Page:A critical and exegetical commentary on Genesis (1910).djvu/137

 here covers a survey of all that has been made, and rises to the superlative 'very good.'

Vv.$29f.$ differ significantly in their phraseology from the preceding sections: thus instead of  ($11. 12$);  instead of the far more elegant ; the classification into beasts, birds, and reptiles (ct. $24. 25$); of the inner principle of life instead of the living being as in $20f. 24$; instead of. These linguistic differences are sufficient to prove literary discontinuity of some kind. They have been pointed out by Kraetschmar (Bundesvorstg. 103 f.), who adds the doubtful material argument that the prohibition of animal food to man nullifies the dominion promised to him in vv.$26. 28$. But his inference (partly endorsed by Ho.) that the vv. are a later addition to P does not commend itself; they are vitally connected with 9$2ff.$, and must have formed part of the theory of the Priestly writer. The facts point rather to a distinction in the sources with which P worked,—perhaps (as Gu. thinks) the enrichment of the creation-story by the independent and widespread myth of the Golden Age when animals lived peaceably with one another and with men. The motives of this belief lie deep in the human heart—horror of bloodshed, sympathy with the lower animals, the longing for harmony in the world, and the conviction that on the whole the course of things has been from good to worse—all have contributed their share, and no scientific teaching can rob the idea of its poetic and ethical value.

'''II. 1-3. The rest of God.'''—The section contains but one idea, expressed with unusual solemnity and copiousness of language,—the institution of the Sabbath. It supplies an answer to the question, Why is no work done on the last day of the week? (Gu.). The answer lies in the fact that God Himself rested on that day from the work of creation, and bestowed on it a special blessing and sanctity.—The writer's idea of the Sabbath and its sanctity is almost too realistic for the modern mind to grasp: it is not an institution which exists or ceases with its observance by man; the divine rest is a fact as much as the divine working, and so the sanctity of the day is a fact whether man secures the benefit or not. There is little trace of the idea that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath; it is an ordinance of the kosmos like any other part of the creative operations, and is for the good of man in precisely the same sense as the whole creation is subservient to his welfare.