Genesis

J. N. Darby.

(Notes and Comments Vol. 1.)

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Genesis 1

In Genesis we have what addresses itself to man in his responsibility, the first Adam placed in it, and what it is needed he should know. We may have counsels in types, but no more; it is the sphere of responsible man, and man in it. The existence of God is assumed, the creation of angels not spoken of; but first the creation of the heavens and earth needed to be known by us, then the forming of this scene in which we are as established in it, where I may notice that the expanse is not called good as no actual part of the things formed in connection with man. Then creatures being finished, and the last pronounced good (chap. 1:25), the solemn creation of a head to represent Him in it, is taken up, and a lord or head over the creation that had been made, but quite a different thing; "saw that it was good" (v. 25) closed the creation.

The "image" is the great point (v. 27), though "likeness" is stated, and image is the word used in the New Testament. We have then, Gen. 2:15-17 - definite responsibility, and verse 18 and following - Lordship, and counsels as to the church, in this only a helpmeet for Christ found; the Lordship was independent of it, but in all of which He was Lord - no helpmeet, no companion; though a living soul, so far is man from the animal which petty infidelity would, in its low thoughts, persuade us he is.

- 1. There is an apparent difficulty in viewing this as a primary creation, and then passing on to present formation, when we compare the fourth commandment in Exodus 20; but I think it rather confirms it, for it takes the creation, as we have it now, as the whole subject of the commandment, as a distinct whole; for the firmament is called "heaven," and then we have "heaven, and earth, and the sea and all that in them is" (Gen. 1:6, et seq): light not being mentioned. Also in Exodus 20:11 it is "made," not "created," and it is evident that angels do not come into this category of creation. Light, I apprehend, is a peculiar thing - a power, whatever its seat, more than an existence created - and the causing this to be, and seating it anywhere, is surely from the fiat of God, but not the making some material being to exist.

All was created of the universe as a structure. The heavens and the earth universal, as a fact the universe. Elohim created this vast system; in respect of man, earth having its recognised place, we have no stars, they merely come in by the bye, that all might be attributed to God; but God was the Creator of the whole scene.

11 - 2. He then leaves the heavens, and begins with the earth; God's dealings with it, and what belongs to it, hence its heavens so to speak. But first the earth - it was utterly a chaos, but a watery chaos - a desolate waste of unorganised existence, not necessarily without form, all matter must have one, but its condition and state an unformed one - without order and waste - in darkness which rested on the watery waste, for such it was. Darkness was its state when God began to deal with it; being in this state, for we begin with it in such a one, knowing nothing of it between its creation, and finding it in this state, we have here "darkness on the face of the deep.

The state of the heavens we have left behind us; we are conversant with the earth in a state of chaos. The spirit of God brooding on the face of the waters is formative power.

- 3. God commanded the light to shine out of darkness, "Let there be light"; it is not said that He made it now, but that where darkness was, there was now light.

"Let there be light" is not formative or adorning by His will, out of the texture of what exists. But He does not say that more than the deep was in darkness. God created the heaven and the earth. "And the earth"; He did not destroy darkness, but brought in light on the face of the deep, and distinguished them for us; for Him they are both alike as to seeing. Light was there, where it was not before God commanded it to shine out of darkness. So in our hearts, there it is created, but not in se, because save in God who is light and dwells in it, light is not a thing but a state, though God may have created what gives it and so it. I do not speak scientifically and materially. Till we come to light again all is a mere ordering of the earth, and light is ordered for the earth, then indeed we have living souls, not said of man; but, God's image, how he became a living soul is in Gen. 2:7.

- 4. "And God saw the light, that it was good" - and divided it from darkness - separated the two - first darkness on the earth, then light

12 - 5. The first light was day; the evening brought on darkness, then morning, and so one day from first day light to morning. There was evening and there was morning, i.e., light comes in where there had been darkness, and so one day; the continuance of the light is supposed till the next evening darkness, for God called the light "day." Hence though morning came after the darkness day was spoken of, and if we translate it simply it is plain; and there was evening and then morning - one day. That is alternation, and day till next evening; how, is not said. But we have night; first, darkness everywhere on the deep - light - night and day - evening and morning. The light may have been created there, or merely placed. There was light, and darkness separate, but also interchange and passage from one to the other, the gradual disappearing of light, and its dawning - day, night - evening, morning.

As regards the day, evening and morning, the light created out of darkness was called "day"; but there was no morning then, hence evening comes first - the disappearance of light. But to complete the recommencement of day, evening and morning must come in - the created light apart from darkness - day; then there was evening, and there was morning, of course with night between, and that counted a day. Although the Jews count from the evening I cannot think this the meaning here; the light had been brought forth and called day; the evening was the close of that - the disappearance of light. Then I read "and there was evening" - evening was - "and there was morning," one day. The night is not taken account of, but by implication, it was the primeval state - absence of light - not a creation. God's works are in the light, only if darkness come on light appeared again - the dawn - there was morning. The evening is noted first, because it closed the day just created, or ordered by light brought in.

Everything a man speaks of as created exists as much in dark as in light. The continued exercise of creative power, I apprehend, we are very ignorant about; that it exists we know and upholds, which is the same thing - save the exercise of divine will.

- 6. An expanse.

- 7, 8. Then the atmospheric heavens, the actual blue sky was formed; waters above - the treasure house for the rain, and below - the heaven or firmament. That was the second day; there was again evening and morning - the disappearance of the light, and its reappearance.

13 - 9. Next the sea is made by withdrawing the waters from the surface of a part of the earth, and causing the dry land to appear. Nothing was made the second day, i.e., any new thing; the separation of waters above and below, leaving the heavens free as a firmament between, was not a new substance created, hence it is not said to be very good.

- 10. But now we have land and sea; this was good. The air (sky or firmament), water, earth and sea are formed, and day and night.

- 11 and 20: "bring forth" are different - in verse 11 it is da-sha (sprouts forth) "let the earth grow with green grass"; and in verse 20 it is sha-ratz (swarms with) "let the waters swarm with swarms of ne-phesh" (soul); in verse 21 it is sha-ratz'.

I think a-sah' (formed) is used for forming, putting them in their order and place according to His will.

He made lights - the firmament - man, in counsel as to what he should be.

Create" is used for heaven, and earth, and man; ya-tzar (formed as a potter) when it proceeds out of a certain sphere or place it belongs to; so even in Gen. 2:7 of man, see also Gen. 2:3.

- 11-13. Plants are now formed; the earth "brings forth" - this first here, and it was so, and good; a third day. The dry land and the seas were the actual forming the habitable earth, and then plants.

- 14-19. Then luminaries were formed, serving to divide day and night, and form epochs, and regulated, or periodic times.

NOTE. - "To divide"; day and night were already divided; this was a special ordering of the function of light as to the earth, in and by the lights.

It is a mark of revelation this to me, for no one inventing a plan would have separately formed light, and sun, and moon, at such an interval. This is order, not existence of light, nor forming, creating the bodies that bore the light.

- 20. We have now the living creatures of the waters, and fowl in the firmament; fowl, though flying in heaven, belonging to earth.

14 - 21. I do not see more in its being said "God created great whales" than the importance of the thing; vast as the creatures might be, they were mere creatures.

I think "created" comes in with intentional fitness; it is the beginning of living creatures, it begins with great whales.

NOTE. - Up to that it had been the creation of materials, the earth, or mere plants; now of living beings.

Tan-ni-nim (sea-monsters) are very large water animals. And then we have it again when we come to man; there is matter and its forms - life and its forms - and man. He is made as part of the sixth day, but it is a new creation.

NOTE. - In chapter 2 the living creatures consequently are wholly dropped; the heavens, earth, and plants are created by Jehovah Elohim, and then the detail of man, and his responsible connection with the paradisaical earth. We have what man really is first, ya-tzar, he is "formed" as a body, and then God breathes into him, etc.

NOTE. - Also in chapter 1 we have after the making the beasts (v. 25), "And God saw that it was good" - the closing judgment on each day's proper creation. Man comes afterwards, wholly apart.

- 24. Next, on the sixth day, the earth brings forth animals. The earth brought forth, on God's fiat, all living creatures on it; they had as in the sea ne-phesh khay-yah (soul of life) - man is quite distinct.

- 25. "He saw that it was good," is said after the beasts habitually, at the end, before "there was evening, there was morning" - day.

- 26 begins a subject by itself, though on the same day. Man closes the formed creation, but he is not properly of it, and save as he comes in under "every thing God had made," there is no pronouncing that he was good; he is not otherwise part of what God looked on and pronounced good - that closed with the animals. You have first light - good; then separation of light and darkness; then the earth formed; firmament; sea; dry land (note, no fire is formed), it is covered with plants, and revolutions of time ordered by celestial luminaries. Then living creatures in water, and fowls, then animals on the earth; these are "good." Thus the form of creation, as such, was complete, and its lord was to be made as a distinct thing; I repeat, the closing "and God saw that it was good," comes before any question of man. On the sixth day the earthly form of creation was complete; yet man was formed as a living creature, with a ne-phesh khay-yah, but it is not said when.

15 - 30 seems to say that the beasts of the earth (as a general expression) ate the green herb. We have not "cattle" and "beast of the field," but whatever was a living thing on the earth (as in the ark I suppose). But the statements are not alike; in chapter 6:21, it is only cattle; chapter 7:8, cattle clean and unclean; chapter 7:21, cattle and beast, without "of the field"; see chapter 2:19-20, where they are all first called "beasts of the field" and then "cattle" distinguished.

- 31. It is not said of man "and God saw that it was good." It is said "He saw all that he had made, and behold it was very good," but man held an exceptional place, and his likeness to God, etc., made it more than a mere good creature; as part of the whole, of course he was so, but he was a distinct being.

Of course all things were perfect and the fruit of perfect wisdom, but there is counsel and plan only as to man.

So we find "it was good"; that is, the ordinary creation of that day closes before He begins with man, who is wholly apart. Counsel is taken when all the rest is already formed - counsel to have man in God's image, not first "like" Him, but in His "image," one that represents Him and is formed to represent Him; he is characteristically one who presents Him to others. In order to this man is made after God's likeness, no doubt without evil in him, but as representing God, a centre of the whole system, looked up to as such, the centre of all affections; one conscious of being all this, a much more compound and relative being it seems to me, as having body, soul, and spirit, than angels are; and the single centre of a vast scene subject to him, which no angels are.

The outgoings of affection, and claim thus of reference to him, as was found in no angel (see Gen. 2:20); at any rate, man is here carefully contrasted with the living creature which the earth brought forth, is not called such (though he were so too); then the sixth day creation was finished and pronounced good, and then man is formed, according to counsel, according to God's image. Thus according to Genesis 1 man was a distinct being made, when the subject creation of plants and living creatures was complete, in the image of God.

"In our image, after our likeness" (v. 26); this has always had something vague for me. I am clear it is not righteousness and true holiness; that is the new creation - renewal in knowledge - quite another thing. Adam had not the knowledge of good and evil, and therefore could not be righteous wholly. But, indeed, this thought is a total inapprehension of what the new creation is - its difference; nay, man, though fallen, is said to be created after the likeness of God

16 I am not yet clear as to all it may mean, but I do see an amazing position in "likeness to God." The consciousness of unity, of a supremacy above all around him, of being the necessary centre of all in relationship with himself; this bringing out all the affections of authority, and reception of dependence connected with this position.

Now this self-centred place as regards others (under God of course, for it was only a likeness and an image) was a most amazing one - no angel held it, for - more glorious as a creature - he was a glorious servant, and the centre of nothing.

The actual dominion was a consequence; but it was one, "and let him have dominion." Innocent Adam would ascribe all to God; fallen - ransack and overwhelm the world, to subdue it and be a centre, with the desire of empire, the Babylon of his creation.

Absence of evil made part of this place; as God created him he would have been a happy, beneficent head. Christ, the Image of God, will have this place.

The autarkeia (sufficiency in oneself) could not be in a creature - it denied his nature; Man did not do to be alone, and he had Eve. Here he is the image of Him to come. As to "image" and "likeness"; "image" is that in which he was created; it was a kind of imitation, or reproduction of something; I believe this is just. "Likeness" is the form in which one is manifested; he was according to the likeness of God (see Gen. 5:1) he is in His likeness, because this was them manifested in man. Christ was made in the likeness of men - this manifested form; it is not a creation of reality, but the manifested form He took.

"Likeness" seems to me to be what Adam was in that place till he fell. An image represents - reproduces; likeness is conformed to. Man cannot quite lose the place, he is not another, nor a new creation; the likeness he has. He is still said to be made in the likeness kata theon, as in Genesis 1, gegonotas, the perfect (note James 3:9), it could not be other wise as to ginomai; we are renewed after His "image"; this at once shows it is not. We are called upon to be like Him, new creation, moral likeness practically, only we have received the life in which we can; this is a wholly new thing, divine, with the knowledge of good and evil. There was likeness to God in Adam, in that evil was unknown within. Conscience, as necessary from God's nature in him, so by man's constitution, had yet no place internally; but this is different from holiness in this, the absence of moral power, evil being known and kept without by the energy of the divine nature; necessarily by nature in God; and through grace and the participation of the divine nature in us.

17 An image represents, but a likeness corresponds, but it must be seen how far tze-lem (image) and d'muth (similitude) correspond to the English words in sense.

In Genesis 1 man is created in God's likeness, and man begets a son in his fallen one, this is the main point, but the latter was also after his image. The likeness is the appearance anything affords even if it be itself - I speak of the word - likeness is the fact of appearance by which I can represent to myself what a thing is. The image exists to represent him exactly, and as replacing him. When a likeness is very accurate it becomes an image; hence the shadows of the law were not the very image, they did not strictly represent, though there were analogies - shadows of the highest importance. At Sinai, Israel saw no likeness, such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. But when man is created, he is created "in the image" of God; next, "after his likeness"; he was the representation de facto of Him on the earth, and not so "like him." Hence man is the eikon (image), the image and glory of God in 1 Corinthians 11:7, it is the place he holds as representing God; so Christ is pre-eminently "the image of the invisible God."

But James shows the folly of blessing God, and cursing him who was made in His likeness; it is not his place and glory as representing Him, this would be quite unsuitable, but what was created - like what he blessed; he does not enter, I apprehend, into the question of the likeness being lost (those who cursed did not either), but the original constitution maintained as the archetype of God's mind - not the result of fallen man; hence it is gegonotas, not genomenous - the condition of creation continued to the mind, not the established fact and its actual consequences. But then, I apprehend, when it is growth according and up to a perfect representation of the original of what He is as He expresses Himself - not qualities, but full growth into the whole personal presentation of what He is - it is image. Likeness is in distinct qualities; "image," complete presentation of the person. Hence in Colossians 3:10, they were renewed in knowledge according to the image, the complete presentation of what, and of all of what He was - a wondrous position and calling - here "likeness" would not do, indeed would have no proper sense - "according to the likeness" - it is according to Himself, but as presented, so as to be known in the revelation of Himself. Hence also in 2 Corinthians 3:18, it is according to or into the same "image" - ("as in a glass" should be left out). "We with unveiled face beholding the glory," "are changed into" the very "image" itself of it; Katoptrizomai (I look into a mirror) is "looking home" or "thoroughly into it," and it is ten auten eikona (the same image).

18 These, and the passage Ephesians 4:24 are very remarkable in connection, and in a certain sense in contrast with the "image and likeness" of God in Genesis. Ephesians goes first in thought here, then Colossians; then 2 Corinthians 3. I think verse 3 shows it could not be mere likeness; Christ is written on the heart by the Holy Ghost. Analogous qualities would have been likeness, this is more. Still we behold, and are changed into, not Christ of course, but His "image," by life-giving and communicating power of Himself by the Spirit; so Romans 8:29, we are summorphos tes eikonos. It is a glorious calling, not merely like qualities - through grace we have them as a consequence - but complete, though not Him (see the transfiguration), but as Him. Compare 1 Corinthians 15:38-39.

As explanation that "image" has the double sense, formed on the same idea, of anything that represents an unseen being - as the image of Jupiter - which need not be like, but of which the final cause is to represent - and hence perfect conformity, because then it does represent, "he is his very image" we say; and this in moral things, i.e., in moral qualities, goes very far, for we cannot be like, really, without having them. The limit to this sameness in moral things, when there is likeness, is there, subsisting as a source in the Person of God, or of Christ who is God, and derivatively in us, for the Godhead necessarily carries with it a character which is wholly its own; It is divine - infinite - has Its source in Itself - sovereign goodness - and the will of a divine nature - not a duty.

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19 There is another division of Genesis 1 besides creation, and the days, made by the words "and God saw" and "it was good." First He creates - He then separating the elements, so-called, to make the kosmos or order out of disorder - makes light to shine out of darkness - the first needed act dispelling the darkness that brooded on the deep; and that was a day. Then the open expanse of heaven or sky; the second day. Then water and dry land, giving each its name; and the world thus prepared He pronounces "good." That is the first division - an ordered kosmos.

NOTE. - The saying "it was good" was not at the end of day.

Then He begins to adorn it, and first produces vegetation on the earth; this is another division, and "it is good"; third day. Then He orders the ephemeris of heaven - lights to order seasons, etc.; only declaring therewith that He made the stars. This is the third division - and "it is good" - the fourth day. Next the waters are peopled, and fowl to fly in heaven, and this "is good" - the fourth division - fifth day.

Then beasts and other creatures having life, and this was good" - the fifth division - part of sixth day.

The first mention of "life" and "moving creature" is in the seas, in the fourth division; here, too, blessing is first pronounced.

The fifth division of mere creation, and an ordered kosmos adorned, and peopled with moving life, ends with the earth bringing forth living creatures; God closes it by "God saw that it was good."

Man stands wholly apart, as the ruler, by God's purpose and counsel, of the earth He had created. Separated wholly in his nature and place; of, and from God; but yet connected with the living creature too.

There is no blessing pronounced on the living creatures of the earth, but on the Head of them, subjecting them to him; and all is on the same sixth day; their respective food being provided, but not life given to him for food; he had the fruit of trees - the beasts, the green herb; and all was "very good."

20 Man being set distinctly, and separately at the head of all after "behold, it was good" pronounced on that division of the work; yet he comes in the same day with the cattle of the earth, and the general order. "Create" is used as to the universe, great whales, and man.

The difference of Genesis 1 and 2 is evident. I do not understand how the infidels make any difficulty or inventions about it. Evidently in chapter I he takes his place in the creation, the work of God as God amongst the creatures, male and female, like the other animals (only paired especially, and that noticed), whereas in chapter 2 it is in his whole moral constitution and being, and place, and relationship in the counsels and ways of God, as He has had to say to men, that he is noticed. Yet in one sense, as a creature, he is distinguished from all others; God thinks about the way of creating him, and has pleasure in that which is like Himself and His image. To this no creature could aspire. But it is not relationship, but God's delight in Himself and creation after it. Not the new creation (as often remarked) of Ephesians 4, that would never do; it could not fall - ought not. It is not mere creation of a being, but a nature communicated - partakers of the divine nature. Nor is it anthropomorphism (i.e., being the form of His body); that were poor and no purpose worthy of God, and pretentious too in man to think of. What is insisted on, however, is the image, not the likeness. So Genesis 9:6 But in James 3:9, "likeness," not "image." But "likeness" must, I think, come first for him to be so, as "image" must in the birth of Seth. As I have said elsewhere, an image "represents," a likeness is "conformed to." Seth did represent Adam on the earth, had his place, though not the first in it, or he could not be an image, but alas! he was in his likeness, too, a fallen sinner.

So when man's blood was to be shed it was not his moral goodness but the place he held and dignity, his representing God as he had been set, but which made it unfit he should be killed. James will not have man cursed, and here "likeness" is the fit word; we bless what God is and curse His likeness - man, who was made in it, for so he speaks. Hence (as I have said elsewhere) He formed man spotless, sinless, free, with a will to be for ever used in the sphere he was placed in, and the centre of all the affections and reverence of the sphere he was placed in, and he stood alone as the centre of it all, the image of God. Christ will be, though far more, yet this, perfectly; being One that in the highest sense fully partakes of the divine nature.

21 We have only then to inquire in what sense it is said in Colossians 3, "renewed into knowledge (epignosin) after the image of Him that created him" - and this I think when reflected on is profoundly instructive - Ephesians is, it seems to me, more the likeness. "After God in righteousness and true holiness." It is like Him - what He delights in Himself. So in the commencement of the Epistle, "chosen in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love - to himself." Hence too, I add, it is kainon anthropon, a new kind of man, and we are ananeousthai, it is the spirit of our mind, it begins all afresh with a man of a new kind, and there is no question of knowledge. Hence it is God Himself, as such, before whom we stand. In Colossians it is more Christ all, and in all, representative and image, Himself of God; and so in chapter 1, "who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of the whole creation."

Now there is the true full image of God only in the whole creation - where in Adam was the image of Him that was to come; and even in forgiveness it is in Colossians, Christ forgave" us; in Ephesians, "God in Christ." In Ephesians Christ offers Himself to God. So again it is here having put on the neon anthropon, the man that had not been there before, not the kainon, new in its kind of nature (though that it surely was too), but it is renewed (anakainousthai) into knowledge it gets during the apprehension of that which is quite new in nature. It estimates the new man - Christ; for Christ is the perfect manifestation of what this new man is in us - we see God represented in Him. The moral apprehension of what God is in Him, also represents Him before men. Hence too we are in Christ, and God is far more fully revealed? or rather spoken of directly, in Ephesians than in Colossians. We grow up to the stature of Christ, He is the head of the body and the like. Our life is the life of God, a kaine zoe. We are mimetai Theou.

In Colossians, "worthy of the Lord," we are to walk in Him, and Christ and His fulness are much more spoken of. Christ is our life, Christ is our all in all; the peace of Christ is to rule in our hearts, the word of Christ is to rule in our hearts, the word of Christ is to dwell in us richly. Now this is very precious, but it is different; we have more of the fulness and life of Christ, our association with Him, in Colossians. His glory is more brought out, the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. In Ephesians He is more the Man once dead, now raised and exalted. How precious to have both. But I think it makes the force of "likeness" and "image" plain for us, and makes the character of the two epistles very precious to us, and how divinely exact in things where man's wits, I am persuaded, would have never worked. And, remark likeness "would not apply to Christ, for He is God. "Image" does, because He does, as Incarnate, represent God. He never imitates God, for He is God. We are called to these things, yet He is the pattern of them, because God is revealed in Him, but then it is original in Him. Walk in love as Christ loved us, and gave Himself, and to God; all this is very perfect. Hence in one sense we find Him more exalted in the Colossians, because He does take a kind of official, or representative place, and that has to be guarded against any misrepresentation All the fulness was pleased to dwell in him" (the English translation is horribly false) and all the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. All this is as it should be. Compare Genesis 5:1, where it is "in likeness," because it is Adam's state. He was made in God's likeness, not what he was before others, but what he was.

22 Genesis 2

It is not the fact of man's being a living soul that is the distinctive point, but the manner of it. The statement, "Thou shalt surely die" (v. 17), certainly implies that, had he not, he should not have died - death entered by sin - the power of the breath of God would have sustained life, but it would have been life here, in relationship with this world. All that follows is government, and consequence as to this - outside the place into which God had brought man, in probation, in blessing. Afterwards, in this state, the question is raised of obtaining life there by obeying, as he had lost it by disobeying, but this, also, in the sphere in which it all took place - the earth.

Then, indeed, God gives life (as in fact from the beginning He had done, in view of redemption) in connection with another world.

23 Real, moral separation from God, sin, and what it was, is known only spiritually; though conscience, knowledge of good and evil, is in all, though away from Him.

NOTE. - Hence whenever a man seeks eternal life (even if he has it) he is under law.

God has given it to us in His Son, though we do seek it in a certain sense, as we have it not yet externally in its own sphere; we have it, but not formally, in another world. Hence in Romans 2 (where the great eternal, unchangeable principles of good and evil are maintained, paramount to all dispensational dealings) those who go right, though eternal life be given as the result (apodosei will render), yet they seek glory, honour, and incorruptibility; we are called, as Peter says, by glory and virtue - nor does he speak of being sinners merely - that they were, but contentious, and not obeying the truth, and having pleasure in unrighteousness; yet the judgment is universal on every soul of man working evil.

If eternal life be given as John unfolds it, that does not weaken the judgment of right and wrong, which even made it necessary; only there is the atonement of full efficacy when life is given. Eternal life, though really given, and our life, is yet surely looked at in resurrection blessedness; yet while its nature could be fully happy alone there, it is equally true that its nature, which will be happy there, is already in us, and that nature is the principal thing, because it enjoys God, and this even true as to the millennium.

Eternal life will not be satisfied, though blessed then, because the Prince of Life and Peace is there, and the power and contradiction, and temptation of Satan gone; nor do I suppose they will die; still, if life be there, there is the seeking for glory, honour and incorruption; and the sight of Christ - the perfect display of it - sustains this.

There is not the kind of desire we have, because the eternal life, nature, is enclosed in this tabernacle, in which we groan in conflict and temptation, and they enjoy, under a present Christ, the full effect of holy and righteous power; but if groaning after it be not there, holy desires I doubt not will, but this will be in communion with Christ. The thing displayed is government, which will be celebrated, but there will be within, what will characterise saints, that they still want a better or fuller accomplishment of their relationship with God; only they wait in peace, fully glorifying Christ there.

24 In this chapter God forms man dust from the "ground," i.e., he had his form first of all without life, and then breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. God Himself was the source of life to him, "for we also are his offspring." He was Ha-adam (Man) from ha-adamah (the ground), and then got life from God; it was thus Adam became a living soul. That man, and man only, had life from God, not simply by will as an angel might, but communicated from God and in a body, is evident, but only as life - existence. As to animals, they are formed from the ground, but they are brought to Adam to name as the paramount lord; it is their relation to Adam here, not their nature; all refers to Adam's place before God. Alive, through the breath of God in his nostrils; responsible; in the garden he had been placed in to enjoy; lord of the animals by God's authority; and God, interested in his estate, gives him a helpmeet taken out of himself, made for him, not a human being with him.

In the first chapter it was the animal's place with God as Creator, and Adam before Him; the second chapter is not repetition, nor is it another contradictory report as alleged - one is creation, and every creature's place in it or over it; the other the whole moral place of man when God, the Lord God, set him up as such.

- 4. The right division is here; the term "God," and then "Lord God" alone shows it.

The first chapter of Genesis should be clearly to the end of chapter 2:3; this is complete, with Elohim. God created, and God rested, and sanctified the seventh day. The serpent speaks of Elohim, as such, in contrast with His creature; but Jehovah Elohim is in communication with Adam and Eve.

So Eve and Cain refer to "Jehovah," nor is it here "Jehovah Elohim," but simple "Jehovah"; only Eve in giving birth to Seth says "Elohim," so the following history of Seth's family is "Elohim." All this is simply historical, not the mind of one knowing Jehovah and His ways, showing what they were.

"Jehovah" I apprehend is simple relationship; "Jehovah Elohim" relationship, and moral dealing connected with God in His moral character as such. So in chapter 6 "Jehovah" said (v. 3) "My spirit"; that was directly His ways with men. But "Elohim" saw (v. 5) God, such as He is as God - this was the great historical fact; (vv. 6-8) his relationship to man - "Jehovah"; (v. 9) historical again to the end, the Creator deals with creation; chapter 7 "Jehovah" deals with Noah, but I should begin chapter 8 at chapter 7:17, thence to chapter 8:19; verses 20, 22 are specific relationship according to the estimate of the writer; chapter 9 history, again "Elohim"; then clearly all is with the Creator, and the earth, so on till we have "Jehovah Elohim" of Shem. Nimrod was a hunter "before Jehovah," it is morally viewed, not merely before God - "before God" would not have the same thought; exceeding great, but "before the Lord" is another thing; he was morally viewed and judged. Then in Babel we get clearly moral responsibility and relationship, and so on with Abraham, though there in electing grace. I think judgment is associated with "Jehovah," it is, however, mainly relationship.

25 NOTE. - Chapter 4 is in connection with chapters 2 and 3, i.e., on the ground of "Jehovah's" dealings - chapter 5 on the natural ground of "Elohim" again - man's history on the earth - "Jehovah's" previous dealings, as such, are referred to at the end - chapter 6 commences "Jehovah's" dealings again.

It is to be remarked that Sodom, as Nimrod, is before the "Lord." The typical victory of Abraham gives Jehovah a new name, One above all gods, whose heaven and earth are, and that in possession.

NOTE. - Though "Jehovah Elohim" is used in the history of Eden, both the Serpent and Eve say only "Elohim." Passing over Enos, whatever the force of that may be, we get Noah building an altar to "Jehovah"; I suppose a name religiously known from Enos - there the blessing is, note, from "Jehovah," God of Shem, while Japhet's being enlarged is only "Elohim." The next is chapter 12, Abraham built an altar to "Jehovah," and called on the name of "Jehovah", chapter 14:22, we have more; chapter 15:2 is "Adonai Jehovah," if I recollect. Sarai calls Him "Jehovah" in chapter 16. The revelation of the name of relationship is in chapter 17, but it is not "Jehovah" in chapter 18, but that was appearing as a man - it was altogether fitting. The angels and Lot say "Jehovah." In chapter 22 "Elohim" all through till Abraham calls "Jehovah" Jireh.

- 5. V'a-dam a-yin "And man was not"; it was the state of things.

26 - 7. N'sha-mah (breath) seems to me the act of respiration souffle; ruakh (spirit) (chap. 7:22, etc.), the existence of respiration as life, spirit or life in us. God breathed into man's nostrils a nish-math khay-yim (breath of life), it is not there ruakh. Thus we have, in the Flood, all in whom was the nish-math ruakh khay-yim (breath of the spirit of life) - this spirit of life itself - ne-phesh khay-yah, a living soul, is all that constitutes individuality - personality - what taken together constitutes I - a person without reference to the body, though in it and living in it, and hence, if used for a dead body as being the apparent person. The ru-akh is the power of life which is exercised in us in breathing, the thing that acts, and in us lives, by breath. Man became a ne-phesh khay-yah (soul of life) by God's breathing the nish-math khay-yim into the formed and organised dust, and so there was a ru-akh which was life, and in the body maintained by breathing. God did not breathe a ru-akh, nor did man become n'sha-mah, or even ru-akh, but a ne-phesh. Ru-akh being the power of life, this word ru-akh is used of Him; it is the active power of God. As to the rest, I have remarked.

As far as I see without a concordance we have only ne-phesh khay-yah (soul of life), then ru-akh khay-yim (breath of life), or nish-math ru-akh khay-yim (breath of the spirit of life) The ru-akh khay-yim (breath of life) made man a ne-phesh khay-yah (a soul of life). The ru-akh khay-yim (breath of life) was in flesh, but no being was ru-akh khay-yim (breath of life), man was (became) ne-phesh khay-yah (a soul of life). Then, moreover, arises the question, is rle-phesh khay-yah (soul of life) said of any but man? It is said, Genesis 1:20-21, of what the waters brought forth, and verse 24 of what the earth. Whatever I suppose had ru-akh khay-yim (breath of life) was ne-phesh khay-yah (a soul of life). Indeed ne-phesh is itself breath or breathing. And this form of life, animal life (I suppose animal the same derivating) man clearly has. But the difference is immense of his becoming so by Elohim's breathing into his nostrils, so that we tou gar kai genos esmen

The object of Genesis 1 is not the Beschaffenheit (constitution). God formed the beasts of or from the ground; so Adam, dust from the ground, not a man from the ground, but dust, and then breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and thus from this breathing in of God he became a living personality - the offspring of God in His existence. Hence God says (chap. 3:19) "and to dust shalt thou return," but that in no way affected that which was breathed into the dust, or spring in man from that divine breathing. And, as I have remarked, whatever divine intimation there may be in chapter 2:17 or chapter 3:3, in the execution of judgment, there was only reference to this world, not to the soul; all that was behind. Thus, "He drove out the man," was removal from God's presence, and his place before God; but, externally, it was only exclusion from Paradise.

27 The whole question of the soul's relationship to God and a judgment after death is untouched here, though, as a spiritual person, I may see separation from God to be eternal ruin. Gradually the instinct of man's soul was lit up by the declarations of the Spirit in the Old Testament, particularly the Psalms, but there was no revelation of life and incorruptibility till the Gospel; they were not brought to light. The Pharisees were right - they had concluded it from the Old Testament, and the Sadducees did not know the Scriptures and the power of God. But the Lord Himself draws it from "I am the God of Abraham," etc., and it is added, "for all live unto him"; death is only death as to this world and man's place there. This revelation has so much the more clearness that the original sentence was limited to that; all still lived to God. So of eternal judgment, it was part of Jewish faith, as in Hebrews 6, but formed no part of the original revelation. Wrath of God from heaven on men was revealed when the Gospel came in, for it met it.

The deep moral effect is justly pressed - He drove out the man - that the God of love, the Creator, should do; that cannot be too deeply estimated. It is rightly felt as judgment, when I know what God and a soul and divine favour means, but the doctrine of soul and life, etc., is not entered on in the passage.

So in Ezekiel, though "the soul that sinneth it shall die," it is still dealing with a living man, responsible on the earth; it may be used as a warning and threat, but its application is life on the earth in the land of Israel.

In 1 Corinthians 15 we have exactly the same statement as to the first man. He is ek ges, chotkos, and we see here that it applies to man as here in the body. It is mortal - sown in corruption - flesh - corruptible, i.e., it is the body - man alive on earth in a corruptible mortal body. It is the body which is always designated thus.

28 In speaking of blood it is always the life of the flesh, not of man, but of all flesh, though of man as flesh, i.e., in his animal nature. Indeed, in Genesis 9 it is carefully distinguished.

The life is in the blood, but He requires the life of man from his brother, because in the image of God He made man. See Leviticus 17:10-14, and Deuteronomy 12, but I do not exactly know what da-mo v'naph'sho (the blood thereof for the life thereof) means. Query, if the accents be not wrong - the munakh under da-mo - and if it should not read, "for the life of all flesh (is) his blood," it is for his soul.

For v'naph'sho - with, or for the life of it, compare Leviticus 17:14, twice, and Genesis 9:4; from the last it is evident, I think, that the expression means in its state of living existence, flesh; v'naph'sho, is not to be eaten; and that state - of flesh ruined - lies in its blood. Thus, Leviticus 17:14, becomes plain, "the life of all flesh," i.e., the subject life in flesh. The fact is simply stated at the end of the verse: ne'phesh kol-ba-sar' da-mo hu - "the life of all flesh is its blood"; i.e., the abstract principle - flesh's life - is the blood. The beginning of the verse merely adds that it is in its state of living existence. Genesis 9:4, comes in to show that the term means with the life in it - flesh, with the life in it - or its state of living existence - which is the blood.

This makes it, I think, quite plain, and it is important too.

- 7. To go back to this verse; it is evident that it is the nature, the Beschaffenheit (constitution) of man, what he is really, and, at the end of the chapter, the woman's relationship with him in creation; it would have been quite out of place to have introduced her having the breath of life from God; it is not even said she had a living soul. In chapter I: 24 we have what the beast is, how he was created, the way he existed as a living thing; as this verse does of Adam, how he did. In chapter 1:26 it is not said even that man was a living soul; his distinct place in creation is pointed out.

As regards Eve not having the breath of God breathed into her nostrils, it is not the subject of this chapter, but her relationship to ha-ish (the man); otherwise she is included in the ha-a-dam, who is made in the likeness of God. They were called ha-a-dam in the day they were created, and she is fully aware of the prohibition to eat the forbidden fruit as alike applicable to both (vv. 16, 17). No doubt this speaks primarily of Adam by reason of verse 18; but it is not the less certain that it is ha-a-dam, the race, that is contemplated - Gen. 3:3 gives the command to Eve as to Adam, ha-a-dam had it; verse 18 begins a history by itself, so verses 7 and 8 are both distinct elements in the account. Adam is looked at as ha-adam - as the head of the race, but chapter 5 shows Eve was included, "Let us make Adam," but so God created ha-a-dam, male and female. This (chap. 1) is Adam's creature place, from Elohim - chapter 2:8, his relative place with Jehovah, including Eve, verse 18 et seq; his relative place to Eve; chapter 3:20, hers to all that followed. Chapter 5:1-2, both in respect of the whole race.

29 - 7, 25. All this is the sixth day.

- 8. This is a constituted place of present blessing and trial. He was not created in Eden, but of dust, and the breath of life breathed into him, that is all; the garden is formed, and he is placed there under such and such conditions. The whole scene is one of relationships, and the footing on which the man stood in every respect.

- 15 et seq: blessing, responsibility, purpose of union, conferred intelligent dominion; then his partner, but his own position was with God first. And though the woman was first transgression, yet the Lord says "Thou," and speaks to dam of the disobedience; for temptation never justifies departure from God.

- 19, 20. This implies a kind of knowledge given of God, which man has not now. Nature, as such, was much more, and otherwise the domain of man.

- 20. The first Adam is ha-a-dam, the second time simple l'a-dam (to man); that is, the first is man as such in his place, before God, put by Him in the place of authority, of which naming in Scripture is the constant sign. All was thus placed under his authority from God; this put him in his place with God as to this. God brought to him every beast, etc. But he, though in this place, with all authority from God (Psa. 8) found, in all that had been brought before him, no associate, no help k'neg-do (as before him), none to answer to what he was, and be before him as such. Adam, let him be ever so much ha-adam - the man - in this place of authority, found no companion for Adam.

30 Ma-tza (found), if not referred to ha-a-dam, must be referred to God, as bringing all this before him; the immediate antecedent is ha-a-dam, otherwise it must be referred back to vay-ya-ve (and he brought), verse 19.

- 21. This is after he is in Eden and dominion over creation, but the purpose (v. 18) expressed, before Adam in lordship is conscious of suited relationship in contrast with creation, and of the quality and source of Eve, when he receives her. In Christ there is necessarily more in His divine purpose of love - as man it is so also with Him; but He consequently takes her before the exercise of his lordship, but not before His title to it as exalted, see Ephesians 1:22.

- 22 is Ephesians 5:27.

- 23. NOTE. - Adam had the knowledge and consciousness of the manner of the formation of his wife, though it were done in a deep sleep - zoth (this) seems all through in contrast as well as hap-pa-am (the time), with the beasts. He gives her a name as well as them, but a name which in the most intimate way connects her with himself. If she was k'neg-do (as before him), it was that she was me-ish (from man). Yet it was in some sense the side on which he was connected with the animals. The hap-pa-am shows this clearly, as indeed zoth, though there is contrast, and this is important as being in creation itself, yet now called to walk together in the grace of life and in spirit; in k'neg-do there is neither male nor female, so truly is it a new creation. But here he gives her a name, as to the others, and Elohim brought her to the man; but then, spiritual things apart, he needed the help, it was not good he should be alone. She was not brought merely to know what he would call her; the identity too with himself, or derivation from himself, was his first thought. The cause of her name was in this. Still it was only one flesh. How thoroughly true and expressive is Paul's statement, "The man was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression," and "the woman was made for the man, not the man for the woman." In the creation she is put e'-zer k'neg-do (a help as before him). In the fall all passes with her, and Adam is I-shah, her man. But in Christ all is new, there is neither male nor female.

- 24, 25. These are, I apprehend, the remarks of the inspired writer.

31 I have noticed it in a measure, but the passage from chapter 1:25-26 is very remarkable and distinct; the day's work ends, so to speak, as to mere creatures of God's hand, with "God saw that it was good." Then comes His mind, God said "let us."

Query, What is man? He is first God's image - represents Him, and presents Him; that it might be rightly so, He created him in His likeness, but the point, as we see in verse 27, was His image. The beasts were l'min-ah (to its kind), but man kid mu the nu (according to our likeness); Adam begat a son in his own likeness, after his image, conversely.

Man is the image and glory of God - stands out before God, as one that characteristically represents Him, showing His power and mind, and yet only representing and presenting Him. Hence Christ, in the highest sense, is the Image of the invisible God; he refers to God entirely, yet represents Him as a Viceroy. Besides this, Christ is God manifest, and so only fully presents Him; but we ought to present Christ, but that is another thing.

K' (as) or kath (according to) is not exactly "in," verse 26. We read of the likeness of the appearance of a man; the likeness of four living creatures - of their faces; the likeness was k' (as) coals of fire (Ezek. 1:13). Seth was in Adam's likeness, the same thing man is according to the way God is seen and known, he is not the same, but answers to what God is, and is set forth as him in whom God represents Himself. The conscious centre of reflective power, though dependent on God, or not really representing Him, but so void of evil that it might be so, and his consciousness towards God abide, that he might consciously be in the place which was His image. The Viceroy has the King's power, not his own, or he is not one, but has the King's power, i.e., not in efficiency necessarily, but in title, and place towards those below him - "have dominion and power" is another thing.

But the peculiar place of man is most remarkable, he must be very miserable or very happy. No doubt, now, it is necessarily so, more than in Adam, because the knowledge of good and evil, and of God through the death of Christ is come in. But there was real likeness - no evil in man - though no holiness and righteousness and intercourse with God, free. A mind - I do not mean reasoning - having capacity for it, in communicated thoughts and feelings, as we know from his history in the garden - that which God could appeal to (not mere conscience), as competent to receive, and enter into, and return, as impressed, His thoughts; and so Adam even when guilty can, though wickedly, still about that which God is cognizant of. This is an immense point.

32 In "Adam, where art thou?" we have natural relationship recognized; "the woman thou gavest me," though thoroughly wretched, and wicked, yet deals with God, as the object of, and cognizant of His doings. And so does man now, though presumptuously, and wickedly. So God with Cain; he is able to understand God's moral reasoning. Now this was rightly so, less conscience before the Fall; he would own God, know goodness, know power, feel His goodness, know his place, know the beast's, know Eve's; have God's mind in respect of Himself, and His ways in creation; was competent, as looking to Him, to act naturally from him in his created place. All this was a great matter; in all this he stood alone. But the "image" was the place, the "likeness," glorious as it was, was needed for it; the "how" is not stated here, it is the fact that is stated.

Yet of course the word means, generally, something, but if I say "That man is very like his father," it is the fact, without saying what all the points of resemblance are, though, of course, there are such, but the fact strikes, when I may not yet see what it is in distinctly. And the fact here, as it is like God, is the important thing. I have no doubt it was in simply answering to the mind of God; a very different thing from reasoning to draw a conclusion, which is the proof of ignorance, and the opposite to what God does.

We can easily understand that, if God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, there must have been in kind, and capacity of being, what answered to God's nature, but in responsibility personally. It was as a creature - "let us make," so God created, but in making He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. Hence in his living soul there was necessary association with God, or, as a sinner, exclusion with a natural capacity of enjoying the sense of it hidden for a time. It is not here a question of what the affections towards God were, but of the natural capacity; so Elohim speaks to them, which He did to none else, even when He blessed them, besides much else.

The angels are never said to be created in the image and likeness of God, as man is; I suppose they have the knowledge of good and evil, and so in creature righteousness and holiness, are so far more what God is. This, man had by the Fall, "the man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil"; this, therefore, was not the image or likeness.

33 Genesis 3

The order of this chapter is interesting. After the temporal judgment of death we have Eve, or life, first brought in; faith recognizes life above and beyond death, and judgment of death. Then Jehovah clothes man through death, and takes away nakedness, and then prevents access back to the tree of life - to nature's place in blessing - which, indeed, now would be perpetuated curse. Abel's is another element; he comes - approaches God by the slain lamb. In Noah we have another - the deliverance by executed judgment out of the old thing into the new. This is death and resurrection as baptism figures it.

NOTE. - Before Satan began to introduce, or could introduce, lusts into the heart of man, he produced distrust of God, and when that was brought in man was easily a prey - all was really gone. As to the way of grace, see then with what infinite goodness, and surpassing grace God attracts, and warrants confidence in the chief of sinners, in Christ.

- 6. It was dreadful - so deliberate and bad - yet how graciously met by Christ's being the woman's seed.

NOTE. - "Where art thou?" is the first great question. It was the first visit, and, as I believe, the first day. God was walking about in the garden - visited man - it was natural for man to be with Him.

Adam is addressed, and speaks alone; he is the responsible man. So the woman here takes her place again, sad as the excuse was, "to be with me."

- 9. God however called to the man - Ha-Adam; it is a terrible scene, and a terrible confession, an unnatural thing so to speak - "I heard thy voice, and I was afraid"; but the fig-leaves and the skins, long noticed by others - man's and God's covering - is most instructive and beautiful.

NOTE. - The Lord does not say in coming into the world, as in the garden, "Where art thou?"

34 In Isaiah 50 we have indeed, "Wherefore when I came, was there no man? when I called, was there none to answer?" but He came with the full knowledge of the state of man, as he was, in full, ripened sin, and utterly evil and wretched, in the state in which the full development of the fall, in all its effects here, had set him; and then in the very midst of this, and as taking his nature, without sin, but exposed to all the suffering, He says, in perfect grace, "Here I am among you." What a truth this is! No doubt atonement was needed to bring us to God - impossible without it - but at least God was with us here, and with us such as we are.

- 13. Query: the force of hish-shi-a-ni "cause me to be false or wicked"?

Elohim asks nothing of the serpent; with man and the woman he draws out the fact, and the conscience as with interest - with the serpent, it is only "because thou hast done."

It is to be noted too Elohim gives no reason to the conscience of the woman. He assigns her her lot. With Adam He enters into the cause, he had listened to his wife's voice, and slighted God's - the first was his excuse. So in verse 12.

- 14. It is remarkable how every part of this, to the end of the chapter, is external - government as respects this world; internal or eternal relationship with God is not touched upon, whatever may be implied or involved in it. The exclusion from the tree of life was de facto from living for ever in this world only.

- 15 is an exception, yet even that is accomplished in the earth.

The question of eternal life or heaven is not raised, separation from God, death in trespasses and sins, left to a divine appreciation of evil; only that man fled from God's presence, and God drove him out from the place of blessing, and there is no way back. Only we have the blessed parenthesis of verses 20, 21, faith in life, and divine clothing.

Why enmity between the woman and the serpent? Was Adam qua Adam held for overcome? and that it was in the hope of the seed that any resistance or hope began?

- 16, 17; and that Eve understood; how perfect all this is! The coming of Christ from heaven has brought out other light, but all this is earthly and governmental; the prophets and psalms had no doubt lifted up the corner of the veil into another scene of life.

35 I have noticed that all the judgments are temporal, or rather government on the earth, for the bruising of the head will be final; at any rate the conflict, and bruising of the serpent's head was not in Adam.

It is remarkable how God owns the superiority even in fallen Adam, he had to say to God, though the woman brought the mischief. So indeed Adam, "I heard," though indeed the history says "they heard." He was the image and glory of God - wonderful place - yet in the woman, the fall and the enmity; in the woman's seed, the conflict and victory. Eve then gets a name, not from Adam but from her children - Khav-vah (life), not Ish-shah (woman). It was not her proper title, I think, but still a title of life and blessing, for death was come in.

When the clothing by redemption comes in it is individual, for Adam and for his wife. It is remarkable that here this thought, with others as to man's condition, of Elohim, recurs as in the making - not in the present temporal judgment - only here it is Jehovah Elohim, not simply Elohim, "as one of us." It is not properly counsel, not even when He says "let us make," but it is association with others; others are addressed when "the man is become as one of us." It is the statement of a fact - but a statement in community of thought with others called "us" - but there is community of act in the other, and consultation, not of doubt, but together, "let us make," or "we will make," and "now lest he put forth," therefore Jehovah Elohim sent him forth, and "He drove out the man." Man becomes a Gershom as to the earthly paradise, his natural seat. This was definitive exclusion, more than the earthly judgments. These are the whole of man's relationship to God as such. Then he is the head of a race.

- 20, 21. This is wonderful grace of faith in life, and divine clothing; and it was present judgment before the driving out comes, which is a distinct announcement.

- 22, 23. It seems to me also that herein Adam was kept from the sin of presumption; it was mercy in the midst of judgment. Not that this is the only consideration; it was the arrest of presumption, as defeating God's plans.

I have often remarked that this chapter presents only the earthly, or governmental consequences of sin; but the truth is, whatever were the developments of this relationship, or the experiences of godly saints, which necessarily savoured of this truth, the full separation from God which sin causes, and is, was only brought out when He Himself was revealed, and indeed, could only then be. Indeed it is what is in Romans 1:18.

36 NOTE. - Though I do not say historically, as they are separate statements, yet in the Spirit's mind, as presented by God; Eve's being the mother of all living where death had come in, and Jehovah Elohim clothing them with coats of skins, before they are driven out of Paradise, grace met their need by God's act, before they were driven from forfeited natural blessings (which they could indeed no longer so enjoy) by judgment.

It is carefully to be noted (I have already partially done so) that the sentences pronounced on the serpent, the woman, and Adam do not go beyond present earthly results, for even the bruising the serpent's head is his whole power over man which is on the earth; the whole question of the soul is behind More may be intimated in the distinct statements that come at the end of the chapter.

The first thing I notice in the end of this chapter is, there is no confession. Adam and Eve tell the truth as to fact, and God pronounces judgment accordingly, as He sees fit, but there is no moral action in their hearts apparent. The serpent is not asked, his judgment goes first by itself - enmity and final destruction by power through Him who had the heel bruised. We then get the present effects in this world on to death (where, note, death is pronounced on the man only as representative of the race, as before the life - breath of life - was communicated); but then we find faith on man's part as to life, Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living - this, after death was pronounced. Then God clothes them both. Life is not from Adam, so to speak, it is the woman's seed; but clothing, and putting away nakedness (the witness of sin, verses 7-10) is Jehovah Elohim's act; this is full of instruction - grace first brought and fully. Man is then driven out from the place of blessing, and all recovery of life naturally. This is the judgment, and blessing of man, as man before God; the history of the race comes in chapter 4.

NOTE. - Death also is a part of the personal temporary judgment of man here, which in certain aspects is an important point. The relations of a soul with God do not come in here, unless by mere analogy. Adam's calling his wife's name "Eve" is clearly a new thing, for he had, as united to himself, originally called her Ish-shah (woman) a supplement to Ish merely - now he (the sinful man) is wholly laid aside. The woman's seed is what God has recognised as that in which the original mischief was to be set aside. Sovereign grace for the remedy comes in the place, and origin of the sin and evil - man, as man, and Adam has no part in it - only he gets the good of it as having faith, as Adam, had here - he is clothed - here it is individual - there is neither man nor woman.

37 God then drives out the man, still the representative man, Ha-Adam - of course Eve with him - but in all this Ha-Adam is the representative man before God - the head of the race.

Even in chapter 4 it is "Ha-Adam knew."

NOTE. - Adam after that disappears; Eve expresses her thoughts and faith; the mistakes, but thoughts with Jehovah or God, are hers. The race is in its fallen - Adam - state; we have no Ish-shah any more, the whole scene is changed.

I have already noticed - lust was not the first thing with Adam, but distrust of God which opened the door to lust - and Christ's restoring confidence in God in the vilest of sinners. But there is more than this as regards Christ Himself. In Adam's case Satan got between Adam and God; the creature's place is dependence in confidence, from this Adam turned and got into sin. Satan insinuated that God had kept back, through jealousy, the forbidden fruit, because if man ate of it he would be like Himself; (Note: this is just what grace does with us, in wondrous mercy, in Christ before God.) Thus dependence was lost, and man acted for himself, for his own happiness - this was will - so that when dependence on and trust in God goes, necessarily will and lust follow. Now Christ, when tempted of Satan, was just the contrary; Satan tried to get Him to distrust God, and act on His own will for His happiness, to lead Him from dependence. The Lord met it by dependence, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that cometh out of the mouth of God shall man live." This was dependence on God (as for the manna every day). So as to trust, "Thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God" - not try whether He will be as good as His word, which is distrust. Thus the wicked one could not get between God and Christ so as to interrupt dependence - could not touch Him, nor introduce it into His soul. When he tried it was in an open way and profitless, and he was rejected as an openly detected Satan, and that was all.

38 In the first instance, the most legitimate want, connected with will, would have been departure from God - taking the world by will without God.

Dependence is a special claim in a world departed from God, more than even Adam in Paradise, though every creature is dependent. Christ trusted God perfectly, so as to wait for His will; then, on the pinnacle of the temple, He trusted God enough to wait till the occasion came for the accomplishment of promise, and would not try it in His own time to see whether he was.

NOTE. - That God became a God of judgment is the consequence of sin; sin has turned Him into this; and man's knowledge of good and evil - He is holy, He is righteous - hence if evil comes in He must judge.

But with innocent man there was no judgment; He was blessed, with unfallen angels. Blessed be His name, He is love revealed in Christ - that is what He is. A child may know his father to be a judge, but he does not know him as such. In fine sin has made God a Judge.

As to Conscience and the Fall, it is, in one point of view, the result of the Fall. Man is set in an anomalous state, they are "as gods," "as one of us," in one sense; they have the knowledge of good and evil, but with this immense difference - God knows good and evil, but is as Supreme over it all; man, as a sinner, knows good and evil, but as a creature, in owning it, is subject to evil, he knows good and evil by being subject to it, by having sinned. God, moreover, the source of all good, knows all evil as something without, not of, Himself; man, the receiver of all good, knows it as in himself, subject to it in himself.

The first man was the failure of the creation under evil; the second man was, under God, the supremacy over evil. So the resurrection was the great point of evincement, for as death was the head and full power of evil, resurrection was the full triumph over it in man, even Jesus; hence Jesus became the second Adam after His resurrection; the power of manifested life in man, that is properly and fully, when He was manifested to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. He, previously to that, proved His competency in His human state, and became it, as having overcome evil - overcome evil with good - instead of being overcome of evil, when all natural good was made His, He overcame with good when all natural evil was made His. He had all quickening power in Him indeed while living in the flesh, but He was not the head as having been made perfect through all. But Adam sinned in Paradise, or Eve individually, and, as ejected, became the head of the fallen race. Christ acted faithfully in the world of sin, and as risen out of it, became the Head of the saved race - the Author of eternal salvation to all them that obey Him. He was not subject to, but overcame evil; Adam in good and Paradise became subject to evil - such was the contrast.

39 The analogy of the first and last Adam seems carried very far, if we take our portion in Adam as excluded, and in the Lord, the last Adam, as risen, and gone in within the veil; for our position in one and the other is largely in fact and morally fully correspondent. Just as we have seen in the circumstances which made way, laid the ground, for their respective characters elsewhere, in the sin of Adam, and the obedience of Christ unto death, and taking the two together as in the opposition of final results, it is most instructive.

Genesis 4

This chapter, as already remarked, as a continuation of chapters 2 and 3, carries on, evidently, the question of sin into men's relationship with one another. It is not absolutely said that Eve gave Cain his name (Seth she did), but the thought is hers. Ha-Adam is merely the course of the race. Eve was Adam's Ish-shah here, but "Eve" is in sense; it was her thought on the Lord's mind of giving a seed; she has gotten a man - "Ish" - the name Adam gives himself in chapter 2; she came out of "Ish." She - Eve - on this great new event, had from herself, with Jehovah's will, and as from Him, a man, a born man, seed of the woman in the world. I say it was her thought; it is not "the Lord hath appointed," that was deference to His will. This, her feeling, though looking to the Lord; she looked at the gift, though she ascribed it to Jehovah; but it was man - natural man - a child of Adam really; evil, yet outwardly in the place God had set Adam in - a tiller of the ground. Abel's place was a place out of the natural place in which man was put, whatever brought him there; he kept sheep, a new and invented thing. In this relationship with God, he was clearly in faith, offering a sacrifice of slain beasts; Cain in nature.

40 Then comes out exasperated hatred; but first the immensely important ground it is all on - law and gospel. First, we have God still in intercourse with fallen man; He had clothed Adam - grace had wrought; next, acceptance if he did well - that is law - if not a khat-tath (sin offering) was there, ready for him; that was the ground he was on with God; as to his brother, as the elder, Abel would be subject to him. But what man is comes out; hatred is above all fear, and remedy or intervention of God. Sin against one's brother fills up the measure of sin against God, through which they were already cast out. There is, again, a present judgment as to the ground; and, besides hiding from God's face (which his own conscience tells him), he goes out - here his own act - from the presence of the Lord, not in sorrow - no humiliation in His presence - the despairing complaint of selfishness - and makes the world as comfortable as he can without Him.

I do not dwell on the evident figure of Israel, I have spoken of it elsewhere; the moral ground is what I look for here.

In Seth's case "God hath given"; it comes from Elohim's, - God's - own act, not "I have gotten" from "Jehovah"; here again Eve is in the sense, and all right. Subsequently the worship, or owning of God - connection of men with Him - was with Jehovah; a name of relationship. This closes this part.

This was the breaking out of an evil nature, when it was there. There cannot be a more important chapter, whether we consider the fact of Jehovah's intercourse with fallen man, or the ground He puts him on, or Cain's conduct afterwards, showing where his nature was. Yet it was founded on the intention of God with Adam. Cain's worship, after Adam and Eve having been clothed with skins, shows great indifference and hardness I think; he had the signs of sin and judgment always before him. Not so Abel; yet he approached by faith - it was Jehovah. Intercourse had given occasion to worship; it was duty, only duty in Cain; spiritually intelligent approach, which had taken notice of his state, and God's grace, in Abel.

NOTE. - Clothing is from God - sacrifice from man, only the true Lamb was God's Lamb. It is remarkable that Gin's worship should be connected with nature and the curse, of which he was daily cognisant; Abel's with God's act in grace, however noticed or apprehended, for slain beasts had been the means of clothing Adam's nakedness.

41 This chapter is a wonderful display of grace, after the fall and exclusion. Cain is nature, and the world after Christ's rejection.

The woman looks for the promise in nature, and connects Jehovah with it - "I have gotten," etc.

Cain's is the worship of nature, when doing what God had set man to do. But nature under grace is "vanity" (Abel); and if connected with Christ, i.e., coming, owning sin, and by death, is rejected of men, and under death must have, in itself, its sentence. In nature Jehovah owns right and wrong. If Cain did well he would be elevated, and his brother subject to him; if ill, there was sin; then sin is completed by murder, and then "instructed" (Enoch) world comes in; but grace, acting in the midst of nature, fails under the power of evil, i.e., of result here. So Christ has in death fully shown.

Then the world is built up - then we have God's appointed seed

- 1. It is "Ish" - not "a son," not "Adam," not "Enosh"; there is triumph in what is right, and promised, but according to nature - he is born after the flesh - not Seth "appointed."

"I have gotten from Jehovah"; verse 25, "Elohim hath appointed me" - but that was after Abel.

There is nothing new in it, but it is wonderful to see how complete is Eve's mistake as to the man from Jehovah. The first man - his blindness and natural insensibility to sin, and where it had placed him, and thinking to worship with what was the sign of the curse - then man of the wicked one - murder and falsehood, and driven out from God - the world and its enjoyments - the whole history of the first man.

Abel coming with the sacrifice, as the only way of access to God, receives testimony that he was righteous; God testifying to his gifts. Seth is the appointed man instead of both.

- 2. Cain was in his legitimate place according to nature; Gen. 3:23. Compare Zechariah 13:5, rightly translating the close - "from" is not amiss - "with" (His aid and blessing).

- 4. Abel's is wholly out of, and above nature and duty; it is faith.

42 NOTE. - Though there is no way back to life here, there is access to God while here through faith.

- 7. "Accepted?" (" and … door"); but the khat-tath (sin-offering) is at our door in Christ.

- 7. I have long thought that "sin-offering" is the true translation here, but I am confirmed in this thought, by the whole course of the history, in an interesting way.

In chapter 4, the question is of the state of man, and how, being such, he could approach God; the answer is, by expiatory sacrifice, which owned the state of sin, grace, and the remedy it afforded; or, rather, the self-offering up of another to God - it is "fat," not "blood" as for committed sin. It was not a question of guilt from sins, but of man's state, so here it is a sin-offering "if thou doest not well." The two things are quite distinct, one is the abstract consideration of man's estate before God; the other, getting an individually purged conscience before God.

I cannot but think that lap-pe-thakh khat-tath' ro-vetz' (sin will be the lier at the door) is a sin offering, meaning it is quite ready - "lying at the door" I suspect to have come from this. We have the doctrine of the eldest, as before of the woman - dependent - looking up to - and desire - and being ruled over. If it be a "sin offering," it shows how early it was spoken of by God - a thing known and recognised.

NOTE. - Not only was there faith, but God had intercourse with Cain, as having to say to man after the announcement of the woman's seed, and the skins - the person and the work.

It is objected that till the law there was no khet' (sin). In general, I apprehend this is just, and the difference important; as in Abel's sacrifice it was the state of man - "Where art thou?" - not what he had done. The burnt offering took this ground; it was not for particular faults which a man had committed, but that man, driven out of Paradise, alienated in sin from God, could not come to God as if nothing had happened; sin, and death for sin, and the glorifying of God as to it, must come in, in order to approach acceptably; and this was the general character of sacrifice till the law made imputable transgressions. It was the ground on which sinful and excluded man stood with God.

The blessed Lord, having come down to reconcile us, took this place - was made sin - and His perfected obedience was, when He was made sin, He drank the cup.

43 When I see sin really, as God sees it, I see it is putting away; I see what it is, only when it is put away. "If one died for all, then were all dead," they were away from God in sin, and He, in its judicial infliction, drinking that cup, was forsaken of God - just feeling it as it really was, as forsaken of God - separated from the presence of God - as to what His soul felt, and judicially. Hence when sin is presented to me fully (not merely my particular sins), Christ and His cross is presented to me - He, on the cross, a sacrifice.

And I think there is allusion to this in the Lord's word to Cain; I do not say it is to be translated "a sin offering," but sin has been laid at my door by God - how? - in Christ. No doubt I have sins to be dealt with; but, when the world is convinced of sin, the whole status of man is exposed - it is in the cross of Christ. So, even here, it is in that "lying couched at the door," that sin is laid there.

Still, it is to be remarked here that the case of Cain's not doing well is put, i.e., not the status of Adam; it is a positive and imputable fault which is supposed, then sin "lies couched at the door," and the word of course is so applied - sin-offering.

If the s'eth (accepted or "exaltation") refers to his exaltation above Abel, not to his place before God, though it be supposed withal, then khat-tath' (sin) refers more to sin itself. I am still rather disposed to take it as a sin-offering, at least Christ presented as such. It is not "at thy door," and it is a reply to anger and a fallen countenance.

There was no need for it, he well-doing - exaltation and acceptance of person; and in ill-doing - the remedy there.

It brings in the state of man before God, and in Abel's offering, that state met, and acceptance - the burnt offering; and thus, supposing sin, the remedy there. There was no need for irritation or hopeless despondency.

It may not be treated of formally till Leviticus 4; but, when these great elements are discussed, it comes in as a part of the needed punishment, and remedy of God for the sinner's sin.

Man was ruined, there were no offerings for sin; Noah offers, and the Patriarchs their burnt offerings (these last only in Palestine, and the young men at Sinai, Exodus 24), and in these cases sin-offerings were not in place; when the law had raised the question of imputable sins, then they were; but here, as a great principle, they are in their place. After the general principle in Abel, Abraham's offering (chap. 15) was the founding a covenant, but it was hardly a burnt offering.

44 As regards khet' (sin) there is another difference. In the o-lah' (burnt-offering) as Abel's, and all others, man approached God by it; he came by it freely to approach and worship God. So here Abel comes; the manner of coming, as recognising all truth, is in question. It was as referred to - it is willing, though due, heart-coming to God - but how to come, now sin had come in, and man was out of Paradise. But Cain's was positive, active sin, and a sacrifice required for that evil; not only man was a sinner and excluded, but he had committed a sin, and against his brother - hence, khet' (sin) was there; still I think presented by God in Christ.

I cannot come and tell the Jew who has slain the Christ, nor the world which has not believed on Him, of their actual sin, without presenting the sacrifice lying at their door; that is, in the grand principle of it, God's way of presenting their sin to them.

In this way the sacrifice of Abel, and Jehovah's words to Cain, have great importance amongst the great foundation principles here set forth; we have the burnt-offering, and sin-offering as the great foundation principles of relationship, and clearance with God, replying to "Where art thou?" and "What hast thou done?"

- 8. The completing of sin in its second part.

- 10. See Hebrews 12:24.

- 13. Rather as in the margin, but in the sense of despair.

- 14. "Of the ground."

- 17. A city here first - the world.

But in Lamech we also return to the Jews.

Civilisation is not merely post-diluvian.

Is there nothing peculiar in va-y'hi bo'-neh (and he was building) instead of ba-nah (he built)? Is it not characteristic rather than historical?

It is nothing new, but very striking, how much more activity and interest there is in the history of Cain than of Seth. It comes first too - it is after the flesh - in fact Abel disappears before it - but less of the individual than of the world.

In Seth we have individuals only - they lived so long and died, that is all; but the progress of the world is largely recounted in Cain's family, cursed from the ground - hidden from God - but establishing cities, and arts, and luxury, and a sister whose name was "Pleasantness." But what a character it gives to the world - "despair" with God, and marked "not to be killed" with man city, and luxury without God - gone from His presence - is that the world?

45 We have another element, "not of the Father." Still it is in rejecting Christ what it is.

He went out from the presence of the Lord in despair, not in repentance - with his life safe. I cannot but think Lamech's a threat - "Have I done as Cain? I will be seventy-seven times avenged" (only I admit it true of the Jewish remnant at the end, as slayers of Christ).

We have the difference of the name of Seth, after we have learned that all is "vanity" (Abel - He'-vel). "God has appointed," not "I have got."

NOTE. - Here it is Elohim not Jehovah, the whole thing began again, so to speak, from Elohim, and so does chapter 5 completely; Cain is not owned at all; Seth is instead of Abel, though he takes the place of rejected Cain.

Then began a distinctive people of God in connection with the name "Jehovah"; not a people called out by it as Israel. Cain had gone out from the presence of Jehovah, and taken care of himself, settling down where Jehovah had made him a vagabond; but in Seth's time the matter began again, and Jehovah was owned on earth.

We have He'-vel's (Abel's) portion, a better one not here revealed.

Is there anything in the names Khanoch' (Enoch) and Enosh?

The condition of the world and man is singularly pictured out in all this.

26 is a distinct part. Enos is in contrast with Ish; nor is it simply Adam - the race. They took the lowly place failure and death put them in. And then (men) began to be separated to the name of Jehovah, and to be distinctively associated with Him, and worship Him. This was the knowledge of faith; it is not "on Elohim."

Nothing provokes the world like divine favour. But Jehovah reasons with Cain on the ground of responsibility, and present government or order, in a world of sin - doing well, a sacrifice of sin-offering if needed, and superiority here in the world. But this, though he did not care for God, would not do; his jealousy was of man enjoying this favour in grace - allowing it to run. Cain was utterly evil - no relenting - no profiting by God's patient goodness.

46 The order is, Abel accepted according to Hebrews 11 - faith; himself accepted and his gift - sin - death - judgment - propitiation recognised.

Cain, like the world, untouched by conviction, is not accepted; as the natural man, furious; Jehovah reasons with him, the case put before him, in grace, to do well, or, in grace, a sin offering is there - no relenting, nor profiting by it - fills up sin against his neighbour; judgment from the world (as Jews with Christ) - no hope or relenting - despair.

God had not said to him to leave His presence. Cain does and goes out from His presence himself, to dwell where judgment had made him a vagabond, and then comes the world - the world as God sees it in its true place before Him.

NOTE. - Cain and Abel - wicked nature and suffering in grace - both disappear; Seth only is man appointed of God - Christ, when He comes again.

Otherwise we have man wicked, the rejecter of God - Adam fully developed - Christ and suffering saints in grace, both pass away. Seth is the appointed man - Christ, as the Son of Man, to come.

It is a wonderful chapter - the whole history of nature and of grace.