Science and Health
with Key to The Scriptures
by Mary Baker Eddy
Chapter XV - Genesis

 

Perfection of creation
519:1
Nothing can be novel to eternal Mind, the author of all
things, who from all eternity knoweth His own ideas.
Deity was satisfied with His work. How could
He be otherwise, since the spiritual creation
was the outgrowth, the emanation, of His infinite self‑
containment and immortal wisdom?
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Genesis ii. 1. Thus the heavens and the earth were
finished, and all the host of them.
Infinity measureless
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Thus the ideas of God in universal being are complete
and forever expressed, for Science reveals infinity and
the fatherhood and motherhood of Love. Hu-
man capacity is slow to discern and to grasp
God's creation and the divine power and presence which
go with it, demonstrating its spiritual origin. Mortals
can never know the infinite, until they throw off the old
man and reach the spiritual image and likeness. What
can fathom infinity! How shall we declare Him, till,
in the language of the apostle, "we all come in the unity
of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto
a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the ful-
ness of Christ"?
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Genesis ii. 2. And on the seventh day God ended His
work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh
day from all His work which He had made.
Resting in holy work
519:25
God rests in action. Imparting has not impoverished,
can never impoverish, the divine Mind. No
exhaustion follows the action of this Mind,
according to the apprehension of divine Science. The
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highest and sweetest rest, even from a human standpoint,
is in holy work.
Love and man coexistent
520:3
Unfathomable Mind is expressed. The depth, breadth,
height, might, majesty, and glory of infinite Love fill all
space. That is enough! Human language
can repeat only an infinitesimal part of what
exists. The absolute ideal, man, is no more seen nor
comprehended by mortals, than is His infinite Principle,
Love. Principle and its idea, man, are coexistent and
eternal. The numerals of infinity, called seven days, can
never be reckoned according to the calendar of time.
These days will appear as mortality disappears, and they
will reveal eternity, newness of Life, in which all sense of
error forever disappears and thought accepts the divine
infinite calculus.
520:16
Genesis ii. 4, 5. These are the generations of the heavens
and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the
Lord God [Jehovah] made the earth and the heavens, and
every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every
herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God [Jehovah]
had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not
a man to till the ground.
Growth is from Mind
520:23
Here is the emphatic declaration that God creates all
through Mind, not through matter, – that the plant
grows, not because of seed or soil, but because
growth is the eternal mandate of Mind. Mor-
tal thought drops into the ground, but the immortal creat-
ing thought is from above, not from beneath. Because
Mind makes all, there is nothing left to be made by a
lower power. Spirit acts through the Science of Mind,
never causing man to till the ground, but making him
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superior to the soil. Knowledge of this lifts man above
the sod, above earth and its environments, to conscious
spiritual harmony and eternal being.
Spiritual narrative
521:4
Here the inspired record closes its narrative of being
that is without beginning or end. All that is made is
the work of God, and all is good. We leave
this brief, glorious history of spiritual creation
(as stated in the first chapter of Genesis) in the hands of
God, not of man, in the keeping of Spirit, not matter, –
joyfully acknowledging now and forever God's supremacy,
omnipotence, and omnipresence.
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The harmony and immortality of man are intact. We
should look away from the opposite supposition that man
is created materially, and turn our gaze to the spiritual
record of creation, to that which should be engraved on
the understanding and heart "with the point of a diamond"
and the pen of an angel.
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The reader will naturally ask if there is nothing more
about creation in the book of Genesis. Indeed there is,
but the continued account is mortal and material.
521:21
Genesis ii. 6. But there went up a mist from the earth,
and watered the whole face of the ground.
The story of error
521:23
The Science and truth of the divine creation have been
presented in the verses already considered, and now the
opposite error, a material view of creation, is
to be set forth. The second chapter of Gene-
sis contains a statement of this material view of God and
the universe, a statement which is the exact opposite of
scientific truth as before recorded. The history of error
or matter, if veritable, would set aside the omnipotence
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of Spirit; but it is the false history in contradistinction
to the true.
The two records
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The Science of the first record proves the falsity of
the second. If one is true, the other is false, for they are
antagonistic. The first record assigns all
might and government to God, and endows
man out of God's perfection and power. The second
record chronicles man as mutable and mortal, – as hav-
ing broken away from Deity and as revolving in an orbit
of his own. Existence, separate from divinity, Science
explains as impossible.
522:12
This second record unmistakably gives the history of
error in its externalized forms, called life and intelli-
gence in matter. It records pantheism, opposed to the
supremacy of divine Spirit; but this state of things is
declared to be temporary and this man to be mortal, –
dust returning to dust.
Erroneous representation
522:18
In this erroneous theory, matter takes the place of Spirit.
Matter is represented as the life-giving principle of the
earth. Spirit is represented as entering mat-
ter in order to create man. God's glowing
denunciations of man when not found in His
image, the likeness of Spirit, convince reason and coincide
with revelation in declaring this material creation false.
Hypothetical reversal
522:25
This latter part of the second chapter of Genesis, which
portrays Spirit as supposedly cooperating with matter in
constructing the universe, is based on some
hypothesis of error, for the Scripture just pre-
ceding declares God's work to be finished. Does Life,
Truth, and Love produce death, error, and hatred? Does
the creator condemn His own creation? Does the un-
erring Principle of divine law change or repent? It can-
523:1
not be so. Yet one might so judge from an unintelligent
perusal of the Scriptural account now under comment.
Mist, or false claim
523:3
Because of its false basis, the mist of obscurity evolved
by error deepens the false claim, and finally declares that
God knows error and that error can improve
His creation. Although presenting the exact
opposite of Truth, the lie claims to be truth. The crea-
tions of matter arise from a mist or false claim, or from
mystification, and not from the firmament, or under-
standing, which God erects between the true and false.
In error everything comes from beneath, not from above.
All is material myth, instead of the reflection of
Spirit.
Distinct documents
523:14
It may be worth while here to remark that, according
to the best scholars, there are clear evidences of two dis-
tinct documents in the early part of the book of
Genesis. One is called the Elohistic, because
the Supreme Being is therein called Elohim. The other
document is called the Jehovistic, because Deity therein is
always called Jehovah, – or Lord God, as our common
version translates it.
Jehovah or Elohim
523:22
Throughout the first chapter of Genesis and in three
verses of the second, – in what we understand to be the
spiritually scientific account of creation, – it is
Elohim (God) who creates. From the fourth
verse of chapter two to chapter five, the creator is called
Jehovah, or the Lord. The different accounts become
more and more closely intertwined to the end of chapter
twelve, after which the distinction is not definitely trace-
able. In the historic parts of the Old Testament, it is
usually Jehovah, peculiarly the divine sovereign of the
Hebrew people, who is referred to.
Gods of the heathen
524:1
The idolatry which followed this material mythology is
seen in the Phoenician worship of Baal, in the Moabitish
god Chemosh, in the Moloch of the Amorites,
in the Hindoo Vishnu, in the Greek Aphro-
dite, and in a thousand other so-called deities.
Jehovah a tribal deity
524:6
It was also found among the Israelites, who constantly
went after "strange gods." They called the Supreme
Being by the national name of Jehovah. In
that name of Jehovah, the true idea of God
seems almost lost. God becomes "a man of war," a
tribal god to be worshipped, rather than Love, the divine
Principle to be lived and loved.
524:13
Genesis ii. 7. And the Lord God [Jehovah] formed man
of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils
the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
Creation reversed
524:16
Did the divine and infinite Principle become a finite
deity, that he should now be called Jehovah? With
a single command, Mind had made man,
both male and female. How then could a
material organization become the basis of man? How
could the non-intelligent become the medium of Mind,
and error be the enunciator of Truth? Matter is not
the reflection of Spirit, yet God is reflected in all His
creation. Is this addition to His creation real or un-
real? Is it the truth, or is it a lie concerning man and
God?
524:27
It must be a lie, for God presently curses the ground.
Could Spirit evolve its opposite, matter, and give matter
ability to sin and suffer? Is Spirit, God, injected into
dust, and eventually ejected at the demand of matter?
Does Spirit enter dust, and lose therein the divine nature
525:1
and omnipotence? Does Mind, God, enter matter to be-
come there a mortal sinner, animated by the breath of
God? In this narrative, the validity of matter is opposed,
not the validity of Spirit or Spirit's creations. Man re-
flects God; mankind represents the Adamic race, and is
a human, not a divine, creation.
Definitions of man
525:7
The following are some of the equivalents of the term
man in different languages. In the Saxon, mankind, a
woman, any one; in the Welsh, that which rises
up, – the primary sense being image, form; in
the Hebrew, image, similitude; in the Icelandic, mind.
The following translation is from the Icelandic: –
525:13
And God said, Let us make man after our mind and
our likeness; and God shaped man after His mind; after
God's mind shaped He Him; and He shaped them male and
female.
No baneful creation
525:17
In the Gospel of John, it is declared that all things were
made through the Word of God, "and without Him [the
logos, or word] was not anything made that
was made." Everything good or worthy, God
made. Whatever is valueless or baneful, He did not
make, – hence its unreality. In the Science of Genesis
we read that He saw everything which He had made,
"and, behold, it was very good." The corporeal senses
declare otherwise; and if we give the same heed to the
history of error as to the records of truth, the Scriptural
record of sin and death favors the false conclusion of the
material senses. Sin, sickness, and death must be deemed
as devoid of reality as they are of good, God.
525:30
Genesis ii. 9. And out of the ground made the Lord God
[Jehovah] to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight,
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and good for food; the tree of life also, in the midst of the
garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Contradicting first creation
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The previous and more scientific record of creation
declares that God made "every plant of the field be-
fore it was in the earth." This opposite
declaration, this statement that life issues
from matter, contradicts the teaching of the first chap-
ter, – namely, that all Life is God. Belief is less than
understanding. Belief involves theories of material hear-
ing, sight, touch, taste, and smell, termed the five senses.
The appetites and passions, sin, sickness, and death,
follow in the train of this error of a belief in intelligent
matter.
Record of error
526:14
The first mention of evil is in the legendary Scriptural
text in the second chapter of Genesis. God pronounced
good all that He created, and the Scriptures
declare that He created all. The "tree of
life" stands for the idea of Truth, and the sword which
guards it is the type of divine Science. The "tree of
knowledge" stands for the erroneous doctrine that the
knowledge of evil is as real, hence as God-bestowed, as
the knowledge of good. Was evil instituted through God,
Love? Did He create this fruit-bearer of sin in contra-
diction of the first creation? This second biblical account
is a picture of error throughout.
526:26
Genesis ii. 15. And the Lord God [Jehovah] took the
man, and put him into the garden of Eden, to dress it and
to keep it.
Garden of Eden
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The name Eden, according to Cruden, means pleasure,
delight. In this text Eden stands for the mortal, mate-
527:1
rial body. God could not put Mind into matter nor in-
finite Spirit into finite form to dress it and
keep it, – to make it beautiful or to cause it
to live and grow. Man is God's reflection, needing no
cultivation, but ever beautiful and complete.
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Genesis ii. 16, 17. And the Lord God [Jehovah] com-
manded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou
mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou
eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
No temptation from God
527:11
Here the metaphor represents God, Love, as tempting
man, but the Apostle James says: "God cannot be
tempted with evil, neither tempteth He any
man." It is true that a knowledge of evil would
make man mortal. It is plain also that mate-
rial perception, gathered from the corporeal senses, consti-
tutes evil and mortal knowledge. But is it true that God,
good, made "the tree of life" to be the tree of death to His
own creation? Has evil the reality of good? Evil is un-
real because it is a lie, – false in every statement.
527:21
Genesis ii. 19. And out of the ground the Lord God
[Jehovah] formed every beast of the field, and every fowl
of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he
would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living
creature, that was the name thereof.
Creation's counterfeit
527:26
Here the lie represents God as repeating creation, but
doing so materially, not spiritually, and ask-
ing a prospective sinner to help Him. Is the
Supreme Being retrograding, and is man giving up his
dignity? Was it requisite for the formation of man
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that dust should become sentient, when all being is the
reflection of the eternal Mind, and the record declares
that God has already created man, both male and
female? That Adam gave the name and nature of
animals, is solely mythological and material. It can-
not be true that man was ordered to create man anew
in partnership with God; this supposition was a dream,
a myth.
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Genesis ii. 21, 22. And the Lord God [Jehovah, Yawah]
caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and
He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead
thereof; and the rib, which the Lord God [Jehovah] had
taken from man, made He a woman, and brought her unto
the man.
Hypnotic surgery
528:15
Here falsity, error, credits Truth, God, with inducing
a sleep or hypnotic state in Adam in order to perform a
surgical operation on him and thereby create
woman. This is the first record of magnet-
ism. Beginning creation with darkness instead of light,
– materially rather than spiritually, – error now simu-
lates the work of Truth, mocking Love and declar-
ing what great things error has done. Beholding the
creations of his own dream and calling them real and
God-given, Adam – alias error – gives them names.
Afterwards he is supposed to become the basis of the
creation of woman and of his own kind, calling them
mankind, – that is, a kind of man.
Mental midwifery
528:28
But according to this narrative, surgery was first per-
formed mentally and without instruments;
and this may be a useful hint to the medical
faculty. Later in human history, when the forbidden
529:1
fruit was bringing forth fruit of its own kind, there
came a suggestion of change in the modus operandi, –
that man should be born of woman, not woman again
taken from man. It came about, also, that instruments
were needed to assist the birth of mortals. The first
system of suggestive obstetrics has changed. Another
change will come as to the nature and origin of man,
and this revelation will destroy the dream of existence,
reinstate reality, usher in Science and the glorious fact
of creation, that both man and woman proceed from
God and are His eternal children, belonging to no lesser
parent.
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Genesis iii. 1-3. Now the serpent was more subtle than
any beast of the field which the Lord God [Jehovah] had
made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said,
Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the
woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of
the trees of the garden: but of the fruit of the tree which is
in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat
of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
Mythical serpent
529:21
Whence comes a talking, lying serpent to tempt the
children of divine Love? The serpent enters into the
metaphor only as evil. We have nothing in the
animal kingdom which represents the species
described, – a talking serpent, – and should rejoice that
evil, by whatever figure presented, contradicts itself and
has neither origin nor support in Truth and good. Seeing
this, we should have faith to fight all claims of evil, be-
cause we know that they are worthless and unreal.
Error or Adam
529:30
Adam, the synonym for error, stands for a belief of
material mind. He begins his reign over man some-
530:1
what mildly, but he increases in falsehood and his days
become shorter. In this development, the im-
mortal, spiritual law of Truth is made manifest
as forever opposed to mortal, material sense.
Divine providence
530:5
In divine Science, man is sustained by God, the divine
Principle of being. The earth, at God's command, brings
forth food for man's use. Knowing this, Jesus
once said, "Take no thought for your life,
what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink," – presuming
not on the prerogative of his creator, but recognizing God,
the Father and Mother of all, as able to feed and clothe
man as He doth the lilies.
530:13
Genesis iii. 4, 5. And the serpent said unto the woman,
Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day
ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened; and ye shall
be as gods, knowing good and evil.
Error's assumption
530:17
This myth represents error as always asserting its su-
periority over truth, giving the lie to divine Science and
saying, through the material senses: "I can
open your eyes. I can do what God has not
done for you. Bow down to me and have another god.
Only admit that I am real, that sin and sense are more
pleasant to the eyes than spiritual Life, more to be de-
sired than Truth, and I shall know you, and you will be
mine." Thus Spirit and flesh war.
Scriptural allegory
530:26
The history of error is a dream-narrative. The dream
has no reality, no intelligence, no mind; therefore the
dreamer and dream are one, for neither is
true nor real. First, this narrative supposes
that something springs from nothing, that matter pre-
cedes mind. Second, it supposes that mind enters matter,
531:1
and matter becomes living, substantial, and intelligent.
The order of this allegory – the belief that everything
springs from dust instead of from Deity – has been main-
tained in all the subsequent forms of belief. This is the
error, – that mortal man starts materially, that non‑
intelligence becomes intelligence, that mind and soul are
both right and wrong.
Higher hope
531:8
It is well that the upper portions of the brain represent
the higher moral sentiments, as if hope were ever prophe-
sying thus: The human mind will sometime
rise above all material and physical sense, ex-
changing it for spiritual perception, and exchanging hu-
man concepts for the divine consciousness. Then man
will recognize his God-given dominion and being.
Biological inventions
531:15
If, in the beginning, man's body originated in non‑
intelligent dust, and mind was afterwards put into body
by the creator, why is not this divine order
still maintained by God in perpetuating the
species? Who will say that minerals, vegetables, and
animals have a propagating property of their own?
Who dares to say either that God is in matter or that
matter exists without God? Has man sought out other
creative inventions, and so changed the method of his
Maker?
531:25
Which institutes Life, – matter or Mind? Does Life
begin with Mind or with matter? Is Life sustained by
matter or by Spirit? Certainly not by both, since flesh
wars against Spirit and the corporeal senses can take no
cognizance of Spirit. The mythologic theory of mate-
rial life at no point resembles the scientifically Christian
record of man as created by Mind in the image and like-
ness of God and having dominion over all the earth. Did
532:1
God at first create one man unaided, – that is, Adam, –
but afterwards require the union of the two sexes in order
to create the rest of the human family? No! God makes
and governs all.
Progeny cursed
532:5
All human knowledge and material sense must be
gained from the five corporeal senses. Is this knowledge
safe, when eating its first fruits brought death?
"In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die," was the prediction in the story under consid-
eration. Adam and his progeny were cursed, not blessed;
and this indicates that the divine Spirit, or Father, con-
demns material man and remands him to dust.
532:13
Genesis iii. 9, 10. And the Lord God [Jehovah] called
unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he
said, I heard Thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid,
because I was naked; and I hid myself.
Shame the effect of sin
532:17
Knowledge and pleasure, evolved through material
sense, produced the immediate fruits of fear and shame.
Ashamed before Truth, error shrank abashed
from the divine voice calling out to the cor-
poreal senses. Its summons may be thus paraphrased:
"Where art thou, man? Is Mind in matter? Is Mind
capable of error as well as of truth, of evil as well as of
good, when God is All and He is Mind and there is but
one God, hence one Mind?"
Fear comes of error
532:26
Fear was the first manifestation of the error of mate-
rial sense. Thus error began and will end the dream of
matter. In the allegory the body had been
naked, and Adam knew it not; but now error
demands that mind shall see and feel through matter, the
five senses. The first impression material man had of
533:1
himself was one of nakedness and shame. Had he lost
man's rich inheritance and God's behest, dominion over
all the earth? No! This had never been bestowed on
Adam.
533:5
Genesis iii. 11, 12. And He said, Who told thee that
thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I
commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat? And the man
said, The woman whom Thou gavest to be with me, she gave
me of the tree, and I did eat.
The beguiling first lie
533:10
Here there is an attempt to trace all human errors
directly or indirectly to God, or good, as if He were the
creator of evil. The allegory shows that the
snake-talker utters the first voluble lie, which
beguiles the woman and demoralizes the man. Adam,
alias mortal error, charges God and woman with his own
dereliction, saying, "The woman, whom Thou gavest
me, is responsible." According to this belief, the rib taken
from Adam's side has grown into an evil mind, named
woman, who aids man to make sinners more rapidly than
he can alone. Is this an help meet for man?
533:21
Materiality, so obnoxious to God, is already found in the
rapid deterioration of the bone and flesh which came from
Adam to form Eve. The belief in material life and in-
telligence is growing worse at every step, but error has its
suppositional day and multiplies until the end thereof.
False womanhood
533:26
Truth, cross-questioning man as to His knowledge of
error, finds woman the first to confess her fault. She
says, "The serpent beguiled me, and I did
eat;" as much as to say in meek penitence,
"Neither man nor God shall father my fault." She has
already learned that corporeal sense is the serpent. Hence
534:1
she is first to abandon the belief in the material origin of
man and to discern spiritual creation. This hereafter
enabled woman to be the mother of Jesus and to behold
at the sepulchre the risen Saviour, who was soon to mani-
fest the deathless man of God's creating. This enabled
woman to be first to interpret the Scriptures in their true
sense, which reveals the spiritual origin of man.
534:8
Genesis iii. 14, 15. And the Lord God [Jehovah] said
unto the serpent, . . . I will put enmity between thee and
the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall
bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
Spirit and flesh
534:12
This prophecy has been fulfilled. The Son of the Virgin‑
mother unfolded the remedy for Adam, or error; and the
Apostle Paul explains this warfare between the
idea of divine power, which Jesus presented,
and mythological material intelligence called energy and
opposed to Spirit.
534:18
Paul says in his epistle to the Romans: "The carnal
mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that
are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the
flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the spirit of God dwell
in you."
Bruising sin's head
534:24
There will be greater mental opposition to the spirit-
ual, scientific meaning of the Scriptures than there has
ever been since the Christian era began. The
serpent, material sense, will bite the heel of
the woman, – will struggle to destroy the spiritual idea
of Love; and the woman, this idea, will bruise the head
of lust. The spiritual idea has given the understanding
535:1
a foothold in Christian Science. The seed of Truth and
the seed of error, of belief and of understanding, – yea,
the seed of Spirit and the seed of matter, – are the wheat
and tares which time will separate, the one to be burned,
the other to be garnered into heavenly places.
535:6
Genesis iii. 16. Unto the woman He said, I will greatly
multiply thy sorrow and thy conception: in sorrow thou
shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy
husband, and he shall rule over thee.
Judgment on error
535:10
Divine Science deals its chief blow at the supposed ma-
terial foundations of life and intelligence. It dooms idol-
atry. A belief in other gods, other creators,
and other creations must go down before Chris-
tian Science. It unveils the results of sin as shown in
sickness and death. When will man pass through the
open gate of Christian Science into the heaven of Soul,
into the heritage of the first born among men? Truth is
indeed "the way."
535:19
Genesis iii. 17-19. And unto Adam He said, Because
thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast
eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou
shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in
sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life: thorns
also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt
eat the herb of the field: in the sweat of thy face shalt thou
eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it
wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt
thou return.
New earth and no more sea
535:29
In the first chapter of Genesis we read: "And God
called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together
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