Article

Interpretation: A Journal of

The Unexpected Universe: Bible and Theology

2016, Vol. 70(1) 7­–20
© The Author(s) 2015
Emergence, Convergence, and Reprints and permissions:
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the “Overview Effect” DOI: 10.1177/0020964315603350
int.sagepub.com

William P. Brown
Columbia Theological Seminary, Decatur, GA

Abstract
Employed hermeneutically, science helps to highlight the interrelations between the first creation account
in Genesis and the new creation account in Revelation, the “bookends” of the Bible. Both have to do,
for example, with processes of emergence and convergence. Moreover, an overview of creation and new
creation reveals an ancient pattern that has important implications for ecological practice today.

Keywords
Creation, Genesis, Revelation, Emergence, Apocalypse, Big Bang, Holy, Sacred, Ecology

The astronomer Fred Hoyle remarked in 1948 that “once a photograph of the Earth, taken from
the outside, is available . . . a new idea as powerful as any in history will be let loose.”1 One such
photograph, often called “the blue marble,” was taken by the crew of Apollo 17 on December 7,
1972, at a distance of some 45,000 kilometers.2 It quickly achieved iconic status, and some,
including scientists, have wondered whether the most important achievement of reaching the
moon was actually discovering Earth. As Hoyle predicted, a powerful “new idea” was unleashed,
more accurately a set of several interrelated ideas or awarenesses: the earth’s sheer beauty, its
unity and vulnerability, and a new sense of humanity’s place on the planet, all suffused with an
overwhelming sense of awe.

1 Quoted in Kevin W. Kelley, ed., The Home Planet (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1988), inside front
cover.
2 The first time Earth was photographed and the photo broadcast on television was in 1968 by the crew of
Apollo 8. A “blue marble” Earth photograph is the cover illustration for this issue.

Corresponding author:
William P. Brown, Columbia Theological Seminary, 701 S. Columbia Drive, Decatur, GA 30030, United States.
Email: [email protected]
8 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

This experience of being profoundly “Earth-struck” has been called the “Overview Effect” by
Frank White—an experience of radical reorientation that redefines humanity’s responsibility for
the planet.3 Astronaut Michael Collins describes it this way:

I remember so vividly what I saw when I looked back at my fragile home—a glistening, inviting
beacon, delicate blue and white, a tiny outpost suspended in the black infinity. Earth is to be
treasured and nurtured, something precious that must endure.4

Such a view of the earth from a distance also inspired Paul and Anne Ehrlich to offer the analogy
of Earth as a spaceship hurtling through space whose rivets are beginning to pop—those rivets
representing rising species extinctions, now over a thousand per year.5

Endzeit in Urzeit
Any overview begins with distinguishing the forest from the trees. It involves stepping back or
“zooming out” to discover an aesthetic whole that remains hidden up close, a new pattern that can
elicit a sense of wonder of the whole. Can one, by analogy, talk about an “overview effect” for the
landscape of Scripture, from Genesis to Revelation, a sense of being “Bible-struck”? Perhaps if
one looks “far” enough. To begin to do so, I lift up the bookends of the Bible, namely Genesis and
Revelation, for consideration, in order to gain a vantage point that affords an “overview.” Together
they elicit, with a little hermeneutical help from science, a canonical “overview” in which the end
informs the beginning, and vice versa. Endzeit and Urzeit, eschatology and protology, creation and
new creation: all are brought together within an “overview” from which an evocative, new pattern
of creation emerges.

The book of Revelation features two verses that are key for discerning how the end of creation
informs the beginning of creation. They serve as two pillars upon which one can stand to gain an
overview of the opening and concluding words of Scripture: (1) “And the one who was seated on
the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new’” (21:5); and (2) “I saw no temple in the city, for
its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” (v. 22). Both verses at first seem only tan-
gentially related, but together they are critical for a canonical re-reading of Gen 1:1–2:3. The first
verse has all to do with process, the second with pattern.

Process: Emergence, Convergence, and Renewal

“See, I am making all things new” (Greek: idou kaina poiō panta): such are the penultimate words of
God in Revelation (21:5b). The syntax is critical. Literally, the sentence reads, “See, new I am making
all things,” with emphasis on the “new.” The voice from the throne is clearly not saying, “See, I am

3 Frank White, The Overview Effect: Space Exploration and Human Evolution, 2nd ed. (Reston, VA:
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 1998).
4 Michael Collins, “Foreword,” in Roy A. Gallant, Our Universe (Washington, DC: National Geographic
Society, 1980), 6.
5 Paul Ehrlich and Anne Ehrlich, Extinction: The Causes and Consequences of the Disappearance of
Species (New York: Random House, 1981), xi–xiv.
Brown 9

making all new things,”6 as if God

were wiping the cosmic slate clean
to start all over again, to create new
things from nothing (ex nihilo).
For all its accounts of conflict and
destruction, the book of Revelation
is ultimately about the renewing of
creation. Indeed, one can expand
the statement canonically to claim
that everything that God has done
and is doing, beginning with crea-
tion itself, has newness as its goal.
“I am about to do a new thing; now
it springs forth, do you not perceive
Earth from space, December, 1992. NASA photograph taken by it?” announces the prophet of the
Galileo spacecraft from a distance of 1.2 million miles. The photo exile speaking on behalf of God
shows Antarctica and the Pacific Ocean.  Ann Ronan Picture Library.
Photo Credit: HIP: Art Resource, NY.
(Isa 43:19). What, then, about the
Priestly author of Genesis 1? Does
the new creation of Revelation find a resonant chord in the primordial creation in Genesis? Whether it
does or not, the theme of newness is readily evident in the “old” creation as we explore what actually
constitutes newness, particularly the process of newness, which science helpfully explains.

“See, I am making all things new.” The scientific notion of “emergence” captures well this sense
of the new created out of the old, or creatio ex vetere.7 Emergence is a process by which something
unanticipated appears, either gradually or suddenly, from existing conditions. The hallmarks of
emergence are complexity and novelty.8 Examples include the emergence of atoms out of primor-
dial plasma, metabolism from organic molecular structures, and consciousness from cognition.
Biologist Harold Morowitz identifies no fewer than twenty-eight emergences that have driven the
history of the cosmos to its current state, from the Primordium of the Big Bang to the apprehension
of the spiritual.9 Of them all, “life is the quintessential emergent phenomenon.”10

6 See the discussion in Brian K. Blount, Revelation: A Commentary, NTL (Louisville: Westminster John
Knox, 2009), 376; M. Eugene Boring, Revelation, IBC (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1989), 220.
7 As coined by John C. Polkinghorne, “Eschatology: Some Questions and Some Insights from Science,”
in The End of the World and the Ends of God: Science and Theology on Eschatology, ed. John
Polkinghorne and Michael Welker, Theology for the Twenty-First Century (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press
International, 2000), 29–30.
8 Robert M. Hazen, Gen·e·sis: The Scientific Quest for Life’s Origin (Washington, DC: Joseph Henry,
2005), 14.
9 Harold J. Morowitz, The Emergence of Everything: How the World Became Complex (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2002). See also Holmes Rolston III, The Three Big Bangs: Matter-Energy, Life, and
Mind (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010).
10 Ibid., 13.
10 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

Emergence is not mechanical; neither is it predictable. Emergence accounts for the complex
interactions of constituent parts that give rise to something far greater than themselves. It is the
“something more” that emerges from the “nothing but.”11 While no physical laws are broken, new
laws may be waiting in the wings within the process of emergence. According to Robert Hazen,
“each emergent step increases the degree of order and complexity, and each step follows logically,
sequentially from its predecessor.” Nevertheless, what specifically emerges cannot be inferred at
the outset; point B, in other words, cannot be predicted from point A. The actual outcome remains
elusive, and that is what makes it novel. “The inherent novelty and layered complexity of emergent
phenomena all but preclude prediction.”12 There remains a persistent “ontological gap between one
sort of property and its emergent successors.”13 This is why cognitive science and evolutionary
biology cannot be reduced to particle physics.14 Emergence is a master of surprise. “See, I am mak-
ing all new things” does not mark a return to the old. It points to a genuinely new creation even as
it is created out of the old. Interpreting eschatological “renewal” through the scientific lens of
emergence enables one to talk about “renewal” without the notion of return. There is no going back
when it comes to emergent phenomena, or as science would say, there is no “reduction” of emer-
gent phenomena. Emergently speaking, renewing is actually “newing.”

The voice from the throne, thus, is making a claim of emergence, of “(re)newing” creation in the
end. But does this have anything to do with creation “in the beginning”? As is often noted, the first
creation account of Genesis begins with the pre-creative condition of darkness, water, and God’s
“breath” (rûah) suspended over it all (1:2), an initial state of “void and vacuum” (tōhû wābōhû), a
primordial soup of sorts.15 It is from and within this dark watery mess that God creates, beginning
with the dramatic moment of light’s appearance. Literally, God’s command is “Let light be” or “Let
light become” (yĕhî ’ôr), and the result is light unleashed, the Big Flash.16 Yes, one could think of
the Big Bang, that inflationary astrophysical fraction of a moment when an infinitesimally small
and immensely dense point of quantum energy bursts forth, producing space-time and eventually
matter. But, of course, Genesis is not making a scientific claim; it is offering a theological account
of cosmogony in which light plays a fundamental role. Light, God’s first creation, is associated
with divine nature, an effulgent, radiant presence, as in Ps 104:1–2a:

Bless the Lord, O my soul.

O Lord my God, you are very great.
You are clothed with honor and majesty,
wrapped in light as with a garment.

11 Ursula Goodenough, The Sacred Depths of Nature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 28.
12 Hazen, Gen·e·sis, 245.
13 Keith Ward, Divine Action: Examining God’s Role in an Open and Emergent Universe (West
Conshohocken, PA: Templeton Foundation, 2007 [1990]), 63.
14 Ibid., 3. Of course, at the quantum level uncertainty abounds.
15 Compare 2 Macc 7:28, which represents a much later perspective that comes close to the doctrine of
creatio ex nihilo. See also Isa 45:6–7; Jub. 2:2–3.
16 See Mark S. Smith’s detailed discussion of the “emergence” of light, as opposed to its absolute creation,
in Genesis 1 in The Priestly Vision of Genesis 1 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2010), 71–79.
Brown 11

God wrapped in light, God’s shining countenance (Pss 44:3; 80:16; 90:8), the “sun of righteous-
ness” (Mal 4:2): in these passages light is associated with divine presence. So it is also in Gen
1:3. God-given light suddenly emerges out of the darkness; it is unleashed, and the first separation
follows, the first, in fact, of many (Gen 1:4; cf. vv. 6, 7, 9, 14, 18). Beginning with light, creation
according to Genesis is creation by differentiation and increasing complexity, of emergence and
“evolution,” not unlike the scientific account of cosmic evolution.17 Creation is the first emergence,
something new created out of dark formlessness: light in creation, from which everything else fol-
lows, including life. Creation “in the beginning” is already creation made new.18

More explicit references to emergence in Genesis are found in the creation of life, both terres-
trial and marine.

Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every
kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. (Gen 1:11)

God does not say, “Let there be plants” (with fingers snapped). Instead, God commands the earth
to produce, and plants emerge from the ground. They are “put forth” by the earth, God’s creative
partner in the fashioning of life on the land. Indeed, the earth itself experiences its own emergence
in the previous verses: the waters are commanded to separate themselves, and the earth arises from
its submerged state:

And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry
land appear.” And it was so. (1:9)

The earth had been submerged all this time, and its “creation” was made possible by the parting
of the waters, commanded by God. Henceforth, the waters and the earth, far from being inert enti-
ties, act powerfully at God’s behest. They are bona fide agents of creation, as demonstrated also in
the creation of animal life: the earth is commanded to bring forth land animals, and the waters are
beckoned to produce sea life.

And God said, “Let the waters produce swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the
earth across the dome of the sky.” (1:20)

And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things
and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” (1:24)

17 This is not to claim that the Genesis account of creation and modern cosmology are compatible; see
William P. Brown, The Seven Pillars of Creation: The Bible, Science, and the Ecology of Wonder (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2010), 73–76. Nevertheless, both accounts, ancient and modern, stress the
increase of complexity and differentiation in creation’s “evolution.”
18 For a people either in exile or recovering from exile, the Priestly account of creation would have offered
a message of hope: the God of Genesis proves to be the God of new beginnings even in the darkest of
moments.
12 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

To be sure, such creations are described as divinely accomplished acts:

So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of which the waters
produced swarms. (1:21a)

So God made the wild animals, each according to its kind, and domestic animals, each according
to its kind. (1:25a)

Nevertheless, as v. 21 makes clear, divine agency is accomplished through the agency of the waters
and the earth. God works with the elements of creation, not despite them, much less without them.
The results reflect a convergence of divine and creational powers, of God, earth, and the waters
acting together. When it comes to divine action in creation according to Genesis 1, God primar-
ily acts convergently with the elemental powers of creation, which serve as God’s “empowering
environments.”19 Indeed, the fact that the divine word, which initiates each step in the creative
process, is cast as a jussive in Hebrew (“Let . . .”) suggests more an invitation than a direct com-
mand, setting the stage for convergent work on the part of both God and creation. Convergence
and emergence, divine collaboration and rising complexity, top down complementing bottom up
activity, are the hallmarks of God’s creative way in Genesis.

Pattern: Sacred Space

With each day building on the previous one, light emerges dramatically from the darkness; the
earth emerges out of its submerged state; plants are “put forth” from the soil; terrestrial life and
marine life are the products of their respective domains, all at God’s behest. What then about the
finished product, creation as a whole? Often noted is the symmetrical structure that unfolds within
the first six days:

DOMAINS DENIZENS

Day 1 (1:3–5) Day 4 (1:14–19)

 Light  Lights
Day 2 (1:6–8) Day 5 (1:20–33)
  Waters above (sky)   Aviary Life
  Waters below   Marine Life
Day 3 (1:9–13) Day 6 (1:24–31)
 Land  Land Animals
 Humans
 Vegetation  Food

According to their thematic correspondences, the first six days of creation line up to form two
parallel columns, establishing a well-coordinated balance. Days 1–3 delineate the cosmic domains,
which are then populated by various entities or agencies (“denizens”) that inhabit these domains

19 To borrow from Michael Welker (Creation and Reality, trans. John F. Hoffmeyer [Minneapolis: Fortress,
1999], 40, 42), who focuses only on the productive agency of the earth.
Brown 13

(Days 4–6). Vertically, the two columns address the two abject conditions of lack referenced in 1:2,
formlessness and emptiness. The left column (Days 1–3) recounts the cosmos being formed, while
the right column (Days 4–6) describes the cosmos being filled. Day 3, moreover, serves as the link
by depicting the emergence of land fully “vegetated,” thereby equipped to provide the means for
sustaining life. Days 4–6 report the filling of the empty domains with their respective inhabitants,
from the celestial spheres, which “rule” both day and night (1:14–18), to human beings, who exer-
cise “dominion” (1:26–28). Astral bodies and human bodies thus bear a functional correspondence:
both are given the task of ruling. With the stars set in the heavens and the various forms of life, each
according to its kind, filling sky, land, and sea, creation proceeds from emptiness to fullness in the
right column, just as it had proceeded from formlessness to form-fullness in the left.

While the six-day schema exhibits a tightly wrought symmetry of correspondence across
domains and denizens or inhabitants, the structure is by no means perfect. Within its literary pat-
terning, the creation account features a number of what J. Richard Middleton calls “nonpredictable
variations,”20 or literary imbalances, clearly evident when one examines the text up close.
Vegetation, for example, occurs on Day 3, concluding the left column, even though plants, like the
animals, are meant to cover the land.21 The sixth day, it seems, might have been a better fit for the
creation of plants. In addition, Days 5 and 6 are one-sidedly weighted with the language of bless-
ing, which bears no correspondence to Days 2 and 3. Whereas the animals on Day 6 are created
from the earth, humankind is made in the “image of God,” which finds no correlation with Day 3.
Structurally, certain literary building blocks such as the fulfillment report and the transition for-
mula (“and it was so”) either do not appear in a consistent order or, in certain cases, are entirely
absent.22 Finally, of all the days enumerated in the account, only “the sixth day” and “the seventh
day” bear definite articles in Hebrew. The text as a whole manifests a symmetry supple enough to
allow for variation, a unity that accommodates diversity.

Such variations, however, pale in comparison to the most significant case of dissymmetry in the
text, namely the additional seventh day (2:2–3). Having no corresponding partner, the seventh day
stands alone; it finds no place among the series of horizontal correspondences featured in the six-
day schema (i.e., the Hexameron). The seventh day is unique in both content and form. God “says”
nothing to formally introduce this new day, and nothing gets created on it. By all appearances this
final day seems superfluous, particularly in light of 2:2.

20 J. Richard Middleton, The Liberating Image: The Imago Dei in Genesis 1 (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2005),
278.
21 The creation of vegetation on Day 3, unlike that of the animals on Days 5 and 6, lacks the divine com-
mission to “fill” the land. Thus, plants are deemed part of the “empowering environment” for the suste-
nance of land animals, including humans (see Gen 1:29–30).
22 For example, the transition formula (“and it was so”) is found at the end of 1:7 rather than at the end of
v. 6, which is more typical (cf. vv. 9, 11). Also, the fulfillment report is entirely lacking in vv. 9–10. No
divine approbation is given on Day 2. Indeed, the Septuagint reflects a more consistent text, reflecting
either a harmonizing tendency or an older textual tradition that the Masoretes saw fit to alter. I suspect
the latter. For a listing of textual anomalies, see the table in Middleton, The Liberating Image, 281.
14 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth and all their hosts were completed. 2:2 On the seventh day God
finished the work that he had done; he ceased23 on the seventh day from all the work that he had
done. 2:3And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he ceased from all the
work that God had done in creation.24 (2:1–3)

But, as is often asked, isn’t it at the end of the sixth day that creation is completed,25 once the pro-
nouncement of “very good” is uttered in 1:31, as confirmed in 2:1? Why, then, this additional day,
which is distinctly post-creational in content? On the surface, the seventh day redundantly marks
God’s cessation of activity, for God already ceased creating at the end of the sixth day. Why, then,
this “extra” day?

Apart from introducing the theme of holiness, the addition of the seventh day serves to
restructure the entire schema of creation itself, a rather unanticipated outcome. To borrow from
the language of physics, the seventh day is a stellar example of “symmetry breaking.” With the
in-breaking of the seventh day, the self-contained symmetry is shattered, but, as I hope to show,
something new emerges (!) from the dissymmetry, a new pattern that builds upon but transcends
the old.

The generative power of dissymmetry is well noted in science. Cosmic evolution, for example,
is made possible through the interplay of symmetry and dissymmetry.26 Symmetry at the cosmic
level comes in many forms: there is “translational symmetry” or “invariance,” which assures that
the laws of physics apply everywhere throughout the universe. There is “rotational symmetry,”
which grants every spatial direction an equal footing. Rotate the universe on any axis, and it will
look nearly the same. On the 300 million light year level (or 1024 meters according to others), the
universe exhibits a near perfect homogeneity, the result of an overall uniform distribution of matter
and energy from the Big Bang. Uniformity is how the universe began, still evident at the largest
scale of perspective.

But zoom in more closely and you will find countless irregularities. “Clumpiness,” for one. The
galaxies, stars, and planetary systems that populate the cosmic expanse are the result of gradual
“clumping” or stellar condensation, as the universe expanded and cooled, thanks to gravity. Such
developing variations can be traced back to quantum level fluctuations at the time the universe was
infinitesimally small and unimaginably hot.

One case of symmetry-breaking in the course of cosmic evolution that made, literally, a world
of difference was the production of matter and antimatter soon after the Big Bang (10-34 seconds

23 From Hebrew šbt, commonly translated as “rested,” but whose fundamental meaning is “cease.” See the
following verse. For discussion, see Smith, Priestly Vision, 105–6.
24 Literally, “created by doing.”
25 The Septuagint translates Gen 2:2 with “sixth” instead of “seventh” day.
26 For further discussion, see Brown, Seven Pillars of Creation, 51–53; idem, Sacred Sense: Discovering
the Wonder of God’s Word and World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), 15, n. 29.
Brown 15

after t=0). When the universe cooled sufficiently for quarks and anti-quarks to “condense out,”
each pair resulted in total annihilation, releasing a photon of energy. Fortunately, the symmetry
between matter and antimatter was skewed ever so slightly: for about every billion pairs of quarks
and anti-quarks engaged in mutually shared destruction, there was an extra quark, a positive odd-
ball upon which the entire future of the universe hung. If perfect symmetry had ruled the “day” (or
millisecond), the universe would have quickly evolved into a random collection of gamma rays.
Owing to this slight imbalance, cosmic evolution was weighted toward matter, resulting ultimately
in life in all its complexity.

Cosmic history is littered with broken symmetries, those anomalies and variations that have
propelled the cosmos toward new levels of self-differentiation and complexity.27 As physicist
David Gross observes, “The secret of nature is symmetry, but much of the texture of the world is
due to mechanisms of symmetry breaking.”28 Perfect symmetry ultimately makes for a uniform,
lifeless universe.29

Genesis 1:1–2:3 can be viewed as a case of broken symmetry resulting in an entirely new pat-
tern, a new symmetry. The result can be illustrated as follows.

“Day” 0
Creation Incomplete (1:2)

Day 1 (1:3–5) Day 4 (1:14–19)

 Light   Lights
Day 2 (1:6–8) Day 5 (1:20–23)
 Sky   Aviary life
  Waters below   Marine life
  Day 3 (1:9–13) Day 6 (1:24–31)
 Land   Land animals
 Humans
 Vegetation  Food

Creation Complete (2:1–3)

Day 7

This final odd day establishes a vertical correspondence with creation’s initial, pre-creative con-
dition described in 1:2, which I paradoxically call “Day 0” for the sake of illustration, the “day”
before time, as it were, a “day” that does not count as a day of creation, to be sure, yet sets the stage

27 For further discussion of “spontaneous symmetry breaking,” see Lee Smolin, The Life of the Cosmos
(London: Phoenix, 1997), 61–68; Michio Kaku, Parallel Worlds: A Journey through Creation, Higher
Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos (New York: Anchor, 2006), 95–98.
28 Quoted in Kaku, Parallel Worlds, 97.
29 Ibid., 98.
16 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

for those that do. In astrophysical terms, it is analogous to t=0, the stellar state of infinitesimal size
and seemingly infinite density and energy at the moment of the Big Bang, the moment of uninflated
inflation. Just as the laws of physics break down at this “moment,” so also biblical language when
it comes to describing “Day 0” (tōhû wābōhû).30 Moreover, one could also say paradoxically that
Day 7 creates “Day 0,” given the surprising affinity the final day has with pre-creation. Together
these two “days” form a subtle correspondence: nothing is created on either day, the static “day” of
non-creation and the “theo-static” day of completed creation. The timeless character of “Day 0,”
moreover, shares a particular kinship with Day 7. Both lack the temporal formula “evening came
and then morning.” As “Day 0” is the day “before” created time, so Day 7 is the day suspended
above time. Nevertheless, these two “days” could not be more different: “Day 0” refers to crea-
tion’s formless, empty state, whereas Day 7 marks creation fully formed and filled (2:1).31 The
Priestly account of creation is thus bounded by primordial chaos, on the one hand, and holy cessa-
tion, on the other. The six days of creation, or Hexameron, are bracketed by pre-creation (“Day 0”)
and post-creation (Day 7).

But there is more. The final day serves as the capstone for an entirely new structure. Without this
symmetry-breaking seventh day, the resulting creation pattern would lose a distinction that remains
largely hidden to modern readers, or at least those not acquainted with the ancient architecture of
sacred space. Therein lies the “overview effect” of Genesis. Put cognitively, the “overview” is
gained through pattern recognition, carefully structured by the Priestly author. Ancient readers of
Genesis would have recognized the resulting pattern as a threefold structure reflecting the architec-
ture of the temple (1 Kgs 6–8), as well as that of the tabernacle described in the latter half of
Exodus.32 In the instructions for building the tabernacle given in Exodus, three discrete areas are
identified: the outer court (hāsēr), the “holy place” (haqqōdeš), and the inner sanctuary or “most
holy place” (qōdeš haqqodāšîm) (Exod 26:33–34).

Similarly, Solomon’s temple is described in 1 Kings 6–8 as consisting of three spatial parts: the
vestibule or portico (’ûlām), the nave (hêkāl), and the innermost sanctum located at the far back of
the temple, the “inner sanctuary” (dĕbîr; e.g., 6:5, 16, 20–23; 7:50; 8:6–8). This threefold arrange-
ment of sacred space corresponds precisely to the way in which the various days of creation are
distributed both chronologically and thematically. The first six days, by virtue of their correspond-
ence, demarcate the architectural boundaries of sacred space. The last day, given its uniqueness, is
lodged in the most holy space, a space that is uniquely unbounded since it lacks final boundaries
by virtue of its transcendent status (see below).

30 Cf. Jer 4:23, in which the conjunction of these two terms appears only one other time, suggesting an
artificially created farrago.
31 See Middleton, Liberating Image, 75–76.
32 For architectural details of Syro-Palestinian temples, see Mark B. Hundley, Gods in Dwellings: Temples
and Divine Presence in the Ancient Near East, WAWSS 3 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013),
105–14.
Brown 17

Day 1 Day 4
Vestibule
(Outer Court)

Day 2 Day 5
Nave
(Holy Place)
Day 3 Day 6
Inner Sanctum
(Holy of Holies)
Day 7

The Priestly overview, in short, casts the cosmos in the image of the temple or tabernacle. The uni-
verse, in other words, is God’s cosmic sanctuary! Creation’s “entrance,” as it were, is demarcated
by Days 1 and 4, featuring the creation of light and lights. Not coincidentally, the Solomonic tem-
ple in Jerusalem, like many temples of its time and vicinity, faced eastward toward the rising sun,
whose rays helped illuminate the temple’s gilded furnishings. On the other end chronologically
(and spatially), the holy seventh day marks God’s completion of creation, God’s “rest,” which cor-
responds to the sanctum where God is said to reside in “thick darkness” (see 1 Kgs 8:12).33 Divine
rest and residence, in other words, find their holy correspondence in creation and temple. The tem-
ple is truly a microcosmos, and the universe, in turn, is a macro-temple. Biblically speaking, then,
creation is God’s first temple.34

Given the structural parallel between creation and sanctuary, one could press the analogy further
with regard to the issue of holiness. The temple, as also its forerunner (the tabernacle), was struc-
tured according to a hierarchy of holiness.35 While the inner sanctum was considered the holiest
part of the temple/tabernacle, the whole structure was also deemed holy—holy by degree or grada-
tion. Something similar, I submit, can be said about creation from the Priestly perspective. To be
sure, the creation account posits what appears to be a categorical difference between the “good,”
which applies to creation fashioned in six days, and the “holy,” reserved for the seventh day.
Nevertheless, it is no coincidence that the word “good” (tôb) occurs not six but seven times in the
creation account, corresponding to the day of holiness, the Sabbath day (2:1–3). Moreover, the
demarcation between “good” and “holy” lies on the boundary established by Days 3 and 6, both of
which have to do with the land and its life, including human life. That boundary, not coincidentally,

33 Reference to “thick darkness” in the temple, similar to the description of pre-creation in Gen 1:2, pre-
serves God’s transcendence beyond time and space.
34 This observation is nothing new. What is relatively new is the temple nature of creation demonstrated
from the text’s own literary structure. See S. Dean McBride Jr., “Divine Protocol: Genesis 1:1–2:3 as
Prologue to the Pentateuch,” in God Who Creates: Essays in Honor of W. Sibley Towner, ed. William
P. Brown and S. Dean McBride, Jr. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 12–15.
35 See Philip P. Jenson, Graded Holiness: A Key to the Priestly Conception of the World, JSOTSup 106
(Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1992); and, most recently, Michael B. Hundley, “Sacred Spaces, Objects,
Offerings, and People in the Priestly Texts: A Reappraisal,” JBL 132 (2013): 749–67.
18 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

corresponds to the curtain or veil that separates the inner sanctuary, the most holy place or “holy of
holies,” from the outer sanctuary or nave, the “holy place.” The parallel between creation and tab-
ernacle/temple suggests that holiness is not the exclusive reserve of the seventh day. What the
seventh day adds to creation’s integrity is a measure of holiness to the entire structure.36 Just as the
tabernacle’s integrity, indeed its holiness, is dependent on God’s holiness, made spatially manifest
in the “holy of holies,” so creation’s integrity (its “goodness”) is infused with a level of holiness
because of the holiest day. The broken symmetry introduced by the seventh day results in a holy
integrity for the entire structure.

Here lies the tension regarding creation’s “holiness”: separation and contact. On the one hand,
holiness connotes separation, such as God’s separation from the created order, established on the
seventh day. On the other hand, holiness connotes a special relationship to God, specifically a
heightened sense of belongingness to God as it pertains to sacred objects and spaces, to those things
that are not in and of themselves holy but become holy in relationship to the divine.37 It is this
second aspect of holiness that pertains to creation as a whole in Genesis 1 (cf. Ps 24:1). The first
aspect pertains exclusively to the seventh day of God’s rest and residence, while the second per-
tains to all creation. Nevertheless, the boundary is porous, for God’s pronouncement of “very
good” in Gen 1:31 (tôb mĕ’ōd), marking creation’s completion, facilitates the transition from
“good” to “holy,” which also marks creation’s completion. On the seventh day, holiness and whole-
ness are bound together.

In sum, the chronological layout of Genesis 1 reflects the spatial framework of the temple/tab-
ernacle. In the seven days of creation lies the threefold structure of sacred space. The Priestly
author, in other words, has an edifice complex, but not just any edifice. In God’s cosmic sanctuary,
time and space are wedded together. Einstein would be proud. Perhaps also Rachel Carson, for the
central message of Genesis is that all creation, from every living thing created “according to its
kind” to the celestial spheres regulating the seasons, has a rightful place in God’s cosmic temple,
all belonging to God. In God’s cosmic temple, all life shares its habitation on Earth, and each form
of life, according to its kind, belongs to God. Creation is a living temple, furnished with life accord-
ing to its various kinds. In Genesis, NASA’s “blue marble” meets the Priest’s “green sanctuary.”
Both are equally compelling images of an integrated, aesthetic, sacred whole.38

So what is the “effect” of the overview of creation as God’s cosmic temple? I can only speak for
myself, but at a fundamental level an overview of Gen 1:1–2:3 engenders an awe and respect for

36 Why creation as a whole is not explicitly called holy in Gen 1:1–2:3 is simple: the seventh day was not
established until after creation was complete. Creation’s holy integrity can only be inferred from the
overview.
37 This double nature of holiness is nicely summarized in Hundley, “Sacred Spaces,” 752–53. This double
sense can also be found in Exod 19:5–6.
38 The connection between temple and creation is not the exclusive purview of the Priestly account. See
particularly Isa 66:1–2b, in which the totality of creation (i.e., heaven and earth) is cast as God’s cosmic
throne room, the inner sanctum (cf. 1 Kgs 8:27).
Brown 19

creation’s sacred integrity. Perhaps such respect has no greater biblical warrant than here “in the
beginning” (and in the end, as we shall see). Respect for creation is tantamount to reverence of
God, the Creator of all and holy inhabitant of creation. Creation is God’s holy sanctuary; the
“depths of nature” are truly sacred.39

New Creation
With creation completed on the seventh day in Gen 2:1–3, the day of God’s rest, the completion
of the new creation is found in God’s residence on earth in Revelation 21–22. John’s conclud-
ing vision of the new heaven and new earth is established by the descent of the new Jerusalem
and God’s declaration of dwelling on earth (Rev 21:2–4). Glorious descent, rather than rapturous
ascent, is the movement charted in this final vision (21:2). The apocalypse ultimately has to do with
God coming down to Earth to dwell, with God’s cosmic indwelling or “tabernacling.” This is, as
Barbara Rossing aptly calls it, “rapture in reverse”: God coming home to creation.40 The new crea-
tion marks God’s complete, fully immanent move toward creation.

And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a
bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home
of God [hē skēnē tou theou] is among mortals. He will dwell [skēnōsei] with them as their God;
they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them. (21:2–4)

The language is not without precedent. John’s vision of the consummation in Revelation builds
on the description of Christ’s incarnation in John’s Gospel: “The Word became flesh and made his
home [eskēnōsen] among us” (John 1:14; cf. Col 1:19). Two different “Johns,” yes, but strikingly
comparable visions; one represents the culmination of the other. The apocalypse is the final, cos-
mic event of God dwelling “among us.” John’s apocalyptic consummation is the incarnation taken
to a new level, that of God’s cosmic indwelling. It is the resurrection taken to a new level, that of
cosmic transformation. As the first fruit of the new creation, Christ’s resurrection leads to crea-
tion’s resurrection, the final fruits. Again, the voice from the throne says it all: “See, I am making
all things new” (Rev 21:5). The apocalypse, in the end, marks God’s resolve to renew, not destroy,
to transform, not abandon.

John’s vision of the new creation marks nothing less than the convergence of heaven and earth,
making cosmic the temple, the holy conduit between heaven and earth. With the descent of the holy
city, heaven itself comes to rest upon the earth, a vivid description of convergence from the “top
down,” and as a result some things drop out: the sea, the sun, and the moon, all replaced by God’s
radiant, life-giving, cosmic presence (21:22–23). The sea is singled out because from John’s per-
spective it is the domain of imperial chaos, the chaos of rebellion against God (e.g., 13:1), where
the monsters of Rome and Babylon reside. Thus, the “sea,” the empowering environment of

39 See Goodenough, Sacred Depths of Nature.

40 Barbara R. Rossing, The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation (New York:
Westview, 2004), 141–58.
20 Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 70(1)

i­ mperial hegemony, has no place in the new creation (21:1). The night, too, has no place in the new
creation, for God’s glory, whose light is the Lamb, will provide uninterrupted illumination (v. 23).

So also the temple: “I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and
the Lamb” (21:22). In the new creation, there is no localized temple, for God’s holy, cosmically
expansive, wholly immanent presence renders any and every temple obsolete. At the completion of
the Jerusalem temple, Solomon asked, “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and
the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!” (1 Kgs 8:27). John
answers with a resounding “Yes!” For the entirety of creation, both heaven and earth, has been
God’s temple from the very beginning. The end mirrors the beginning, recalling the Priestly view
of creation as God’s cosmic sanctuary, and the beginning mirrors the end in God’s work of “making
new.” The result is the holy habitation of the Most High . . . on Earth! The innermost sanctum is no
longer innermost.

The overview from Genesis to Revelation discloses a trajectory that has all to do with creation,
renewal, and divine indwelling, with “top down” and “bottom up” activity, convergence and emer-
gence. In the beginning, God constructed a cosmic temple, both good and holy. In the end, God
enters and rebuilds the cosmic sanctuary to dwell in it permanently. In the new creation, rest, resi-
dence, and renewal find their convergence. The timeless seventh day “in the beginning” portends
the consummation at the end of time, a Sabbath consummation in which creation is completed once
and for all, renewed and hallowed, fully indwelled and utterly upheld. The arc of the universe,
Scripture testifies, ultimately bends toward holy newness, toward sacred emergence and conver-
gence, and the “effect” of such an overview lies in the eye, and hands, of the beholder.