“In the beginning”

The first word

Genesis 1:1 in Hebrew opens with one word: bereshit (בְּרֵאשִׁית). It is a prepositional phrase: be- (in) + reshit (beginning). Literally: “in [the] beginning of” or “in [the] first of.”

HALOT s.v. reshit glosses it as “beginning, first in time or order.” But the grammatical question is what follows.

The two readings

The Hebrew of Genesis 1:1-3 is grammatically ambiguous. Two readings are both within the grammar:

Reading 1: absolute statement

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty… And God said, ‘Let there be light.’”

This is the standard reading in most English translations (KJV, BSB, NIV, ESV, NASB). Verse 1 stands as an independent declarative sentence — God’s first act. Verses 2-3 then describe the state of what was created and the further acts of creation.

This reading supports creatio ex nihilo — creation from nothing — because verse 1 names creation as the very first event, before the formless conditions of verse 2.

Reading 2: temporal clause

“When God began to create the heavens and the earth — the earth being formless and empty… — God said, ‘Let there be light.’”

This reading takes verse 1 as a temporal subordinate clause leading into verse 3 as the main clause; verse 2 is a parenthetical description of pre-creation conditions. The first divine act is the speech in verse 3 — “Let there be light” — and what verse 1 names is the situation in which that act occurred.

This reading does not support creatio ex nihilo in the same way. The pre-creation chaos of verse 2 is implicitly already there when God begins speaking; God’s creation is the ordering of pre-existing chaos, not the production of all matter from nothing.

Why both are grammatically valid

The construct form bereshit (without the definite article ha-) is the same form used in Hosea 1:2:

בִּתְחִלַּת דִּבֶּר־יְהוָה בְּהוֹשֵׁעַ

“When the LORD began to speak through Hosea…”

This is unambiguously a temporal clause. The grammar of “in the beginning of [verb]” can naturally function as a temporal subordinate.

Equally, the Septuagint’s Greek translation — en archē — reads it as an absolute statement, which the Greek grammar handles unambiguously. The Septuagint translators (3rd-2nd century BC) made the absolute reading the default for Greek-speaking and later European Christianity.

Where translations land

The split tracks scholarly trends. Earlier translation tradition assumed Reading 1 with little discussion. Modern critical scholarship has increasingly recognised that Reading 2 is at least equally defensible from the Hebrew, and has produced translations reflecting that recognition.

What this site does not do

We do not adjudicate which reading is correct. The Hebrew is genuinely ambiguous; the choice between readings has theological consequences (specifically for creatio ex nihilo); different traditions and scholars hold both readings. We document the grammatical situation. The choice between the readings is interpretive.

For the broader treatment of Genesis 1, see our passage entry.