40. Bereshit — Abarbanel on the Torah, Section 40

Heaven and Earth Created Without Intermediaries

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And in this way the third question is also resolved: why, in the creation of the heavens and the earth, it is not written “And God said.” The reason is that they were created from nothing; and since there was no subject underlying their coming-into-being, the expression “And God said” is not used with regard to them. By contrast, in the work of the other days—where there is “something from something,” and a subject exists to receive the divine decree and will—the language of speech is employed. For Hashem decreed upon what had already been created that it should become such and such, according to the power He had placed within it.

For this same reason, it is not said concerning the creation of the heavens and the earth, “and it was so.” That expression is used only to indicate the permanence and continued existence of things in the form in which they were created, without change. But from the heavens He made the firmament, as will be explained, and from the earth the elements were differentiated. Since the heavens and the earth did not remain in the same state in which they were created on the first day, the phrase “and it was so” is not used in their creation, for it implies continuity without alteration—as if to say, “and it remained so always.”

In this way, the fourth question is also resolved: why Scripture does not explicitly mention the creation of the four elements, nor say “let there be earth,” “let there be water,” and so on, as it says “let there be a firmament,” “let there be lights.” The reason is that all four elements are already included under the name “earth” in this first verse, and there was no need to mention their creation again in detail, except insofar as to describe what occurred to them after their creation.

Now, the Torah did not say “God created in the beginning,” but rather “In the beginning God created,” for two reasons. First, because the Blessed One is not known to us except through His actions; therefore it first states “In the beginning He created,” and only afterward mentions the name Elohim. For through His creation of the world it becomes known that He is the First Emanator, as the prophet says: “Thus says the Lord, the Creator of the heavens—He is God” (Isaiah 45:18).

Second, had the Torah said “God created in the beginning the heavens,” we might have erred and thought that bereshit referred to a created entity—such as that primordial matter which Nachmanides held to have preceded the formation of the world, and which, being the beginning, could be called reshit—and that from it all other things came into being. We might then have understood the verse to mean: “God created the beginning, and from it the heavens and the earth.” To remove this error, and to make clear that the Holy One, blessed be He, did not create any matter prior to the creation of the heavens and the earth, the Torah says: “In the beginning God created…”

As for why it says “(et) the heavens” rather than simply “heavens and earth,”¹ it is taught in Bereishit Rabbah (1:14) that Rabbi Akiva asked Rabbi Ishmael this question, and he answered in the name of Nachum Ish Gamzu: if it had said “In the beginning God created heaven and earth,” we might have said that heaven and earth are themselves divine. To this he replied: “For it is no empty thing for you” (Deuteronomy 32:47)—if it seems empty, it is because you do not know how to interpret it. Rather, “(et) the heavens” includes the sun, the moon, the stars, and the constellations; and “(et) the earth” includes the trees and the vegetation.

Rabbi Akiva, in truth, gave a fine explanation: had the verse said “In the beginning God created heaven and earth,” people might have erred into thinking that the three—God, the heavens, and the earth—were all creators: that God created the heavens, the heavens created the earth, and the earth then produced its composites. Thus one might have understood the verse as describing a chain of creators, each above the other. To remove this error and make known that all things were created by His power alone, without intermediary, it says “(et) the heavens and (et) the earth,” indicating that the heavens and the earth are created beings, not creators.

Rabbi Ishmael, however, offered a different explanation: not only did the Holy One, blessed be He, create on the first day the encompassing heavens and the earth, which includes the four elements, but He also implanted within them, from that moment, the power to bring forth their subsequent developments in the following days, through His decree and command. Thus, the sun, the moon, and the other things mentioned later were not created in their full actuality on the first day, but the potential for their emergence was already placed within the initial creation.

This, then, is the complete explanation of the verse according to its true meaning—although I have interpreted it differently in my commentary on Pirkei Avot, where I followed the opinion of Nachmanides; but here I have examined the matter more precisely according to what is correct.

(Parashat Bereshit — Genesis 1:1, Heaven and Earth Created Without Intermediaries in the Commentary of Don Isaac Abarbanel)

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1. In Hebrew, the word et (את) does not have a direct equivalent in English. It is a grammatical marker used to indicate that the following word is the direct object of the verb. Here, Abarbanel—following rabbinic interpretation—notes that the presence of et before ‘the heavens’ and ‘the earth’ can also suggest inclusion or emphasis, leading to additional layers of meaning.