Creation and Chaos in the Primeval Era and the Eschaton

A Religio-Historical Study of Genesis 1 and Revelation 12

Hermann Gunkel

with contributions by

Heinrich Zimmern

Translated by

K. William Whitney Jr.

William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

Grand Rapids, Michigan / Cambridge, U.K.

Originally published in German as Schöpfung und Chaos in Urzeit und Endzeit:

Eine religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung über Gen. 1 und Ap. Jon 12;

© Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen, Germany, 1895 (1921).

English translation © 2006 K. William Whitney Jr.

All rights reserved

Published 2006 by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

2140 Oak Industrial Drive N.E., Grand Rapids, Michigan 49505 /

P.O. Box 163, Cambridge CB3 9PU U.K.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Gunkel, Hermann, 1862–1932.

[Schöpfung und Chaos in Urzeit und Endzeit. English]

Creation and chaos in the primeval era and the eschaton: a religio-historical study of Genesis 1 and Revelation 12 / Hermann Gunkel, with contributions by Heinrich Zimmern; translated by K. William Whitney Jr.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-10: 0-8028-2804-3 / ISBN-13: 978-0-8028-2804-0

1. Bible. O.T. Genesis I—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 2. Bible. N.T. Revelation XII—Criticism, interpretation, etc. I. Zimmern, Heinrich, 1862–1931. II. Title.

BS1235.52.G8613 2006

222′.1106—dc22

2006010896

www.eerdmans.com

Albert Eichhorn

in friendship and gratitude

by the author

Contents

Foreword, by Peter Machinist

Translator’s Preface

Transliteration

Introduction

GENESIS 1: CREATION IN THE PRIMORDIAL AGE

1. Literature (Concerning the Babylonian Origin of Genesis 1)

2. Genesis 1 Is Not a Free Construction of the Author

The ancient features transmitted in Genesis 1 (chaos, the divine spirit, darkness, origin of plants, stars, the creation of humanity, “good,” the commandment concerning food, the Sabbath) show that Genesis 1 originates from ancient traditions. Some features (chaos, stars) point to the Babylonian origin of the tradition

3. The Babylonian Cosmogony

Greek descriptions by Damascius, and Berossus. The cuneiform account, paraphrased and elucidated in its important features, the ambiguity of the myth in its Babylonian form, variants

4. Allusions to the Myth of the Struggle of Marduk against Ti’āmat in the Old Testament, apart from Genesis 1

I. The dragon traditions

—Rahab: Isa 51:6f.; Ps 89:10–14; Job 26:12f.; Job 9:13; Ps 87:4; Isa 30:7; Ps 40:5

—Leviathan: Ps 74:12–19; Isa 27:1; Job 40:25–41:26; Ps 104:25f.; Job 3:8

—Behemoth: Job 40:19–24; 1 Enoch 60:7–9; 4 Ezra 6:49–52; Isa 30:6; Ps 68:31

—The Dragon in the Sea: Job 7:12; Ps 44:20; Ezek 29:3–6a; 32:2–7; Jer 51:34, 36, 42; Pss. Sol. 2:28b–34

—The Serpent: Amos 9:2f.

(The examination continues on 200ff.)

Compilation of the mythological materials discovered, variants, application

II. The traditions of a primeval sea

—The conquest of the sea in primeval times, Ps 104:5–9; Job 38:8–11; Prov 8:22–31; Jer 5:22b; 31:35; Pss 33:6; 65:7f.; Sir 43:(25)23; ...