May the mumbling commence!
It’s another time of
beginning. Let’s begin to look at the alternative
creation story recorded in Genesis chapter two. Read from Peterson’s The Message:
At the time God made Earth and Heaven, before any grasses
or shrubs had sprouted from the ground – God hadn’t yet sent any rain on Earth, nor was there anyone
around to work the ground) the whole Earth was watered by underground springs) –
God formed Man out of dirt from the ground and blew into his
nostrils the breath of life. The Man came
alive – a living soul!
Then God planted the garden of Eden, in the
east. He put the Man he had just made in
it. God made all kinds
of trees grow from the ground, tree beautiful to look at and good to eat. The Tree-of-Life was in the middle of the
garden, also the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil.
A river flows out
of Eden to water the garden and from there divides into four rivers. The first in named Pishon; it flows through
Havilah where there is gold. The gold of
this land is good. The land is also
known for a sweet-scented resin and the onyx stone. The second river is named the Gihon; it flows
through the land of Cush. The third
river is named Hiddekel and flows east
of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
God took the Man and
set him down in the Garden of Eden to work the ground and keep it in order. (Genesis 2:5-15)
Now read the same passage from the
NIV translation:
When the Lord
God made
the earth and the heavens – and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the
earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent
rain on the earth and there was no man
to work the ground, but streams came up from the earth and watered the
whole surface of the ground – the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed
into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
Now the Lord
God had
planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had
formed. And the Lord
God made
all kinds of trees grow out of the ground – trees that were pleasing to the eye
and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
A river watering
the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four
headwaters. The name of the first is the
Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. (The gold of that land is good; aromatic
resin and onyx are also there.) The name
of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of
Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.
The Lord
God took
the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of
it. (Genesis 4b-15)
In both the NIV and Peterson’s
work, there is a shift in the representative name for God. The first creation story it was simply “God”. In the second creation story Peterson goes
with God and the NIV goes with the
Lord God. I thought that transition marked a different
Hebrew word for God, but in looking at it, it’s the same word.
There is no word change to warrant
the name change… But there is a
difference in the theme of creation. We
have gone from a distant God of the universe to a more intimate “God” or “Lord
God”. It’s a matter of interpretation
for both the NIV and The Message… and
the NRSV. I’m not sure about the
reasoning.
Another change is the wording for “a
living being” in the NIV in comparison to “a living soul”. That may be taking the Hebrew a little too
far into interpretation… trying to make a distinction between Man and the
animal kingdom.
The other changes seem incidental
(the ground in verse 15) or an accurate showing of the uncertain reading of
names and geography for the rivers and for the Garden of Eden.
No translation will fully show us
the wonderful word play between the Hebrew word for ground (ADAMAH) and the
Hebrew for human (ADAM)!
Enough mumbling for now…
Peace Out
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