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It might sound bizarre to the average reader of the Bible to hear that there are billions of years between the creative activity of Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2. Advocates of this theory contend that there is a chronological gap of eons of time between Genesis 1:1-2. The basic thesis of this doctrine is that; God created a perfect heaven and perfect earth (Genesis 1:1). God also made soulless men along with animals and plants. Satan sinned against God and thus God judged Satan and the world with a global flood which is referred to as the ‘Lucifer’ flood. The earth then became formless and void (Genesis 1:2). Then followed a the six-day renovation of the world.
Weston Fields summarizes the gap theory thus: “In the far distant dateless past, God created a perfect heaven and perfect earth [Genesis 1:1 – emph. added]. Satan was the ruler of the earth which was peopled by a race of “men” without any souls. Eventually, Satan, who dwelled in a garden of Eden composed of minerals (Ezek. 28), rebelled by desiring to become like God (Isa. 14). Because of Satan’s fall, sin entered the universe and brought on the earth God’s judgment in the form of a flood (indicated by the water of 1:2), and then a global ice age when the light and heat from the sun were somehow removed. All the plant, animal, and human fossils upon the earth today date from this “Lucifer’s flood” and do not bear any genetic relationship with the plants, animals, and fossils living upon the earth today.”
Thomas H Chalmers, the Scottish theologian credited as the originator started with the idea that the KJV said in Genesis 1:28 that “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” (emph. added). So he reasoned that God commanded Adam and Eve to replenish (refill) indicating that it was inhabited by previous humans forms who were destroyed. Replenish as used by the King James translators in 1611 meant ‘fill’ and not refill. It takes looking the word up in a good dictionary to confirm this! The theory is built on a word that has changed its meaning as used in the version of the Bible.
Those teaching this doctrine often resort to a distinction between ‘asah’ and ‘bara’ which translates as ‘made’ and ‘create’ respectively. They argue that in Genesis 1:1, Moses said God created [bara] the heavens and the earth. However, in Exodus 20:11, Moses recorded that in six days the LORD made [asa] heaven and earth and sea suggesting a re-creation of a ruined world. The gap theorist pursues the honor of showing that the two verbs cannot be used interchangeably. Custance pointed out, “If we allow that the basic meaning of the Hebrew verb ‘asah’ is not creation but rather the giving of a new role to something already in existence, then we have plenty of illustrations throughout Scripture of the use of this verb in this sense.”
Commenting on the word ‘bara’, C. F Keil explained, “In the Qal stem, it [bara] always means to create, and it is only applied to a divine creation, the production of that which had no existence before. It is never joined with an accusative of material, although it does not exclude a pre-existent material unconditionally, but is used of the creation of man and of everything new that God creates, whether in the kingdom of nature…” The two words ‘bara’ and ‘asah’ are used interchangeably in Genesis 2:4. Moses wrote, “This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created (bara), in the day that the Lord God made (asah) the earth and the heavens,” (emphasis added). It will take extra help from false teachers to see a distinction between these two words as employed in the Genesis account. In Nehemiah 9:6, the Levites ended the argument on the false distinction with these words, “You alone are the Lord; You have made (asah) heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and everything on it, the seas and all that is in them, and You preserve them all. The host of heaven worships You.” (emph. added). The gap theorists hold that the heaven and the host in them were created (bara) but not made (asah). Either Nehemiah 9:6 is wrong or the gap theorist is wrong. The writer leaves the judgment of this to the honest inquirer.
The Hebrew grammar and syntax do not allow for a period between the first two verses of the Bible. When the grammatical features of the first clause of Genesis 1:2 and the nature of the Hebrew particle ‘waw’ are examined, they demonstrate that God did not communicate a gap between the first two verses. The Hebrew particle ‘waw’ when followed by a verb, it is generally denoting a sequence of events. For instance, in Genesis 1:3, the Bible reads “And God said, let there be light: and there was light.” In the Hebrew, the ‘waw’ is followed by said pointing out that it is describing a series of events. Genesis chapter one is filled with ‘waw’ consecutive. However, when ‘waw’ is followed by a non-verb such as earth, such construction is called ‘waw’ disjunctive serving as a parenthetical statement (an explanation) to the previous verse. Genesis 1:2 is an example of ‘waw’ disjunctive making it grammatically incorrect to separate verse 1 and 2 with any period whatsoever. This waw disjunctive disallows any gap of time between verse 1 and 2 because verse 2 does not follow in time. On the contrary, verse 2 is explaining and clarifying verse 1.
Tay et.al concluded right when they wrote “Genesis 1:2 begins with a “wan” followed by a non-verb. This requires the verse to be translated as a waw disjunctive (‘now’) rather than a waw consecutive (‘and’). In other words, it is not possible to interpret Genesis 1:2 as an event that occurs after verse 1. Rather the syntax requires us to understand Genesis 1:2 as an in-depth description of what Genesis 1:1 means when it says, ‘In the beginning’. The waw disjunctive in 1:2 functions like a bracket – a series of three circumstantial clauses that explain Genesis 1:1. Since Genesis 1:2 begins with a waw disjunctive, it is not possible to insert a time gap between verses 1 and 2. The gap theory is incompatible with the Hebrew Syntax.”
Thus, Keathley and Rooker conclude, “Genesis 1:2 explains more clearly the condition or the circumstances attending God’s creative act. Genesis 1:2 is thus a description of the earth as originally created.” [223]
Proponents of this dogma sometimes resort to arguing that the Hebrew word ‘hayah’ must be translated as ‘became’ instead of ‘was’ indicating a change in the state of the earth after the cataclysmic judgment of the once perfect earth leaving it formless and void. Field observed “Hayeta is the Qal perfect, third person feminine singular from the verb haya, “to be,” and has generally been translated as “was” in Genesis 1:2”. It must be set clear in the reader’s mind that the meaning of a word is not determined by the frequency of translation or the translator’s digression but by the context. The word ‘hayah’ can only take up the meaning of became if the context clearly demonstrates a change in condition. For instance, in Genesis 19:26, the Bible says, “But his wife looked back behind him, and she became [hayah] a pillar of salt.” The passage clearly teaches a change of state of Lot’s wife. In Genesis 3:22, Moses wrote, “Then the LORD God said, ‘Behold, the man has become [hayah] like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever.” The context teaches that man is going from innocent ignorance to experiential knowledge. If Moses wanted to inform the readers that the earth became formless and void, he only needed to add the Hebrew letter ‘lamed’ to the verb “to be” (hayah le). This is seen in Genesis 2:7, where the Bible says, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living [ḥay·yāh] being.” The lamed is attached to the phrase living being. It comes not as a surprise that many standard Bible translations such as KJV, ASV, NKJV, NIV, and others translate the word ‘was’ because that is its meaning.
It is also argued that ‘formless and void’ in verse 2 indicated not the original creation but the sinful and judged state of the earth. The reason that God created the earth perfect in Genesis 1:1 and millions of years afterward destroyed it was because of Satan’s fall causing the earth to be formless and void. Isaiah 45:18 and Jeremiah 4:23 are used often as proof texts for this doctrine. In Genesis 1:2, the phrase ‘formless and empty’ tohu wa bohu occurs 3 times in the Old Testament (Genesis 1:2; Isaiah 34:11 and Jeremiah 4:23). However, when dealing with the gap theorist, their go-to passage is Isaiah 45:18 which states, “For thus says the Lord, Who created the heavens, Who is God, Who formed the earth and made it, Who has established it, Who did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord, and there is no other.” Their idea is since God did not create the earth to be in vain (tohu) and Genesis 1:2 said the earth was formless (tohu), then the earth in Genesis 1:2 is a destroyed earth as a result of God’s judgment on Satan and the pre-adamic world. The thrust of this verse is that God had a definite purpose for the earth. He created, established, made, and formed it as a habitation for man. When initially called into existence by God, it was “unformed and empty,” as stated in Genesis 1:2, but God did not intend to stop there. He took six days to prepare it for man in order to set a pattern for man’s work week (Exodus 20:8-11); the earth was not “perfect,” in the sense of being “finished,” until God said so, at the end of the six days (Genesis 2:1-3). Isaac Boabeng agrees with the assessment of Isaiah 45:18 when he wrote, “What the writer of Isaiah 45:18 is saying then is that, the initial desolate earth God created was not left in its state forever, but was formed to be suitable for habitation.” The Isaiah 34:11 and Jeremiah 4:23 passages deal with the judgment of Israel and not the intial state of creating the earth.
We acknowledge the technicalities involved in the use of Hebrew grammatical tools in this, but these have been necessary to overthrow the supposed sophistry of the gap theorists. Believers of the Bible as God’s inspired word would do well to heed to the words of the apostle Paul, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” Colossians 2:8. The wild speculations of men who desire to sound academic should not be taken as sound exegesis of God’s word. We should always let the Bible to has it say in what we believe and teach.
WORKS CITED
Custance, Arthur C. Without Form And Void. Classic Reprint Press, 2008.
Fields, Weston W. Unformed And Unfilled. Master Books, 2005.
Rooker, Mark F, and Kenneth Keathley. 40 Questions About Creation & Evolution. Kregel, 2014.
Boaheng, Isaac. “A Linguistic And Theological Assessment Of The Gap Theory With Particular Reference To Genesis 1:1-2B”. E-Journal Of Humanities, Arts And Social Sciences, vol 1, no. 1, 2020, pp. 1-10. Noyam Publishers, https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.2020051.
Kon, KeeFui. Biblicaltheology.Com, 2022, https://www.biblicaltheology.com/Research/KonKF03.pdf.
“The Gap Theory Interpretation Of Genesis”. Kjvbible.Org, 2022, https://www.kjvbible.org/gap_theory.html#:~:text=The%20History%20of%20the%20Genesis%20Gap%20Theory%20Interpretation,world%20into%20which%20He%20placed%20Adam%20and%20Eve
