Berashit

Grammar

Word: בראשית 
Representation: BRAShYT
Transliteration: B'reishit or Bereishit
Translation: “At-a-beginning-of-[missing word]...”, or "Because-of Reshit..."
Strong Concordance: H7225

Form: Prepositional phrase - B + RASh + YT. Note: It is more commonly used without the "B" prefix, as in Jeremiah 26:1 and Deuteronomy 18:4, and many other places).

Break-down: 

"B"  is the preposition and means in, by, with, at, because-of
"RASh" means "head" "chief", "top", "beginning". But it can also be non-translatable (see below).
"YT" is the suffix that, for the RAShYT form, indicates that an object will immediately follow it. It is akin to terminating the translation with "of".

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Exposition

Where is "the"?

The first letter ("B") can be translated as "in", "at", "by" and "because-of" (as well as other variations that indicate connection). In other words, it is a preposition that causes a relationship. I am comfortable with any of these uses of the word being used.

Traditionally, there is a vowel indicator that looks like a colon under the first letter ("B") called a sh'vah. It causes a half-pause rather than a full-pause between syllables. Because of that, the word is pronounced "B'reshit" (sometimes transliterated as "Bereshit)", but not "BAHreshit". This is important because the "ah" sound would indicate that an inferred "the" would follow the "B".

In Hebrew, rather than having a word such as "B'ha-reshit", the "ha" is removed and the first letter is pronounced "Bah", which would cause the "ha" to simply be inferred. This makes for a smoother pronunciation. And it is the "ha" that denotes that "the" would be part of the expression.

In other words, if the author meant "in the beginning of", then "bah-reishit" would have been used. He didn't, and since "b'reshit" was used, there is no "the".

In other words, "In THE beginning" is incorrect, while "In/by a beginning of" is less flawed. 

And "THE" is the least of the problems that traditionalists have with this word.

The problematic suffix

The bigger problem is that the "YT" portion of "BRAShYT" demands a connecting noun. Without the nouns, it would be akin to ending a sentence with "of". 

The reason: the "RASh" root (in BRAShYT) with a suffix of "YT" will always indicate that there will be an object that will immediately follow it.

Examples: 

Jeremiah 26:1:  "RAShYT (beginning of) the reign of Jehoiakim". 
Deuteronomy 18:4: "RAShYT (first of) your grain". 

"Grain" and "reign" are nouns, objects that the "YT" suffix requires to exist.

However, in Genesis 1:1, the object is missing. So while it is not the best translations, "At a beginning of [missing-word]" is still better than "In the beginning".

If you wanted "In the beginning" without the need for an object, you would use BRAShONH (bah-rishonah), which is not the case.

Some apologists have tried to insert “everything” where the [missing word] is, but respected commentators throughout the ages were uncomfortable with that. Others try interesting grammmatical tricks, which causes more problems than it fixes (one unintentionally has the Elohim being created). Volumes of books have been written about this one word, and, in most cases, students simply ignore that problem.

How to translate this word

There are a few possibilities.

The first one is that there is a missing word.

It seems unlikely that, out of the entire book, the second word should go missing and nobody noticed or remembers what it was. But if you want to hold that this is the case, then you would need to translate it as:

At-a-beginning-of-[missing word]

It isn't clean, but some people might be OK with this.

Another possibility is that "Reshit" is an abbreviated euphemism. 

For example, the Jewish Sages interpreted the "Reshit" portion of this word as referring to Proverbs 8:22-25, where it says 

"The Reshit of His course" ("beginning of His course", meaning wisdom) 

And by working backwards and connected back to the first word of the Torah they were able to interpret the first word to mean: "With Wisdom He created...".

It is a stylish interpretation, and one that addresses the question: what is "reshit"?

Another possibility is that "Resh" in "B'reshit" can refer to the head of something, as in a leader, or the first of something, as in the first fruits. 

"With a First One".

It's not a bad idea.

And as we read in Scripture, the text often plays with words, reassigning the names of other Gods and turning them into insults, and twisting their pronunciations to reduce their importance. We have "Molech" as a variation of "Melech" (lit. "king"), the King of Heaven, the God El of the Canaanites who was also insulted with the name "Ba'al-zebub" - Lord of a fly (a pest that makes a home on garbage and dung).

Because of this, I am content to translate this word as "Because of Reshit", or "It was because of Reshit that...", or "it was at Reshit's behest that..." which flows smoother in English. 

Since the Torah is a propaganda text for YHVH, I am tempted to have it be "At YHVH's behest, the Elohim manifested...", which appears to be the most logical possibility. But, in reality, we won't really know which idea was intended without confirmation from the other texts, that are silent on the matter.

It is not so important that we know Who or what Reshit represents as to know that the Elohim were impelled to create as a result of it. And that is the important message that I want to bring to you.

Conclusion

The word "B'reshit" makes no sense to read it as "In the beginning". The article "the" is absent and the suffix demands that "Reshit" have an object that immediately follows, which is does not, or that it simply remains transliterated rather than translated, as in "it was because of Reshit that...".

The result is that Scripture does not speak of THE beginning, or any beginning for that matter. It simply speaks of the Elohim doing their job, creating a vast watery body that contained earthly-material because of Reshit.