The Pulpit Commentary — Genesis — Section 110

EXPOSITION. Ver. 24. -Day six. Like clay three, ground) after his kind. The order of creation this is distinguished Ly a double creative (vcr. 25) differs from that in which they wer~ net, the production of the higher or land summoned into existence (vcr. 24). The latter animals and the creation of man, of the may be the order of time, the former the order latter of which it is perhaps permissible to of rank ; or there may have been two division3 see a mute prediction in the vegetation of the work, in the former of which the which closed the first half of the creative herbivora took the lead, and in the latter week. And God said, Let the earth bring the carnivora. According to the witness of forth the living creature after his kind. geology, "the quadrupeds did not all come In these words the land animals are generi- forth together. Large and powerful herb,',. cally characterised as nephesh cha'Y"Jah, or vom first take the field, with only a few animated bein~ ; in the terms which follow carnivora. These pass away. Other her- they are subdivided into three well-defined bivora, with a larger proportion of carnivora, species or classes. Cattle. Behemah; liter- next appear. These also are exterminated, ally, the dumb animal, i. e. the larger grass- and so with others. Then the carnivora eating quadnipecls. And creeping thing. appear in vast numbers and power, and tl,e Remes; the moving animal, i. e. the smaller herbiv<Yra also abound. Moreover, these rar,cs animals that move either without feet or with attain a magnitude and number far SUTp"-SS• feet that are scarcely perceptible, such as ing all that now exist. As the ma=alian worms, insects, reptiles. Here it is land- age draws to a close, the ancient carnivora creepers that are meant, the remes of the and hei·bivora of that era all pass away, sea having been created on the previous day. excepting, it is believed, a few that are 11Seful And beast of the earth (chay11ah of the to man. N e,v creations of smaller size people earth) after his kind. 1. e. wild, roving, the groves" (Dana. Qnoted by Dawson, carnh•orous beasts of the forest. In these '0. W.' p. 224). And God saw that it was three comprehensive orders was the earth good. As in the third day's work each commandc<l. to produce its occupants ; which, branch is scaled by the Divine approbation, however, no more implied that the animals so in this. The creation of the higher an i- '\Vere to be developed from the soil than were me.ls completed the earth's preparation for the finny tribes genera ten by tho sen. Simply the advent of man; to \\hich, doubtless, the in obedience to tho Divine call, and as the Creator's commendation of his finished work product of creative energy, they were to had a special reference. Everything was in spring from the plastic dust as being essen- readiness for the magnum opus which was tially earth-born creatures. And it was so. to close his creative labour and crown his Modern evolutionists believe they con e;on- completed cosmos. ccive-thcy have never yet been able to Yer. 26.-The importance assigned in the demonstrate-the modus operandi of the Biblical record to the creation of man is ~uprcme Artificer in the execution of this indicated by the manner in which it is intro- part of the sixth day's work. Revelation duced. And God said, Let us make man. has not deemed it needful to do more than Having already explained the significanco of simply 11tate that they were-not, by an the term Elohim, as snggesting the fulness of evolutionary process carried on through in- the Divine personality, and foreshadowing conceivably long periods of timo, developed the doctrine of the Trinity (ver. 1), other from the creatures of the fifth day, but- interpretations, such as that God takes cou11- producc(l directly from the soil by the fiat of scl with the angels (Philo, Aben Ezra, Elohim. Delitzsch), or with the earth (Maimo11iJcs, Ver. 25. -And God ma.de (asah, not l\I. Gerundius), or with himself (Kalisch), bam, the principle of life being not now must be set aside in favour of that which introduced for the first time, as in ver. 21) detects in the peculiar phraseology an allu- the beast of the earth (tho cliayyah) after sion to a sublime concilimn among the persons his kind, and cattle (behe1 iah) after their of the Godhead (Calvin, 11-focdonald, l\lurphy) kind, and every thing that oreepeth on The object which this concilimn cont,·m- ho e11rth (liternlly, every remes of tho platcd was the construction of a mw creature  THFl BOOK OF GENESIS. [cR. I, 24-81.