This essay seeks to answer the common belief that the Bible contains two creation accounts in the book of Genesis that contradict each other. To put it bluntly, I do not think that Genesis 1 and 2 are giving us two different creation “myths.” Instead, they present one account of creation but focus on different themes and topics that supplement each other.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. This is how the Bible begins. It is also perhaps one of the most well-known sentences in history. The Bible spends two chapters teaching about the creation of the universe. Genesis 1 tells us how God spoke everything into existence over the span of six days with humanity and the land-dwelling animals being made on the sixth day. The second chapter of Genesis gives us a more detailed look at day six focusing on the creation of humanity in the Garden of Eden.

A good summary of the traditional interpretation of these chapters is that “Genesis 1 is a broad outline [of creation] whereas Genesis 2 is an elaboration which focuses on mankind.”[1] Genesis 1 gives us a wide view of God creating the heavens and earth. In contrast, Genesis 2 is “a description of the condition of the land before the creation of mankind…[it] briefly describes the environment and the state of the earth on day six just before God created Adam and Eve.”[2]

However, over the past couple of centuries, there has been a push to teach that these chapters do not contain one creation account, but two. The arguments for this are as follows:

  1. First, the two chapters contradict each other in the order of events. Genesis 1 tells us that plants were created on the third day while animals are listed as being made before humanity on day six. Genesis 2 presents the order of creation as man, plants, animals, and finally the woman.[3]
  2. The two chapters use different names for God. Chapter one only uses the Hebrew name Elohim (translated simply as “God”) while Genesis 2 adds another name for God: Yahweh (translated as either “LORD” or “Jehovah”).[4] Yahweh is used in this chapter with Elohim. If Genesis was written by one person why would he only use Elohim by itselfin one chapter and only add Yahweh in the next chapter? The alleged answer is there were once two creation accounts that were combined by a later editor. Each original author only knew God by the name that they used.
  3. Genesis 1 and 2 are written in different literary styles. Genesis 1 is “neatly organized into three days of preparation followed by three days of actual formation. Each day concludes with the formulaic expression ‘and there was X.’” However, chapter 2 “lacks both the structure and the focus of the first creation account. It is much less formulaic; rather, it is a dramatic narrative in a series of seven scenes.”[5]
  4. It is also thought that the two authors had distinct theological agendas. Genesis 1 presents God as “distant, creating through speech according to a master plan.” Genesis 2, in contrast, “depicts God as a human-like figure who walks in the garden and, like a potter working with clay, has a hands-on, trial-and-error approach to creation. God in this version seems more accessible than the transcendent creator of Gen 1.”[6]
  5. The two creation accounts have different settings. Genesis 1 presents a “heavenly” creation while chapter 2 gives us an “earthly” creation.[7]
  6. Scholar Peter Enns believes that the two chapters present different views of humanity. Genesis 1 teaches a mass creation of humans simultaneously in contrast to Genesis 2 where only one male is created followed shortly thereafter by one female. Chapter One views humans as royal figures and chapter two as servants/priests working in the garden. The priestly language used in Genesis 2 looks at the garden as God’s sanctuary/dwelling place where God shares his space with Adam.[8]

Peter Enns summarizes the belief that there are two creation accounts by writing, “The two creation stories are not saying the “same thing,” nor does Genesis 2 follow chronologically from Genesis 1. They are two distinct stories of creation, both in terms of content and order. They cannot be harmonized—they were never intended to be.”[9]

The Order of Creation

As just mentioned, one of the arguments in favor of two creation accounts is that each chapter gives us a different order for when things were created. In fact, in their book Reason, Science and Faith, Roger Forster and Paul Marston present the seriousness of the problem when they say, “Taken ‘literally’ Gen 2:5 ‘clearly’ states that there were no shrubs and no plants of the field’ before the creation of man – whereas Gen 1:11-12 ‘clearly’ puts them three days earlier.”[10]

Table 1: The Order of Creation
Genesis 1Genesis 2
Plants
Animals
Humans		Man
Plants
Animals
Woman

A close examination of these details does not suggest that each chapter presents a different order. Instead, a study of the Hebrew words in the two chapters shows us that they are consistent with each other. Let us start with the timing of the plants.

Genesis 1:11-12 says, “Then God said, ‘Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.’ And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.”

Genesis 2:4-6 says, “This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created. When the Lord God made the earth and the heavens– 5 and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground,6 but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground.”

A simple reading of these two passages, as seen by the quote above from Forster and Marston, seems to imply that God created plants three days before humanity whereas chapter 2 says that no plants had appeared on the earth until after the creation of people. Is this true? I do not believe, as Forster and Marston think, that there is a contradiction here. Genesis 2 is not referring to plants in general as Genesis 1 is. Instead, Genesis 2 is speaking about specific kinds of plants.

Genesis 1:11 is using all-encompassing terms. Hebrew words used include deshe (“grass” and “vegetation” in general), eseb (“plants”), and ets (“trees”).[11] Genesis 2:5 uses more restrictive Hebrew terms such as siyach hassadeh (“shrub of the field”) and eseb hassadeh (“plants of the field”).[12]

The word siyach is not used in 1:11 and means shrub or brush. Eseb (which is used in both verses) refers to non-woody vegetation that grows only with rain (for example, grass, cereals, and vegetables). It is interesting to remember that 2:5-6 says that rain had not yet appeared.[13] Eseb hassadeh refers to any non-woody, edible plant that requires human cultivation. This includes cereal crops, rice, vegetables, and herbs.[14]

Genesis 1:11 is speaking of God creating plants in general while Genesis 2:5 is speaking about certain kinds of plants that were not going to appear until rain appeared, or Adam was created to tend to them. The “plants of the field” had not yet appeared on the earth and were not going to until humans were there to cultivate them.[15]

It is also possible that some of the “shrubs of the field” may be referring to “any non-edible, uncultivated plant growing in the wild, including thorns, thistles and cacti…” It is therefore probable that at least some “shrub[s] of the field” would not appear until after Genesis 3:18 when God cursed the ground.[16]

Scholar Jonathan Sarfati summarizes this well when speaking about the use of the Hebrew words kol and terem (“every…not yet”) in this context. He says, “[these words contrast] the universal with the particular. That is, although God created the land vegetation, certain groups had not yet sprouted at this time, just before man was created.”[17] To put it simply, Genesis 1:11 and 2:5 do not contradict each other. 1:11 is simply referring to God creating plants in general whereas 2:5 is speaking about particular plants that would not appear until Adam was working in the garden and after humanity fell into sin.

Next, we have a problem with the creation of animals. Genesis 1 lists animals first, but Genesis 2:19 does not mention the creation of animals until after God created Adam. Let’s start with how verse 19 is translated.

  • The New King James Version (NKJV) translates the Hebrew as “Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air.”
  • The New International Version (NIV), however, translates it differently: “Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air.”

The NIV adds the word “had” to the verse whereas the original Hebrew does not contain “had.” This is where people see a contradiction. Many believe that the Hebrew does not say that God had already created the animals (as in Genesis 1), but that he was only getting around to it after he created Adam.[18]

However, there is a simple reason why “had” does not appear in Hebrew. The simple past tense (“had”) does not exist in the language.[19] The Hebrew verb wayyitser used in 2:19 is a pluperfect and can be translated “had formed.”[20] To put it simply, the only way we can know that Hebrew is using the simple past tense is by understanding the context. The context of Genesis 2 involves Genesis 1 as both chapters speak about the creation of the world. As one writer has said, “2:18-19 should be read in light of 1:24-27.”[21]

Different Literary Styles, Theological Agendas, Settings, and Views of Humanity

The only way we can read 2:19 as a contradiction to 1:24-27 is if we already believe that Genesis 1 and 2 are two different accounts of creation. Interestingly, this is the way most of the arguments in favor of two stories are. As a reminder, these other arguments include different literary styles, different theological agendas, different settings, and different views of humanity. Although these arguments may look good at first glance, I do not believe they hold up under scrutiny.

1. Different Literary Styles: Why can’t one author use more than one literary style? This idea that because more than one literary style can be detected between two chapters (or two books as in the case with other parts of the Bible) then those chapters cannot have only one writer has never made much sense to me. J.R.R. Tolkien used different literary styles in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Both of these works are narratives but mix in songs and poetry at certain times in the text. At the end of The Return of the King are appendices that include narration, genealogies, and chronicles. Tolkien even created languages and explores multiple themes within the same written works.

Does this mean that Tolkien was not the author of those books? How could one man create a language, use narrative, use poetry, songs, and family trees all in the same text? Using the logic that critics have of Scripture Tolkien surely could not have been the only writer of The Lord of the Rings. Heck, maybe Tolkien wasn’t even one of the authors! To put it simply, an individual author does not have to use the exact same vocabulary, themes, or formulas every time that he writes.

2. Different Theological Agendas: Similar to literary styles does an author have to present God in the same way every time they write? It makes sense that God may feel more “distant” in Genesis 1 so it gives a broader/wider view of the creation. God is presented as the great creator of the universe while Genesis 2 gives us a more narrow look a the creation of the creature that bears God’s image.

Genesis 2 presenting God as walking in the Garden, more accessible to people, and being more “hands-on” is consistent within the context of the chapter. It is about the creation of Adam and Eve and it makes sense that God would be “hands-on” when creating a creature made in his image. The fact that Genesis 2 presents the Garden as a temple-like sanctuary makes the image of God walking even more profound.

Genesis 2 is a more detailed and intimate account of the creation of man. Genesis 1 is a broader view of the creation of the universe. God may feel more “distant” in a wider perspective. Although I will admit that the feeling of a “distant” God seems to be subjective. I do not feel he is “distant” in this chapter.

3. Different Setting: This is not a strong argument against the traditional view. Of course, the setting is different. Once again, Genesis 1 is a broad overview of the creation of the universe. Genesis 2 takes place in the Garden of Eden. It would make no sense if they had the same setting. There is no reason why one author cannot write about two different settings when the setting within the account changes.

4. Different Views of Humanity: Genesis 1 does not tell us explicitly how many people were created on Day Six. If one accepts the traditional view then it follows that only Adam and Eve were made in chapter one. Peter Enns’s belief thatGenesis 1 teaches a mass creation of humanity is based upon his acceptance of Darwinian Evolution. He does not believe that all humanity descended from Adam and Eve so he needs more people to have been created in the beginning. This is an example of eisegesis (reading one’s preconceived ideas into the text) instead of exegesis (using context to determine the meaning).

How does Genesis 1 teaching humanity as royal figures contradict the priestly focus of Genesis 2? Cannot mankind be both? Why can’t one author focus on one office in one chapter and focus on another in the next chapter?

The Names of God

The belief that there are two creation accounts in Genesis can be traced back at least as far as the French physician Jean Astruc. In his book, Conjectures (1753), Astruc argued that Genesis 1 and 2 were written by two different authors with Moses as the editor. Astruc’s reasoning was that each chapter used two different names for God. He was intrigued as to why one author (Moses) would only use Elohim (“God” in English) in one chapter but then add another name, Yahweh (“Jehovah” or LORD” in English), in the next chapter. In Astruc’s mind, one author would never do this so Moses must used two creation accounts to write the beginning of Genesis. He used one author who only knew God by the name of Elohim and another author who referred to him as Yahweh.[22]

This argument constitutes one of the main arguments in favor of the Documentary Hypothesis. This is the theory that Moses did not write the first five books of the Bible, known as the Torah or Pentateuch. Instead, these books are said to have been written by different authors hundreds of years after Moses lived. Around the year 400 BC (roughly 1,000 years after Moses) an editor(s) combined these multiple sources into what we now know as Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.[23]

Is this argument as strong as many believe it is? I do not believe so. What is interesting is how so many think that one author would never use more than one name to refer to the same God. However, when studied closely, it becomes clear that using two names of God makes perfect sense in this context. What we find is that the names Elohim and Yahweh can be used by one author as each name has its own special meaning in the context of the passages they are found in.

The name Elohim speaks of God in more general, universal terms that portray him as God of all the Earth and who is outside and above the physical universe.[24] In Psalms, for example, the name Elohim is used to “convey the general idea of divinity, or to mention the Almighty as the God of the whole world, as the Creator of the entire universe, as the Deity of all peoples…”[25] Elohim is used as more of a title (“God”) and is appropriate for the Creator of the universe. This is why Elohim is used in Genesis 1 because it is about the creation of the universe.[26]

Table 2: Elohim & Yahweh – Common Noun vs Proper Noun
Elohim was originally a common noun, an appellative, and could be used for the God of Israel or pagan gods. Yahweh is a proper noun, the personal name of Israel’s God. Take, for example, the word “city” is a common noun while “Jerusalem” is a proper noun.[27] As scholar Umberto Cassuto has said, “…the variations in the choice of the divine names did not come about accidentally but by design.”[28]  

Elohim is also used when God’s relationship with someone outside of the chosen people of Israel is portrayed.[29] This is in contrast to the Hebrew name Yahweh which is the personal name for the God of Israel. This appears not only in the Torah but throughout the Old Testament as the Prophets mostly use Yahweh because they are speaking of specifically the God of the chosen people of Israel.[30] The same can be found in modern Hebrew: Yahweh is used for the Jewish idea of the Deity while Elohim is used to express the universal/general concept of God.[31]

Yahweh is the covenant name of God, which emphasizes his special relationship with Israel. This is appropriate for Genesis 2 where God begins a covenant with Adam and Eve (which connects the first human couple with the later covenants with the people of Israel).[32] Cassuto puts it this way: Yahweh is used “when God is presented to us in His personal character and in direct relationship to people or nature…”[33]

The two names of God, Yahweh and Elohim, bring out different aspects of God’s character.[34] This is why Moses, and other writers in the Old Testament, use two different names when speaking about God: “different topic matter means different attributes are stressed.”[35]

In contexts that emphasize God as a universal deity (like Genesis 1), Elohim is used while in a text that emphasizes God as the covenant savior (like Exodus 6), Yahweh is more likely to be used. It is possible that in some cases “in which neither aspect is particularly stressed, the names may be alternated for variety or indeed for no specific reason.”[36] However, the general pattern seems to be Elohim as the universal God and Yahweh as the covenant Lord.[37]

A good example can be found in Genesis 3 when Satan uses Elohim. This makes sense because Satan is not in a covenant relationship with God so he would not use the name Yahweh. [38] This difference between Elohim and Yahweh was noted as early as the 12th century by Rabbi Jehuda Hallevi who mentioned that Elohim was the divine name in general, and Adonay (or Yahweh) was the name for the God of revelation and covenant.[39] “To put it simply, Elohim is what God is and Yahweh is who he is.”[40]

Elohim is used exclusively in Genesis 1 because in this chapter God appears as the Creator and Lord of everything.[41] In the Garden of Eden, God is portrayed as the moral Ruler and has a direct relationship with man and other creatures so Yahweh is best suited.[42]

So why does Genesis 2 use Yahweh with Elohim? There is a simple answer to this. Yahweh is linked with Elohim because Yahweh is the same being as Elohim that created the universe. The God of Israel is also the God of the entire world.[43]

Concluding Thoughts

It is popular today to believe that Genesis 1 and 2 present two creation accounts that contradict each other. This essay showed that this is not the case. An argument can be made that both chapters give us different perspectives of the same creation event and that they are complementary to each other.

Reasonable answers can be given to each of the arguments used to support two creation accounts. The common argument that Genesis 1 and 2 give us a different order of creation is challenged with an examination of the Hebrew words used. The arguments that both chapters have different literary styles and settings do not hold up as well as many think, and the different views of God and humanity do not necessarily contradict each other. The main argument, the different names of God, has a perfectly reasonable explanation: two different names are used depending on the context of the particular passage.

Sources

Gleason L. Archer. A Survey of Old Testament Introduction. Revised and Expanded (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2007).

David Bokovoy. “The Two Creations in Genesis.” https://www.bibleodyssey.org/passages/related-articles/the-two-creations-in-genesis/. Accessed June 25, 2023.

Umberto Cassuto. The Documentary Hypothesis (New York, NY: Shalem Press, 2011).

Peter Enns. “Israel’s Two Creation Stories.”  https://biologos.org/articles/israels-two-creation-stories. Accessed June 25, 2023.

Roger Forster and Paul Marston. Reason, Science and Faith (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2001).

Richard Elliott Friedman. Who Wrote the Bible? (New York, NY: HarperOne, 1997).

Duane A. Garrett. Rethinking Genesis (Geanies House: Christian Focus Publications, 2000).

Wayne Grudem. Systematic Theology. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000).

Scott W. Hahn and Jeffrey L. Morrow. Modern Biblical Criticism As a Tool of Statecraft (1700-1900) (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2020).

Victor P. Hamilton, The Book of Genesis: Chapters 1-17 (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990).

Andrew S. Kulikovsky. Creation, Fall, Restoration: A Biblical Theology of Creation (Geanies House: Christian Focus Publications, 2009)

H.C. Leupold, Exposition of Genesis Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1942).

John H. Sailhamer. The Pentateuch as Narrative (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992).

Jonathan D. Sarfati. The Genesis Account (Powder Springs, GA: Creation Book Publishers, 2015).

Rudolf Smend. From Astruc to Zimmerli: Old Testament Scholarship in three Centuries (Tubingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 2007).

Bruce K. Waltke, Genesis: A Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001).

Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Word Biblical Commentary Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1987).

Source for feature photo: Beth Jnr (unsplash.com)

[1] Andrew S. Kulikovsky, Creation, Fall, Restoration: A Biblical Theology of Creation Geanies House: Christian Focus Publications, 2009), 177-178.

[2] Kulikovsky, 177, 180.

[3] Richard Elliot Friedman, Who Wrote the Bible?  (New York, NY: HarperOne, 1997), 50-51. David Bokovoy. “The Two Creations in Genesis.” https://www.bibleodyssey.org/passages/related-articles/the-two-creations-in-genesis/. Accessed June 25, 2023. Peter Enns. “Israel’s Two Creation Stories.”  https://biologos.org/articles/israels-two-creation-stories. Accessed June 25, 2023.

[4] Friedman, 51. Bokovoy.

[5] Bokovoy. Also see Enns.

[6] Bokovoy. Also see Enns.

[7] Bokovoy. Enns.

[8] Enns.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Roger Forster and Paul Marston. Reason, Science and Faith (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2001), 269.

[11] Kulikovsky, 181; Jonathan D. Sarfati. The Genesis Account (Powder Springs, GA: Creation Book Publishers, 2015), 296.

[12] Sarfati, 296.

[13] It is also possible that some plants of the field had not yet sprung up because there had not been any rain yet (Kulikovsky, 181-182; John H. Sailhamer. The Pentateuch as Narrative (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992), 97). Wayne Grudem believes that the lack of rain or man to cultivate is not the “physical reason why there were no plants, but only explain that God’s work of creation was not complete” (Wayne Grudem. Systematic Theology. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000), 303). However, as Kulikovkey notes, the casual conjunction (“for, “because”; Hebrew ki) “clearly indicates the reason why these plants had not appeared – there was no rain and no man to cultivate the ground” (Kulikovsky, 180). 

[14] Kulikovsky, 181; Sarfati, 296. Bruce K. Waltke, Genesis: A Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001), 84.

[15] Kulikovsky, 181-182; Sarfati, 296; Victor P. Hamilton, The Book of Genesis: Chapters 1-17 (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990), 154. H.C. Leupold, Exposition of Genesis Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1942), 112-113.

[16] Kulikovsky, 181; Hamilton, 154; Sailhamer, 97. Gordon Wenham notes that “shrub” “seems to denote the low bushy plants characteristic of the arid areas bordering on the fertile crescent” (Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Word Biblical Commentary Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1987), 58.

[17] Sarfati, 296.

[18] Forster and Marston believe that “had formed” is not a straightforward reading and that Hebrew is a simple past tense. They accuse the NIV as having a theological motivation, not a linguistic one. They also point to the Septuagint as evidence that it is not “had formed.” The Septuagint translated it “God further formed” (Forster and Marston, 269).

Kulikovsky answers this by saying, “Furthermore, the Septuagint (LXX) uses an aorist active indicative functioning as a constative aorist, which simply refers to the fact of the action (as a whole) in past time without saying anything about the kind of action involved or its precise timing” (Kulikovsky, 193).   

[19] Another view is that of Hamilton who thinks that “[t]his verse does not imply that this was God’s first creation of animals. Rather, it refers to the creation of a special group of animals brought before Adam for naming” (Hamilton, 176). I believe that the explanation in the main text of this essay is simpler and answers the problems more effectively.

[20] Sarfati, 323; Hamilton, 176.

[21] Kulikovsky, 193-194.

[22] Gleason L. Archer. A Survey of Old Testament Introduction. Revised and Expanded (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2007), 71-72. Scott W. Hahn and Jeffrey L. Morrow. Modern Biblical Criticism As a Tool of Statecraft (1700-1900) (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2020), 109, 110-111. Rudolf Smend. From Astruc to Zimmerli: Old Testament Scholarship in three Centuries (Tubingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 2007), 1, 8-9.

Rudolf Smend, quoting another scholar (J.E. McFadyen) says, “the modern view of the Hexateuch [Penateuch + Joshua] was laid in 1753 by Astruc in his epoch-making discovery of the significance of the divine names, Yahweh and Elohim, as pointing unmistakably to different literary sources” (Smend, 1).

It is interesting to note that Astruc was writing to defend that Moses was the author of the Pentateuch but that Moses relied on earlier sources for Genesis and the beginning of Exodus since this was before his time. Astruc was even worried that skeptics would misuse his work to question traditional authorship (Hahn and Morrow, 109-110; Smend, 7, 10-11).

[23] Umberto Cassuto. The Documentary Hypothesis (New York, NY: Shalem Press, 2011), 19.

[24] Duane A. Garrett. Rethinking Genesis (Geanies House: Christian Focus Publications, 2000), 16. Cassuto, 37.

[25] Cassuto, 29.

[26] Archer, 104-105; Cassuto, 37; Sarfati, 28.

[27] Cassuto, 22.

[28] Ibid., 21.

[29] Ibid., 37-38.

[30] Ibid., 24, 28.

[31] Ibid., 35.

[32] Archer, 105; Cassuto, 37; Garrett, 16; Sarfati, 28.

[33] Cassuto, 37.

[34] Garrett, 16.

[35] Sarfati, 28.

[36] Garrett, 16-17. The interchange of the two divine names in some places is often “for the sake of variety or reflects popular usage” (Garrett, 16). It is possible that when this happens the alternation of the two names “may be unconscious because of the identity of the two names” (Garrett, 16).

[37] Waltke, 84. Waltke notes that Elohim “represents [God] as sovereign Creator, while [Yahweh] designates him as the one who initiates a unique covenant commitment with Abraham and his seed and who oversees its fulfillment in history…”

[38] Archer, 105.

[39] Ibid., 105.

[40] Garrett, 16.

[41] Cassuto, 38-39.

[42] Ibid., 39.

[43] Cassuto, 40. Sarfati, 28. Cassuto (40-49) gives a similar analysis of the Divine Names from other sections of Genesis. Waltke (p. 84) adds, “The combination of names shows that the Creator of the cosmos rules history through chosen humanity.”