Genesis Series: The Word Face in Genesis 1

You sent forth your Spirit, and they were created, and you renewed the face of the Earth. (Psalm 103)

The word 'face' is a fairly simple concept taken from antiquity. This word is used a great many times in the Bible e.g. face of the Earth, face of the sky, face of wind, etc. In the Hebrew it is a plural word which some have pointed out suggests the many motions and changes of the human face.

Face refers to the front of the head, that location from which the eyes are directed. The ancients transferred the concept 'face' to pretty much anything even God. When this concept is used figuratively an observer substitutes his eyes with the plane of the object in question. It is as if objects have a face with eyes and are looking the observer in the face. So it is as if the Earth has a face with eyes looking at you when you are aligned with plane of the Earth. Strictly speaking this is only possible from outer space but it can also be envisioned from a mountain top over looking a plain.

Now take the Man on the Moon as an example. We face the full Moon and imagine it to have eyes and a mouth on its plane. Face of the Moon, face of the Earth, face of the wind, etc. is a subjective, self-referential notion. It's use implies an observer projecting an imaginary set of eyes on the plane of the object in question. You look at the object and imagine the plane of that object to have eyes looking at you or at something else. Perhaps later this notion degenerated to reference the literal plain concept of a surface but the above is, I think, something of the original notion that dates to antiquity.

So now take the second verse of Genesis One. The sacred author describes the Earth as if some features of its plane were looking at him:

And when the Earth existed as an astonishing-desert with darkness over a face of an abyss, and the Spirit of God oscillating over the face of the waters . . .

The sacred author describes facial features of the Earth. His use of the word 'face' suggests to me that he had a bird's eye view of the Earth and that Genesis One is a prophecy. How else could he write with any sort of intellectual honesty?  This view was made possible by God who stimulated a prophetic experience in the brain of the sacred author. The sacred author was not really present way back when the Earth existed like an astonishing wasteland with a water supply prior to the moment when God changed it in the light-event; but he was able to see this Earth because of the vision that God induced in his brain.

The sacred author was induced to look at the Earth from afar as if from a vantage point in outer space. This is how he is able to describe this object as an astonishing-desert with some sort of aquatic facial features. As if the waters, or whatever primitive ocean existed was looking at him placed beyond in outer space with the imaginary eyes he substitutes on its plain.  At first the sacred author is seeing the Earth from the vantage of a satellite or spaceship. And what did he see? His description is basic. He saw a dark and barren astronomical object standing out before him, with no life or living entities.  He also knew of a water supply and the Spirit of God hovering over the surface.  

This is simple stuff, the difficulty lies in establishing a reasonable and correct context.  By doing this we do not stray by reading all sorts of ridiculous myths, matter, space, time, universe, Hell, fallen angels, photons, cosmic microwave background, etc. into the first and second verses. 

Genesis One is a prophecy. The sacred author describes the Earth just prior to God changing it's surface in the miraculous light event. The light event is a physical and phenomenal manifestation of God's power, election, mercy, love. God enacts an event in direct relation to the Earth via the Spirit. God and the Earth came face to face and as Earth revolved God was like the Sun, miraculously stimulating it in the events described.  If you were there to see you would see the Earth lit up and the atmosphere bursting forth from the waters. God sent forth the Spirit and transfigured the face of the Earth. This happened just prior to the Earth being locked into an inverse square gravitational regime with the Sun, which is described later in the narrative as the fourth day.