Revisiting the Days of Genesis: A Study of the Use of Time in Genesis I–II in Light of its Ancient Near Eastern and Literary Context. By B. C. Hodge.

Abstract

T his volume stands outside the normal sphere of modern critical Old Testament study and represents an original, if unconvincing, attempt within conservative evangelical discussion to come to terms with certain problems raised for the modern reader by Genesis 1–11. Chapters 1 and 2 set the scene before Hodge gives us his own specific arguments. Thus, in chapter 1 Hodge admits that Genesis 1–11 conveys truth through the use of myth, but he prefers to use the term ‘cultural symbolism’ because of the danger of people misunderstanding the word myth. Chapter 2 then discusses the history of interpretation. Hodge shows that among Christians and Jews, even before the rise of modern biblical criticism, there have been differences of opinion as to whether the seven-day creation of Genesis 1 is literally true or not. Philo, Origen, and (at some point) Augustine, for example, did not take the ‘days’ literally. In chapter 3 Hodge argues that the seven-day creation account of Gen. 1:1–2:4a symbolically depicts the creation of the universe as a cosmic temple (or tabernacle). The view is not new (even if Hodge gives some additional reasons for it), and there are indeed parallels between the creation account in Gen. 1:1–2:4a and the Tabernacle narrative in Exodus 25–31 and 35–40, both, for example, involving creation or construction following a series of divine speeches (seven in Exodus and eight spread over six days in a seven-day cycle in Genesis). However, there is nothing in Gen. 1:1–2:4a itself to suggest that the universe is conceived as a temple/tabernacle. This seems to be eisegesis. Related to this interpretation, Hodge sees humanity’s being in the image of God in Gen. 1:26ff. as constituting a specifically cultic image in God’s cosmic temple, but the fact that the Old Testament uniformly rejects cultic images elsewhere suggests that it is unlikely that humanity is conceived in such terms.