01_VanSeters_copiaaaa_01_25 28/04/15 11:15 Pagina 10 10 JOHN VAN SETERS He took Abram outside and said, “Look up into the sky, and count the stars if you can. So many [...] shall your descendants be”. And as if to balance YHWH’S creation of the heavenly bodies, Second Isaiah asserts in 40,28: “YHWH is the creator of the whole world”. The theme of the deity’s creative powers is expanded in 42,5 to include humanity as well: Thus says the [supreme] God (lah) YHWH, the creator of the heavens and the one who stretched them out, the one who spread out the earth and all that grows upon it, the one who gives breath (hmvn) to the people who live on it and life-giving spirit (xwr) to those who walk about on it [...]. This imparting of breath to humanity corresponds to the descrip- tion of the deity imparting the breath of life (~yyx tmvn) in Gen 2,7, and this same language is repeated by J in the flood story in Gen 7,22 15. By contrast, in P’s addition to the flood story he prefers to use the phrase (~yyx xwr) in the sense of “breath of life” instead, and completely avoids using hmvn. It seems unlikely that Second Isaiah’s use of xwr has anything to do with P. It is more likely that the prophet was influenced by Ezekiel’s remarkable use of xwr in Ezek 37,5-10 in the vision of the valley of dry bones in which this term was re- peatedly used in the sense of life-giving breath. It is this term that is later picked up by P in preference to the term that is used in J. Another term that is used by Second Isaiah as an alternative and direct equivalent to the verb arb “to create” is the verb rcy “to form” and its nominal equivalent rcwy, often rendered as “maker”. The two verbs expressing the act of creation can be used in parallel to each other as in Isa 45,18, which describe YHWH as the one “who created (arb) the heavens” and “who formed (rcy) the earth”. Apart from the reference in Isa 42,5 quoted above, Second Isaiah makes little comment on the creation of humanity as a whole, but speaks instead about the creation and formation of Israel (43,1.7.15.21) to- gether with the creation of heaven and earth. Second Isaiah can also speak about Israel being “formed” by God from the womb (49,5), which seems to reflect a Mesopotamian tradition associated with royalty in which the king was especially formed by the deity for 15 The use of xwr in this context is clearly secondary and redundant.