Shabbat Shalom! The Torah portion for this week is "Bereishiet," (Genesis 1:1 through 6:8). It deals with many famous stories, including the creation of the world, Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, Cain killing his brother Abel, and the long-lived generations leading up to Noah.
At the risk of stating the overly obvious, "Bereishiet" is the opening parsha to the book of Genesis. Now what is the book of Genesis about? Taken as a whole, Genesis is the story of the first Jews: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. These four generations are the foundation of our religion, and thus occupy the first book of our Torah. No one disputes the importance of these four patriarchs and their stories. But why does it take two full portions, "Beresheit" and "Noach," before we get to them? Why doesn't the writer of Genesis simply begin, "Once upon a time there was a man named Abram"? Why must the reader have to deal with all of this stuff before we meet Abram? Why go all the way back, far back, to the beginning of the world?
There was a time when the traditional answer to that question seemed simple enough: this is in fact how the world began. God created the world in one week, approximately 5,762 years ago. If that were the fact of the matter, case closed. But for a century-and-a-half, we have been confronted with plausible theories and hard evidence that this is not so. And thus begins the great debate--between science on one hand and religion on the other. And a less prominent debate between history on one hand and literature on the other.
Perhaps no other story in the Bible, in the last century-and-a-half, has elicited such controversy, than this story of creation. It seems to go to the heart of who we are and what we believe. Knowing where we come from helps us to determine where we are and where we are going. No wonder everyone becomes so passionate about it. No wonder a play like "Inherit the Wind," in which the teaching of creationism versus evolution is debated, has had tens-of-thousands of performances. Hollywood has made it into a movie three times. Think about it--there are very few stories so passionate that Hollywood will invest millions of dollars three separate times in less than 40 years. A testimony to the continuing power and significance of this debate upon the human consciousness.
So what are we, as modern liberal Jews, supposed to do when confronted with evidence that the world in fact did not begin this way? Should we just ignore this story of creation? After all, if the book of Genesis is really about Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, why don't we just lob off the first two parshiot and start with "Lech L'cha"? Once upon a time there was a man named Abram. Why not? What would be lost? If it's not scientifically or historically accurate, what value is there in it?
I say there is tremendous value. It is very important to remember that Genesis was written NOT as a scientific or historical text, but rather as a religious document. It is an unprecedented literary work, like nothing seen before. As someone with a master's degree in English literature, I can tell you that the writer of Genesis was a literary genius. There are many reasons why he chose to start his book with this story of creation; tonight I would like to point out three of them.
To begin with, it's quite an attention getter. Anyone who's ever taken a creative writing class is taught that you have to grab your reader right away. Nowhere is this more true than in my own field of screenwriting. Screenwriters are told that if they don't have what we call a "big event" in the first five pages, the screenplay is thrown in the garbage. So here, on the very first page of Genesis, we have one of the biggest events of all. God said, "Let there be light." Boom! Quite a big bang. And now that I've got your attention, you'll come along with me as I tell you about the epic of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.
Secondly, and perhaps obviously, this creation story is quite the poetic tale unto itself. It really is a beautiful, powerful story moving from chaos to order. In the beginning, it was all just a mish-mash. Matter without form. And suddenly, with a stroke of inspiration, God created the light. And it was separated from the darkness. That's order. And order is good. And on the next day, more order came as God separated the heaven from the earth from the waters. And on the third day, plants grew on the land and fish in the water and birds in the air. And on the fourth day, the heavenly bodies came into existence to orbit this geocentric universe. The sun to rule the day and the moon and stars to watch over the night. And on the fifth day, God created animals to inhabit the land.
And now we come to the grand climax of it all, on the sixth day, with the creation of man. Man is created in God's image. Man is given dominion over all the animals. Now why is this the grand climax? If man is an animal, why isn't he created along with the other animals on the fifth day? Because Genesis is written by a human for humans. This is a human book and humans are the protagonists. As humans, we identify more with humans than with the other animals. And that is why this story is thus crafted. The creation of humans is the powerful climax.
And finally we come to the dénouement. The seventh day. The relaxing of the tension. God rested, God reflected, God judged his world and pronounced it good.
It really is a powerfully crafted and reassuring story. It gives us a sense that this is not an entropic world. Things get better as time goes on. The natural history of the world is away from chaos and toward order. This is a very comforting story--most especially in times like these, after the events of this last month. When we have witnessed great towers that seemed like they could stand for centuries come crumbing to the ground in dust and ash, taking with them 5000 innocent lives... when we have seen a relatively stable world suddenly go to war in less than a month, against a chaotic and enigmatic enemy without borders... when we begin to entertain thoughts of biological, chemical, nuclear attacks, the end of the world... when nothing, not even our very existence, is certain... it seems like entropy reigns supreme. And yet we can turn to a story like this and a calm washes over us. We know that there is a plan. Maybe we cannot see it from our vantage point, but order will return. That is the natural order of the universe.
And finally, we come to my third point. If Genesis is about Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, what is most important about these men is their relationship with God. Therefore it is absolutely necessary to first establish God as the all-powerful creator, before we get to Abram. God and Abraham are not equals. Sure, they have a moment where they act as equals, arguing the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, but they are not. God is immortal and humans are not. It is God who rules the universe, and it is necessary to establish this right from the beginning. Of all the supernatural miracles in the Bible--and there are many, many of them, from the parting of the Sea of Reeds, to turning the Nile to blood, to making the sun stand still--none can compare to the creation of the world. Simply by speaking, God creates the greatest miracle of all. This is a necessary prelude because to understand Abraham and his descendants, we first have to understand God.
As so, as the reader goes through Genesis and is introduced to the characters of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, he remembers that it is God who has created all this and is the primary figure--the continuing constant--throughout this religious text. The motif in all of their lives. And in our own, as well.
So in the end, it doesn't matter that the world didn't really evolve the way it's described in the first chapter of Genesis. This story of creation has more important things to teach us than how our world came into being. It sets us up for our own relationship with God. Genesis does not tell us the literal truth, but it does tell us the spiritual truth. And I think that is far more valuable.
Shabbat Shalom.