Foreword

“The book we are going to interpret is exceedingly important because of its fundamental significance. Genesis or the book of beginnings is the precondition of the Torah, the Torah is the precondition of the A.T., the A.T. is the precondition of the religion of redemption, the redemption is the precondition of the present world and its history – thus on the pillars of this book rests the edifice of our salvation reaching into eternity. What in the N.T. are the four gospels, that in the A.T. are the five books of the Torah…. The beginning and end of the Old and New Testament canons join together. … The creation of the present heaven and the present earth on the first leaves of Genesis corresponds to the creation of the new heaven and the new earth on the last leaves of the Apocalypse… Thus the holy scripture forms a rounded closed whole, as a proof that not only this or that book, but also the canon is a work of the holy spirit…”1

From the preface of the old master of the conservative exegesis of the Old Testament, Franz Delitzsch, to his “classical” Genesis commentary from 1860, p.3.

1 From the preface of the old master of the conservative exegesis of the Old Testament, Franz Delitzsch, to his “classical” Genesis commentary from 1860, p.3.