“In the beginning…”
My inclination was to dismiss this phrase as being a literary device
much like “Once upon a time…,” not that I believe that this is the beginning of
a fairy tale. However as I continued to
puzzle over the phrase a question came to mind.
Why a reference to a time frame?
Certainly, this is not the beginning for God, an infinite entity (my
belief). No, this is “the beginning”
within a human time frame. The human
mind needs a time reference. Time is an
illusion to help give some meaning to human experience and to facilitate human
comprehension of that experience.
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the
earth...."
“These
words, with which Holy Scripture begins, always have the effect on me of the
solemn tolling of a great old bell, which stirs the heart from afar with its
beauty and dignity and gives it an inkling of the mystery of eternity.” (In
the Beginning...." : A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and
the Fall (Eerdmans, 1986, 1995) A commentary on Genesis 1-3 by Cardinal Joseph
Ratzinger (English translation by Boniface Ramsey) (http://www.philvaz.com/apologetics/p81.htm)
“The mystery
of eternity” a concept created by the human mind to understand an entity that
does not exist in time as we experience it.
We have developed a concept of limitless time as “eternity,” but this
will always remain only a concept because no human can experience it. Time is a human conception relevant only to
human life and human experience. To
argue the existence of God within a time frame is similar to arguing how many
angels can dance on the head of a pin.
To argue the existence of God within a concept of time would be like
trying to measure God using inches or milimeters, another human concept used
for comprehending human experience.
Would we argue that God must be measurable because all things within
human experience are measurable? No,
eternity and infinity are concepts humans have created to indicate that which
is beyond human experience, consequently beyond total human comprehension, to
describe a God that has no beginning, middle or end as we know it, nor any physicality as we
understand it. We use man-made concepts
to help us describe a God and a God’s presence that we would not otherwise be able to describe.
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