Peter’s epistles also show a firm belief in a historical Genesis. In 1 Peter he affirms that eight people were saved in the ark, and in 2 Peter he says that sinning angels were sent to Tartarus in close connection with the Flood as a judgment for ungodliness on the earth and saving Noah and his family in the ark. He also affirms that the earth was formed out of water and was destroyed by water.

Jude is widely regarded as being very close to 2 Peter, and this one-chapter book has four references to Genesis. Like 2 Peter, he refers to the sinning angels, but this time it’s closely connected to the perversions of Sodom and Gomorrah. He also accepts Genesis 5 as a strict chronological genealogy without gaps, since Enoch is “seventh from Adam”.

Revelation is ‘overlayed’ with many things from the old testament and gives us some important references to Genesis. First, there is a theme of “uncreation” as the earth is being destroyed—judgment in the Bible is commonly pictured as a reversal of creation, e.g. the Flood took the world back to its condition on Day 2, before the land and water had separated, so the land was totally submerged again; Jeremiah 4:23 alludes to an uncreation back to the state in Genesis 1:2—the judgment would be so severe that it would leave the final state as empty as the earth before God created anything. The Seven seals and the 7 last plagues run the days of creation backwards.

But more importantly, the New Jerusalem is filled with Edenic imagery—the Tree of Life, river, and the continual presence of God in the New Jerusalem mark, if not a return to Eden, a restoration of redeemed humanity to unfettered access to and fellowship with God. There is no more curse and no more sin in the New Jerusalem—humanity and creation are returned to an unfallen state.

So, who do we trust? Jesus, Paul, and all the writers of the Old and New Testaments, who collectively believed in Genesis 1-50 as history, or those who make philosophies of their own devising? It would require a book-length study to examine all the New Testament references in the depth that they deserve, but this brief overview should show how important a historical view of Genesis is for New Testament interpretation. It should also be noted that simply giving references to Genesis does not give the full picture—there are many doctrines which make no sense apart from their foundation in Genesis, and much of the New Testament teaching makes no sense unless one assumes that foundation.