Bible 101: Genesis

The name “Genesis” comes from a Greek word meaning “beginning”. The Hebrew title, “Bereishis”, means “in beginning”, or literally, “head”, and is the first word of the book in the Hebrew language. This book is an appropriate introduction to the entire Bible. The seeds of all future scriptural truth are found in Genesis. More than half of recorded human history is covered in its fifty chapters. Genesis answers our gnawing questions about the origins of the universe, of ourselves, of all life forms, of sin and evil in the world. Genesis unfolds the early history of humanity and contains the family records of God’s chosen people, Israel, and related lines of descent, from the dawn of time to the settlement in Egypt.

Although Genesis is, strictly speaking, not a scientific document, only divine inspiration can account for its modern accuracy in a pre-scientific age. Genesis is very clear that all things were created and had a definite beginning point – God. Everything was well designed by a Supreme Intellect and continues on the basis of His purpose, not chance. God controls the cosmos and truly cares about the centerpiece of His creation – mankind. Though the human race departed from God’s ordered plan for them and must live with the consequences, God has lovingly provided a way back home to paradise. Genesis alone informs of the events which predated Moses, who is believed to be the author. He surely wrote using ancient sources under God’s direction.

Here is some selected commentary from the Stone Edition Chumash (rabbinic commentary):

“We begin the study of Torah with the realization the Torah is not a history book, but the charter of Man’s mission in the universe. The reason for the Torah’s narrative of Creation is to establish that God is the sovereign of the universe. But even after reading how the world and its central character, Humanity, came into being, we still do not understand the secret or even the process of Creation. It is a deep mystery. What we do know is that Adam and Eve, the forerunners of humanity, had the mission of bringing about the fulfillment of Creation by carrying out God’s commandment. They failed, and were driven into exile. Man’s mission did not change, however, only the conditions in which it would be carried out. God punished the transgressors, but did not discard them. They could repent; indeed, the concept of repentance was a prerequisite to Man’s existence, because he could not have survived without it. Adam and Eve repented. So did the subsequent sinners, Cain and Lamech. This, too, is one of the major lessons of the story of Genesis: Man may sin, but he can come back, and God allows him the opportunity to do so.
All this is a prelude to the story of Israel. God was patient for ten generations between Noah and Abraham, but each one of these generations failed to carry out the mission for which it had been created. After that failure, God chose Abraham and his offspring to be the bearers of the mission that had originally been universal.
The Torah relates the story of the six days of Creation ex nihilo (out of nothing) to establish that God is the sole Creator and to refute the theories of those who claim that the universe is timeless or that it came into being through some massive coincidence or accident. This is implicit in the narrative of the first six days, for Scripture gives no specific details regarding the process of creation and makes no mention of angels or other incorporeal (without a body) beings. The story of creation tells of when the major categories of the universe came into existence only in very general terms, because the primary purpose is to state that nothing came into being except at God’s command.”

Messianic Prophecies in Genesis

Seed of the woman
OT References: Gen 3:15
NT Fulfillment: Gal 4:4, Heb 2:14

Nations blessed through Abraham
OT References: Gen 12:3, 18:18, 22:18, 26:4, 28:14
NT Fulfillment: Matt 1:1, Acts 3:25, Gal 3:8

Seed of Abraham
OT References: Gen 12:7, 13:15, 15:18, 17:7-10, 23:7
NT Fulfillment: Acts 7:5, Rom 4:13, 4:16, 9:8, Gal 3:16, 3:29

Seed of Isaac
OT References: Gen 17:19, 21:12, 26:3-4
NT Fulfillment: Rom 9:7, Heb 11:18

From the tribe of Judah
OT References: Gen 49:10
NT Fulfillment: Heb 7:14, Rev 5:5