Who really is the God of Genesis | thebereancall.org

TBC Staff

The God of Genesis is not someone whom Christians share with Islam, modern-day non-Messianic Judaism,1 Hinduism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Unitarians, or any other belief system which rejects the divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Rather, unlike those systems, Genesis portrays the God of Christianity (the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) to be the God who is not only one, but is also more than one.

The very first verse of the Bible reads: “In the beginning God (plural) created (singular) the heavens and the earth” (Genesis:1:1). Moses, the author of Genesis under the direction of the Holy Spirit, chose to use the Hebrew plural term elohim for God, rather than the singular el or the singular poetic form eloah. But he does use the singular form of the verb ‘created’! Besides elohim, Moses also used other plural forms with reference to God in Genesis. Genesis:1:26 reads, ‘Then God said, “Let us make [plural] man in our [plural] image.’” Here Moses uses the singular verb ‘said’, but quotes God as using a plural verb and a plural pronoun with reference to Himself. See also Genesis:11:7, where God says, “Let us go down and confuse their language.” Why did Moses use these plural forms?

Some have suggested that this plurality is merely a plural of majesty, like the ‘royal we’ grandly used by kings, queens and others today. However, the kings of Israel and Judah were all addressed in the singular in the Bible accounts. Linguist Dr Charles Taylor says: ‘Nobody is in a position to show that in Moses’ day or earlier, people were in the habit of addressing kings and princes in the plural. In fact, there is no evidence at all from the Bible itself, and the Bible is one of the oldest books there is.’

Others have gone further and said that elohim shows that God includes within Himself plurality of powers, attributes and personhood. With this we agree. Elohim is a plural noun with a singular meaning. The Old Testament writers used it over 2,500 times, usually with singular verbs and adjectives (as in Genesis:1:1), implying that God is one, yet more than one—what some commentators have referred to as the ‘uniplurality’ of the Godhead. So does this ‘uniplurality’ or ‘plurality of personhood’ refer to the Trinity?

We should be wary of using as proof texts any verses of the Bible which the author did not originally write with that purpose in mind. So it is probably better not to say that Genesis 1 explicitly teaches the Trinity. The terms Moses used by divine inspiration in writing Genesis are completely in harmony with the Bible’s later and fuller revelation in the New Testament about all three Persons of the Trinity.Having said this, we need to emphasize that we should expect that the wording of Genesis would not contradict later biblical teaching about the Son of God or about the Holy Spirit. In fact, we find that the terms Moses used by divine inspiration in writing Genesis are completely in harmony with the Bible’s later and fuller revelation in the New Testament about all three Persons of the Trinity. Genesis affirms, from the very first verse of the Bible, that the Creator God is truly one God. This is taught in the famous Shema (Hebrew for ‘hear’) from Deuteronomy:6:4: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord.” But even here, the word for ‘one’ is echad, which is often used for plurality within the oneness. E.g. in Genesis:2:24 (which Jesus cited in Matthew:19:5Mark:10:8) the husband and wife (two people) shall become one (echad) flesh.

The rest of the Bible reveals this one God to be Father, Son and Holy Spirit—three personal distinctions within the one eternal divine nature or essence. Thus, the Trinity can indeed be found in Genesis 1. And it is clear that only the God of Christianity—unique and triune—is the God of Genesis, who is not only Creator, but also Lawgiver, Saviour and Judge.

The root meaning of elohim is ‘the powerful one’, and so elohim stresses God’s omnipotence. As such, it was a particularly appropriate term for Moses to have used to describe the Creator God of Creation Week. ‘His power is seen much more clearly in creating many diverse objects and beings in a short time, than it can be seen in a long, drawn-out evolutionary timetable.’

Although generally thought of as a name for God, elohim is rather a title or a descriptive expression. The truly personal name of God is the one He revealed to Moses at the burning bush (Exodus:3:15), namely YHWH, often transliterated Yahweh or in English as Jehovah and written in capitals, Lord. It means ‘I am who I am’ and so means ‘the self-existent one’ or ‘the one who causes to be’. It is used of God’s personal relationship with Adam and Eve in Genesis chapters 2 and 3, where Moses uses the combined term Yahweh elohim, which the translators have rendered as ‘the Lord God’.

https://creation.com/who-really-is-the-god-of-genesis