Genesis 1:1-11:32

Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible - Genesis 1:1

‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.’ God Creates The Heaven And The Earth And All That Is In Them (Genesis 1:1-31 ; Genesis 2:1-4 a). “In the beginning”. This phrase is signifying the beginning of existence as we know it, the beginning of our universe. The writer is considering the beginning as it relates to man. It does not refer to the creation of God, Who has no beginning, nor necessarily to the creation of the angelic or spiritual world which is outside the scope... read more

Arthur Peake

Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible - Genesis 1:1-5

Genesis 1:1-5.—Since the formula “These are the generations of” is usually placed by P at the beginning of a section, whereas here it occurs at the end (Genesis 2:4a), it is thought by many that its present position is due to its removal from the beginning of this chapter, and that the story opened with the words “These are the generations of the heaven and of the earth.” But this implies a different use of “generations” from what we find elsewhere in P, who employs it to express what is... read more

Arthur Peake

Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible - Genesis 1:1-31

Genesis 1:1 to Genesis 2:4 a. The Priestly Story of Creation.— This section belongs to the Priestly Document (P). This is shown by the use of several of its characteristic terms, by the constant repetition of the formulæ , and by the formal arrangement. P’ s interest in the origin of religious institutions is displayed in the explanation of the origin of the Sabbath. The lofty monotheism of the section is also characteristic of his theological position.The story rests upon a much older... read more

Matthew Poole

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible - Genesis 1:1

In the beginning, to wit, of time and things, in the first place, before things were distinguished and perfected in manner hereafter expressed. Or the sense is this, The beginning of the world was thus. And this phrase further informeth us, that the world, and all things in it, had a beginning, and were not from eternity, as some philosophers dreamed. God created the heaven and the earth; made out of nothing, either, 1. The heaven and earth as now they are with their inhabitants. So this verse... read more

Joseph Exell

Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary - Genesis 1:1-2

CRITICAL NOTES.—Genesis 1:1. In the beginning] Or, “at first,” “originally,” “to start with:” Sept. en archê (εν αρχῃ) as in John 1:1. God] Heb. ’Elohim (אֱלֹהִים): w. ref. to this frequent and interesting Divine Name, note (1.) its radical conception—that of POWER; (2.) its form—PLURAL, either “of excellence” (Ges. and others), or “of abstraction,” as in “lordship” for “lord” in English (B. Davies); (3.) its construction—gen. w. SING. VERS, AND PRONOUN, as here w. bârâʾ (בָרָא), he... read more

William Nicoll

Sermon Bible Commentary - Genesis 1:1

Genesis 1:1 I. What is meant by creation? The giving being to that which before was not. The expression, "the heavens and the earth," is the most exhaustive phrase the Hebrews could employ to name the universe, which is regarded as a twofold whole, consisting of unequal parts. Writing for men, Moses writes as a man. The moral importance of the earth, as the scene of man's probation, is the reason for the form which the phrase assumes. The truth of the creation governs the theology of the Old... read more

William Nicoll

Sermon Bible Commentary - Genesis 1:1-31

Genesis 1:0 It is possible that God made at first only one kind of matter, the germ of all the universe. Indeed, Scripture seems to hint this in the sublime record of the origin of light: "And God said, Let there be light, and there was light." Here light is evidently regarded as the first of all sublunary things. The principal agent in this work was the Son of God. He had made the third heaven. He had created angels. The strong Satan himself was originally the workmanship of Christ. It is no... read more

Chuck Smith

Chuck Smith Bible Commentary - Genesis 1:1-8

Chapter 1:1-8Shall we now turn in our Bibles to Genesis chapter one, verse one?The word Genesis in Hebrew means "beginning." And so, it is "the book of the beginnings", and in Genesis we find the beginning of the universe, first of all, and then the beginning of the life forms within the universe, the beginning of man, the beginning of sin and death. Then we find the beginning of God's redemptive program by the beginning of a nation.The majority of the book of Genesis has to do with God's... read more

Joseph Sutcliffe

Sutcliffe's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments - Genesis 1:1-31

Genesis 1:1. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth; all the orbs which revolve and shine in the expanse of heaven, measuring time by days, and years, and periods. By consequence, the sublime system of nature is not eternal. If matter were eternal, then the אלהים Elohim, Ο Θεοτης , the Godhead or Divinity who acts here, is also material, dependent on matter, and a necessary agent. The perfections of wisdom, goodness and love, can no longer be attributed to him. These... read more

Joseph Exell

The Biblical Illustrator - Genesis 1:1

Genesis 1:1In the beginning God created the heavens and the earthThe Christian doctrine of creationIn considering the subject of creation we see, first of all, that a distinction must be drawn between what I would call primary and secondary creation.Primary creation is creation proper. It is that grand act whereby Almighty God in the beginning called into being the finite world. Secondary creation, on the other hand, belongs to the sphere of Providence, or to the sphere of the history of the... read more

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