Genesis 2:7

Genesis 2:7

(with Genesis 1:27 ).

In studying these chapters carefully, we find some degree of difficulty in the form of the sacred story itself. There appear to be, and in a certain sense there are, three different narratives, three distinct records of creation. We have one in the first, one in the second, and one in the fifth chapter. Why is the narrative of the creation repeated three times over?

Because man needs an account of the creation from a physical, from a moral, and from a historical point of view. The physical account we find in the first chapter of Genesis. It tells us that matter is not eternal that, go back as far as you will, at last the world which God created came from its Maker's hand. It stands alone in its sublimity, alone in its impressive greatness, alone in its Divine and miraculous reserve. We must cling to the truth contained in the text: (1) for the answer it gives to the questions which are pressed upon every one of us by the mystery of existence; (2) for the solid hope which it gives to every one of us of a distinct, a personal and individual immortality; (3) in order to guard ourselves from the great peril of desecrating that nature which God Himself gave to us.

Bishop Alexander, Man's Natural Life ("Norwich Cathedral Discourses," 4th series, No. 1).

References: Genesis 2:7 . S. R. Driver, Oxford and Cambridge Undergraduates' Journal, Oct. 25, 1883; J. Keble, Sermons for the Christian Year, vol. iii., p. 108; J. Laidlaw, The Bible Doctrine of Man, p. 48; J. Van Oosterzee, The Year of Salvation, vol. ii., p. 323; B. Waugh, Sunday Magazine (1887), p. 134; H. J. Van Dyke, The Reality of Religion, p. 49; R. W. Evans, Parochial Sermons, p. 293; Bishop Walsham How, Plain Words to Children, p. 29; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 3rd series, p. 76. Genesis 2:8 . T. Chamberlain, Sermons for Sundays, Festivals and Fasts, 2nd series, vol. i., p. 265; W. E. Boardman, Sunday Magazine (1876), p. 676; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 406.