The Biblical account of the creation

Preface

EVER since the researches of modern science have begun to make known the early history of the earth, and the character and structure of the living creatures which successively appeared upon it, the truth of the Biblical account of the creation has been called in question. It is asserted that the facts brought to light are at variance with the narrative in the book of Genesis, and show that it cannot possibly be true. This involves consequences of momentous importance; for the account of the creation in the book of Genesis is the foundation of the Bible, which everywhere rests upon it and recognizes it ; and if it is not true as a record of the beginning of things, the Bible can no longer be regarded as a revelation from God, and its claims to inspiration and the belief of mankind must be rejected.

Numerous attempts, therefore, have been made to discredit the facts which show that the different species of living creatures which now inhabit the earth sprang from other and older forms, in one of which man himself had his origin. But the facts cannot be ignored. They are brought to light in greater numbers every day, and their significance iv Preface

is constantly becoming clearer and more convincing. But no progress whatever has been made in the interpretation of the Biblical account, which continues to be regarded in accordance with the simple notions of a thousand years ago, and is, therefore, held to be at variance with the record of nature.

This led me to make a careful study of every passage in the Bible that speaks of the work of creation, particularly of the first two chapters of the book of Genesis, to determine their relation to each other, and their true interpretation with reference to the operations of nature.

I soon found that the second chapter has a twofold meaning in accordance with the twofold form of the Divine name used in it, Yahveh-Elohim, — one part designating the Creator as the God of law and order, good and evil, and the other, as the God of sinless nature, — and that it is descriptive of the physical formation and condition of the earth, as well as of man, to whom alone it is regarded as having reference; and, further, that every chapter onward to the eleventh describes, in like manner, events connected with creative action, which modified the face of the earth and the condition of man. This is the work which Elohim finished on the seventh day (see Gen. ii. 2); and it is on the border line which connects the work of the sixth day with that of the seventh, and is, therefore, common to both.

Every verse in these eleven chapters of Genesis I have compared, step by step, as I went on, with the operations of nature to which it has reference, and I have noted every sign in the symbolism of the Hebrew text, that indicates the deeper meaning connected with its brief but comprehensive state-

Preface v

ments. This has brought to light many things not hitherto perceived, notably, that the Biblical account of the creation, as written in the Hebrew text, clearly shows that all flowering plants had their origin in the first simple, cellular vegetation of the earth, and that it was not till after a long period of organic growth and development that different species were produced. And so with the fruit tree, the last and largest of all plants, which is, in like manner, shown to have proceeded by the same process of organic growth and development, from the flowering herb.

Again: not only does the Biblical account state that animal life began in the waters, but it shows clearly that living creatures of the waters were the progenitors of the air-breathing animals of the land; and, finally, it speaks of one of the latter as the immediate progenitor of man. But this is not all. In the guise of a long and intricate genealogy, it gives in detail the history of man's origin and development, with the numberless changes of form and condition through which he has passed, as a creeping thing of the waters, and afterwards of the land, from the first protoplastic matter in which life began, till he became a highly organized being with an upright form, and an intellectual nature that raised him far above the rest of the animal creation.

In like manner the Biblical account gives the complete history of the formation of the moon, trom the time she began her existence as a dark, unstable mass of matter on the crust of the whirling earth, till she became a bright orb of light in the heavens; and, further, it makes the moon the corresponding symbol of man, showing that they had a common origin in the dark, inorganic matter of vi Preface

the earth, describing their formation by a common narrative, and making the phases of the moon, as she becomes more and more enlightened, the signs of the growing light in the mind of man.

I have already said that there are signs of deep meaning connected with the written form of the sacred Hebrew text; and in the course of the long and careful study I have made to determine the true meaning of the Biblical account of the creation, I have discovered the existence of a great system of symbolism connected with it, and that this extends throughout the Bible from the beginning of the book of Genesis to the end of the Apocalypse.

This symbolism had its origin in the phenomena of nature, to which also the events recorded in the first eleven chapters of Genesis have reference; but the narratives describing them w T ere derived, as is now well known, from older forms long existing in Babylonia. Accordingly, I have written a short introduction describing some of the ancient Babylonian notions of the creation and other events ascribed to the mythic gods, which makes clear the symbolism of the seven great cities of Nimrod — Babel, Erech, Akkad, Calneh, Nineveh, Resen, and Kalah — which is necessary to explain their character in connection with the formation of the moon as described in the tenth chapter of Genesis.

The account in the eleventh chapter, of the building and destruction of the tower of Babel, is likewise derived from an ancient Babylonian legend connected with the clouds and darkness; and I have shown how these mythic conceptions of the phenomena of nature came in the course of time to be modified so as to become a true record of events in

Preface vii

the early history of the earth, and made an important part of the Biblical account of the creation.

The significance of numbers in the symbolism of the Bible, which has for so long a time proved a subject of inexplicable difficulty, I have traced to a Babylonian origin, and discovered the principles of its development into complex signs. The importance of this symbolism, in denoting the character and relation of the different parts of the Biblical account, calls for a short explanation of the system. This I have, accordingly, given, in the first appendix to this book, with a diagram showing its origin in the four sections of the cosmic sphere, and the alternations of night and day; and I have exemplified it by a good many instances in the chapters and verses of the Biblical text, and in the order and character of the work of the creation. This is the first part of the book to which the reader should give his attention, for it shows the events mentioned in the Biblical account in their proper light, and gives more effect to their interpretation.

The numerical symbolism of the tenth chapter of Genesis, in Appendix II., should be carefully studied in connection with the table of the generations of the sons of Noah, because of the marvellous way in which by their names and the numbers denoted by them, the w r onderful history of the formation of the moon is made known, and the many changes of form and condition by which the creeping thing of the waters became man.

Appendix III., which contains a tabulated statement of the generations of Terah, and some important observations on the symbolism embodied in it, is especially valuable as showing the gradual viii Preface

growth of light in the original darkness of man's nature, and the beautiful symbolism which makes the moon in her change from darkness to light the sign of it.

Appendix IV. consists of passages descriptive of the work of creation, from the book of Proverbs, the Psalms, and the prophecies of Habakkuk. The passage from Proverbs (viii. 22-29), i* 1 which Wisdom affirms her eternal co-existence with God, is remarkable on account of its speaking of the pre-nebulous state of matter; and the sublime description of the flood and of the separation of the dark moon from the earth, in the third chapter of Habakkuk, is given as an addition to the history of her formation in the tenth chapter of Genesis, with which it is symbologically connected.

The present book consists of two parts, one dealing with the account of the creation in the first chapter of Genesis, described as the work of Elohim, the God of sinless nature, the other with the account given in the next ten chapters, where, as Yahveh, the God of law, he determines between good and evil, and, accordingly, he is named Yahveh-Elohim, in sign of the twofold character of his work. And this requires two separate interpretations, one of the formation and condition of the earth, and of man as a creature of the earth; and the other of man as an intellectual and moral being.

The interpretation given here is the one which describes the physical formation and condition of the earth; and this includes the animals to which man belonged in his original darkness as a living creature, and brings him to the point at which he walks upright upon the earth, with a noble form

Preface ix

and mental faculties capable of distinguishing between good and evil, as we find him in the garden of Eden.

The higher interpretation of the Yahvistic work, which begins at this point, and makes of man a moral and intellectual being, having within him the dawning light of a spiritual nature, and a growing knowledge of the existence of God, is reserved for another book.

I would add that I have endeavored to make the interpretation of this great subject as clear, pointed, and concise as possible, and that I preferred keeping the great number of new and important things I have brought to light, free from the confusing effect of numerous details.

Contents

PAGE

Introduction ...... i

The Biblical Account of the Creation . 13 Part I. Genesis I. General Account . 13

Part II. Genesis II-XI: . . . .64

1. Special Account of the Creation of the Earth ...... 69

2. The Creation of the Moon . . .140

3. The Creation of Man . . . .160

Appendix I. The Hebrew Alphabet and the

Symbolism of Numbers . . .197

Appendix II. The Numerical Symbolism of

the Tenth Chapter of Genesis . . 230

Appendix III. The Numerical Symbolism of

the Generations of Terah . . .246

Appendix IV. Passages from Proverbs, the

Psalms, and Habakkuk . . .250

Introduction

IT is now well known that in ancient Babylonia, the land of the forefathers of the Hebrew race, there existed accounts of the creation of the heavens and the earth, of man and other living creatures, and of a beautiful garden, called "the garden of the gods/' in which grew the tree of life, and also of a great flood which covered the wh .e earth, and of the building of a lofty tower m defiance of the gods, who destroyed it and punished the builders. These accounts are older by many centuries than the Biblical narratives of the same events, and are wholly mythical; but there is a direct connection between them, and the Biblical narratives are the ultimate forms of the early Babylonian myths. It is necessary, therefore, to go back to ancient Babylonia, and the notions in which these mythic stories originated, to explain the character of the narratives as they appear in the Bible, and show how they came to have a place in it.

The first attempts of man to account for the existence of the world and the changes which are taking place around him have always begun in mythic conceptions of the phenomena of nature, and the gods of all primitive peoples have been personifications of the powers of nature to which these conceptions have given birth. At a very earlyperiod such a system of mythology had grown up among the Akkadians, a people of Turanian origin, who had established themselves in the land afterwards known as Babylonia, and founded its cities. Their mythological traditions and their notions concerning the gods and the creation of the world were adopted and developed by the Shemitic tribes which afterwards overran the country and became its masters.

The Chaldcean Account of Genesis, written by George Smith, and revised by Professor A. H. Sayce, — a work based on ancient inscribed tablets found in the ruins of Nineveh, and now in the British Museum, containing accounts of the creation and of events in the early history of the earth — makes known to a considerable extent their notions of its origin, and their conceptions of the phenomena connected with its existence. Unfortunately, most of the tablets are broken into small pieces many of which are lost, and others cannot be put together so as to be deciphered; but those which have been translated are sufficient to serve in the interpretation of the Biblical account.

These earliest inquirers into the origin of the world drew their first notions from the phenomena of night and day. The dark, lifeless night, which preceded the life-giving light of day, led them to the conception of a time in which, to use the words of Berosus the Chaldean priest, " There existed nothing but darkness and an abyss of waters." In close connection with this is the beginning of the tablet account :

i. "At that time above the heaven was unnamed:

2. below, the earth by name was unrecorded;

3. the boundless deep also (was) their generator.

4. The chaos of the sea was she who bare the whole of them. ,, 1

The heavens and the earth were made by separating these chaotic masses from each other and arranging them in order. This was the work of the great god whom the Akkadians called Anu, "the lord of the sky," and the Shemites II or El, who is the Biblical Elohim, the God of nature. With Anu were associated two other great gods, Bel, the lord of the lower heavens and the surface of the earth, and Hea, "the god of the house of waters," which was in the under world. By these three the whole work of the creation was accomplished. The tablet account describes it as a gradual process, the successive stages of which it speaks of as "days," and adds that "the days were long." 2

According to the Akkado-Babylonian notions, the earth was borne up on the waters of the abyss. From the depths of the west these waters flowed in a great stream, that divided into four rivers which encompassed the four sides of the earth. s Into these abysmal waters the sun descended every evening when he set, and emerged from them again every morning when he rose; and at each of these two

1 Chald. Gen., p. 57.

2 Chald. Gen., p. 58; Tablet I. 1. 13.

3 The mouth of this divided stream is mentioned in the legend of Izdubar (Tab. XI. col. iv., 27-30, Chald. Gen., p. 288). The hero, after journeying "in the path of the sun," and passing the western bounds of the world, reaches the bright region where Hasisadra dwells with the gods, "in a remote place at the mouth of the rivers. "

sides of the world was a great gate, one through which he passed at his rising, and the other at his setting. Here, also, the sun approached the earth and impregnated it with his vitalizing light. It was by this union all things were produced; and, accordingly, the tree of life, which was the embodiment of these notions, had its seat in the west at the gate of the setting sun. And here, too, was the bright garden in the sunset clouds, known as " the garden of the gods." *

This beautiful mythology was embodied in the land of Babylonia itself. The two rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, between which it lay, represented the two great rivers which flowed, one on the east, and the other on the west side of the earth; and the rivers of the north and south were represented by two great streams which flowed through channels cut across the country from the Euphrates to the Tigris, the one on the north side being the Ar-Malcha, or " Royal River/' and the one on the south side, the Ar-Kush, or " River of Kush " (now the Arikhat).

But the chief seat of this symbolism was the city of Babylon itself. Its native Shemitic name, Bab-el, means "gate of El," that is, of the Sun-god, Bel Merodach, to whom the city was dedicated; and it represented the gate through which he passed in radiant glory at the close of day. From an early period this part of Babylonia was called Gan Duni, or Duniyas, "the garden of Duni" (the Danaos of Berosus), one of the early mythical kings of the country, whose name identifies him with the setting sun. Gan Duni is only another name for "the

1 Hea, the lord of Eridu, was "King of the rivers and the garden/'

garden of the gods"; and to complete the symbolism, the Akkadians called the great city itself Tintir-ki, "the place of the tree of life."

This extraordinary mythic and religious symbolism characterized every city in Babylonia. For instance: three of the most ancient and famous cities in the country — Erech, Nipur, and Eridu — represented the seats of the three great gods, Ami, Bel, and Hea, who presided over the upper heavens, the surface of the earth, and the under world of waters.

Erech — in Akkadian, Uru-uku — signifies "the eternal city," called also Erech Suburi, the abode of the blessed; and it was so named with reference to the eternal city of the god Anu in the highest heaven, the dwelling-place of departed spirits. Hence Erech (Warka) was the necropolis of ancient Babylonia, and its ruins are surrounded by mountains of the dead. 1

Eridu, which was dedicated to Hea, "the lord of the abyss," is placed by Sir Henry Rawlinson at the junction of the Tigris and Euphrates. But there was another Eridu, whose "mighty enclosure, the girdle of Eridu," was the red sky of the western horizon. This was the Eridu in whose dark forest (the dusky clouds of evening) Dumu-zi (Tammuz), the beautiful young Sun-god, met the unhappy fate which compelled him to spend half his time in the world below ; and here grew the great pine tree whose roots drank of the dark waters of the abyss, and its top of the light of heaven. Hea, the lord of Eridu, was the giver of life; and this is why the formula on an ancient tablet 2 for curing a man of the plague, says, —

1 See Loftus's Travels in Chaldcea and Susiana, p. 198.

2 Translated by Lenormant, Chald. Magic, p. 171.

"Instil into him the regenerative grace of Eridu; Turn his face towards the setting sun. 1 *

Nipur (Niffer) represented the seat of Bel in the middle world, over which that god presided. This explains why "his temple at the city of Nipur was regarded as the type of all others"; 1 for it was the great temple of nature herself, whose sacred ziggurat 2 reached from earth to heaven.

Kutha, the name of which signifies " darkness," was another of these symbolic cities. It was so called after Kutha in the dark under world, the seat of Nergal, the god of Hades, to whom it was dedicated. This Kutha of the under world is mentioned in a cuneiform fragment (K 162, British Museum) describing the descent of the goddess Ishtar into Hades, a translation of which is given in The Chaldcean Account of Genesis, p. 240. When Ishtar demands admission into Hades, Allat, the queen of that gloomy region, says, —

"' Go, keeper, open the gate to her,

Bewitch her also according to the ancient rules/ The keeper went and opened his gate : 'Enter, O lady, let the city of Kutha receive thee; Let the palace of Hades rejoice at thy presence.' "

In like manner the great river on the western side of the world, at the gate of the Sun-god, like the river of Babylonia, which was its geographical representative, bore the name of Euphrates. This is the Euphrates spoken of in the message of Ishtar, the goddess of the west, to the solar hero Izdubar: 3

1 Chald. Gen., p. 53.

2 The pyramidal tower of the Babylonian temples.

3 Chald. Gen., p. 227.

"I will make thee also, Izdubar, my husband: Into our house enter, mid the scent of the pines. When thou enterest our house May the river Euphrates kiss thy feet."

This can be understood in no other than a mythological sense; therefore "the river Euphrates'' here mentioned is not the historic river of Babylonia, but the Euphrates of the sunset land, 1 described elsewhere as "the land of the pine trees, " where also was "the garden of the gods" and the place of the tree of life. This garden, as already stated, was a conception of the bright clouds of sunset, which presented the appearance of trees with glowing foliage and glistening fruits, and groves of light, bright with the splendour of the setting sun.

The notion of a bright and beautiful garden in the sunset land existed also among other ancient peoples. The Egyptians knew of happy fields — the fields of Aaru and Hotep — where flowers of exquisite beauty filled the air with fragrance, and the golden corn grew seven cubits high beside the crystal waters where the Sun-god sailed in his bark at the close of day. The Persians had their paradise in the Aryana-Vaedjo, whose golden pillars, and odoriferous groves, and holy fountain Ardvi-gura, all belong to the sunset land. The Greeks had their garden of the Hesperides (the bright cloud groves of the west) to reach which Herakles (the toiling sun) journeyed to the verge of the world, to obtain the golden apples which grew there. The Scandinavians had their Asgard, the bright dwelling-place of the gods, on the plains of Ida, where grew the

1 This, and not the historic river is the Euphrates beyond which the Akkadians placed the entrance of Hades.

great ash tree Yggdrasil, whose roots were in Niflheim, the gulf of darkness, and its head in the height of heaven. There, as the Edda relates, dwelt the beautiful Iduna, to whom the gods committed the keeping of the apples of immortality, which they ate when they felt themselves growing old. But the crafty Loki beguiled her into a dark wood, and stole the immortal fruit. These apples are the golden apples of the bright garden of the Hesperides, Loki is the dusky red of evening, the dark wood is the forest of Eridu, and the great ash tree Yggdrasil represents the giant pine that grew there.

But the beautiful garden of the Babylonian myth is described in records far older than any of the others, and is the one that has to do directly with the garden of Eden of the Bible. It is also in closer connection with the earliest mythic conceptions of man, and his first notions of good and evil. These were connected with light and darkness, and it was with the approaching darkness of night, when evil came upon the earth, that the brightness of the delightful groves disappeared, and the beautiful garden was lost. This is sufficient to explain the Biblical story of the garden of Eden, and to show its connection with the Babylonian garden of the gods, and the bright groves of the setting sun.

And where else should the garden of Eden be but in the beautiful sunset land, where the early traditions of all peoples have placed the happy gardens of the blest? And where else should the four rivers have their source, but in the deep fountain of the west, whence flowed the great streams which watered the whole earth? And where else should the tree of life grow, but where the ancient Babylonians placed it, — in the gate of God, in the garden of the sun, at the point of the mystic union of heaven and earth ? And where else should the tree of the knowledge of good and evil be found, but on the border between light and darkness, their earliest and most expressive symbols? Thus it was that Eden was lost to man through the fruit of that fair but fatal tree, led thereto by the stealthy serpent of night, that reared his dark form behind it. 1 And in the curse pronounced upon the reptile, — that he should go upon his belly and eat dust all the days of his life, — we have the symbol of the creeping night feeding upon the dark and lifeless earth.

The Babylonian account of the flood, in the form in which it existed long before the first book of the Bible was written, has come down to us in the eleventh tablet of the Izdubar legends, translated in The Chaldaoan Account of Genesis, pp. 279-294. It is of mythic origin, and must be interpreted on mythological principles. But a careful study of the subject enables me to speak with confidence.

It is a myth of the crescent moon and the darkness of night. This darkness is the waters of the great flood which covered the whole earth, and the ark f

1 This symbolism is presented in an early Babylonian cylinder figured in The Chaldcean Account of Genesis, p. 88. In the centre there is a tree with a bunch of fruit on each side. On one side of the tree, shown by the three branches to be the east, is a man with his hand extended towards the tree ; and on the other side, shown by the four branches to be the west, is a woman with her hand extended to the fruit of the tree on her side, and with an erect serpent behind her. The two bunches of fruit, in connection with the symbolism of the tree, are significant, the one of good the other of evil.

io Introduction

which, both in the Biblical narrative and the Babylonian mythic story, preserved the seed of life, is the crescent moon, which the Babylonians always figured in a horizontal position, like a boat or vessel floating in the sky. 1 The living creatures and the seed of life in the ark are symbolized by the light, with which life has always been connected. This accounts for the great antiquity of the story of the flood, and its existence in one form or another, in almost every part of the world; for, apart from the spread of the original Babylonian story during thousands of years, the mind of man in the early ages everywhere connected darkness with a flood of waters and the presence of evil, and light with the presence and preservation of life. The time the flood lasts is according to the various mythic or symbolic notions embodied in the story. In the tablet account it is seven days.

The building of the great tower is another notable event in the early Babylonian legends, and the original form of the story has been found in some fragmentary tablets dug up in the ruins of Nineveh, and translated in The Chaldcean Account of Genesis, pp. 163-5. Like the story of the flood, it is a Babylonian myth. The tower "whose top was unto heaven/ ' was a great pyramidal mass of clouds in the west, near the gate of the setting sun; and, in keeping with its origin, it is recorded in the tablets that it was destroyed by winds during the night.

« This symbolism of the crescent moon was embodied in the Deus Lunus Arkaeus, worshipped by the Albani of Pontus, by the people of Cabeira in Armenia, where he had a superb temple, at Antioch in Pisidia, and at Haran in Syria, where he was especially honoured. In fact the Arkite Moon-god was worshipped all over Mesopotamia, Syria, and Armenia.

Here the question may be asked, Does not the presence of these mythic stories vitiate the Bible and exclude its claims to Divine inspiration? This is a question which must be clearly answered.

In the dawn of time, as I have already stated, the first attempts of man to account for the existence of the world and the phenomena of nature have always been embodied in mythic conceptions and stories. Accordingly, the history of all ancient peoples and of the earliest events known to them begins with stories of mythic origin. The notion of good and evil was soon connected with light and darkness, and the powers of nature were feared or worshipped according as they brought evil or good to man.

In the development of these mythic and religious notions the ancient Babylonians were before all other peoples. Their land, as I have already shown, was made to symbolize the whole world, and their cities the seats of the gods. The greatest mystery of their religion was the principle of life, and the most sacred object of their worship was the symbol of the tree of life.