Genesis 1:1

Genesis 1:1 is the first verse of the first chapter in the Book of Genesis in the Bible and forms the opening of the Genesis creation narrative.

Hebrew text

The verse in the Masoretic text consists of 7 words and 28 letters and is as follows:

Bereishit, "In the beginning [of]...". The first word is b'reishit, or Bereishit (בְּרֵאשִׁית). Its elements are:

The definite article (i.e., the Hebrew equivalent of "the") is missing, but implied. The complete word literally means "at [the] head [of]", or more colloquially, "in [the] beginning [of]". The same construction is found elsewhere in the Hebrew bible, usually dealing with the beginning of a reign.

bara, "[he] created/creating...". The second word is the Hebrew verb bara (ברא). It is in the masculine form, so that "he" is implied. (English verbs do not distinguish between he, she, and it.) A peculiarity of this verb is that it is always used with God as its subject, meaning that only God can "bara"; it is the characteristic verb for God's creative activity in Genesis 1. "Bara" is also used in Genesis 2 verses 3 and 4. The meaning of "bara" is not "create" in the modern sense, but to differentiate/separate and to allocate roles - e.g., in the creation of Adam and Eve, God allocates gender roles to "male and female".