283 
08. It is unnecessary to enter at any length upon Hebrew 
criticism in our proposed reading of the first verse of the Bible. 
It has been so fully and well done in Aids of Faith, by the late 
Dr. McCaul, who was confessedly one of the first Hebrew 
scholars of the day, that, with the exception of one single point, 
which I shall presently mention, he has left nothing to be 
desired in confirmation of the truth of these words respecting 
the creation of the heavens and earth. It will be sufficient to 
notice that Moses, in using the term “In the beginning 
expresses Duration or Time, previous to Creation ; that the 
Hebrew word n-q bar a, although not necessarily meaning 
creation out of nothing, is always used in Scripture to denote 
the work of God and not of man ; and here, as elsewhere, 
something new, which did not exist before. Hence the learned 
Gescnius says, in reply to those who contend that this word 
implies the eternity of matter, — “ It is abundantly plain that the 
use of this verb in Kal is altogether different from its primary 
signification, and that it is more used of new production 
( Genesis ii. 3) than of the conformation and elaboration of 
matter. But that in Genesis i. 1, the first creation of the 
world out of nothing is proved by the connection of things in 
the whole chapter. Thus, also, the Itabbis (see Alien Ezra in 
loco) say, ‘that creation is a production of something from 
nothing/ ” f 
69. Hence it will be seen in the translation I have adopted as 
more exactly conveying the literal sense of the original, the 
term, “ the essence of the heavens,” and “the essence of the 
earth,” which is rendered by nx eth in the Hebrew, is under- 
stood to signify “essence,” or “ substance,” by the Jews them- 
selves. X In this brief record of the Divine act and will we 
have all that the comparatively infant science has been enabled 
to discover after a virtual search of 6,000 years of the condition 
* Lightfoot relates a curious story concerning the word n'U/x - o recorded 
in both of the Talmuds — of the seventy elders, employed by Ptolemy Philadel- 
plms to translate the Hebrew Scriptures, that they wrote; the first sentence 
of the Pentateuch “ God created in the beginning,” not as in the Hebrew, 
“In the beginning God created”; fearing lest the king should say, 
“ P.eresheth is God, and that there were two powers, and that the first 
created the latter.” ( Exercitations upon 1 Cor. viii.) 
t Gesenius’s Thesaurus, in loco. 
I Both Aben Ezra and Kimchi affirm that the particle ns signifies “sub- 
stance ” ( Sepher Shorash, rad. nx.). And Maimonides observes that it is the 
same as “with” ; and then the sense would be, “ God created with the 
heavens whatsoever are in the heavens, and with the earth whatsoever are in 
the earth, i.e. Ilie substance of all things in them both.” (Moreh Nevochim, 
par. 2, ch. 30.) 
