In the beginning God, or in the beginning when God?

In last night’s Hebrew class we finished reading the Book of Ruth, and we will begin to read Genesis. As with most of the Old Testament, Genesis has many difficult interpretive problems. Even in the very first verse there is uncertainty with respect to the phrase בראשית ברא אלהים. The traditional reading has “In the beginning God created,” but some commentators and recent translations (such as the NEB) have begun to adopt a different reading, “In the beginning when God created.” (It is interesting to note that the successor to NEB, the REB, reverted to the traditional reading.)

The key to this issue rests in the determination of בראשית, whether it should be read as a construct or an absolute. The form looks like a construct, thus favoring the newer reading. However, the verb ברא is pointed as a finite Qal verb, not an infinitive construct. Besides, there is a passage (I cannot recall—one of Waltke’s articles on Genesis has the reference) that uses בראשית as an absolute, and there is no dispute about that. Of course, one can re-point the ברא and make it an infinite construct and change the atnach on אלהים and the disjunctive mark on בראשית, but that would involve emendations of the text. Based on these, I believe the traditional reading is correct. But then my understanding has infinitesimal weight in the world of Old Testament scholarship.

My Hebrew tutor’s professor (call him Professor C.B.) seems to prefer the newer reading. I asked him (tongue-in-cheek of course) whether Professor C.B. is infallible. He said, “Pretty close.” I then pressed on and asked, “Is Jerome infallible?” knowing that Jerome is one of the great minds whom he admires exceedingly, as he had once said, “Jerome cannot be wrong.” He said again, “Pretty close.” Now we have an interesting dilemma here, for Jerome has the traditional reading.