In the beginning

[Jeremiah Ames]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

 

[Orbit]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

It's a creation myth, so from the perspective of the intended hearer, the earth and the sky above it.

 

[Jos]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

One interpretation is that "the heavens" refers to the universe or outer space or something along those lines whilst "the earth" refers of course to the planet.

 

[Salvador]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

There was no time before the Big Bang because time did not exist before the formation of space-time associated with the Big Bang... time diverged from a three state dimension - as we perceive time now - after the Universe was at the age of the Planck time. Time gives way to space, such that at first there is only space without time. ....

Hartle–Hawking state - Wikipedia

 

[Deeje]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

Since God had no beginning, this is the beginning of his material creation. And since these things were witnessed by his angelic family in heaven, it is not the beginning of creation per se....Jesus as God's "firstborn" is the "beginning" of his creation. (Colossians 1:15-15; Revelation 3:14)
That is my understanding.

 

[Salvador]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

There are no theories in physics that describe what the universe was like before gravity separated from the other fundamental forces of nature at Planck time (10e^-43 seconds)

 

[Jos]

Jesus as God's "firstborn" is the "beginning" of his creation.

If humans are God's most special creation why were humans created last and created in material form as opposed to spiritual form like how God is a spirit?

 

[Stevicus]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

That's a good question. I also wonder about what, exactly, was going on in the time before Creation. I conjure up images of some formless entity called "God" existing in some vast, dark emptiness. A single being, all alone in an endless void.

It must have been awfully boring, to say the least. So, He decided to create a universe to break up the monotony.

I've asked a similar question a while back here: "When God said 'Let there be light,' to whom was He speaking?"

Did God just cause all the galaxies, stars, planets, etc. to just pop up out of nothing? And it took a while before humans were created.

 

[Nimos]

That's a good question. I also wonder about what, exactly, was going on in the time before Creation. I conjure up images of some formless entity called "God" existing in some vast, dark emptiness. A single being, all alone in an endless void.

It must have been awfully boring, to say the least. So, He decided to create a universe to break up the monotony.

I've asked a similar question a while back here: "When God said 'Let there be light,' to whom was He speaking?"

Did God just cause all the galaxies, stars, planets, etc. to just pop up out of nothing? And it took a while before humans were created.

Ricky Gervais might be able to answer your questions

 

[Thief]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

the ability to say......I AM!!!!

 

[Deeje]

If humans are God's most special creation why were humans created last and created in material form as opposed to spiritual form like how God is a spirit?

God created his spiritual family in heaven first, probably eons before his excursion into material creation. They witnessed the creation of the Universe and applauded it. (Job 38:4-7)

Since he already had intelligent, free willed beings in his own realm, his decision to venture into creating and shaping matter required material beings to inhabit that material world. Humans were created last for a very good reason.....God had by then settled on what creatures would co-exist with the caretakers he was going to place in charge of what he had created. They were also instructed to "subdue" the earth itself, spreading the boundaries of their paradise home to encompass the whole earth....imagine....

As his representatives, humans were endowed with God's qualities....morality, wisdom, justice and love. They were to exercise dominion over the lower creatures but not over one another. They would be ruled by God and be answerable to him in all things. They were also the only material beings endowed with spirituality, which would keep them perpetually connected to their Creator as long as they obeyed him.

 

[Thief]

I believe....Let there be light
and.....I AM!!!

are the same statement and would be simultaneous

and Someone had to be First

 

[Thief]

Humans were created last for a very good reason

yeah....a good reason
but not as caretakers

God created Man as a blend of body and spirit
a soul incarnate
to operate as individuals

caretaking is a side effect

 

[Deeje]

yeah....a good reason
but not as caretakers

God created Man as a blend of body and spirit
a soul incarnate
to operate as individuals

caretaking is a side effect

Please read Genesis 1:27-28...
"And God went on to create the man in his image, in God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. 28 Further, God blessed them, and God said to them: “Be fruitful and become many, fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving on the earth.”

There is the mandate.....the man and woman were created in God's image (having been endowed with God's attributes) and they were told to "fill the earth" with their kind and to have all the other creatures "in subjection". That means that they were to oversee the welfare of all other living things as God's representatives. All creation was subject to man. But man alone was subject to God. In 'subduing' the earth, it was their role to extend the borders of their paradise and bring the untamed world outside the garden under their control. The whole earth was to become a paradise.

Both man and animals are "souls" which simply means a 'living breathing creature'. The fact that man alone was designed to worship his Creator means that our spirituality has a purpose that animals do not experience....a close and personal relationship with their Father.

"The tree of life" was also in the garden guaranteeing that everlasting life was possible for all of them if they would just remain obedient to God's instructions. As free willed beings they had choices.

 

[Salvador]

A person is approximately 3 ^ 10 -82 the size of our observable universe. If there were really a being the size of our universe, why should anybody, merely 0.0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000003 percent the size of our observable universe, be of any important significance?

 

[sun rise]

There was no time before the Big Bang because time did not exist before the formation of space-time associated with the Big Bang... time diverged from a three state dimension - as we perceive time now - after the Universe was at the age of the Planck time. Time gives way to space, such that at first there is only space without time. ....

Hartle–Hawking state - Wikipedia

That entire idea is very interesting to me. Emergent time is part of some spiritual systems expressed as the "eternal now"

 

[exchemist]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

A modern reading would, I think, refer to the cosmos and the order by which it operates (what we model with our so-called "laws" of nature).

 

[RESOLUTION]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

Simply everyThing.

 

[Workman]

The first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV

Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.

What exactly did God create?

The Heaven created the Earth.

 

[Native]

The first verse of the Bible.
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. KJV
Interesting line. Lots of information. We could dissect it for eternity and continue to understand more and more. Yet, I want to keep this as simple and easy as possible, so just one question.
What exactly did God create?

Of course we have several cultural Stories of Creation and it is mostly in the Abrahamic tradition which speaks of "One God" who created everything. In most of the other stories, everything is created by a pair of male and female deities.

I don´t think the ancient stories told af a beginning of the entire Universe as our ancestors "only" did know of the local part of it, the Milky Way and the Solar system.

I also don´t think the term "beginning" is valid in this story. To me the creation stories primary speaks of "principles of creation", thus describing the primordial pre-conditions before the creation of the Milky Way and later on of the cosmogonical issues in our Solar System.

Here, the outlook of the Milky Way contours plays a significant role in the ancient symbolism and disscription of the ancient world.

Besides this, our ancestors percieved the creation to be of an eternal and cyclic nature which of course discards the ide of a beginning at all. This is IMO a much better and logical perception compared to the conventional ideas in modern cosmology.