Genesis 2:4

"These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that Jehovah God made earth and heaven."

The Hebrew word rendered "generations of the heavens and the earth," [~toledowth], is the recurring introduction to the various sections of the Book of Genesis that follow. The word introduces ten sections of Genesis:

The ten toledoths are the following:

1. Genesis 2:4-4:26, the [~toledowth] of the heavens and the earth;
2. Genesis 5:1-6:8, the [~toledowth] of Adam;
3. Genesis 6:9-9:29, the [~toledowth] of Noah;
4. Genesis 10:1-11:9, the [~toledowth] of the sons of Noah;
5. Genesis 11:10-26, the [~toledowth] of the sons of Shem;
6. Genesis 11:27-25:11, the [~toledowth] of Terah;
7. Genesis 25:12-18, the [~toledowth] of Ishmael;
8. Genesis 25:19-35:29, the [~toledowth] of Isaac;
9. Genesis 36:1-37:1, the [~toledowth] of Esau;
10. Genesis 37:2-50:26, the [~toledowth] of Jacob.[4]

In all of these uses of [~toledowth], not one of them deals with the creation of what stands at the head of it, but with the subsequent developments. From this, it is mandatory to believe that the [~toledowth] of the earth and heavens is not a discussion of their creation (except retrospectively), but a discussion of what came AFTERWARD.

With regard to the critical device of making this chapter to be a variant, contradictory account of the creation revealed in Genesis 1, the blunt words of Leupold are especially appropriate:

"It is just as unlikely as can be that the author (of Genesis) should have been such a dunce as to set down at the very outset two mutually exclusive records of creation ... This critical claim comes very close to absurdity."[5]

What one finds in Genesis 2, therefore, are the supplementary facts essential for a proper evaluation of Genesis 3. The word "and," (Genesis 2:5), is not to be taken in the same sense of "next," meaning the next things God did, but rather, "in the sense of a loose `also,' without thought of time sequence."[6]

"Jehovah God ..." This introduction of another name for God is the pivotal point at which critics begin their postulation of multiple sources, authorships, or both for the Book of Genesis. Volumes of so-called evidence is collated and advanced in support of this ridiculous theory which has no foundation whatever except in the subjective imaginations of men who disbelieve the Bible and are trying to discredit it as the Word of God. Fortunately, the Christian already has the final and definitive answer for such questions in the words of Jesus Christ himself. Our Lord quoted from both of these chapters in a single breath (Matthew 19:4-6), linking Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24 as both being attributable to God Himself. "These passages tied together are the basis of Jesus' moral standard concerning marriage."[7] This undeniable teaching of Jesus Christ is the complete frustration of all the nonsense about diverse contradictory documents. The Lord here attested to the holy unity of the these two chapters (and of the whole Bible, for that matter), attributing the words to God Himself. Now, if it could be proved that Moses indeed made use of prior documents in compiling the inspired words of Genesis (which proof is an utter impossibility), there could be no reflection whatever upon the sacred narrative in the Bible. Luke, it will be remembered, had such sources and consulted prior written documents when he composed the Book of Luke (Luke 1:1f).

The most preposterous thing about the documentary theories of origin for Genesis is that no such documents exist. They are the fancy children of unbelieving critics, who have never agreed upon where this or that alleged document appears in Moses' account, and who are extremely impotent to produce any logical reason for accepting their theories. The very arguments upon which the various alleged "sources" are postulated are inaccurate, unconvincing, and without exception subject to devastating proof of the corresponding elenchus. Furthermore, the documentary theories breed more and more documents, with each new wave of scholars, as many as fifty different alleged "documents" having been discovered! Believe it? Impossible!

We devoted some time to this in the Introduction to Genesis, but do not choose to waste any further time in the pursuit and refutation of irresponsible theories about the alleged "origins" of Genesis. Enough for Christians, that the holy Head of our sacred religion accepted Genesis as the Word of God, and for that matter, the whole Bible, even the prophecy of Jonah!

It is appropriate, however, to observe that the use of various names for the God of the O.T. is invariably connected with special and specific reasons for the various names embedded in the context where the various names appear. The term "Jehovah" appears in at least ten other combinations in the O.T., and in every instance for the purpose of stressing some appropriate meaning (in the context) of the nature of God.[8] For a discussion of these, see my commentary on Hosea at Hosea 12:5. Such a purpose is discernible, here where there is about to emerge the personal relationship between God and humanity, and a little later the special relationship to Israel as their covenant God. Here is the real reason for the various uses of multiple names of the Deity in the O.T., and it has nothing whatever to do with Moses' alleged "source." A number of verses in the minor prophets have three names of God, as in Amos 3:16; and once there were four names of God in a single verse (Habakkuk 1:12). Such facts cannot be fitted into any form of documentary hypothesis.

"Made earth and heaven ..." A new focal point of interest appears in this, the earth, mentioned first, is the principal concern of what is revealed in Genesis 2.