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During the semester we have discussed ideas about the identities of the various authors of Pentateuch and creation stories of two authors (P and J). The Priestly account found in Genesis chapter one features God creating the world in six days and resting on the seventh. The story by J author in Genesis chapters two and three is the well-known account of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. In this paper I will explain the differences in these two stories, which describe the same event, and the main theme they have in common.

The Creation of Separation

In the analysis of the Genesis we have found “doublet” of creation story written by P (priestly source) and J authors. These two stories have certain common threats and differences, some of which are significant and bring a portion of confusion in the general outline of creation that can be derived from two different stories. Firstly there will be analyzed the differences of different stories and afterwards specific features which make P and J authors’ writings identifiable.

So the first story (Genesis 1 – P author) starts from chaos (so there is no world) and God creates the heavens and the earth.  Then God creates something new from day to day in accordance to the following outline: 1) the light separated from darkness (day and night); 2) expanse separated the water from water (the sky); 3) the dry ground separated water (land and seas) and vegetation appeared (plants); 4) the lights separated day and night (the stars, sun and moon); 5) the sea swarmed with living creatures and the sky with birds; 6) livestock and animals appeared on the earth, the same day God created “man in his own image” also. The seventh day of creation was reserved for the rest (holy day). It is noticeable that man and woman were created at the simultaneously and made them in charge of everything on the earth and allowed them eating fruits from any trees.

The second story (Genesis 2 – J author) is much simpler and is not complicated with details. It just establishes a fact that the earth and the heavens were created; there are no plants, rains and people. Then the earth was watered and Lord creates single man (Adam), then Lord made trees grow (including trees of life and knowledge of good and evil). Later Lord creates animals and birds, and only after all the above God separately creates woman from man’s rib.

Thus the main differences in these doublets are concerned with the orders of creation (what was first, second etc and last) – they are almost reverse, the situation before creation – P source states there was a chaos, J source claims there was land and seeds (probably) but no water and farmer to help them grow; the creation of man and woman; J source does not explain the nature of stars, moon and sun also.

For me it is obvious that the above stories describe the same events but from different perspectives. The first creation account seems to be more detailed and trust-worthy while the second misses significant details and does not explain many things. But I consider these creation accounts to be complementary. Because the second story can be used just as introduction to the story of Adam and Eve (and the fall of man) without intention to provide details of word creation at all. So the second story can just generally repeat the creation, distort the facts by representing the story from another viewpoint and skip some details. This is a normal situation for the history related texts – different authors describe the same events differently while claiming for the originality of their stories.

Each story has a different name of the Creator: Elohim (P) and Yahweh (J). The priestly writings (P) include lots of words that are specific for priests (like righteous man, corrupted etc), most sentences start with the conjunction ‘and’, the story is told in a formal way – the major nuances explained extensively in order to make the story more authentic, the role of man is emphasized: “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground” (Genesis 1:26), the priest stresses the power of God everywhere it’s possible. The J story is written in informal style – for example the Lord was walking in the garden, it is even humorous in some way. J’s writings certainly have their own, unique, style which can be identified by professional linguists and analysts, but they are not so obvious for usual Bible readers.

The separation of man from God implies death – the first record of separation is mentioned in Genesis 2, when God warns Adam not to eat the fruits from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The separation from God can be achieved through disobedience because God expects people to follow his commandments and instructions. But God understands there is a possibility Adam will not completely understand or follow his instructions and deliberately creates forbidden tree in the garden so as to separate man from himself. When Adam and Eve eat from forbidden tree God curses them: “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life” (Genesis 3:17). In Genesis 3:21 Lord said: “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever” – this is another instance of separation of man from God. The Lord confirms the words of serpent when it tempts Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, banishes people from the Garden of Eden. So the separation implies the absence of relationships with God. The J story tells that God and man were not separate from the beginning because they communicated and God even walked in the garden while man was to guard (look after) the garden. The garden story gives us first understanding of guiltiness and guilt projection: the disobedience is bad (it is a sin) and for this reason man is guilty before the Lord, the Lord and sin are incompatible. The guiltiness causes the projection to all next generations of people (they were cursed because of Adam) – they became guilty in advance, be default. Thus the Lord did not give a single chance to people be righteous before him and separated man from himself. The priestly source tells that man was already created in the image of God (but man was not able to fly, create birds or stars, whatever). So P source implies that man was designed like God and J source states that man can become like God after eating the forbidden fruit, and finally in second story it happens. For this reason God separated man from himself for sure once and forever. It can be concluded that God deliberately made us in his image but later decided to change it and separate us from himself.

The Old Testament describes the universe to be three-tiered: the top (heaven) is the place of Gods which have supernatural abilities and forces; and the heaven is represented like a tent over the lower tiers (the earth and Sheol) with sun, moon and stars; the middle tier is the earth where all living people and creatures live, and the bottom is Sheol. People of Israel are chosen to be saved after death while others are not chosen. Sheol is the place where dead people inhabit (both righteous and unrighteous) separately from God and live people. The God send people there and he can take them back on his discretion. There is dust in Sheol and the Lord created man from dust (Genesis 2) and later God said:”from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return” (Genesis 3:19) – he talks about Sheol, probably.

Finally, I would like to express my own thoughts about the creation and separation. I consider all the contradictions of different authors are not the reasons to disbelief because they are written by different people in different time periods and thus represent different viewpoints. The common treat is that they intend to explain us that God created the universe, the earth and the man. It is not a scientific writing and thus it is not the purpose of the Bible to explain and prove us the nature of things. Scientists still can not completely and earnestly explain this issue. Bible teaches us love each other, love God and continue the human race. It does not matter how many people wrote ‘the word of God’ and why the details are different. The Bible is a book of deep knowledge for me and all people understand it differently, all people can find something interesting and edifying in this book.

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