John Ray comments on the opening line of the Bible - how should it be translated? I thought I would contribute one thing that Rashi has to say about it (for more go here). Rashi is the foremost and most normative of Jewish biblical scholars, he lived in the 11th century.
ולא בא המקרא להורות סדר הבריאה
לומר שאלו קדמו
שאם בא להורות כך היה לו לכתוב
בראשונה ברא את השמים
שאין לך ראשית במקרא שאינו דבוק לתיבה שלאחריו
כמו בראשית ממלכת יהויקים
ראשית ממלכתו
ראשית דגנך
אף כאן אתה אומר בראשית ברא אלהים את השמים
כמו בראשית ברוא
ודומה לו תחלת דבר ה' בהושע
כלומר תחלת דבורו של הקב"ה בהושע
ויאמר ה' אל הושע
V'lo' ba' hamiqra' l'horot seder habri'a
Lomar she'elu qadmu
She'im ba' l'horot kakh haya lo likhtov
Barishona bara' et hashamayim
She'eyn l'kha reshit b'miqra' she'eyno davuq l'teyva shel'akharav
K'mo b'reshit mamlekhet y'hoyaqim
Reshit mamlakhto
Reshit d'ganekha
Af kan ata omer b'reshit bara' elohim et hashamayim
K'mo b'reshit b'ro'
V'dome lo t'hilat d'var H' b'hoshea`
K'lomar t'hilat diburo shel haqadosh barukh hu b'hoshea`
Vayomer H' el hoshea`
And the Bible doesn't mean to show the order of creation
To say that these preceded [those]
For if it meant to show this it would have been written thus:
In the beginning (barishona) He created the heavens
For you don't have 'reshit' (beginning-) in the Bible that is not attached to the word after it
As in: At the beginning (b'reshit) of the kingdom of Hosea
The beginning (reshit) of his kingdom
The beginning (reshit) of your grain
Thus here you say: At the beginning of God's creation of the heavens
As in: At the beginning of the creation (b'ro')
And similar to it: The beginning of God's speaking to Hosea
That is to say: The beginning of the speaking of the Holy one Blessed be He to Hosea
The Lord said to Hosea
Rashi, B'reshit 1:1
The first word of the Bible is: b'reshit. The: b' is usually translated into English as 'in', 'at', or 'with', depending on the context. Reshit is in a form that can only appear as the first part of a compound word, meaning: "beginning of". Therefore, Rashi wants to translate the first verse of the Bible as: At the beginning of God's creation of the heavens and the earth. The only problem with this is the second word of the verse: bara'. As far as I know, this word is never used as a noun, only as a verb: (he) created. Rashi says that we should understand bara' as if it were written: b'ro' - which would be the expected form of the word.
Note also that Rashi says explicitly that these words are not meant to show the order of creation. Follow the link above for more evidence, and more of his reasoning on the matter. (Unfortunately, I can't find an online source for the original Hebrew.)
UPDATE: Amritas links. I probably should have mentioned that Rashi is not only the foremost and most normative Jewish biblical scholar, he is also the foremost and most normative Talmudic scholar. These two are very closely related: to be a Jewish biblical scholar, you have to take into account Jewish tradition and the precedents set by previous Rabbis - all of which is recorded in the Talmud. And of course, the Talmud is a commentary on the Bible. Related posts: here, here, and here.
Posted by David Boxenhorn at February 4, 2005 02:42 AM