At the beginning of Genesis 1, God forms the world out of waters that are "without form" and "void." You're probably familiar with this.
But are you familiar with the other story of creation in the Bible? Starting in Job 38, we have another accounting of creation in which God tells Job all about how He created the world - how He laid the cornerstone and foundations, how He restrained the seas when they burst forth, etc. This continues for a couple chapters, before the text takes a sudden turn in chapter 40.
Suddenly we have a story of subduing two monsters, the Behemoth and the Leviathan. The Behemoth is a monster that drinks up whole rivers. The Leviathan is a sea-monster with hard scales and sharp teeth that breathes fire.
And this starts to get interesting when we compare Job's monsters to the creation stories from other ancient cultures that lived around the Israelites -
In the creation story of Babylon (the Enuma Elish), their god Ea subdues Tiamat, a beast of primordial chaos whose body is waters and whose domain is the oceans. He then he takes its watery body and forms the land from it. He also slays Tiamat's lover, Absu (whose body is made of fresh water) and transforms this into a subterranean realm of water that he uses for His home. This is called the Abyss, taking its name from the slain Absu.
The most ancient and revered Greek writer, Hesiod, likewise recounts a great battle between Zeus and the titan Typhon - a great serpent-like monster who epitomizes storms and water. The titan is defeated and imprisoned deep underground...
The Hittites as well, have a myth of a battle between their chief god Teshub, and a great serpent-monster who rides the storms.
These are all variations of the same myth... and it looks like Job's monsters are a version of the same story. Job mentions the monsters with his creation account because they are related to creation. God creates the world from water... water monsters.
Going back to Genesis 1, remember those "waters" that are "without form" (Hebrew: Tohu) and "void?" (Hebrew: Bohu) It turns out that those words are related to those monsters. The Hebrew word for Behemoth is... Behemoth, and Bohu is a form of the same word.
A few chapters later, in Genesis 9, God brings the flood to destroy the world by opening the 'fountain of the deep.' That word DEEP in Hebrew is Tehowm, a variation of the same word 'Tohu.' The story is taking shape - this DEEP is more than a subterranean lake; this is one of those primordial monsters of water and chaos. The Hebrew Tehowm IS the Greek Typhon and the Babylonian Tiamat and Job's Leviathan.
A story is taking shape... In the beginning... God MADE the world by subduing these monsters, bringing order from chaos and land out of waters. And in Noah's day, when God intends to UN-MAKE the world, He unleashes the old monster from its underground prison. The whole world sinks back beneath the waves of primordial chaos for a season.
And then... God stops the waters, and sends the monster back underground. In Job 41, God indicates that he has made Leviathan his servant, put a hook in his nose to lead him as a beast subservient. In chapter 38 He tells us He 'shut up the seas with doors' and 'declared its place' and 'set bars' on it.
And perhaps we should read the story of Noah's flood as a creation story too? The former earth was UN-MADE by waters, and a new earth was RE-MADE from the waters, just as the first one.
@Rella ~ I am a woman
But are you familiar with the other story of creation in the Bible? Starting in Job 38, we have another accounting of creation in which God tells Job all about how He created the world - how He laid the cornerstone and foundations, how He restrained the seas when they burst forth, etc. This continues for a couple chapters, before the text takes a sudden turn in chapter 40.
Suddenly we have a story of subduing two monsters, the Behemoth and the Leviathan. The Behemoth is a monster that drinks up whole rivers. The Leviathan is a sea-monster with hard scales and sharp teeth that breathes fire.
And this starts to get interesting when we compare Job's monsters to the creation stories from other ancient cultures that lived around the Israelites -
In the creation story of Babylon (the Enuma Elish), their god Ea subdues Tiamat, a beast of primordial chaos whose body is waters and whose domain is the oceans. He then he takes its watery body and forms the land from it. He also slays Tiamat's lover, Absu (whose body is made of fresh water) and transforms this into a subterranean realm of water that he uses for His home. This is called the Abyss, taking its name from the slain Absu.
The most ancient and revered Greek writer, Hesiod, likewise recounts a great battle between Zeus and the titan Typhon - a great serpent-like monster who epitomizes storms and water. The titan is defeated and imprisoned deep underground...
The Hittites as well, have a myth of a battle between their chief god Teshub, and a great serpent-monster who rides the storms.
These are all variations of the same myth... and it looks like Job's monsters are a version of the same story. Job mentions the monsters with his creation account because they are related to creation. God creates the world from water... water monsters.
Going back to Genesis 1, remember those "waters" that are "without form" (Hebrew: Tohu) and "void?" (Hebrew: Bohu) It turns out that those words are related to those monsters. The Hebrew word for Behemoth is... Behemoth, and Bohu is a form of the same word.
A few chapters later, in Genesis 9, God brings the flood to destroy the world by opening the 'fountain of the deep.' That word DEEP in Hebrew is Tehowm, a variation of the same word 'Tohu.' The story is taking shape - this DEEP is more than a subterranean lake; this is one of those primordial monsters of water and chaos. The Hebrew Tehowm IS the Greek Typhon and the Babylonian Tiamat and Job's Leviathan.
A story is taking shape... In the beginning... God MADE the world by subduing these monsters, bringing order from chaos and land out of waters. And in Noah's day, when God intends to UN-MAKE the world, He unleashes the old monster from its underground prison. The whole world sinks back beneath the waves of primordial chaos for a season.
And then... God stops the waters, and sends the monster back underground. In Job 41, God indicates that he has made Leviathan his servant, put a hook in his nose to lead him as a beast subservient. In chapter 38 He tells us He 'shut up the seas with doors' and 'declared its place' and 'set bars' on it.
And perhaps we should read the story of Noah's flood as a creation story too? The former earth was UN-MADE by waters, and a new earth was RE-MADE from the waters, just as the first one.
@Rella ~ I am a woman
