Hebrew Word Study – Two Beginnings – Bereishith – בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית  Beth Resh Aleph Shin Yod Taw

Genesis 1:1: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”

II Corinthians 12:2: “I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught up to the third heaven.”

Note: This is a sample of our In Depth Study which will posted this week as well as the topic of our discussion in our Weekly Hebrew/Aramaic Bible Study and Discussion on Monday September 30 at 7:00PM.  Plan to join us. If you are unable to attend our online class you may listen to the recording of our class discussion on the Two Beginnings on or All Access site.  

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Just what was this third heaven that Paul was taken up into.  In Aramaic the word for heaven is in a plural form.cognate to the Hebrew word shamyim. Most commentators follow a reasoning that Paul is simply adopting a classification passing through three regions on his way to paradise. The first region is the aerial which includes the clouds and atmosphere.  Then you reach the second region, the starry heavens the heavens that contain the sun, moon and stars and then finally the third region which is the spiritual or supernatural realm.  Paradise is some sort of inner recess in third heavens. This third heaven is the seat of the divine Majesty, the residence of the angels and the souls of the departed saints. The Talmud teaches that this is where the third temple is located and will come from heaven to the earth during the Messianic era, similar in our eschatology הַשָּׁמַ֖יִםthe millennium when, as taught by our Christian teachers on prophecy heaven will come down on earth and there will be a thousand years of peace.   

In taking a deeper dive into Jewish thought on this matter of a third heaven, I discovered something not really spoken about in our commentaries nor have I heard discussed in my years of seminary and Bible college. That is the possibility of two beginnings.  A beginning for the world and a beginning for the heavens. This seems to be a logical conclusion to the basic thought offered by our commentators.  God created two regions the natural world and the region of the universe or the natural heavens, that is the starry heavens.  All this was done from a third realm which is a spiritual realm which was and is the dwelling place of God.

We find this possibility from the very first word in the Bible bereishit or “in the beginning.” In the beginning God created the earth and He created the heavens. The sages teach that the letter beth is also the number two.  Thus, the syntax could read, “God created two beginnings, the heavens and the earth. 

This would shed some light on this matter of heaven and hell, the existence of a realm of the devil and his demons.  The sages point out Genesis 1:2: “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”  When God created the earth there was darkness upon the face of deep. The word deep is tehom and according to Davidson Lexicon this comes from the root word hom which is an agitation or confusion or a billow which is a large undulating that is a smooth up and down motion of a mass of something like smoke, a cloud or steam. Whatever it was it was dark. Darkness wasn’t just there, God created it.  

Then we learn in Genesis 1:3: “And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.” The word “let there be” is yehi which means to be or to exist. But note this is in a Qal imperfect third person singular which would make this an imperfect tense when translated into to English we would rendering this as “there will be (light).”  However, a Qal imperfect third person singular also denotes a Jussive form which is expressing a desire or wish. So, we could also render this as “Let there be (light).”  God expressed a desire to put light into this darkness.  

Now keep in mind when we say light here we are not talking about a luminary. The sun, moon and stars were not created until the fourth day, so there were no luminaries in existence at this time. In John 8;10 Jesus said: “Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”  Here Jesus is saying He is the Light of the world. This Light is the Light of life.  The world that God created was created with darkness, that is without his presences, his essence, that lack of the Light of life.  You will note that God did not create the Light but only expressed a desire or wish for the Light to enter this creation of darkness.

This world and this universe was created to be separated from the creation. That separation is called darkness. Later in the New Testament it is called outer darkness. Matthew 8:12: “But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

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