The Imagery of Scripture: Genesis: Seeing the Word through New and Ancient Eyes

By David Stellwagen

This Bible study focuses on what the ancient church fathers referred to as typology. It is an approach to reading Scripture that has been overlooked for centuries. The Imagery of Scripture series takes the core idea of typology and builds upon it on an epic scale. Twenty years and more than ten thousand hours of a magnificent obsession have yielded a unique Bible study for the ages. The Imagery of Scripture: Genesis is the second book in the series, a series that focuses on seeing the Word of God with both new and ancient eyes. This approach will allow the reader to admire the Bible in a profound way, revealing the wonder of God's Word and how it points in untold ways to a place named Calvary.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Feb 15, 2024
• ISBN: 9798385207961

David Stellwagen

David Stellwagen has been a Christian educator for thirty-nine years, teaching literature, English, art, US history, math, and religion. He is the author of Imagery in Scripture (2022). He lives in the Midwest with his wife, Debby.

Book preview

Prologue

What do you see?

Each school year I surprise my students by telling them I’m an eye doctor. I explain that while I’m not your standard eye doctor (one who helps correct poor vision with glasses, contacts, etc.), I am an eye doctor who tries to improve their vision daily within the spheres of literature, English writing, art, U. S. History, and Scripture. The ultimate goal is to help each one of those students continue to grow and learn for the rest of their lives.

My situation with you is similar, for I strive to help improve your vision within two of those realms: art, and far more importantly, the Word of God.

But there’s another question I’d like to ask you.

What do you taste?

What I realized, over time, was that I wanted to serve you in another way as well: as your personal chef.

A seasoned chef can serve up some of the most delectable meals possible, flavors and combinations beyond compare. In our case, the Word is the meal. And you will not believe the number of recipes I want to share with you. Our first book, The Imagery of Scripture, is a highlights selection of some of the best imagery in Scripture; but it is only one course. More great food, more great meals, lie ahead.

And I know the perfect place where we can meet for those delectable meals: my kitchen table! So, pull up a chair. We have much to sample and talk about.

Before we begin our look at the grand book of Genesis, there are a few points of emphasis I would like to share with you.

First, a quick carryover from The Imagery of Scripture: we will continue to italicize any image connected with Jesus and his sacrifice upon the cross (i.e., five stones). I highly encourage you to note these examples somehow in your Bible (I circle them in mine). As we dig deeper and deeper into the Word, the number of markings will grow, allowing you to see firsthand how bountiful images of the Savior truly are.

Second, never forget that the Bible is the perfect Word of God. It is crammed full of imagery, imagery that always leads to the same place: to Jesus as the Savior of the world and his atoning sacrifice upon the palm tree. It is for that reason why I return continually to this verse–

I Corinthians

2

:

2

"For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified."

The third item is a little lengthier, but I think it’s relevant because I have some people I’d like you to meet.

Friends

On more than a few occasions while working on this Bible study, I have taken time to pause and look back at where this journey has led me. Every time the result was the same: I marveled. I marveled not only at the depth and breadth of this study, but I also marveled at the various paths I have crossed to arrive here. I have found myself referring to some of the writers and artists I have encountered along the way as friends. Though I have never met them personally, they have impacted my vision so greatly, and have provided me with such a bounty of insights, that I can’t help but feel an inseparable bond with them. Jan van Eyck and Thomas Hoving are two that come to mind. Both have been with me on this quest for more than two decades.

But I also have made two new recent friends in my journey within Genesis. Through a strange set of circumstances, a novel by Cormac McCarthy led me to a Hebrew scholar named Robert Alter, a man who set about writing a literal and literary translation of the Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament: Genesis through Deuteronomy). Besides reading it out of literary curiosity, I wanted to see if there were any insights I could glean for this study. From my thinking, there was a rare opportunity here, for Alter had zero interest or intention of connecting anything found in the Torah with Jesus. I looked at this as a positive, for I was all but certain that Alter would not twist or alter anything in his translation to fit a Christian perspective. So, if I came across a grand or worthy detail of imagery, odds were high that it would be legit.

I wasn’t disappointed.

But what I never expected was that his book would garner me another friend. Early in his commentary on various verses of the Torah, Alter referenced a Jewish scholar named Rabbi Shlomo Itshaqi (who lived approximately a thousand years ago). History has since used the acronym Rashi to refer to him. Here, too, was an Old Testament scholar who would go nowhere near the teachings of Jesus; but, as with Alter, Rashi provided select insights that add a grand layer to our overall study of imagery within Scripture.

If even non-Christians can help us improve our vision in this study, where will it ever end?

Some final advice: take things slow. Savor each moment immersed in the Word. Taste and see how good the Lord truly is. And don’t be afraid to smile if you come across something that lightens and brightens your day. The longer I worked on this study, the more I marveled and smiled at what I came to see.

Genesis awaits.

Come, sit at my kitchen table with me.

I have much to share.

It’s time to eat.

1

The Garden

Until~Kidron~Mary

We call it Eden.

Genesis

2

:

8

–

9

"The Lord God planted a garden . . . in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The Tree of Life was also in the midst of the Garden . . ."

It all began in a garden. But it didn’t end well.

Genesis

3

:

22

–

24

". . . And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the Tree of Life, and eat, and live forever—therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. So He drove out the man . . . to guard the way to the Tree of Life."

Ponder the implied details of those verses: Adam and Eve would live forever as long as they ate from the Tree of Life. But once they sinned, God, in his mercy, knew that living forever in that now-sinful body was not in their best interest—so he kicked them out.

Keep out! No trespassing!

No garden.

No Tree of Life.

Until . . .

Look at what we read in connection with the beginning of Jesus’ passion, on his way to the cross.

John

18

:

1

"When Jesus had spoken these words, He went out with His disciples over the Brook Kidron, where there was a garden." [Matthew

26

:

36

tells us that the name of this garden was Gethsemane.]

The march to Calvary began in a garden—but Scripture reveals there was something special connected with the ending of Jesus’ passion as well.

John

19

:

41

"Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid."

In the original garden, man brought sin and death into the world. Now, in an example of grand imagery, we learn that a new Man brought life and salvation in an act that began and ended in a garden as well.

That Man, who is also a Good Shepherd, wanted something, something we noted in our first book.

"The entire focus of Psalm twenty-three is on how Jesus will lead his flock back to paradise. Adam and Eve were driven from Eden for their rebellion, but the Good Shepherd wants more than anything to bring us back home."

The passion of Christ began in a garden. The passion of Christ ended in a garden. All because Jesus wanted, above all else, to bring us home to a new Eden, a new garden, where people would once again see God and speak with him face to face—in a place called paradise, a place where the old Tree of Life had been replaced with a new Tree of Life: the wooden cross and Jesus, its fruit.

But there’s more.

John

20

:

15

[And Jesus said to Mary Magdalene after his resurrection] "‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?’

She, supposing Him to be the gardener . . ."

The gardener!! Are you kidding me? In all my years of reading the Bible, I never understood or saw any importance as to why Mary Magdalene mistakenly thought Jesus was the gardener. Now, we see the imagery for what it truly shows: that Jesus was and is the ultimate gardener. And his favorite plant? It is called the Tree of Life, which, after thousands of years, was once again available to all who believe and trust in him.

Eden.

Gethsemane.

The tomb.

Gardens supreme.

But that gardener!

He still leaves me speechless.

2

Soil

Student~Tertullian~Unplowed

I am a teacher.

I am a student.

The day I stop learning is the day I stop breathing.

Though I sometimes have wondered what else is left to learn regarding the imagery of Scripture, I am wise enough to realize there is so much more to see. What I need to do is be patient and wait. God will, in his