Ancient pictures of the world and Genesis 1 (1:6–21)

Says God makes a רָקִיעַ (raqia; BSB “expanse”) and separates “the waters beneath it from the waters above” (Gen 1:7, BSB). He calls it שָׁמָיִם (shamayim; BSB “sky”), the word rendered “heavens” in 1:1. He sets the unnamed “greater light” and “lesser light” in it (1:16–17), and birds fly across it (1:20). God creates “the great sea creatures” (1:21). Ps 74:13 praises God, who “divided the sea by Your strength” and “smashed the heads of the dragons of the sea.”

The Babylonian Enuma Elish begins when heaven and earth were not yet named and the waters of Apsu and Tiamat were mingled together (I 1–9; King, n117). Marduk splits Tiamat “like a flat fish into two halves” and sets one half “as a covering for heaven” (IV 137–138; King, p. 77, n191). He then fixes stations for the gods, the stars, the year and the moon (V 1–14; King, n193).

Uncertain Whether Genesis 1 knows such texts, or shares, corrects, or simply speaks within such ancient pictures, is open; no dependence is claimed here. So is the referent of רָקִיעַ: a solid dome, the atmosphere or sky, or language describing the world as it appears. Some see the unnamed lights and created sea creatures as a quiet contrast with worship of sun, moon and sea; others think that reads too much in. No lean is taken here, and this background does not fix the meaning of 1:6–8 or the days.