one more time that that is Jesus. I'm sorry, everyone is going to be angry at me now, but it drives me insane. Would you fill us in?

Nehemia: Uh-oh.

Keith: Why are you going to throw him that softball? I mean Nehemia, are you going to answer this question?

Nehemia: Which question? I mean I'll tell you the grammatical function of et. Et is a word in Hebrew that marks the direct object, and when I say that, most people's eyes glaze over because they don't know what a direct object is. In English the way you indicate a direct object is through word order. One of the examples I like is, “Georgia ate the cat,” Georgia is my dog, for those who don't know.

Jono: Good, Georgia.

Nehemia: How do I know who did the eating and who got “ate”? From word order. Now, if I say, “The cat ate Georgia,” it indicates that Georgia got eaten by the cat, and if you've seen Israeli street cats you know how possible that is. Hebrew doesn't function that way. It's a different language. You can't just take one word in Hebrew and translate it into English and another word and translate it into English, it doesn't work that way. You can't do that with any language. If you do that with Spanish, it sounds ridiculous. And any language if you translate word for word you lose a lot of the meaning. The way Hebrew marks what got eaten is by saying “et”. So if I were to say the following sentence, if I want to say Georgia ate the cat, I just say “Georgia achlah et ha-chatul.” When I'm translating that literally I guess I would say Georgia ate et the cat. Now some people have come along and said, “Oh et appears here, and so it doesn't translate, you said Georgia ate et the cat, and et doesn't translate, so it must have some spiritual significance,” and they say that refers to Jesus.

If you want to translate my sentence, “Georgia ate Jesus the cat,” or “Yeshua the cat,” that's your belief, but grammatically you should understand the function. In this first sentence of Genesis, it says, “In the beginning,” I'll translate it very literally, “In the beginning, created Elohim et the Heavens and et the earth.” So what they'll do is they'll say, “Oh, that et doesn't translate,” and whatever, it’s a whole theory they have, and they say “et” refers to Yeshua. If you want to say that - you know, I don't mean you - but if someone wants to say that, that's a theological belief, but it does have a grammatical function that marks a direct object.

Jono: It does have a specific grammatical function.

Nehemia: By the way, in Hebrew, I could also say “Et the cat ate Georgia,” and the cat still got eaten because I marked a direct object with “et.” That's a completely legitimate sentence that actually emphasizes what Georgia ate. If I say, “What did Georgia eat?” Then you would say, “et the cat ate Georgia,” and et doesn't mean Yeshua in that sentence, it marks a direct object of what the action was done to.

Jono: There it is. Now, we're all in trouble, but I just want to throw in one more thing before we move on. Of course, for those who aren't sure what we're talking about, in Revelation, I am the Alpha and the Omega in the Greek, the Aleph and the Tav in the Hebrew. It's interesting to note, and this is all I’m going to say, it’s just interesting to note that in the Peshitta, in the Aramaic, it's Yehovah who says those words in Revelation.

Nehemia: Uh-oh. Interesting.

Jono: Anyhow, Keith you were going to say?

Nehemia: We all know the Aramaic are the original words that Yeshua spoke.

Jono: Oh, yeah... [laughing]

Keith: Hold on guys. Listen to this, though. Can I just throw something out here? Let me just throw something out. So, the reason I brought this up regarding the Ru’ach Elohim, that some people say that that's Yeshua, one of the things that I'm finding is that - and I think this is the power of what we're doing, of what we can do here - even though it's one little topic we're talking about, out of a portion, by us giving the information there are literally a lot of people that are going to listen who just never heard it in any other way. So what I want to be sensitive about, and let me be the peacemaker, is I want to be sensitive for those folks that are out there who heard an opinion that et means this, or who heard an opinion that every single phrase, every single word, Yeshua is in every single word in Hebrew, and they just don't know. And why this is so powerful is we've got Jono here, he's got his opinion, and what's great about you, Jono is that you are in your own process. We've got Nehemia, we've got myself, and it's somehow that the Ru’ach, the spirit of Elohim, would hover over this and would bring light to the folks who are literally in darkness because they don't know. I don't want to throw them under the bus completely because I want them to come back. I think there's going to be so much that's going to come from this, when we actually interact with the language itself and the history and the context of this Bible, without completely throwing them under the bus.

Nehemia: I wasn't trying to throw them under the bus, what I was saying is that if you want to say that Yeshua is the et in the first verse of Genesis, knock yourself out, but understand what the grammatical significance of it is. Because what some people will say is, “Oh, that word doesn't translate, it's completely extraneous to the verse.” That's not true, that it's extraneous, that's factually not true, because without “et”, then you end up with a situation where you could say, “Oh, the heavens created Elohim and the earth.” Or, “The earth created Elohim and the Heavens.”

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: You don't know who created what. The rabbis actually have a discussion about that. They say that when the Greeks translated the Bible they didn't understand it, or the rabbis were afraid they wouldn't understand it, and so they actually tinkered with the translation to avoid a situation where the Greeks would think that the heavens created the earth, because in Greek it's a little bit different. There's a possibility in Greek that you could legitimately read it in Greek that “In the beginning, created God, the Heavens and the earth,” that it created all three - because in the phrase inarcho, it can also mean “the ruler,” “the first one,” meaning, the first one of the city, as well, or of the country. In Greek, it's kind of ambiguous, and I think this is the problem when you translate into other languages, you get this ambiguity. I’m not throwing them under the bus, I'm not even mocking them, I'm just saying understand what the grammatical significance of it is. If after that you want to say that “et” refers to Yeshua, no problem, that's your theological belief...

Jono: No, let it be noted in the minutes that it was Jono who threw that theory under the bus.

Keith: It was Jono.

Nehemia: Oh, okay, so Jono was the one...

Keith: Here’s why I wanted to say this. Can I bring up why I brought this up?

Nehemia: Sure.

Keith: As I was setting the table for us as we go forward. So Nehemia brought up a really great image. We were in the car somewhere, and I was driving, of course, and he had his feet up on the counter.

Nehemia: And no socks.

Keith: And we were driving through the wonderful scenic land of Texas, where everything is flat. We were talking because there's such a kickback with people as they learn and as they grow and whatever, and Nehemia brought this image up. We were talking two or three different times about the ex-smoker. Now, Nehemia, the reason I want you to bring this up on our little radio interview here is because what we want to do is, we want to... go ahead and tell the image of the ex-smoker and why...

Nehemia: Well, if you've ever met an ex-smoker, they hate smokers. They can't stand to be around smokers. Everything about smokers, they go ballistic. A lot of times I'll interact with people who were... or let’s take a lot of the Messianic people who used to be Christians - they hate Christians. They won't admit it, some of them, but they hate Christians. They learned something and now they have the truth and everybody else who doesn't know what they learned is just willfully ignorant and evil. Not everybody is like that, but there are quite a number of people who are, and they hate everything about Christianity. They just hear the word Methodist, that you are in the United Methodist Church as an ordained minister, and they can't stand to hear it because they were once part of some church system. They immediately make assumptions about you that you are a pork eating, Christmas keeping, Sunday worshiping, Mithra worshiper, and that's how they describe it. One of the things I've learned from you, Keith, which I appreciate, is don't make assumptions about people and let them define themselves and don't stick them into a box.

Keith: Right.

Nehemia: People are who they are, and I think every human being is in a process and let them have that process without confining them to the box. Because what the spiritual border police want to do is they say, “Well, you’re in the Methodist box Keith, you get over there. We don't want you talking to the people who are in this other box.” They’re in that box. You learn a lot more about yourself and other people by interacting with those who aren't necessarily coming from the same place as you are coming from, who have a different outlook and...

Keith: That's why I have to say, Jono, why I think this is so important that we’re doing this, and why I appreciate you so much, especially under this idea of Truth2U, is I keep getting the image of the little old lady or the man or the younger person or the wife or the husband who just has never gotten a chance to interact with the Scripture in its context. And why I think this is so important that you’re doing this Jono is that we are going to at least - even if it's just one little portion, one little part of one little verse for them to read it differently or to see it differently or to have different... the glasses off their eyes and maybe that their eyes will be opened - is that it could help them in their process. So that's why I love those people, and I want those people to enjoy and to experience this without completely feeling that they're completely wrong. I want them to be brought along in the process. That's my Methodist approach.

Jono: Blessed are the peacemakers, Keith.

Nehemia: Amen.

Keith: Amen.

Nehemia: I think you meant the cheesemakers.

Jono: The cheesemakers.

Nehemia: When I mentioned the thing about Ru’ach Elohim, it didn't even occur to me that somebody would... and of course, I've heard this, but I wasn't thinking in terms of, is that Jesus or Yeshua. What I was talking about with the angel is that there is this concept in Jewish philosophy that they say, “Well, if God is infinite and the universe is finite, then the infinite has no way of interacting with the finite, and so there has to be an intermediary.” And so they created this... in the 8th century they called it the Creating Angel. Philo, who was a first-century Jewish philosopher, he referred to the same concept, he called that the Logos, the word of God, because God is infinite. The only way He could possibly interact with the universe is through the finite, which is His Logos. So He sends this Logos, this word - Logos means word in Greek – which then interacts with the universe and creates it, et cetera. The Maimonides call the same thing the active intellect, which was, “God never directly speaks with the human being. It's always through this intermediary.” I'm not saying this because I believe this. I don't believe that. I actually believe the opposite. I believe that God is infinite and He can interact with the finite, but I think, for me, the questions are sometimes more important than the answers. Just to be aware that there's such an opinion and to know that such a question exists, and whatever you interpret Ru’ach Elohim to be, whether you say it's Jesus or you say it's Mohamed or you say it's my dog Georgia and her spirit, or if you say it's actually the personal spirit of God. What answer you come up with that's between you and your heavenly Father. I think that for me what's important is that you ask the question...

Jono: And that you be aware of the conflicts, or even the variety of philosophies out there and theories out there that are there to explain. So rather than remain ignorant on one specific view that your pastor told you throughout the rest of your life, just listen in.

Keith: Exactly.

Jono: Listen in, my friends. Please come back while we do the Torah portion each week, and just be challenged to look at things in a new light that you've never considered before.

Nehemia: One of the things I'll hear from a lot of Christians, or ex-Christians, and Messianics and things like that is they'll say, “Well, this is just confusion. I heard five different opinions. I don't know which it is.” What you're basically saying is instead of being spoon-fed some doctrine, you've actually been challenged to think for yourself. If you still come back to the original doctrine, that's fine. That's between you and your Creator. But I think that God created us with intelligence and wants us to use that intelligence, and not check that intelligence at the door when we come to church or synagogue or wherever.

Jono: Sure. So now we've got a little bit of time left, and it seems like almost a crime to skip ahead and find another passage within this Torah Portion, another Pearl that we can just focus on for a few minutes. Keith, do you want to focus anywhere in particular?

Keith: Well, I thought here I was so excited that I was going get a chance to bring Nehemia to, “In the beginning, was the word and the word was with God and the word was God” and move on. Here, he's talking about the Logos... I mean, you guys, got to be kidding me, but look, let’s move on...

Nehemia: I was talking about Philo’s Logos, not John's.

Keith: Jono, I want to bring up something I think it would be really cool.

Jono: Sure.

Keith: If you could, if this is possible. I was speaking in - I don't even remember where it was - and we were talking about chapter 2. I remember this being a really significant thing, but Nehemia, if I ask a question, I want to ask a question to you Jono and I want to ask a question to Nehemia. What is the culmination of the creation story, of the creation account? What's the climax? What's the crescendo of the creation story, in your opinion, Jono?

Jono: The first thing that comes to my mind is the seventh day, I would say, it's Shabbat. That's where...

Nehemia: I agree.

Jono: You agree? Nehemia?

Nehemia: Yes, absolutely.

Keith: You say it’s the seventh day. So here's my question, and I was talking to some folks about this, so why is it that's in chapter 2 and not chapter 1, Nehemia?

Nehemia: The real answer is that the person who created the chapters was the Archbishop of Canterbury, Stephen Langton in the beginning of the 13th century, and he had an agenda. His agenda was that there would be a portion to read every week in his church, and so his main agenda was, of course, length. He wanted things to be roughly more or less the same length. He was kind of limited by the content. But in some instances, he didn't let the content stop him in where he put the beginning or end of the chapter. So putting the Shabbat at the beginning of chapter 2 is very clearly with the intention of disconnecting it from the creation account.

Keith: Amen!

Nehemia: So think about the situation they'd end up with is, one week they read chapter 1 in the church, and they’d end up with the culmination of creation being mankind; the human being is the culmination of creation. The next week, they read this thing, “And afterward, the heavens and the earth were created, were finished,” et cetera. That is then the beginning in chapter 2 of a completely different story, and who remembers what you read last week? I think he did that so that they would be disconnected from creation. “You know this thing? Yeah, God blessed the seventh day, has nothing to do with creation.” That's almost like incidental if you read one week chapter 1 and then the next week you read chapter 2, the way he intended it.

One little side point, I think, actually, a very important point, which is that chapter 2, beginning in verse 4, all the way through the end of chapter 3, is a unit unto itself in the Hebrew, and here again the chapters completely mess up what the story is about. Chapter 2, verse 4 through the end of chapter 3 is really not about creation, it's about the Garden of Eden. A lot of people will read chapter 2 as the creation account - just chapter 2 by itself - and it sounds like, “Here's another story of creation,” and instead of it being in six days and resting on the seventh, in verse 4, it says, “In the day that God, Yehovah Elohim created the heavens and the earth,” and that makes it sound like it's one day, and actually, day, of course, can just mean time in Hebrew. The time period, the era. And chapter 2 describing creation is only incidental for introducing the Garden of Eden. Because of that, it's actually not chronological, because if you compare the sequence of events in chapter 2 with chapter 1, you'll see they’re different. That's not unusual in Hebrew writing for something to be… one time be presented chronologically, and then in a different section it'll be introduced by subject rather than chronological.

One of the examples I love is that Numbers chapter 9 takes place before Numbers chapter 1, even though it's eight chapters later. There's a principle that Scripture is not necessarily chronological. And that's definitely the case in chapter 2, whereas chapter 1 is explicitly intended, whether you say it's billions of years or six literal days, it's intended to present something in a chronological framework.

Keith: So the reason I brought that up is because I know is there are a lot of people listening that did not realize that the chapters were placed in such a late time and that there was possibly an agenda. But what I remember when I'm reading in Hebrew and I'm going through chapter 1, and then you get to chapter 2, but then it says there's one day that He sanctified, that He set apart, that He made holy, and there's no other day where He says this, and yet, this is a day that, in my tradition, has been set aside and replaced. And I just think it's important, I especially think it's important if we're reading this and we get to this idea of Him sanctifying this day, and setting this day apart, that it's the Shabbat. And here we are at a time, where because of His time, we're in that time right now where we set aside this time and we get a chance to open up Scripture and interact with it. So I just wanted to bring that up.

Jono: Amen, I have one question, if I may, and I know we don't have anywhere near enough time to even think about this, but I just want to jump ahead into Bereshit chapter 3, and here we are that is commonly the event known as “the fall”, the serpent. Nehemia, I know that Christian theology obviously has a rather detailed and illustrious career of Satan and the devil to almost a God-type status, and the battle back-and-forth, and so on and so forth, and it all begins here at the serpent. Let’s not get into that, but I know that the Jewish understanding of Satan is an almost an entirely different thing when we look at the Book of Job, obviously. But here, the serpent, we understand that everything that Elohim created was good. How do we explain the serpent? Can you do it in a nutshell?

Nehemia: It’s a snake. God created everything good, but then He gave us free choice, and the animals also have free choice. They're guided by instinct, but they have free choice and they decide... You know, the lion makes a decision, is he going to kill that person or is he not? The snake decided he was going to deceive the woman. Why he did it? Well, maybe he was jealous. I just see it as a snake. I don't see this is as a part of a cosmic battle. I understand that Christians...

Keith: I'd like...

Nehemia: What's that?

Keith: I'd like to give the Methodist interpretation here.

Nehemia: Bevakashah.

Jono: Keith?

Keith: Jono, I think the verse is really clear. The verse is really clear, in fact, the verse before this verse is very clear. It says, “And they were, the two of them, they were arumim” - they were naked – “the man and his wife, and they were not ashamed.” And then there's this wordplay, “Ve-hanachash hayah arum.” So he was crafty, or more crafty. And what I love about this one verse, one statement, in chapter 3 verse 1, “From all the animals whom Yehovah made.” So He made the serpent arum, crafty, and so we expect him to be crafty. It's a created snake, serpent, whatever we want to call it, and He made it be arum, and it’s doing what it was created to do.

Jono: It's doing what it was created to do. And so now, one has to ask...

Keith: And you know what? And guess what?

Jono: Yeah?

Keith: Here goes the radical part. The radical part is this - God wasn't up in the heaven saying, “Wow, that serpent. Wonder where he got that idea?”

Jono: “You didn't expect that.”

Nehemia: “I didn't see that one coming.”

Jono: “I didn't see that one coming, well.”

Keith: He made him arum. Somebody say arum.

Nehemia: Arum.

Jono: Arum.

Keith: Anyway, I love that.

Jono: So he was doing what he was supposed to be doing. And so Nehemia, as you said...

Keith: I love that, yeah.

Jono: … it's an expression of free will. And so, okay, I’m good. Now, this is obviously one of two...

Nehemia: When Georgia steals the peanut butter off of the counter and eats the whole thing, she knows what she's doing. She's not quite as crafty as the serpent, but she's pretty crafty. She knows she's not supposed to be doing that, and she still does it because she has free will, and that's part of how God created the universe. Hallelujah.

Jono: There it is. And one of two conversations with animals, I think in the Bible, the other one is the donkey of Balaam?

Nehemia: Numbers 22, Balaam's ass.

Jono: There it is.

Nehemia: Where Balaam spoke to his own ass.

Jono: That's right.

Keith: Hey, no cursing. No cursing on this show.

Nehemia: What are you talking about? I haven't...

Jono: It is written.

Keith: Okay.

Jono: All right, my friends, is there anything else that we want to quickly throw into a nutshell? Keith?

Keith: I would like to just simply say that by God's grace and His perfect favor and will, it would be nice for people to know that we are going to at least try one of these topics per week. And if He allows us, we don't have to feel like we have to do everything, but you know what? What we were able to accomplish by this one little portion, one little section of Scripture like that, where we could discuss it and have a Midrash, or whatever you want to call it. I think it's really beneficial, and I want to thank you guys for doing this.

Nehemia: Amen. Yes, thank you. My little nutshell nugget is verse 14. This is, I guess, a future discussion, but verse 14, talks about the sun and the moon. It says, “And they shall be,” it says, “for signs and for,” they translate, “for seasons and for days and for years.” And the word they translate as, “for seasons” in Hebrew is actually mo'adim, which is the Hebrew word for appointed times. The same word used in Leviticus 23 that describes the appointed times of the Creator, these biblical festivals. What this is actually saying is that God created the sun and the moon to function for the purpose of His biblical appointed times. So that was actually hot-wired into creation, that system.

Keith: Amen.

Jono: Amen. There we are, my friends. There is Pearls from the Torah Portion. Again, thank you, Keith Johnson and Nehemia Gordon. We look forward to speaking to you again next week, and of course, next week Noah chapter 6 through to chapter 11. Looking forward to having a look at a few passages there. In the meantime, listeners, be blessed, be set apart by the truth of the Father's word. Shalom.

Nehemia: Shalom.

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  • Wayne says:

    I came hear to learn not be entertained. I only want truth so that in understanding I can serve my brother in truth. After 63 years there are numerous religions but still only one true Elohim, Jehovah. He works through the mind and heart of man at his pleasure for his glory, in his time. Elohim Jehovah will do all his pleasure and that we may seek him in all truth regardless of titles of congregations of men. Leaving behind the fables, deception and traditions of men….

    Happy that he has dealt graciously to me in finding a path back to him in truth. Thank you Dr. Gordon for doing his will in your work.

    Regards,
    Wayne
    a gentile in the states united for America

  • donald murphy says:

    stay away from that pagan religion christainty.

  • ALONSO MENDOZA says:

    Hover: could it be that God was giving birth to all of creation? For example, dont hens ”hover” before laying an egg?

  • José says:

    Nehemia, is there an explanation of why light was created in day one, plants/trees in day three but the sun in day four? I mean, the sun is what provides light, and is what makes plants to grow, right?

    • Sam says:

      Moses called the light goodness. 24 hour days did not exist yet he created light …goodness some… Christians believe he created yeshua…that is why yeshua said he was there from the begining….

    • Sherry says:

      Maybe the light created in day one did not need the sun, moon, stars etc. YeHoVaH is light, and in the end we won’t have sun, moon, stars because we won’t need for light. He created those so we would have season’s, etc. Just a thought.

  • donald murphy says:

    since shemini atzeret, the annual reading, nor hanukkah r not in scripture, then y do people celebrate them??

    • Sherri says:

      Two cryptic references in the Torah cause the confusion about the status of Shemini Atzeret. In both Leviticus and Numbers, God commands that the eighth (shemini) day –referring to Sukkot–is to be a “sacred occasion” and an atzeret, generally translated as “solemn gathering.”

  • Walter Schwenk says:

    It would have been GREAT to have had prof Gerald Schroeder in on this gen 1 conversation. Thanks Nehemia for the two times you had him on the hebrew voices series. After the bible, I count his interpretation of gen 1 as the best ever.

  • Paige says:

    Pearls colleted:
    1.about the chronological problem of God’s creation, Nehemia refers the view of numbers of jews is not that exact as the Christian or westen view. This point let me think of the difference between Chinese ancient culture and western culture. Chinese ancient painting never seems as real as western oil painting. I don’t think if this approves some contrast between estern and west.
    2. about “Et” in Hebrew the grammatical truth V.S. theological belief of referring to Jesus, I think latter one is just Nehemia’s respect of different view. It is so clear and easy here. I would like to know how Nehemia talk about more places in old testment reffering to Jesus by Christian.
    Thanks for u all for this leading truth talk show. I am trying to follow from Bereshit. Hope not too late. Thanks.

  • Brian Hanson says:

    Keith on arum & Nehemia on mo’adim. Mind-blowing insights.

  • Garry says:

    I read a long time ago that God “began” to create the heavens and the earth

  • John Jacob S says:

    Finally found my confirmation. It was heartwarming to find the nikkud to the holy name of the Judaeo-Christian God.

  • Jose Cruz Marquez Aguilar says:

    I believe that science is a way to discover/understand many thing that God does (even when many scientist claim to be atheists).

    About the creation, I believe that God doesn’t create anything that is chaotic, without order. I also believe that the whole process starting from verse 2 is literally 6 days… but, from verse 1 to verse 2 I believe there is a “gap” of many years (could be hundreds, I don’t know) and this is why:

    1. I believe that God created everything and I was good (even maybe God did it through a big-bang).
    2. I can’t turn my back to the fact that there are proofs of the dinosaurs, so I believe they were part of the original/first-part-of creation.
    3. When Adam disobeyed, Satan was already a “fallen angel”.
    4. Based on previous point, I believe that Ez 28 is a “shadow” of what Satan did, so, in the “gap” between verse 1 and 2, is the time when Satan became actually Satan, and that caused the destruction of everything that was on the Earth.
    5. This destruction caused the Earth to be in chaos (we know, that if a few of the biggest volcanoes start erupting, the Earth would fall into an irreversible process of darkness and destruction due to all the clouds/smoke/rocks… etc).
    6. Then the Earth is now in chaos, void, dark… and the process of creating the Earth as we know it, started. That is what Genesis focus on, the establishing God’s order on Earth, and then with the “crown” of creation, the human being.

    That is the way I see it, but I ask God to always make see the truth, so I can “fix”/change what I believe. And of course, as you said, believing in this gap or not, it does not affect my relationship with God, but it certainly makes me see that, in fact, everything was created by his Word/Hands, including the dinosaurs (or the rests of them)

    Yehovah bless you and your ministries!

  • Jeremy Hula says:

    What about the book of Jubillees. It says and then Yehovah shut the mouths of the animals. They used to talk before the stunt with the serpent.

  • Jeremy Hula says:

    I like the way that they camped in the shape of a cross in the desert.

  • Gregory Irby says:

    Interesting discussion guys.
    GOD is light / GOD dwells in Unapproachable Light. The scriptures tell us things like this.
    Could it be that when GOD Spoke and said “Let There Be Light”, that what he was really saying was “Let My Holy Spirit be present in all the world?

    One thing I have learned over the years is that the Word of God tends to be Spiritual, especially the Prophetic Writings.
    It’s bread from Heaven and food for thought.

    7 the number of completion? I found that to be an interesting concept. GOD completed all his work in 6 days. It is true the the 7th day completes the week.
    I have been taught that 7 is the number of Spiritual Perfection and 10 represents completion. We count 1 thru 10.
    Unless,… Your a Mayan Indian and you head God is the Great Dragon and you count by 20’s

    According to their prophecies: Quezicotel is scheduled to return at the beginning of the next age or era. Their last age ended in 2012.
    Isn’t it interesting, in “Revelation” we’re told “Whoa to the Earth and Sea for the Devil has come down to you having Great Wrath, knowing that his time is short. ”

    From the beginning of the Creation until the time of the end we have the very WORDS OF YEHOVAH! Hallelujah!

    In the Tanakh & the NT we are told GOD is going to return and retake this planet by force and dwell with his people forever!

    Satan is gonna get the boot!

    I know this may be a little offtrack for the Genesis study but, whether Jew Christian or Muslim, we all look forward to the return of GOD and the establishment of HIS Kingdom.

    Shalom Friends!

    • Gary says:

      What an interesting post. I like your imagery and the concept of God’s light being the Holy Spirit in the world. I am coming to a notion that the Holy Spirit (and other such related descriptions) is a bridge connecting the Spiritual reality to the Physical reality.
      I feel that the components of each reality interact with other components of their particular reality. My problem is the question of how these realities may interact. The Holy Spirit (or Light of God) may be thought of as such a connection.
      I have often counseled persons going through tough times in their lives that the darkness in their lives and future is like a large shadow in the path before them. Could it be, I ask, your own shadow you see before you because you have turned your back to God? Change and turn more and more around to go toward God (the light} and the darkness will have no part of your future.
      I think people can hold such an image for a long time. It is simple, and is actually pretty easy to confirm.
      Thank you.

  • donald murphy says:

    once again people, we need to stay from the so called new testament. its not true.

    • Gary says:

      Well, I’d like to explore this statement more deeply with you, but I’m not sure it is “on topic” in this forum. I will just “tease” it a little to say that I disagree with the notion of “true and false” when evaluating the NT. Remember, like all documents of this type, it is opinions of Spiritual matters expressed in Physical reality concerns. It is very difficult to express in words and images that are all physical in nature. Plus, the writings we have are copies of copies or copies … done by Why Knows? who have various skills or lack of over many years, translated from and to a variety of languages which weren’t known by some of the scribes, even some of whom didn’t read at all but were only copying characters one by one. The whole process is fraught with mistakes and errors of various kinds, and has been changed with rearrangement, and revisions based on personal opinions of the copyists and their managers. Hopeless? Maybe. But does any of it speak to the truth of reality in no way? I hope by looking at it deeply and considering its time and ours, we can dig out some obvious “truths” and some partial truths, and even skip or modify some untruths that we can see were made.
      Hard job? Yes. Possible at all? I hope so.
      Yes, I’d like to explore more deeply. In the sense of Ecclesiastes … it may really matter at all what we think.

      • Gary says:

        See how easily errors can be made? Of course I meant,
        “In the sense of Ecclesiastes … it may not really matter at all what we think.”

        Which brings up the issue: Can I edit what I have posted? It’s hard, being human, to be perfect.
        Gary

  • John Stava says:

    Thanks for an informative portion.

  • Laurie says:

    What I love about God our Father is that He does things past my understanding. I love what is written in 1:3 “Let there be light” and He hadn’t even created the moon or the sun yet! “His Spirit hovered over the surface of the water. ” I am in Awe of Him! And what Yochanan wrote in the first chapter lines right up with what is written in the beginning. Absolutely beautiful!

  • Sarah Fennel Buchanan says:

    I have a question about Gen. 2:4, in many English translations it says “these are the generations of the heavens and of the earth…” Could that be a correct translation from Hebrew and if so wouldn’t that lead us to think it wasn’t 6 literal days?

  • Teresa. Henriques says:

    In this exact moment I am listening to Torah Pearls, Genesis, and in my Bible in Spanish, in the first verse says: IN THE BEGINNING, WHEN GOD CREATED THE WORLD…..so the word which clears this verse is WHEN?

  • Randy Heaton says:

    I just like to study Torah with other people who like to study Torah.

  • Ruth Peterson says:

    Thanks for your posts with the three which is a good way to discuss views of Torah and yet k3ping a good Spirit…

  • Sherri Young says:

    Nehemia, have you every taken a long look at the Young’s Literal Translation? What do you think of the YLT’s translation of Genesis 4:26? Is that a good translation of that passage?

    Thanks.

  • Krista says:

    Will you ever do a redo of Bereshit that covers the entire section? There are so many questions I and others have that we would benefit from a redo where you cover all of this section

  • UKJ says:

    Animals (snake in the case of Gen.) vs. Humans

    Ah, how marvellous, now I get it and understand why I am being whispered to by my pets, they always get their treats that way, just realized this..thank you for giving me that comprehensive insight!

    I realize now how superior they are, they can tell me without speaking a word…

    (Only kidding)

    • UKJ says:

      Gen 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

      Somehow I feel something might be missing in our understanding of the serpent as an animal. I am specifically referring to the conversation bit. Please may I ask whether the Hebrew text is the same in it’s translation and meaning?

      I do understand that Yehovah is wanting us to understand things and this may be the only way …of course most relate the serpent to satan, but I would be most appreciative in understanding the actually Hebrew meaning of the words and whether the english translation is missing some points?

      • UKJ says:

        In addition …

        Jas 1:13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man:

        This begs the question :” How could Eve have been tempted by a serpent without vocal cords?

  • UKJ says:

    Gen 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void;

    I do have a question, :”Without form and void” What is the exact translation from the Hebrew text ?? Thank you for the answer.

    • Ursula Jebb says:

      Gen 1:2
      And the earth was without form, and void;
      Friedrich Heinrich Wilhelm Gesenius,1812
      Christopher Leo’s edition of Gesenius, published in 1825
      gives the meaning: “to be” or “to exist”, “to become”, “to be done”,

      The text in Gen.1:2 could be rendered “the earth had been created perfect and then it became without form, and void..
      However, this could possibly be a problem for those who believe in evolution.

    • Walter Schwenk says:

      UKJ, you might appreciate Gerald Schroeder’s take on the days of creation, “genesis and the big bang.” The earth came into being in rough form, then was brought to habitable condition. In other words, heaven and earth were created on day one, but in “kit form”, with some assembly required.

      • UKJ says:

        PS
        On a side note it seems that instead of gradual improvements on the earth , things are actually deteriorating, this could explain the lengthy life that people had in those days. It is only medical science that extends the life of people’s in our society.

  • Roopods6 says:

    So that Genesis 1:1 actually tells us that “In the beginning” – “Created Elohim” – “at the heavens” – “and at the earth”. Nice to finally hear the correct meaning after 55 years. That isn’t being sarcastic either. Thank you Nehemia.

    One small oversight I’d like to mention though. In the beginning of what? My point being the whole purpose of a material universe is completely glossed over as per the usual. We think so small don’t we? I mean we haven’t a clue of a greater reality even existing do we? The greater reality existed before a created material universe ever did. For eternity past we haven’t a clue just as we haven’t a clue to eternity’s future. We have only the Creation made by the Creator for his story (Word). Genesis 1:1 begins the story, His Story (History) of the Creation that he made for his son(s).

    The greater reality is the ‘spirit world’ that has existed and will continue to exist when this material world no longer exists. The Adonai of Ruachs (Lord of Spirits) created the spirit within your own flesh (Psalm 139:13) when it was in your mothers womb. Yah is the EL (Mighty One) who judges (Psalm 82:1-8) Elohim (mighty ones) is he not? And wouldn’t that mean it was the mighty ones, the Elohim who helped in the creation of the material universe according to the Word of Genesis 1:1? I mean weren’t the Elohim there too? Doesn’t that say exactly just that in Genesis 1:1?

  • Laurie says:

    I have to agree that in chapter one, Yehovah created and is written what Yehovah created. In chapter two gives the history of what He created. How and when. I would like to comment on something I love in chapter two. From a woman’s perspective. I love the thought of my Father, our Father. Causing the man to sleep while He formed me. I don’t know how much alone time Ishah had with our Father, but I, my alone time with Him. This is the time when I am free and truly am loved and safely I can love.

  • Nehemia, Thank you for all these teachings. It is so wonderful to have a Hebrew perspective.

    On the light issue, I read this more along the lines of drawing back a curtain. It is as if the world is swaddled in a curtain of dark clouds and “let there be light” does not create the light, but rather draws back the curtain and lets the light in. The curtain is drawn back more and more until on the fourth day the sun, moon and stars become visible. The heavenly lights were not created on the fourth day, they only became visible on that day. The text seems to mention that, oh by the way, Elohim was the maker of these heavenly bodies also, but it doesn’t say when. I can’t read Hebrew well enough to know if this is all born out in the original text? Your thoughts?

    I read that YHVH created the universe in the beginning. Then, He came to a formless world and took six days to change it to support life. He may have made the universe in an instant but then why take six days, six light and dark periods, to form life on the planet? To show us Shabbat, of course. I don’t know how long it took to create the universe and if I was meant to know the Torah would have told me.

    • David says:

      In Job38, YHVH says He set up the foundations of the earth, measures, sets the cornerstone, makes the morning stars appear, pours water over the earth and swaddles the earth in dark clouds. I see no reason our star (the Sun) wouldn’t appear at the same time as all the other stars. This is the condition of the planet at the beginning of the first day indicating that all these Job38 actions occurred before the first day. Job38 is part of Gen1:1 before we start on Gen1:2. I’m sure there were other things which make up Gen1:1 as well. How long does all this Gen1:1 stuff take? I don’t see any Torah answer? I doubt it takes 14.5 billion years and I am quite sure there was no Big Bang. All the morning stars shone together. Were the Sons of God (angels) created at the same time as the morning stars or did they exist before?

  • Virgil says:

    If an evening and the morning constitute a day, does this mean we are still in the 7th?

    • David says:

      I think the seven creation days were both single days and thousand year periods. The seventh day comes right after the sixth. We are nearing the end of the sixth thousandth year period – one more thousand to go!

  • Sandra Iventosch says:

    Gerald Schroader, a brilliant Israeli physicist, wrote a book entitled, “Genesis and the Big Bang” that is a must read for anyone contemplating the accuracy of Bereshit verses what we theorize must have happened (step by step) in a big bang event.

  • Antonio Gary says:

    I am new too this my brothers but am open and willing and thirst too learn

  • buddy mascaro says:

    a snake really, its the fig. of speech ,hypacatastasis .see bullinger ,a person well versed, john w schoenheit ck, it out or not. im no schalor by any streach but yehovah loves to use figures of sp.your buddy Michael rood would a great deal about them from his background.

  • Sekartaji says:

    Nehemia, I am waiting for you and Keith to continue this Bereshit and talking about Cain, Abel, Set, Enos, and Nephilim!

  • Helwing says:

    Poruszający watek z Tory
    Pozdrawiam, Helwing
    http://www.jehowa-biblioteka.com/

  • ariellat says:

    Just to refer to the idea of ex Christians not tolerating Christian teachings, Some, perhaps most of us need to make a clear division between what we used to believe and what is truth. Otherwise it comes across as confusion. Perhaps after coming to a stand and being settled, then to look at the other side might be more comfortable. People in a process are on a journey and don’t want to look back. Thanks for your very good study on Bereshit!

  • Laurie Jo says:

    YHWH Elohim alone created the heavens the earth, the seas, and fountains of water, so fear Him, because the hour of His judgment occurs without fail. This is the good news folks. Read Revelations 14:6-7, and don’t believe the misconception that Yahushua Messiah created anything. That is not what Scripture teaches.
    All things were created through, by, or for Yahushua, meaning that YHWH created all things with Yahushua in His heart to make everything filled. Yahushua fills the feast days, etc… Yahushua IS The Prophet of whom Mosheh spoke, etc…
    Written in love for Abbas people,
    Laurie Jo

  • Rachel Tan says:

    After listening this episode about Creation part for many times, I came to my personal conclusion. When God create the universe, from day 1-6, it before human time, so IMHO the “day” length were different with what we know now. After day 6th, Adam life in Eden, in my understanding, it is not on the earth we know now. We don’t know (or I don’t know) how long the different time between Adam and Eve creations.

    Now, if in bible stated the age of Adam, is that his age after he became mortal, or since he created by God? Also, when Adam created, he already in mature age (not in cute baby form).

    So whatever the theory is, my faith to Jehovah as Creator is still the same.

  • kris says:

    ____________________________________

    Genesis 1:1-2partial
    In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth being without form and empty, and darkness on the face of the deep…

    Isaiah 45:18-19
    For so says YHVH, Creator of the heavens; He is God, forming the earth and making it; He makes it stand, not creating it empty/vain, (but) forming it to be inhabited. I am YHVH, and there is none else. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth. I did not say to Jacob’s seed, Seek Me in vain. I YHVH speak righteousness, declaring right things.

    hayah – to be, to become, to be made or done, to exist, to come to pass, to be over, ended, gone by

    ____________________________________

    I have heard that …
    Water + Particular Sound Frequency = Full Spectrum of Light
    Any scientists out there? Is this true? If so, any reliable scientific journal articles (or the like) to which someone could point me?

    ____________________________________

    Any opinions on the use of “eth” and “ha”?

    ____________________________________

    Opinions …. double helix or rib, or both?

    ____________________________________

    Yes, it is true that some Christians such as myself view the serpent as more than a serpent. Likewise…

    Ezekiel 28:11-19
    And the word of YHVH was to me, saying, Son of man, lift up a lament over the king of Tyre, and say to him, So says the Lord YHVH: You seal the measure, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You have been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone (was) your covering, the ruby, the topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper; the sapphire, the turquoise, and the emerald, and gold. The workmanship of your tabrets and of your pipes in you, in the day you were created, they were prepared. You (were) the anointed cherub that covers, and I had put you in the holy height of God, (where) you were. You walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created, until iniquity was found in you. By the multitude of your trade they filled your midst (with) violence, and you sinned. So I cast you profaned from the height of God, and I destroyed you, O covering cherub, from among the stones of fire. Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. I have cast you to the ground. I will put you before kings, that they may see you. By the host of your iniquities, by the iniquity of your trade, you have profaned your holy places; thus I brought a fire from your midst; it shall devour you, and I will give you for ashes on the earth, in the sight of all who see you. All who know you among the peoples shall be appalled at you; you shall be terrors, and you will not be forever.
    ____________________________________

    I have heard that that word can also mean naked. Is that true? Any comments?

    ____________________________________

    According to Geza Vermes, “Various Qumran caves have yielded for the first time the original Aramaic text of one of the major Pseudepigrapha, the Book of Enoch, which was previously known from a complete Ethiopic translation…”. While Vermes states that , “The [content] differences they display concern partly the structure of the work…” and also that “There are also noticeable stylistic divergences which may be attributable more to the absence of a unified text of Enoch than to the work of the Ethiopic translator”, I nonetheless find some of it interesting. Below is an extract from 4Q206, along with a quote from the Epistle of Jude. I am aware that the comparison is a huge stretch, but nonetheless it’s interesting to me and so I figured to share. [Note: The two passages from 4Q206 (below of which is one) that Vermes includes in his volume, according to him, “testify to a recension noticeably different from the corresponding Ethiopic version.”]

    4Q206 I xxii
    Vermes
    … [the soul] of all the sons of man. And behold, these are the pits for their prison. They were made thus until the day of their judgement, until the final day of the great judgement which will be imposed on them. vacat There I saw the spirit of a dead man complaining and his moaning rising to heaven and crying and complaining…

    Jude 1:6
    And those angels not having kept their first place, but having deserted their dwelling-place, He has kept in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgement of a great day

    ____________________________________

    Noah:
    Just man
    Perfect generations
    Walked with God

    ____________________________________

    Matthew 24:36-37
    But about that day and the hour, no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, except my Father only. But as the days of Noah, so also will be the coming of the Son of man. For as they were in the days before the flood: eating, and drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah went into the ark — and they did not know until the flood came and took all away — so also will be the coming of the Son of man.

    ____________________________________

    Rev 12:7-9
    NASB
    And there was war in heaven, Michael and his angels waging war with the dragon. The dragon and his angels waged war, and they were not strong enough, and there was no longer a place found for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

    • Ursula Jebb says:

      Very interesting, thank you.

      I would like to throw in the following questions:

      ‘Why did Jehovah bring in the flood upon such an ungodly and wicked world, when the world carried on as before after the flood ? ‘

      Could it be that it had to do with the “DNA”, which became completly corrupted by these wicked spirits ?(who took wifes from the human race)

      Could this explain Noah and his family as the only Humans with DNA still uncorrupted as to represent Humans made in the image of Jehovah? Just wondering.

      • Yes, exactly. That’s why it says Noah was “perfect in his generations.” This is the only time in the bible this phrase is used. I don’t think it means Noah was perfect, but rather that he had no corrupt DNA.

        I first read this in a Jewish commentary. This fallen angel corruption has been a Jewish idea for centuries, maybe even prior to Jesus.

  • Debra aka Devora Forsman says:

    Nehemia could the ruach be the breath of Elohim when He spoke it havered (lol) over or caused a flutter or ripple effect as He spoke and the very sound waves from His speaking caused things to come into existence? I know I get a little out there sometimes but this is what I see in my minds eye as Yehovah begins to speak those words, it was like the sound waves caused a ripple effect over the water….I know! Way out there right? Have you seen those videos where the sound waves cause different beautiful patterns to form? THINKING outside the box!

  • Nicholas Mansfield says:

    Can someone please refer Keith to Proverbs 8? There the messiah witnesses YHWH creating. He has no hand in the creation. The Qur’an confirms this (latter) matter, in agreement with the Tanakh. Christians seem confused by the John 1:1-3. It should be interpreted:

    “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God and the word was [the will of] God. This is the one was in the beginning with God (Prov. 8:22,29, Micah 5:2). Through him everything [with purpose] came into being and without him nothing that exists came into being [with purpose].”

    • Linda Murray says:

      Nicholas Mansfield… EX-SQUEEZE ME, dear…!

      Proverbs 8 says… “I, WISDOM…” which I believe you & I BOTH agree is Yeshua/ Messiah.

      He most CERTAINLY DID have a hand in the creation… & I will show you how.

      ‘Gen 1:1…
      In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.’

      Bereshit… in the beginning… has not been fully translated correctly in the English. It SHOULD read… ‘With WISDOM God Created…’

  • On the question of time during creation week, it is very simple. Light is not necessary to provide a measure of time. All that is needed is a regular motion and a reference point. The rotation of the earth is a regular motion. We need light in relation to observing the passage of time as a means of communicating the information to us. The creation of the lamps on Day 4 (described by an observer on this planet) added a reference point for human observation of days, as well as mechanisms for months and years. But they were not necessary for the measurement of time on Day One.

    There are things in the solar system which support the young-earth viewpoint. One is the recession of the moon. It is slowly getting further from the earth (and I can never remember whether it is an inch a yer or only a centimetre a year). Projected back in time, this points to increasingly violent tides. Well within the time scale postulated by evolutionists, the tides would have been too violent to match the scenario they propose. Secondly, the rings of Saturn are falling onto the planet at such a rate that it is very unlikely that they are millions of years old. Thirdly, when the Voyager probes were being launched, Russell Humphries proposed readings for the magnetic fields of some of the outer planets and their moons, based upon a Genesis chapter 1 model with young-earth assumptions. His predictions were ridiculed as being too far from what other people expected on an evolutionary model. But the measurements from the Voyager probes vindicated Russell Humphries’ model. Fourthly, the lack of significant quantities of meteorite dust on the moon, coupled with the distribution of craters on the moon and Mars, also imply a recent date of origin and a unique and relatively short-lived burst of impacts. There are still enough lumps of rock in the solar system to continue to do damage, but not enough to match an evolutionary time scale. Fifthly, the relatively short life of comets, and the lack of any observations of the postulated Oort Cloud (postulated to explain why we still have comets if the solar system is hundreds or thousands of millions of years old) fits better with a young earth model.

    • Patricia Palinski says:

      What convinced me of a young earth is not something in outer space but here on earth: the oceans are not yet full of salt. If the earth and the oceans are millions or billions of years old, there would be so much salt in the water from minerals washing down for so long, the water would be super-saturated with them such that it would be precipitating out and falling to the bottom. Water can hold only so much dissolved minerals. We have explored the bottom of the oceans, and there is no layer of salt scores or hundreds of feet deep, that you would expect to find if the oceans have been collecting salt for millions of years. So that adds to the evidence from outer space–the process of minerals washing into the seas cannot have been going on for very long, or there would be tons more salt in the water than we find now.

  • Diane Buckalew says:

    Nehemia I was able to listen to whole program with no problems. thank you

  • Sandy says:

    Seems to work fine. Appreciate any teachings I can find of yours. Michigan

  • Jeffery Roger Justice says:

    I Had no problems with the sound or stream…

  • yzwisey62 says:

    Stream cuts out but, picks back up.