The brother who sent the following questions, says that there has been some dispute over them in the Sabbath-school:
1. What does "in the beginning" refer to in the first verse of the Bible? to the beginning of the first week or to some other time?
2. Was the earth created during the first week, or was it simply fitted up then, and created ages before?
3. Were the sun and moon created during the first week, as the Bible says, or were they created ages before?
1. In the Beginning
"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." (Genesis 1:1)
In the beginning of what? Not of God's existence, because He is from eternity. Not the beginning of eternity, because eternity has no beginning. Then the text must mean that in the beginning of time God created the heaven and the earth. Time, then, begun with the first act of the creation of this earth.
2. The First Week
Now read the first verses of Genesis: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. ... And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day." (Genesis 1:1-5)
Here we have the work of the first day. What was it? It was the creation of the heaven and the earth, the creation of light, and the separating of the light from the darkness, thus forming day and night. The measurement of time by days and nights must, of course, have begun as soon as time began. So "in the beginning" refers to the first day of the first week of time, in which the heaven and the earth were created.
3. The Sun and Moon
"Were the sun and moon created during the first week, as the Bible says, or were they created ages before?"
We are quite inclined to believe that it was just as the Bible says. We know it is not fashionable nowadays to believe the Bible in all particulars, and those who do so are considered as old-fogyish; but we have never yet found any more reliable authority than the Bible.
We would advise our Sabbath-schools to stick to the Bible, and not to run after the speculations of "science, falsely so-called." (1 Timothy 6:20)--Signs of the Times, February 24, 1888--Genesis 1:1-5.
E.J. Waggoner