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“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day” (Genesis 1:1–5).
On this day, we see three of four “techniques” (for want of a better word) that God used in creation. First, the technique of creating the heavens and the earth is unspecified. God spoke a command, the second technique, to create light. When God called the light Day, He used the third technique, naming by fiat. As with all days but the second, God pronounces His work on that day to be good.
There exists some confusion over the meaning of without form and void. There are ancient teachings that the world began as chaos and this idea from heathen philosophers has persisted to this day. It is quite overstating the case. The Hebrew tohoo means a desert, a desolation, without form, an empty place, and similar; here it is translated without form. Nothing has been made from the earth yet; it is as a lump of potter’s clay. Nothing has been built on the earth; it is yet as a desert place. The other Hebrew word is bohoo, meaning void, that is, empty; here it is translated void. The earth is, in a manner of speaking, a container. One must shape the formless clay and make a pot first, then you have a container into which you can put something. But this formless state was not chaos; it had a useful, specific composition; the potter’s clay was not mixed with mud and gravel. Or for another analogy, accurately mixed dough awaits being cut into cookie shapes, baking, and the addition of toppings.
Taking the text in order, it would seem our next topic is, What was the Spirit of God doing while hovering over the face of the waters? But there are reasons why we will not attempt to answer that question, and they deserve some extended explanation.
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