Halakhah zu Schemot 3:14

The meaning of “was empty and void” (“tohu vavohu”) (Genesis 1:2) is that it contained neither man nor animal. As Jeremiah explains, “I saw the land and it was empty and void (tohu vavohu)” (4:23), for which he explains the meaning afterward by saying, “I saw and there was no man” (ibid. 4:25) nor “animal” (ibid. 9:9). Similarly, “like the light of the seven days” (Isaiah 30:26) is an explanation of “sevenfold” (ibid.). Also, “that which I will be” (Exodus 3:14) explains “I will be” (ibid.). I have already explained the mystery of “sevenfold.”¹⁶ In his Alternative Commentary to Genesis (1:14), Ibn Ezra explains that the light increasingly intensified over the seven days of Creation, hence “sevenfold” means that there were seven stages to the light. Our Rabbis hinted at this when they said that on the fourth day the luminaries were hung (Hagiga 12a). How admirable to the intelligent is the choice of the word “hung.”¹⁷ The description of Creation in the book of Genesis deals only with creation of the lower world, the world of generation and decay, and it does not expound on the creation of the heavenly bodies. So all Scripture tells us about the heavenly bodies is that they were “hung” and visible to the lower world. Thus the words of Jeremiah disprove those who say that “tohu vavohu” means that there was no earth.