This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the LORD God made the earth and the heavens. – Genesis 2:4

Today's Scripture Reading (June 20, 2021): Genesis 2

My grandfathers were both great storytellers. That might be why I treasured my time with them and miss them both very much. Admittedly, sometimes when they were alive, I might have outwardly dreaded another telling of one of the more familiar stories, but inside, all I wanted to do was to sit with them and listen to their stories one more time. I also have to admit that, sometimes, it was years after the first hearing of the story that the message grandpa was trying to tell me finally got through to me. As I grew older, I found that I understood some of the story's finer points just a little better, making the story new again. And there are very few things that I want more than to sit beside them one more time and just listen to them tell me their stories.

Genesis, at its heart, is a collection of stories. Traditionally, Genesis is the first of the five books of Moses. But the Book of Genesis, unlike the other four books of Moses, is outside of the experience of Moses. So, one question that needs to be asked is, "how did Moses come to be in possession of these stories?" For some, it is believed that Moses knew the stories because God verbally communicated the stories to him. And while this is possible, it is more likely that these are the stories that were committed to memory and told from father to son. We might live in a culture where we look and try to find where the information we need is written down if we want to know something, but Moses couldn't do that. In his culture, great effort was taken to pass down the information from generation to generation in stories. And we know that these stories, in most cases, were passed down with great accuracy.

Genesis presents the phrase "This is the account" ten times in the book of Genesis. In addition to these ten incidences, Genesis once states, "This is the written account." Each time that Genesis uses the phrase, it begins a story or a genealogy for the reader to consider that is part of the history of the beginnings of everything. It seems likely that these were individual stories handed down from father to son and repeatedly told whenever the family gathered. "This is the account" indicates the oral history of the story from Adam to Jacob. And everything that those involved in those stories considered to be important were contained within the tales.

"This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created" begins the second creation account that we have in our Bible. It is a more theologically oriented account than the Great Creation Poem that makes up the first account. But, while this is the second creation account, this story likely is the earliest of the creation accounts, and the first of the stories passed down from father to son.  

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Genesis 3