Though we can’t pinpoint the location,
Back on the first day of creation,
With, “Let there be light,” (2)
The cosmos turned bright
And started its current inflation.

At first, there was tohu v bohu, (3)
But then Elohim made his debut
And the welkin rang
From a great Big Bang
(Zen buddhists would say it’s impromptu.) (4)

James Ussher pinpointed the timing,
When Elohim started pump priming,
In only six days,
God cleared up the haze
And made what was chaos start rhyming.

Then physicists found that four forces (5)
Served as the primordial sources,
For most everything
Of which poets sing
Or learn in biology courses.

Then Charles Darwin wrote, evolution (6)
Had been Mother Nature’s solution
For diversity,
Not divinity,
Creating a huge revolution.

Did it take six days or take billions? (7)(8)
Or something between, maybe millions?
We’re here anyhow;
Sometime and somehow, (9)
“Who cares?” Is said by most civilians.

(1)Bishop James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh in Annals of the Old
Testament, 1650, published his scholarship on the creation stories in
Genesis and concluded that the date of creation was October 23, 4004
BCE. Such precision has been a source of disputation.

(2)Genesis 1:3, “Yehe or,” in Hebrew (the language God spoke), “Fiat lux,”
in Latin, and, “Let there be light,” in English. This is the first thing that
God (Elohim) says.

(3)“Tohu v Bohu,” The King James and the Revised Standard Versions of
the Bible translate this Hebrew phrase as “without form and void.”
Another concept would be “chaos.” Note that God (Elohim) did not
start with nothing but created order out of chaos.
(4)Zen Buddhism would say that details don’t matter. Shit happens.

(5)The strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force, electromagnetism
and gravitation.

(6)On the Origin of Species, 1859.

(7)In the first chapter of Genesis, God’s creation takes six days. On the
seventh day, he ceased what he had been doing, establishing and
sanctifying the Shabbat. In the second chapter of Genesis, God’s
creation of the Earth and skies takes one day. See Richard Friedman,
Commentary on the Torah, 2001.

(8)Modern cosmologists estimate the age of the universe at 13.8 billion
years (or so.) They also estimate the age of the Earth and our solar
system to be a little over 4 billion years. The first life may have arisen
about 3.8 billion years ago. Modern Homo sapiens evolved no more
than a few hundred thousand years ago.

(9)One might reconsider the Zen Buddhist approach: “Shit happens.”
We’re here somehow. Meditate and let the cosmos reveal itself to
you. And raise a glass to Bishop James Ussher every October 23rd,
“Big Bang Day.”