INTRODUCTION I. TITLE The title “Genesis” comes to us by way of the Latin Vulgate (Incipit Liber Bresith id est Genesis), which in turn borrowed, or transliterated, from the Greek LXX, Génesis. This word is best reproduced in English by “origin.” In postbiblical Hebrew usage the title is berēʾšîṯ, which is, in fact, simply the first word of 1:1 (“In [the] beginning”). This follows the custom of naming the books of the Pentateuch on the basis of either their first word, their first two words,