Structure of Genesis 1:1-2:3
. . . The Hebrew text of Genesis 1:1 – 2:3 has a remarkable feature. It is precisely structured around the number seven, in ways not apparent in translation. The narrative speaks of creation in seven days. But the text itself is precisely patterned on this number. So the word 'good' appears seven times. The word 'God' appears thirty-five times. The words 'light' and 'day' occur seven times in the first paragraph. The first verse contains seven words, the second fourteen words. The paragraph describing the seventh day contains thirty-five words, and so on. The passage as a whole contains 67x7 words. The entire passage is constructed like a fractal, so that the sevenfold motif of the text as a whole is mirrored at lower levels of magnitude.
When a text is written this way, apparently superfluous words become highly conspicuous. There is one obviously superfluous word: the last of the entire passage. The verse says, 'God sanctified the seventh day for on it he rested from all the work that he had created' (2:3). The sentence should finish there. In fact, though, there is one extra word in the Hebrew, la'asot, which means 'to do, to make, to function'. What is its significance?
Two classic commentators, Ibn Ezra and Abrabanel, interpret it to mean, '[he had created it] in such a way that it would continue to create itself.' Without stretching the text too far, we might say that la'asot means, quite simply, 'to evolve'. Evolution would then be hinted at in the very last word of the Genesis creation story.
