Covenant Structure in Genesis 1 – Day 1

The Creation Week establishes the fundamental pattern that governs everything in the Bible from beginning to end, both the literature and the history.

As an expansion of the five-point covenant pattern (that which structures Genesis chapters 1-5 and the five books of the Torah), the Creation Week must be understood not only as tabernacle-temple architecture but also as a chain of authority, from the ultimate authority of God in heaven, via a mediatory “veil” (the firmament) to its corresponding earthly mediator, an Adamic “veil of flesh” (Hebrews 10:20).

However, while the overall sequence is relatively simple, a closer analysis of its internal structure reveals a wonderful diversity between the days, since each plays upon the basic theme in its own way. Moreover, these idiosyncrasies drop subtle hints concerning later events.

DAY 1

Overview

Just as the Sabbath—the first feast of the seven listed in Leviticus 23—established the pattern for the entire sevenfold harvest year, so also the events of Day 1 of Creation are the entire Week in microcosm.

1. The Creation Week is a process of forming and filling: three days of dividing things (building the house) followed by three days of filling them with stuff (moving into the house). It is fascinating that the creation itself begins with a duality, the heavens and the earth. Everything that follows is about the relationship between these two domains.
2. “Without form and empty” is the negative precursor to “forming and filling.” The darkness in this second step corresponds to the firmament of Day 2 and the Veil of the Temple.
3. The correspondences in line 3 with the events of Day 3 are subtle but there nonetheless. The dove sent out by Noah was a sign of the “ascension” of the dry land from the waters of the flood. Matthew 3 describes Jesus’ baptism as a Levitical rite, and the Spirit hovers like a dove over the waters. This is thus an act that prefigures an ordination for humble service. Every command by God in heaven is obeyed by the quiet earth. The word “face” also relates to the “Bread of the Face” in the Tabernacle which corresponds to the fruit bearers of Day 3. While stanza 2 mentioned the “face”of the deep, the Spirit of God is now shining upon that face. The entire goal is that heaven and earth might ultimately be “face to face.”
4. The actual creation of light corresponds to the creation of the multiplied lights of Day 4—the one and the many. “And God saw” relates to the light afforded by the seven lights—or seven “eyes”—of the Lampstand.
5. Day 4 is usually the easiest step to spot, but Day 5 is frequently the toughest; its basic theme is multiplication so perhaps it is not surprising that it employs manifold symbols to get that point across. While the prophets, as legal witnesses, commanded the sea and the sky (think Moses and Elijah, the “two witnesses”) the correspondence here might simply be the role of the prophet in softening the hearts of some and hardening the hearts of others. This act of separating the light from the darkness is the role of the preacher since Satan himself can appear as an angel of light.
6. The act of naming is a form of “oath,” an authoritative word. Corresponding to Day 6, this act of “calling out” physical light and darkness would be replicated in the call of Adam, as the image of God, to discern and “name” moral light and moral darkness.
7. While God would not rest from His work of creation (at least officially) until Day 7, the first day ends with the world in a “deep sleep.” Since the heavenly lights were not yet created, the role of governing the times and seasons was still in the hand of God, and not yet delegated to created objects. This reminds us that the power of kings (as human “stars”) is not inherent but delegated to them by God.
8. Since Day 3 is twofold, the “forming” section of the Week is an image of the whole. Its sacramental “grain and grapes” are a promise of rest and rule with God in the same way that the manna and the grapes of Eshcol were a priestly promise of the kingly possession of the fields and vineyards of Canaan.

Analysis

• Like the Torah, the very first stanza of the Bible is fivefold and thus governed by a chain of authority. What is interesting is that ’elohim is not the first word. God is the lawmaker at the center of the pattern. All history follows this pattern at multiple levels, but it is trinitarian in that it follows the relationship between the Father and the Son. The Father speaks, the Son obeys, the Father blesses. This suggests that the stanza hints at what John describes explicitly—that all things were made through the Son. His obedience “unto death” actually began at the foundation of the world. Although all things were made through Him, it seems that He did not know all that was in the Father’s mind for Him.¹For more discussion, see Educating Jesus and The Eternal Perfection of the Son.

• Contrary to what many claim, God did not create the cosmos out of chaos but ex nihilo—out of nothing. There was no chaos until Adam sinned. The process of creation does not move from disorder to order but from orderly emptiness to orderly fullness. The first half of stanza 2 describes the lack of forming and filling regarding the earth, but then the complete stanza describes the earth below (as forming) and then its lack of covering (as filling). The concept of Division is communicated in the fact that the central line is missing, prefiguring the same emptiness that occurs at the center of the Day 2 cycle. Notice that “formless” is in the “waters” position and “void” is in the “land” position. The “face” will come to be the mediating “flesh”of the High Priest on Day 6 (Atonement) and the “deep” will be the wild “waters” of the nations, the domain of the Man who walks upon the Sea.

• The Spirit is the Transcendent authority in this stanza. The motion of “avian” hovering (“moving, fluttering, shaking, trembling”) suggests the vibration of soundwaves relating to the speaking of the creative Law-Word. The face appears once again at Oath/Sanctions, and the waters to the nations.

• This methodology is supported by the fact that not only is the thesis at the center of the Day 1 cycle the creation of light but also that the mention of light here is threefold—a priestly command, a kingly “incarnation” in obedience, and a prophetic assessment. In terms of human responses to Ethical light, this is Word given, Word opened, Word received.

• The symmetrical use of the word “between” (meaning an interval, a space between) means that this stanza replicates the vertical arrangement of the Tabernacle, which was comprised of three domains (related to the above, beside, below of Exodus 20:4) that were separated by the veil and the tent. The same word is used in Genesis 3 to describe the enmity “between” the seeds of the woman and the serpent, and then not again until Genesis 9 where it is used repeatedly to describe the covenant made by God between Himself and all living things on the earth. This divided architecture informs all Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. The parable of the rich man and Lazarus also employs it, and cannot be understood without it.²See Their Table Made A Snare.

• In the “naming” stanza, the light and the darkness now take the positions of the covenantal “betweens,” with the day at the center, prefiguring the creation of the governing lights, the “royalty” of the heavens, at the center of the Week. This stanza, as a miniature cycle, hints at the daily rotation of the earth, with sunrise and sunset as the “betweens.”

• In the final stanza, the light and the darkness have swapped places, suggesting the shift between the “eve” of the old era (via judgment) and the beginning of the new, an image related to the succession of the rule of the Father in the inheritance of the Son. In festal and historical terms, this is the transition from the mediatory role of Israel (Atonement) to the global rule of Jesus (Booths).

If you are new to this method of interpretation, please visit the Welcome page for some help to get you up to speed.