And it was good.
"God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the Earth. – Genesis 1:28
My joke about Genesis, Chapter 1: If God didn't create humans until the sixth day, who was there on days one through five taking notes? I'll let the theologians investigate that while I just enjoy the beauty of the language, its epic sweep, the parsing of the entire universe into just a few component parts – and of course the eternal contrast between darkness and light.
Although the whole first chapter is a good read, this verse really speaks to me about some of the greatest challenges to humans on planet Earth. When you consider how we have poisoned parts of the planet, packed more punch into hurricanes and wildfires by warming the oceans, and failed to completely corral COVID 19 and its variants (not to mention measles), we might reasonably argue humans have "dominion," i.e., the power to affect "every living thing," but as I recall looking over the complete elimination of New Orleans neighborhoods by Katrina, or seeing the destruction of the Palisades Fire, it would be a stretch to say we have "subdued" the natural world around us.
So
I read this passage of Genesis as a grant of stewardship, that is,
both power and responsibility. We are capable to subdue or to
nurture. Our stewardship gives us choices to create as well as to
destroy. We should make those choices carefully, because:
"God
saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good."
– Genesis 1:31
Bob Rossbach
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