The fourth proposition or chapter concerns the initial state in Genesis 1 being nonfunctional. The description of the earth as tohu and bohu (translated “formless and void” and in numerous other similar ways) is the focus, and as the latter term only occurs three times in the Bible, always in conjunction with the former, it is the former that becomes the important term to define. Walton provides a chart with all the instances (p.48), and suggests that the evidence points to the term denoting unproductiveness rather than lack of material form.
By way of both similarity and contrast, when various components are creation are declared “good” or in one instance “not good”, the point is not about their physical form but their function in the cosmos. Indeed, Genesis 1 is focused on the appearance of human beings, and so in a very real sense the goodness of the preceding creation relates to the preparedness of the creation for humans.
A text from the Nies Babylonian Collection is quoted to illustrate this chapter’s point further. NBC 11108 depicts the primordial state as one in which waters and earth exist, but have not been ordered. This state of potential but not-yet-existence is highlighted in terms of what is lacking at this point, such as the high priests of Enlil and other elements of cultic worship, or the furrow and the production of crops (p.52). This resembles Genesis 1 inasmuch as there too, we begin with unorganized primordial waters and the production of habitable spaces and then inhabitants, rather than the focus being on the bringing of matter itself into existence.
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