God and the Whistling Train Chapter 1 Section8
The next issue facing any teacher is the issue of how much do you introduce. Obviously, if you are describing the creation of something the size of the universe and as small as the smallest part of the atom you would need a book much larger than the Bible and probably larger than most libraries, The language that would have to be used would be incomprehensible to most of us. So what we have is really an extension of what was discussed in the miracles above. They are far too complex for us to talk about them in terms that would explain the science.
We therefore have three pictures. The first picture is the the overall statement and the others gradually build and unpack it. By the time we get to the end of the second chapter we have a the picture of what God created. As we read through the bible we get many reiterations of the first statement because of its importance. It is also a statement that we need to be reminded of in many different situations.
What we get in the first sentence is a statement that God did it. It is very simple. Yet strangely in these first few words is some incredible truth, that a little research can bring to the forefront to help us in future understanding.
If we look at the Hebrew writing of the sentence, it has a set number of words. That is, it is composed of seven words. Now we find, as we read the Bible that God has a preference for certain numbers like seven which he tends to use in reference to himself. But you often find numbers like forty or three. An example would be when Jesus faced temptation in the wilderness, a story that comes early in the Gospels, He is faced with three questions and answers with three quotes from the book of Deuteronomy. The Gospel of John is littered with groups of seven. There are seven ‘I am’ statements and seven signs. As you read the Bible is is interesting to search for these. So in the first sentence has god’s stamp on it. It gives if order and predictability and exhorts us to search for more. This first stamp you have to be aware of the original language.
Now the next important issue requires us to look at the word Elohim, which is the Hebrew word for God in the first sentence, and some aspects of that which are not apparent without research. When learning a new language you find that words can be declined. That is that the inflection of nouns, pronouns and adjectives for categories such as case and number. We have a word for one, then that changes slightly for a word for two which changes again for three or more. The word ‘Elohim is a plural term.