1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
2:4-25
1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
God had finished creating the heavens and the earth.
2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
So on the seventh day, He rested. [1]
3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
God blessed the seventh day and made it holy.
Because he rested on that day.
2:4-25
4These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,
5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.
6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.
In the beginning, plants didn't exist,
because God hadn't yet made it rain,
and there wasn't a man to till the ground. [3]
7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
God formed a man from dust
and breathed life into his nostrils. [4]
8 And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
God planted a garden in Eden, and put the man in it.
9 And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
10 And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.
11 The name of the first is Pison: that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;
12 And the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone.
13 And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia.
14 And the name of the third river is Hiddekel: that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates.
God made all the trees that are nice to look at and good to eat.
15 And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
God put the man in the garden "to dress and to keep it." [6]
16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
17But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
You may eat from every tree in the garden, except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.The day you eat from that tree, you will die. [7]
18 And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
God said,
It's not good for the man to be alone. [8]I'll make a help meet for him.
19 And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
After making the animals, God has Adam name them all. [10]
20 And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
but none of them appealed to him as a "help meet." [11]
21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
22And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
God made a woman from one of Adam's ribs. [12]
25And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
Adam and the (unnamed) woman were both naked,
and they weren't ashamed. [13]
Even God gets tired sometimes.
The second creation account. Compare with Genesis 1:1-2:3 in which the order of events is entirely different.
Before God could create plants, he had to create rain to water them and a man to care for them.
In chapter 1 plants are created on the third day before humans are created on the sixth. In chapter 2 the order is reversed.
But humans were not created instantaneously from dust and breath, but evolved over millions of years from simpler life forms.
Eat from the first tree, and you become a god and live forever (3:22); eat from the second and you'll die the same day (2:17).
God says that if Adam eats from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, then the day that he does so, he will die. But later Adam eats the forbidden fruit (3:6) and yet lives for another 930 years (5:5).
Some believers claim that this verse requires them to be environmentalists.
Why can't he eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? What's wrong with knowing right from wrong?
God starts talking to himself again. (As he did in the last chapter.)
But animals were not created instantaneously from the ground, but evolved over millions of years. And we still don't have names for all of them. Ten thousand new species of insects are discovered and named each year.
Note that in the first creation story, God makes humans (male and female) after the other animals; in the second, God makes a man first, then the other animals, and then a woman.
The naming of several million species must have kept Adam busy for a while.
This verse (Genesis 2:19) is the first in the Bible to give a name (Adam) to the man that God created. Later, in Genesis 5:2, God calls both his male and female human creations "Adam".
It's interesting that all of the animals, both male and female, were made by God to provide a "help meet" for Adam. I guess God wasn't sure which species or sex of animal Adam might prefer as his help meet.
Because of this story, it was commonly believed (and sometimes it is still said today) that males have one less rib than females. When Vesalius showed in 1543 that the number of ribs was the same in males and females, it created a storm of controversy.
The women is still nameless at this point. Adam doesn't give her a name until after they are expelled from the garden near the end of the next chapter. (3:20)
It is interesting that God insisted that Adam name the millions of animals species (2:19), but neither he nor Adam were in much of a hurry to name the woman.
If a god claim contains any sort of omnipotence or maximal power, I would not expect "resting" to be necessary as it would suggest that such a god could become exhausted or, in another way of putting it, sapped of its power. Wondering what "rest" means in this context, I decided to look up some explanations for why the Christian God had to halt production on "day" seven.
According to https://www.thebrandsunday.com/blogs/home/importance-of-rest in the article, Importance of Rest, God wasn't resting on the seventh day because he was tired. It was because he was setting a standard for mankind to follow, thus making it sacred. From this came the fourth commandment of acknowledging the sabbath. ...and be careful if you misuse your day of peace, ease, and contentment. You may be put to death if you screw it up by being productive. (Exodus 31:14-15)
Seriously? He rested on the seventh day? I never expected an omnipotent, omniscient God to require rest, but apparently, our good 'friend' Yahweh is a bit of a lazy bum.
And then there's the second creation story, which, from what I've heard, exists because the first couple of books of the Bible used multiple sources. There are several models that attempt to explain this, such as the 'Documentary hypothesis' and offshoots of it.
But that's boring, so let's get into the story of Adam and Eve (not to be confused with 'Adam and Steve', 'Madam and Eve', or any adult stores that happen to have the name 'Adam and Eve').
God made Adam out of dust (not stardust, you Sagan fanatics, actual dust!), and breathed life into his nostrils, which makes for good art pieces, but not for accurate science. God tells Adam to maintain the garden, and that anything that comes from the plants in the garden is free for him to eat, with ONE big exception. (Yeah, like that's gonna work out...)
God also puts a metric fuckton of animals in the garden and has Adam name them all. He also essentially has Adam look amongst them for a 'help meet', or a spouse, which implies that a ton of something beginning with 'best' and ending with 'iality' ensued. 'Family Values' at work, everybody!
But Adam can't find a suitable partner for obvious reasons, so God says fuck it and gives him a woman, who as of the ending of this chapter, is unnamed, but we all know what her name is, just saying.
Also, this is a nudist garden, as Adam and his wife are completely naked.