An excerpt from the novel Disobedience by Naomi Alderman:
In the beginning, the Lord created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was tohu vavohu. What is tohu vavohu? This matter is much debated among the sages. There are those who say: formless. There are those who say: void. There are those who say: astonishingly empty, as though they had stood alongside the Almighty in the time before time, and had been astonished at the emptiness, had, perhaps, remarked upon it.
And there are those who say: chaotic. This interpretation seems to allow the words, which are all that we have of the beginning, their voice. Tohu vavohu. Higgledy-piggledy. Upside-down. Inside-out. Hither and thither. The Creator wanted to show us the first contraction of all-that-is. All modes of expression were open to Him, every human sense. He chose words — tohu vavohu. Tumble-jumble.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was bingle-mingle.
In the beginning, therefore, the most important work is of separation. It is of pulling apart the tangled threads. It is of saying, “This shall be separate from that. This shall be water, this shall be sky and this shall be the line between them, the horizon.” It is of setting a line between them.
What does it mean, that this world came into being at first through a blinding Act, but then, subtly, slowly, as elements were teased away, as infinitely fine lines were drawn? It means, surely, that, to understand the world, one must understand the separation.
The chapter begins with this Jewish prayer:
Blessed are you, God, our Lord, King of the Universe, who distinguishes between the holy and the workaday, between light and darkness, between Israel and the nations, between the seventh day and the six days of creation. Blessed are you, God, who distinguishes between the holy and the workaday.
from the Havdalah prayer, recited at the end of Shabbat [i.e., the Sabbath Day]
