With the fourth word of Genesis, the second inversion arrives. At this rate, I may not get far, because here a long pause is required on this word.
“In the beginning, God…”
There is no word more argued about, discussed, twisted, bargained over, or rejected than the word God. We all have some idea what it means. But more importantly, what we believe at this top level affects the heart and mind. What we believe about this fourth word of the bible ultimately directs how we live. This acceptance or rejection of God, and what that word means, acts like a compass along the journey of life. Where we end up depends on the compass we use as well.
We can have wildly different understandings of it, but let me stop here to address the most common errors: the word God means neither cop nor genie. Many bad understandings regarding God fall into either the cop or the genie category. For some, he is both a genie and a cop. But this inversion suggests to you that he is neither. He is several things that can be asserted with confidence, that is, with faith, which is what the word confidence means:
He is one. He exists. He is first.
He is the sheer act of “being” itself.
He is an all-powerful Creator.
He is a loving father, not a bully, who desires your return.
He is true, good, and beautiful.
That is all you need to know for your mental health regarding this inversion. Good night! The end.
But clearly more must be said, even though we could (and should) just contemplate all of these in silence. There is much to be said, so starting from the top, this inversion will focus on the oneness of God.
He is not many. He is not none.
He is one. (Truly, he is three-in-one, but even then he is one. Later inversions will discuss the Trinity.)
Genesis is not a shouting match, but it is quietly entering a deadly serious argument at this point. Genesis is in dispute with every other culture and myth in the world. By this fourth word, the first book of Moses sets his belief apart from every culture - literally, every culture - that surrounds him. Before Moses, Abraham believed the same, but Moses and his scribes wrote it down. This is important, because had he not written it down, Jesus would not have said so often, “It is written…”
Jesus invokes the written word of Moses and the Prophets rather often, especially to rebuke the devil during the temptations in the wilderness. If you believe Jesus is God, and Jesus quotes what is “written” by Moses and the Prophets, then these words have weight - infinite weight - in how to view the world and, by extension, how we should live our lives.
Thus, what we think of God matters greatly in how we view scripture, the world, and the spiritual life. If Jesus is God, and Jesus quotes scripture, and God inspired scripture, then God used human authors to convey his eternal word. This makes for a simple waterfall set of conditions that fall with gravity into place:1
If Jesus is God…
And Jesus quotes scripture as the word of God…
Then Jesus inspired the sacred writers…
Meaning Jesus authored the scriptures.
That was mighty kind of God, in my opinion, to give us the scriptures. Even more kind, he came down to us in the form of man to go ahead and make things more clear to the apostles so they could pass on the tradition and teach us. But this should give you some idea about why we all like to argue about scripture. We argue because we disagree about who or what is God. Further, we argue about how he reveals himself, and to whom. But most of all, we argue because we dislike authority and the Catholic Church believes it has the teaching authority. This is why we argue. Even atheists love to argue about all of this, but they come at scripture wearing a bent pair of glasses, because the word God means something very different if you reject the idea of God. Likewise, you cannot understand the cross of Christ and the resurrection without at least getting the foundational idea of God in place first, not to mention the idea of an ultimate authority in heaven and on earth.
Thus, it’s no surprise that the “word of God” only makes sense if you believe in the supernatural existence of God. Truly, reading the bible without belief in God is like reading a bike repair manual without believing in bikes. Even if you believe in God, the perception of it leads to wildly different conclusions, which is why we have such wide-ranging belief systems as Islam and Jehovah’s Witnesses and thirty-one flavors of Protestant churches. The bible is a difficult read, and this is why the “bible alone” is insufficient as a teaching authority, because we can see with our own eyes how different each group uses that teaching authority.2
Where we are at in this opening line of the bible is the origin story of all creation. Every culture needs a creation story. Every culture has one, and even atheists have a faith-based creation story. We certainly have our stories about the creation of America, just as the Soviets did (or tried to), or the Italians, or the English, so this should not seem odd to anyone. Comic books have an origin issue. Businesses have foundation narratives. My favorite pie shop, Betty’s Pies (“The Best Pies in Minnesota”) has a founding story about Betty. Without a story, we are left stuck in a no-man’s-land. We’re like the orphan Annie who runs away from Miss Hannigan in search of her real parents.
As it turns out, the beginnings of things need a cause, a character, a maker, or doer, or a force. The choices for who lifted the curtain on this grand play called “Creation” come in three sizes: many, one, or none. Also, you cannot mix these - you must pick one, and only one. Genesis declares that the answer is one. And if you think you don’t have to choose, you are incorrect. Really, you have already chosen. You may think you have chosen in your mind, but you choose by how you live today and every day. Actions reveal the choice, as Jesus described in the great Parable of the Two Sons.3 Actions speak louder than words.
Every seeker must accept or reject God’s oneness. For the seeker, the treasure to be found is the truth, but only one choice is not fool’s gold. Every angsty teen, every doubting Thomas, every physicist, every Greek mythologist, every internet atheist, every Christian and Muslim - truly, anyone who is seeking truth must venture into the test of oneness.
Genesis is inverting the worldview that accepts the “many gods” and the “no gods” hypotheses. Genesis states that there is one God.
This may seem trivial but it’s not. Genesis declares a truth that many do not want to be true. And even those who say “Amen” often do not fully understand the implications of what this “oneness” means.
Greek myth has a story of creation. The old mythology is a search for the truth, just as astronomy, psychology, and chemistry are also deep investigations into aspects of truth. And we all want the truth, more than anything, except for when we want to do something that requires a different truth.
But what is truth? Ah, that is the question. Now we are getting warmer. Hamlet asked the great question of “To be or not to be,” and Hamlet was right. That is indeed the question. He was close to the answer just by using the word “being.”
What does it mean “to be”? We are getting warmer still.
Pontius Pilate, long before the fictional Hamlet, said it even better when he asked Jesus straight up: “What is truth?”
This question of “What is truth?” and “What does it mean to be?” are related. When Moses asks for God’s name at the burning bush, God tells him that his name is “I AM”. I found this rather confusing as a child. But just consider what “I AM” means. This is the verb for “to be.” God might have said it another way, as in “I BE.” In fact, that phrase sounds like it could be the name of a modern pop song.
“To be” is to have come from God. Being comes from God. Being and truth both come from the simple, beautiful, transcendent oneness of God. God is to be. John Keats said “Beauty is truth,” but God’s being and truth go together with beauty. Descartes said “I think, therefore I am,” but thinking is not being. No, God is “to be” and he created us, giving us our being.
In any case, it’s worth pointing out that Zeus is none of these things: he is not good, true, or beautiful. Zeus is an ugly power-hungry shape-shifting rapist. That is not the God of the bible. This inversion is easy to spot if living in the ancient world. Today, we have different versions of the pagan gods, but they are still around. They have moved into other forms, such as honor, wealth, pleasure, and power - but rest assured, for every god of the ancients, we worship strange versions of it now.
More important, however, is the subtle inversion regarding Zeus and every other contender god. None of the other gods are the act of “being.” Again, God’s name is “I AM.” In most stories about Zeus, he shifts into the shape of a swan or a bull, so he could say the opposite: “I am who I am not.” This is exactly what the shape-shifting devil presents to Eve: a lie.
Once again, like in the first inversion, regarding the nature of time having a beginning, a middle, and an end, there is one Creator, one “sheer act of Being,” and one source of all truth.
This, once again, is an inversion upon which you can rest your head, where your finite mind can focus. One true God is much better to aim your meditation toward than nothingness, and much more sane than thinking about the pantheon of Greek and Sumerian gods. However, when in prayer, you can easily find out which gods you worship, because your distractions will lead you there. The distractions reveal your fragmented understanding of God, as they pull you away from the oneness of God.
Knowing that God is one is an act of faith, because no amount of proof can sway the mind alone to accept it. But it is an act of faith anchored in reason. And reason can take you to the doorstep that there is one Creator, but faith is needed to knock on the door. As St. John Paul II wrote, faith and reason are the two wings that make us fly.
St. Anselm and St.Thomas Aquinas presented rational arguments of the “ways” to know that God is one, and that God is logical, and that God is beautiful. People can and will argue until the end of time over God’s existence - and this is a good thing because skeptics often come to believe in the oneness of God in a most profound way, such as Augustine, Dostoyevsky, or Antony Flew. To doubt the oneness of God is not a defect, it is part of the journey back to God. However, argument will only take you to the door. You still have to knock, enter, kneel, and pray. This is a mystery and it is wonderful. God seems to have designed it this way for our own good.
The most common doubt today is about God’s existence. But there is no existence at all without God, who is the act of being itself. When we doubt God’s existence, we are much like the “self-made” billionaire who thinks his fortune came entirely from himself instead of the complex set of circumstances that were needed to allow for his success. In his self-satisfaction, the billionaire ignores the whole and only sees himself. Sure, he may have worked hard, but he didn’t create the infrastructure, culture, opportunities, timing, talent, and need that led to his wealth. He did not educate himself or feed himself as a child. In other words, he sees everything in terms of the self. (Hint: we are all the billionaires in this metaphor).
The pursuit of wealth is a search for meaning, as are the pursuits of pleasure, honor, and power. But the real search is for the origin story, the place of rest, the giver of life - we are searching for home - but we confuse where that place is at. Seekers who are burdened with the burning need to find the truth will undoubtedly try on the differing hypotheses of “many gods” and “zero gods” before they really look into the possibility of “one God.” With the Zero hypothesis, this leaves only the self and the void to find answers - there is no soul to save. With the Many hypothesis, it leads to a flattening and scattering, a divided mind and separated body and soul, a rudderless chase.
With the One hypothesis, there is no confusion. There is a body and a soul, and one source, one origin, one beginning, one ending. This puts solid ground underfoot and a proper heaven overhead. It almost seems too simple of an answer, because there is no struggle. Mythology seems more exciting, more dramatic (but that is the next inversion after this one to discuss).
The One hypothesis of Genesis also shrugs off the coercive policemen concept, as God creates out of his goodness. He is the Artist who creates because he can create. Moreover, God creates and does not engage in transactions with his creation, but rather made everything for its beauty. He is a great artist who creates out of love and calls all of this creation to himself.
St. Anselm called the Christian search a way of “faith seeking understanding.” You might say that those who believe in Greek myth or pure materialism also have a faith seeking understanding. Even the atheist is a believer in no gods, and that a faith in nothing must seek understanding through reason alone.
With all texts, with all searches, we must take something on faith to find the truth. This is unavoidable.
To compare a creation story from Greek myth, from Hesiod, against Genesis, let’s take just the opening lines:
Here’s the opening from Hesiod’s creation story (after he finishes praising the Muses):
In the beginning there was only Chaos, the Abyss, but then Gaia, the Earth, came into being…
With that one line, we have a whole cast of characters to consider, and it only expands from there. With Hesiod, we don’t just have to bother with the Muses, now we have three more beings, and soon there are about fifty.
Genesis starts much cleaner, simpler.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
Done. The writer of Genesis starts out with a roundhouse. He says, “Let’s cut the nonsense: God was first and created everything.”
So much is said in so few words. The first line of Genesis is a masterful sentence that never stops speaking. But what else is the fourth word of the bible saying? What is God? We know there are basically three options: no gods, many gods, or one God. If the bible is declaring one God, which it is, what does that mean for us?
Our idea of God has everything to do with where we came from and where we think we are going. I’m not yet talking about the big “why,” but just the where for now: where did we come from and where are we going?
I often think of the analogy of trying to fly a rocket to the moon. First, the rocket must be pointed upward, not toward the earth. The Zero gods hypothesis aims the rocket at the ground. That rocket is going nowhere. The One hypothesis and the Many hypothesis is aiming the rocket upward. But clearly, that is not enough, for even a rocket aimed upward must have precise calculations to reach its target. Missing by a single degree will leave the crew lost in outer space. This inversion is about calibrating and setting the sights on the right target, charting the destination. Declaring that there is one God, not many, and not zero, will get you going in the right direction (and later inversions will fine-tune the landing).
With this inversion coming so soon in sacred scripture, this sets apart the people of Moses from all surrounding families and nations. The Canaanites and Egyptians of Biblical fame did not have one God, they had many. Abraham must have seemed a strange man in the ancient world and even had to leave his home in order to follow the one God. His city likely worshipped a moon god, meaning their rocket was aimed at the wrong heavenly body. Abraham must depart because he knows that will end in disaster. His faith in God Most High is not the norm. It’s not popular. But he knows it is the truth.
Even today, Abraham would have to leave home, because we still have many gods. We have believers in no gods and believers in many gods, and then we have believers in the one God.
Mythology as we know it today is what we refer to when we want to talk about dead religions. When the Sumerians were worshipping moon gods or the Greeks were rocking out at a Dionysus fest, they were not saying, “Man, I love our mythology!” No, those gods and goddesses were real to them, or at least some of them. The household gods of Romans, which taught men and women to live virtuously, were not like Calico Critter figurines that didn’t mean anything to them. These were meaningful objects, symbols of unseen realities.
Genesis, in its quiet boldness, states out loud that all of these little gods are ugly babies. Really, the sacred writer just cannot pretend any longer - these are false gods. Thus, these are fighting words for people and nations who have entire lives, rituals, and power structures built around these gods. Every domain of life, from hearth and home to war and sex, all had a god or goddess. Genesis rejects all of them. We have them today too, which we will get to later.
Again, we have lived with the idea of one God so long that we cannot comprehend how hard it was for Abraham and Moses to say, “All of your gods are fake. Only one is real.” This is the inversion that brings much hatred against Jews and Catholics to this day. Yet while we nod along about the idea of one God, we often live as if there were Many or Zero.
But why? Why is it so irritating to believers in the Zero or Many hypotheses? Why does saying, “There is only one God” irritate us? Why does saying, “There are no gods” bother people? Why does saying “There are many gods” make us do a double-take?
The reason is that it matters immensely, because like our view of time, our sanity and cosmology rests upon:
1.) Does God exist?
And if the answer is yes, then:
2.) What is the nature of that being (or beings)?
The question of whether or not God exists is fundamental to how your life is lived, how your family eats, and how your government operates. This is where we build our lives. Like it or not, upon this rock we stack up all other things.
And this choice always requires an act of faith. Even if we select the Zero hypothesis, that is an act of faith. The internet atheists make an act of faith when they say, “There are no gods or God” just as much as when a Catholic says, “Credo in unum Deum” (I believe in one God). The “unbelievers” actually are believers, they just subscribe to the belief that there is only matter and energy. That is a creed, also. There is no proof for either side that can be used to win the other over by pure argument or technique. It is not pure geometry. Nor are feelings enough to prove anything. There is only an act of faith in the end.
The act of faith in One God, Many gods, or Zero gods comes down to an act of the will, where we submit our will and intellect to a choice. When I felt there were no gods, never once did I say, “God help me be willing to be willing to believe no gods exist.” Why not? Because I didn’t want to believe in God or gods. I wanted to mock the idea that God existed, crown Jesus with thorns, and be unburdened by the consequences of what it means to say “God exists.” Because if you say those words, then it follows that God is not just matter. Then it follows that God matters. Then it matters in how you live your life.
But wait - the bible just says “God” in Genesis 1:1, it doesn’t give any details. What kind of God is this one God? Is this the clockmaker God of the Deists? Is it a vindictive God? Is it a God merely made in our likeness? Is this an invented God to control people? Is this a God of convenience for power? Is this a God you can barter with? Is this a God who built the universe and then departed, or is he watching us with his many eyeballs right now?
These are the questions that the rest of the bible answers. But the Catechism of the Catholic Church has a nice little paragraph to help us here.
Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.
God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, image-bound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God--"the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable"--with our human representations. Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God. (CCC 40-42)
In this inversion, we can start small, without diving into the nature of God too far. It’s often easier to say what God is not than to say what God is, because being bound in time and space does not allow us the language to describe God, but it allows us to know there is a God. Once again, we are given all that we need for salvation and sanity, not every last detail that we want out of curiosity.
Just as hunger goes with our craving for food, and our thirst matches our need for water, so does our spiritual longing pair nicely with the God that created all things. Our hearts seek God, and God is all that can quench that seeking thirst. But mostly, in this inversion, what Genesis is saying is:
God exists.
God is one.
God was first.
God created.
This inversion marks a departure from all other creation stories. It casts out all myth systems and modern atheism.
In the Greek creation story, Chaos gets first billing and then mother Earth just pops into being, as if birthed by itself.
The point that Genesis makes is that the first mention of any “being” is God, who is “Being Itself.” Chaos is not first. Earth is not first. Nothing is first. But God precedes that nothing.
Surely it is proper for the first character of the bible to be God, from whom all being is sustained. “It is right and just,” as we say at the Catholic Mass. This is also why Genesis is so memorable. It’s simple. It’s beautiful. It’s good. No one memorizes Hesiod, not just because it’s longer, but because it’s not as good, not as simple. We don’t memorize Hesiod because it’s false. It lacks the three transcendentals of goodness, truth, and beauty. Many people know the opening line of the bible because it is terrific writing and speaks a truth that makes sense, even if many wish it wasn’t so.
We can’t look away from Genesis for a reason: it is a masterpiece, and masterpieces do something to us.
The first eleven chapters of Genesis cover massive territory, but there is nothing that says quite so much as the very first line. This is much like the Apostles’ Creed, with the opening line of “I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and earth.” A lifetime can be spent meditating on that alone. To meditate on Chaos and the Abyss does not satisfy in the same way. In fact, Chaos and Abyss in capitalized letters sound like a couple of rollercoasters at Six Flags or Cedar Point. (What a strange time to be alive, when we name our fun distractions after the things that terrify us - Leviathan, Behemoth, Goliath, Medusa…I suspect an amusement park will just go all in and soon name a rollercoaster “Satan, the Accuser,” but let’s not get ahead of future inversions to be discussed.)
I realize that there are many differing accounts of the Greek, Sumerian, and Roman creation stories, so Hesiod’s writing is not the only version. However, all of them start with something other than one God. This is why the inversion of Genesis is so stark in contrast.
This inversion, of coming to know that there is one God, is not like the fleeting thrill of reading about Chaos and Gaia. This is no cheap Double-Bubble parade gum that grows stale after a short time, but rather it is endless food for the mind and the soul.
The idea of one God, on its face, does not seem as interesting as a tale that begins with Chaos, the Abyss, and Gaia’s spontaneous generation. If I had two movie choices to select from, I would choose the one starring Chaos in the leading role. But Genesis is not a movie. It is not about entertainment. Genesis is going higher and deeper than what Hollywood or Greek myth does. Genesis does not set out to titillate and persuade. So while Chaos may be more exciting in the short term, it makes far more sense logically and spiritually that before all things were, God is.
And merely four words into Genesis, the sacred writer has inverted the nature of time, and asserted the existence of one God, and declared the number of God is One.
This is why, as these inversions gather together, it becomes increasingly clear why the tribes of Jacob cannot help but be called “the chosen people,” because these differences are not small, not subtle, but glaring and sharp, like a knife that carves them out from a world of very different expressions of faith.
In closing, the mention of God in Genesis upends other worldviews.
We believe that God needs no pre-existent thing or any help in order to create, nor is creation any sort of necessary emanation from the divine substance. God creates freely "out of nothing":
If God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter, what would be so extraordinary in that? A human artisan makes from a given material whatever he wants, while God shows his power by starting from nothing to make all he wants. (CCC 296)
God exists. God is one. God is first.
Many people have gotten caught up in an academic distraction about the word Elohim being used in various lines of the bible. This is where personal interpretation of the bible can go wild, like college students on spring break. This is where deep dives into Giants and extra-biblical texts like the Book of Enoch and the Divine Council become unhealthy distractions. Interpretation of the bible should never be approached as a research exercise, but as an encounter with God, in a living tradition. If there are two books to keep on your shelf, or to take along to a desert island, to keep from getting lost or going insane, it is these: The Bible and The Catechism of the Catholic Church.4
Many heresies start when the idea of the oneness of God is discarded or doubted. Rest assured, however, that God is one, even if he is three-in-one. The many and none hypotheses are upside-down worlds. The oneness of the Trinity has fingerprints all over the bible, even in the opening line. The Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is still one God. Yes, there are other created spirits, like angels, but there is no other God than the one true God, also known as God Most High. The Trinity is beyond full comprehension, and this is a wonderful mystery to pray on. As always, prayer is the key, as it pleases God and is offered like heavenly incense to Him. To embrace the certainty of God while letting go of the desire for all divine data is a liberating act for your mind, body, and soul. The certainty and mystery of God’s oneness is glorious.
With that, let’s move to the next inversion, which happens in the fifth word of the bible, which is the word “created.”
“Through divine revelation, God chose to show forth and communicate Himself and the eternal decisions of His will regarding the salvation of men. That is to say, He chose to share with them those divine treasures which totally transcend the understanding of the human mind.…” “In Sacred Scripture, therefore, while the truth and holiness of God always remains intact, the marvelous "condescension" of eternal wisdom is clearly shown, "that we may learn the gentle kindness of God, which words cannot express, and how far He has gone in adapting His language with thoughtful concern for our weak human nature." (11) For the words of God, expressed in human language, have been made like human discourse, just as the word of the eternal Father, when He took to Himself the flesh of human weakness, was in every way made like men.” (For a terrific read on divine revelation and scripture, read Dei Verbum.)
Without jumping ahead too far, this is why the Primacy of Peter makes more sense than individual interpretations of the “bible alone.” The origins of Peter as pope is why the Catholic Church has teaching authority, also called the magisterium. This is part of the “three-legged stool” of the Church. To sit and feel steady, all three legs are needed: Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium (teaching authority). If the third leg is rejected (along with Peter), then each reader of the Bible takes on the massive burden of becoming his or her own pope. It’s much easier to read the Bible and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, celebrate Mass, engage the Sacraments with body and soul, embrace the Church’s wonderful traditions, and live in harmony with the liturgical calendar. Figuring it all out alone is exhausting. For further reading, see Casey Chalk’s book The Obscurity of Scripture.
The Parable of the Two Sons: Jesus said…“What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went. The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” (Hint: the one whose actions spoke louder than words) Matthew 21:28-32
The Didache Bible does a lovely job of combining the two, with the bible having footnotes of the catechism. This can reduce your essential desert-island bookshelf to a single volume.
