JSNT Special Issue on Creation: Introduction

Some twenty years ago, theologian Michael Welker declared that he was ‘greatly surprised’ to find that there’s a great divergence between the creation texts of Gen. 1 and 2 and the concepts of creation dominant in Western religions and cultures. While Western ideas surrounding creation involve production, causation and dependence – all predicated on patterns of power – the actual accounts in Genesis describe God reacting, interacting, intervening and responding, emphasizing how the Creator’s and creatures’ initiatives coincide. ‘The creating God is not only the acting God, but the reacting God, the God who responds to that which has been created’ (Welker 1991: 61).

This way of understanding creation invites further exploration of the interdependence of creatures with the Creator. While Welker gave primary attention to human beings as the ones that had been created, more recent scholars are giving attention to the ‘more-than-human creation’.

The aim of this special issue of the JSNT is to give particular attention to creation as it is constructed in the writings of the New Testament – not as a passive object, but relationally...