Scripture is a liturgical text. All things have their source and being in God, and we are related to God by means of our worship and liturgy. The cosmos exists in its vertical relationship to God in worship. The world is called into being by the divine word, in which creation is spoken into existence. It is crowned by the creation of Man, the organism in whom and to whom God speaks and receives speech. Thus, the fall of Genesis 3 is narrated in terms of the role of speech. The serpent spoke to the woman. The woman replied by a quotation of God’s word, which she received from Adam (who alone was present when God issued the command in Genesis 2:16-17). Adam himself, who was the mediator in the speaking out of God’s word to the cosmos, is silent. Adam acts without speaking (Genesis 3:6-7). The arrival of God is described in terms of the Voice of the LORD walking in the garden (Genesis 3:8), and it is the Voice of God from which our first parents fled (Genesis 3:10). As the word of God is the paradigm after whose model all things were created, Adam’s failure to express and pass on the word of God to the woman in the temptation leads to his flight from that Divine Voice when it arrives in person. All of this is framed in its liturgical setting. Adam is commissioned to work and keep the garden (Genesis 2:15), language which is used in the description of the priestly tribe (Numbers 3:7). The garden of Eden itself is planted on the mountain of God (Ezekiel 28:12-14) in relation to the jewels on the breastplate of the high priest (Ezekiel 28:13, Exodus 28:16-20). Like the High Priest, who is first vested and then placed in the Tabernacle for worship (Leviticus 8-10), Adam is created outside of the garden and then placed inside (Genesis 2:7-8).
The world came into being through the Spirit of God, who descended on the surface of the primordial chaos and illumined it through His carrying of the divine Word (Genesis 1:2-5), and this pattern is replicated in the creation of man. Man, likewise, comes into being through the outbreath of the Spirit of God (Genesis 2:7), a man who then receives the word of God’s commandment (Genesis 2:16). Taking all of these threads in conjunction reveals the Biblical ontology of creation. The cosmos exists through the operation of the divine Word, manifest in the Holy Spirit. Man, the image of God, is created to exist in conversation with God. It is to Man, that God speaks in Genesis 1:28. This captures the relation of God to man through the Word. Yet Man not only exists in his relation to God. He also exists in a relation of headship to the creation, which he is to subdue and reign over. Thus, we find that the relation of God to the world in Genesis 1- a relation which holds in the divine Word- is expanded outwards to include the mediation of man. That mediation is set in a liturgical context- the whole cosmos is therefore summed up and given its interpretation by liturgy.
Considering the geography of the world before the flood provides another lens through which we can see this relation. The headwaters of the river which runs into Eden begins at the top of the mountain, above the garden itself. The river flows downwards into the garden and is then divided in the garden. The root of the word “beginning” used in Genesis 1:1 is also the root of the word “river” in Genesis 2:10. Likewise, the word for “divided” in Genesis 2:10 is used to describe how the nations were “divided” in Genesis 10. Taking all of these things together, we are able to see the way that Scripture conceives the relation of man to the world. Creation has its ontological beginning in God, through the Word. Man exists in His relation to God by that same Word, but by receiving the Word in worship and liturgy, he is able to transmit it outwards to the world at large. This is why, I suggest, Genesis 2:10-14 emphasizes the unique characteristics of the lands which the rivers divide. The nations of the world are dispersed to differentiated lands and energized by the divine Word to creatively work the matter of these lands. In Exodus 40, we observe how verbiage used of God in Genesis 1 is applied to Moses in the context of the erection of the Tabernacle. The Tabernacle, fashioned after instructions given in seven speeches ending in a sabbath-focused speech (Exodus 25-31), is a microcosm. It rises up through the procession of the Divine Plan from God’s mouth on Sinai into the mouth and mind of Moses. Moses, having thus received the word, actuates it and builds up this liturgical cosmos. As God “finished” all His “work” in creation (Genesis 2:2), so also does Moses “finish” all the “work” in Exodus 40:33.
As God fashioned mankind with a “let us” bringing forth a differentiated unity, so also does God differentiate the nations with another “let us” (Genesis 1:26, 11:7). It is this divine Word which disperses the nations to their respective lands. 1 Kings 5, among other texts, ties up these threads beautifully. The Dispersion occurred so that the nations would be divided outwards and cease to creatively work for the erection of their own name against the Name of God. But the Temple is the place where God sets His Name (Deuteronomy 12:1-5). God thwarts Babel not to stop human creativity, but to provide for its redirection and fullness in His Name. After all, the Name of God is the source of creatures to begin with. One cannot work in God’s world against God’s Name- such endeavors invariably self-destruct. In 1 Kings 5, we read that the Temple in Jerusalem was not merely built by the hands and work of the people of Israel. Rather, Hiram, the King of Tyre, through his unity with the House of David and Solomon, sends the workmanship of his people to assist in the construction of the Temple. The emphasis on speech here is important. The Word of God had come to Solomon in 1 Kings 3. In 1 Kings 4, Solomon cleverly used speech to render wise judgments. And in 1 Kings 5, it is the mutual conversation between Jerusalem and Tyre which allows the Temple to rise towards Heaven so that the Glory of God can fill it (1 Kings 8).
There is thus an inseparable bond between an appropriately directed worship offered to God- which binds God to the world by the high priestly mediation of man- and an appropriately ordered society formed by charity. The tower of Babel gives rise to the city of Babel. The Temple of Solomon gives rise to the Polis of Solomon, a society in which there is abundance and beatitude, not simply in the personal relationship of every Israelite to God, but in the splendor of the polity which arises out of that relationship. This beatitude then extends and flows outwards, so that Solomon addresses that very word which has its origin in God to the people of all nations and all the kings of the earth (1 Kings 3:34). The love with which we are bound to each other is love descending from heaven to earth. We must be bound to God before we are bound to creation. We must love the Lord our God before we love our neighbor. We must have the life that comes from God before we have the knowledge of those creatures which come from God. If we take knowledge before we take life, we will end in neither. But if we obediently offer ourselves to God as His creatures in need of His life, He will give us, in the measure appropriate to our selfhood, both life and knowledge. In the next post, we will directly address the Scriptural language concerning idolatry- both in its immediate, liturgical form and its extended, cultural form.
Helpful as always, thank you. A minor point: it is the word "head," not "river," in Genesis 2:10 which is the same root as "beginning" in Genesis 1:1.