Catholics and Scripture Interpretation of the Creation story from Genesis

The first creation story describes how God created the world from being formless and void, “2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters”( Genesis 1:2). The next six days, God then brings order to a formless world by creating day and night, Heaven, earth and sea, vegetation, sun and the moon, great sea creatures and winged birds, living creatures and finally humanity. The second creation story describes how Adam and Eve were created. Adam was created from dust and Eve in turn created from Adam’s ribs. Apart from the names of God and creation of animals, the number of days is another emerging difference.

The first creation account takes place in six days while the second creation story only takes place in one day. God, in the first creation story God only uses word of mouth in the creation story while in the second account God is personally involved in the creation story. The other visible difference is the that the first creation story does not mention a garden, but in the second creation story, God mentions the garden of Eden. Also, the commands are different in the two accounts. The critics base the criticism on two different authors, writing styles and different accounts. It is believed that the two creation accounts were written on different occasions by different writers and were merged. The authors are seen to be in different periods since they do not align in the same way of thinking.

One of the critics believes that a first account is a chronological event with the creation of man being the climax. He further states that the second account is an additional of the first and purposes to add more details to the first. From this homily Ratzinger calls for the modern Catholics to read the bible and Genesis for that matter as it is and to respect it as a true text. People are called to read and believe in the text as it is and know that that it is the profound truth about God the creator. The second homily talks about the unity of the Bible. The homily according to Ratzinger is meant to clear the doubts of the image and the intended expression in the creation story.