Harmonising Gender Concepts in the Book of Genesis
A deep dive into Genesis 1:27 & 2:22
The creation narrative of humankind with the concept of gender binary, notably from Gen. 1:27 & Gen. 2:22, has been a common reference for many conservative Christians to justify their stance on gender binary, at least in the biblical context. I will be straightforward in this article with how I personally interpret and harmonise the related verses.
My stance
- I am an independent Christian i.e. no particular affiliation with any denomination, and I believe in the Bible as the inspired word of God. I do not reject „Apocrypha“ writings per se, but that’s whole another topic.
- Interpretations are of personal nature, here my approach is to harmonise the scriptures with materials as early as possible.
- With all that being said, I do not consider that gender binary is a biblical concept.
Textual analysis: Genesis 1:27
Luckily, Genesis 1-2 is one of the historically earliest and most well-preserved pieces of text in the Hebrew Bible. The text as we see it today has little variations from all other manuscripts.
However, the documentary hypothesis gave us a constructivist view of how the Pentateuch could have been composed. For a quick summary, it suggests that four main sources are involved throughout the completion of the Pentateuch:
- Elohist (calling God with אלהים elohim, presumably early fragmented writings) - 10th century BCE
- Yahwist (the presence of the Tetragrammaton יהוה YHWH, suggesting a non-monotheistic nature in early Israelite beliefs) - 9th century BCE
- Deuteronomist (mainly historical materials) - 7th century BCE
- Priestly and/or Redactor (the layer with probably the earliest attempt to harmonise the whole Torah, origin debated) - 6th century BCE
I will be using the Masoretic text as the basis of original Hebrew, when two sources are involved. Primary English translations are provided in the King James Version (KJV).
Here with Genesis 1:27, we see both the Priestly & Elohist sources:
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
I praise the KJV translators for their accuracy in resembling the original Hebrew sentence structure, and that’s also why the last part sounds a bit off for English grammar.
Let’s break down word by word in an interlinear:
vav-(he) Elohim created human, in his image, in Elohim’s image, he creates [a singular object]. Masculine-vav-feminine (ones) he created them.
Now as you may easily notice, the Hebrew sentence as a whole is a mess. The interpretation would first based on how you parse the sentence. This kind of ambiguity is common throughout the early Hebrew writings, for this specific verse though, no huge ambiguity is present in any way of parsing it. The repetition of words, which is another common feature in biblical texts, actually plays a major role in disambiguating the sentence.
This verse progressively portrays the creation of human, the first part (Elohim created human) serves as a general statement similar to how some would interpret Genesis 1:1. The second part (in his image, in Elohim’s image…) specifies the importance of „image“ or the nature of human being, which is, in the manner of God. And the last part (…he creates [a singular object]. Masculine-vav-feminine (ones) he created them) reinforces that God created human, as a race, a chosen race to be in the image of God if you will, and he created these two attributes for human: masculinity and femininity.
Role of Vav-consecutive
I did not translate the grammatical vav (letter ו, waw in older Biblical Hebrew pronunciation) on purpose. As in biblical Hebrew, the vav-consecutive can act like a tense & aspect converter, but a less-known function is that it can also be used as a contrastive conjunction. In this case, the vav-consecutive in the last part of the verse is used to contrast the two attributes of human, masculinity and femininity.
It is often nuanced whether a grammatical vav is used as a contrastive conjunction or a simple connector, take for example:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
It is really hard to tell whether the heavens (הַשָּׁמַיִם) and the earth (הָאָרֶץ) are being described in a contrastive manner or not, both interpretations would be as perfectly valid.
In some verses it is obvious that a contrastive interpretation would make more sense:
And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
Love Yourz, Yahweh: Genesis 2:22
The second chapter of Genesis is often considered a more detailed and/or an alternative version of the creation narrative. Following the documentary hypothesis, Yahwist is the main source for this chapter, the only Redactor involvement is to add the word Elohim אלהים after every occurrence of YHWH יהוה. Looking back in the history of Israelite religion from a proto-polytheistic nature, going through a monolatristic phase approximated within the lifetime of the First Temple period, then to a full monotheistic belief around the establishment of the Second Temple, this addition is a clear sign of the redactor’s attempt to harmonise between a general „God“ and Yahweh as one of the gods in the Levant at that time.
And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
An interlinear for the verse:
vav-(he) YHWH-Elohim built (that) the rib, which took from the human, (turned it) to a [fem.]spouse. vav- brought her unto the [masc.]human.
The verse is a bit more straightforward than the previous one, the common literal interpretation would see this verse as a strict man-woman relationship, which is not necessarily wrong. With that being said, the Hebrew text for this verse uses different words describing the concept of gender, in Gen. 1:27, the words used are זָכָר zakhar and נְקֵבָה neqevah, in biblical usage, zakhar as a masculine noun can be used to describe both animals and humans, when used as an adjective it can only be used for humans. Neqevah acts only as a feminine noun, and can be used for both animals and humans.
In Gen. 2:22, the words used are אִשָּׁה ishah and הָאָדָם ha’adam. ’Adam under the context here is not yet a proper name, but a common noun meaning „human“. The main issue being ’ishah, which is a feminine noun, and can only be used for humans. The word ’ishah is derived from ’ish meaning „person“, in a more individualistic sense at least in the creation narrative.
The biblical figure Enosh אֱנוֹשׁ is of the same root.
Considering the fact that Hebrew is a heavily gendered language, the usage of ’ishah in this verse can give us some insights into the intended meaning of the verse. Almost all gendered languages use masculine as the default, Hebrew is no exception. The usage of ’ishah in this verse can be seen as a way to emphasise how God’s intention is to create a partner or „companion“ for the first human, Adam (Gen. 2:18). If there is a strong intention to draw an image of binary gender and heterosexual couple, the word of choice would at least be a ’ish - ’ishah pair.
With all that being said, rendering the verse as the first human meeting their companion, a partner, a spouse, is more accurate.
Summary
I did learn a lot during the process of harmonising scripture with my identities, not only on this topic. Methodologies to separate layers of text and then pack them back together, from different angles to read a single verse, or to find the metaphysical understanding.
Hope this article can find you a new path to explore your faith, never feel being limited or being left out.
Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.
Shalom.
