The Days of Creation: A History of Christian Interpretation of Genesis 1:1 – 2:3

Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Notes
Abbreviations
Chapter 1 Introduction
	Defining the Enterprise
	Important Themes in this Story
	Related Studies and the Gap that Remains
	Reading Genesis Before Darwin
	The Nature of Genesis 1:1-2:3
	The Interpretive Impact of Old Testament Translations
	A View of the Landscape
Chapter 2 The Days of Creation in the Church Fathers
	Introduction
	The Existing Interpretive Smorgasbord
	The Earliest Interpretations of the Creation Week
	The Alexandrian School’s Conceptual Creation Days
	The Cappadocian Father’s Literal and Philosophical Creation Days
	The Antiochene and Syrian Traditions
	Eastern Influences in the Latin Fathers prior to Augustine
	Augustine’s Quest for the Literal Meaning of Genesis
	The Creation Week on the Brink of the Medieval Period
	Conclusion
Chapter 3 The Days of Creation in the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance
	Introduction
	An Augustinian Creation in the Early Middle Ages
	The Timeless Creation of Eriugena
	Three Biblical Reference Works of the Twelfth Century
	Creation in the Commentary of the Twelfth Century
	The Creation Week Re-Acquainted with Time
	The Creation Week Re-Acquainted with Nature
	Medieval Pluralism in Robert Grosseteste’s Hexaemeron
	Reconciling Augustine: The Great Masters of the Thirteenth Century
	The Late Medieval Synthesis: Nicholas of Lyra and Dionysius the Carthusian
	The Abstract Creation Week of Two Renaissance Platonists
	Catholic Interpretations at the Dawn of the Reformation
	Conclusion
Chapter 4 The Days of Creation in the Era of the Reformation
	Introduction
	The Literal Creation Week of Early Reformed Scholars
	Burying Instantaneous Creation: Jesuit Scholars
	The Hexaemeral Literary Tradition in the Renaissance
	Alternate Stances: Genesis One Encrypted
	Alternate Sources: Genesis One Excluded
	The Literal Creation of Early British Protestants
	The Hexaemeral Framework of the Mirror Literature
	The Creation Week in Chronologies and Universal Histories
	Hints of Deep Time in Figurative Creation Week Understandings
	The Role of Genesis One in Early Modern Geotheories
	The Impact of Burnet’s Theory on Creation Week Belief
	William Whiston’s New Genesis-Based Geotheory
	Conclusion
Chapter 5 The Days of Creation and the Ambition of Reason in the Eighteenth Century
	Introduction
	The Influence of Whiston’s New Theory and the Defence of Moses
	The Bearing of Diluvial Theories on the Interpretation of Genesis One
	Departures from Diluvialism
	Expanding the Creation Week: Examples Prior to Mid-Century
	The Fading Flower: Eighteenth-Century Biblical Universal Histories
	Eighteenth-Century Mystical Interpretation of Genesis
	The Rise of the Ruin-Restitution Hypothesis
	Genesis 1 as the Primordial Human Document
	Pioneering Concordist Proposals
	Buffon’s Epoques
	De Luc’s Lettres
	Long Creation Days in the Late Eighteenth Century
	Conclusion
Chapter 6 Nineteenth-Century Interpretation of the Days of Creation until the
Origin of Species and Essays and Reviews
	Introduction
	The Emerging Impact of Biblical Criticism
	The Day-Age Approach in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain and France
	The Gap Theory and Surviving Chaos Concepts
	Granville Penn and the Geology of Moses
	The Day-Age and Gap Theories in Early Nineteenth-Century
America
	Mid-Century Developments in the Day-Age Theory
	The Day-Age Views of Dana, Guyot and Dawson
	The Idealist Alternative to Realist Concordism
	Conservative Anti-Concordism in the 1850s
	Harmony or Variance: The Concordist Debate in the 1850s
	The Climax of the Debate over Concordism around 1860
	Postlude: Darwin’s Origin of Species and Debates over Genesis One after 1860
Chapter 7 The Shape of the History of Christian Interpretation of Genesis 1:1-2:3
	A Story of Depth
	A Story of Difference
	A Story with a Trajectory: The Influential Career of Genesis One
	Re-utilizing the Interpretive Tradition
Bibliography
Indexes
	Index of Primary Texts Authors, Ancient Figures and Movements Named for Figures
	Index of Modern Authors (select)
	Index of Subjects
	Index of Scripture and Other Ancient Texts