Overview: Genesis 1-11

The book of Genesis is the first book of the Bible, whose historical line is divided into two main parts. Chapters 1 through 11 tell the story of God and the entire world, and then come chapters 12 through 50 which focus on telling the story of God and a man, Abraham, and then his family. These two parts are connected by a key story at the beginning of chapter 12, and this structure gives us clues about how to understand the message of the entire book as a whole and how it presents the story of the entire Bible. The book begins with God taking the disorder and darkness described in the second sentence of the Bible and from it God creates order, beauty, goodness and creates a world where life can flourish and God creates beings called humans, or Adam in Hebrew .

He makes them in his image, which has to do with their role and purpose in God's world. Therefore, human beings are made to reflect the character of God to the world and are appointed as representatives of God to rule the world in His name, which in context means using its full potential, caring for it and transforming it into a place where there is even more life. God blesses the people - this is a key word in this book - and gives them a garden, the place from which they begin to build the new world. The point is that people can choose how to build this world and this is represented by the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Up to this point it has been God who has determined what is good and what is not, but now God is giving people the dignity and freedom to choose: Will they trust God's determination of good and evil or will they seek independence and define good and evil? bad for themselves? The risks are too great. Rebelling against God is embracing death because you are turning your back on the giver of life. This is represented by the Tree of Life. Then, in chapter 3, a mysterious creature, a snake, appears in the story. No description is given about the serpent except that it is a creature made by God and it is made clear that it is a creature in rebellion against God and wants to lead people to rebellion and death.

The snake tells the story of the tree and its choice in another way. It says that seeking the knowledge of good and evil does not cause death, in fact it brings you life and makes you like God. The irony of all this is tragic because we know that humans are already like God, they were created to reflect the image of God, but instead of trusting God, man seeks independence and determines his own knowledge of good and evil and immediately The story takes a direction. downward spiral out of control. The first consequence is the breakdown of human relationships.

Suddenly, husband and wife realize how vulnerable they are to the point that they cannot trust each other, so they make clothes to cover their bodies. The second consequence is that the close bond between God and man is broken. They run to hide from God and when He finds them they begin the maneuver of blaming whoever rebelled first. It is here that the story stops and is followed by a series of short poems where God declares to the serpent and then to the man the tragic consequences of his actions. God tells the serpent that despite its apparent victory it is destined for defeat and will eat dust.

God promises that one day a seed or offspring will come from the woman and is about to deliver a fatal blow to the snake's head, which sounds like very good news, but the victory will come at a cost because the snake will also deliver a blow. fatal to the calf's hoof when it crushes its head; a very mysterious promise to a wounded conqueror but in the course of history so far it is understood that it is an act of God's grace. The people have just rebelled and what does God do? He promises to save them. But this does not erase the consequences of the people's decision, so God informs them that now every aspect of their lives both at home and in the field will be overwhelmed by sadness and pain because of the rebellion, leading everyone to death.

From here the story gets worse; Chapters 3 through 11 show the growing consequences of rebellion and the breakdown of human relationships at all levels. The story of two brothers is told: Cain and Abel. Cain is so jealous of his brother that he wants to kill him. God warns him not to give in to temptation, but he does it anyway and kills his brother in the field. Then Cain goes to build a city where violence and transgression reign, and all this is captured in the story of Lamech. He is the first man in the Bible to have more than one wife; he collects them as possessions and then proceeds to sing a short song about how he is more violent and vengeful than Cain.

After this we come to the strange story of the sons of God, which may refer to evil angels or it may refer to ancient kings who claimed to be descended from the gods and, like Lamech, took as many wives as they chose and gave birth to the Nephilim. . , ancient heroes. Whichever opinion is correct, the bottom line is that people are building kingdoms that fill the world with violence and more destruction. In response to this we are told that God was troubled at heart. Humanity is destroying the good world from him and they are destroying each other, so, motivated by his passion to protect the goodness of the world from him, He cleanses it of the evil of humanity through the great flood. .

But he protects a blameless man, Noah and his family, whom he designates as the new Adam. He repeats the divine blessing and sends him into the world, so our hopes rise but Noah also fails, he too in a garden. He goes, plants a vineyard and gets drunk. Then one of his sons, Kami, commits a shameful act towards his father. So here we have the new Adam, naked and ashamed, just like the first Adam; and the fall begins again. This brings us to the founding of the city of Babylon. The inhabitants of Mesopotamia mastered the new brick technology.

They can build cities and towers bigger and faster than others before, and they want to build a new type of tower that can climb up to the gods, to make a name for themselves; It is an image of human rebellion and arrogance; It is the rebellion in the garden intensified, so God breaks their pride and scatters them. It is a set of very diverse stories, but you can see that they all deal with the same topic. God keeps giving people the opportunity to do right in the world and they screw it up. These stories proclaim that we live in a good world that we have turned bad; that we have all chosen to define our own good and evil, so we all contribute to this world of broken relationships, which leads to conflict, violence and ultimately death.

But there is hope. God promises that one day a successor will come, the wounded conqueror who will defeat evil. Therefore, despite human evil, God is determined to bless and save the world from it. So the main question, of course, is what will God do? And the next story, the key, gives the answer, but for now this is the summary of what Genesis 1-11 says. Contact us: [email protected]