How do you think the creation account in Genesis would affect a Christian's worldview?

Answer 1

It tells me that this world, and life, are purposeful creations, not random accidents. These links may be helpful:

Is there evidence for Creation?

Can you show that God exists?

How many Creation-accounts?

Answer 2

Confusingly, there are actually two creation accounts in Genesis, one in Genesis 1:1-2:4a (the first sentence of verse 4), the other in Genesis 2:4b-2:25, and they are very different from each other.

I can see that both accounts, each in its own way, is entirely inconsistent with the scientific evidence. Origen's view is expressed in On First Principles, 3.1.1:

"Now what man of intelligence will believe that the first and the second and the third day, and the evening and the morning existed without the sun and moon and stars? And that the first day if we may so call it, was even without a heaven? And who is so silly as to believe that God, after the manner of a farmer, 'planted a paradise eastward in Eden', and set in it a visible and palpable "tree of life", of such a sort that anyone who tasted its fruit with his bodily teeth would gain life: and again that one could partake of 'good and evil' by masticating the fruit taken from the tree of that name? And when God is said to 'walk in the paradise in the cool of the day' and Adam to hide himself behind a tree, I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history and not through actual events."

Thus, it is rational even for a leading Christian to dispute the historicity of these stories. Whether one's world view is based on theism or Atheism, the accounts in Genesis 1 and 2 should make very little difference.

For more information on some modern perspectives, please visit: http://christianity.answers.com/theology/the-story-of-creation

Answer 3

Most Christians probably believe there is only one creation account in The Bible, or at least that the second creation account (Genesis 2:4b-20) is in some way only a more detailed version of the first. Leon R. Kass (The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis) says that not only should we recognise the independence of the two creation stories, we should also scrupulously avoid reading into the second story any facts or notions taken from the first, and vice versa.

Most Christians in earlier times would certainly have believed the creation accounts to have been literally true, so it is understandable that they thought that the two creation accounts were the same. Some Christians still do believe that they are both the same and both literally true, affecting their ability to accept the facts of an ancient earth and of the evolution of species. They believe that the world was created by God much as we now see it, just a few thousand years ago.

However, it is not necessary for Christians to hold this view, and therefore there is no reason for Genesis to affect their worldview. For example in 2006, the General Convention of the Episcopal Church affirmed, via Resolution A129, that God is creator and added that "the theory of evolution provides a fruitful and unifying scientific explanation for the emergence of life on earth, that many theological interpretations of origins can readily embrace an evolutionary outlook, and that an acceptance of evolution is entirely compatible with an authentic and living Christian faith." This is a worldview that accepts scientific facts and religious belief.

For more information, please visit: http://christianity.answers.com/theology/the-story-of-creation

Answer 4

The narrative in Genesis teaches Jews and Christians that the we, and the world, were created by God. This means that we possess a soul, life is purposeful and we are responsible to God.

Note that the Torah, in describing the Creation, deliberately employs brevity and ellipsis, for a reason given in the Talmud (Hagigah 11b), which says that delving into too much detail in this matter can lead to heretical notions.

Note further that according to tradition, there is only one Genesis creation-narrative, with ch.2 serving as an expansion of the brevity of ch.1, not a separate set of events (Rashi commentary, Gen.2:8).

http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=6&article=1131(a Christian author)

http://www.whoreallywrotethebible.com/excerpts/chapter4-1.php

http://www.pearlmancta.com/BiblicalcriticswrongRShlomoCohen.htm

Answer 5

It seems that the believer intertwines all that God says as being the truth, including His Creation. Paul intertwines the Resurrection of Christ with His creation of all things.