Plutarch writes thus in Theseus:
You know...how geographers, when they come to deal with those parts of the earth which they know nothing about, crowd them into the margins of their maps with the explanation, 'Beyond this lie sandy, waterless desrts full of wild beasts'...Now that in writing my Parallel Lives I have reached the end of those periods in which theories can be tested by argument or where history can find a solid foundation in fact, I might very well follow their example and say of those remoter ages, 'All that lies beyond are prodigies and fables, the province of poets and romancers, where nothing is certain or credible'
He recognises the consequence of not-history: if history cannot be reliably established, then there is nothing certain or credible.
This seems to establish the reason for the Bible giving us, and purporting to give us, sufficient detail of our historical setting and therefore the setting of God's covenant with us (and of the basis of our response to this world and to God), to provide us with understanding of the relationships that obtain in real terms between God the creation and ourselves. It is by these terms that God sets forth the setting of the drama of our interaction with God in his creation.
Thus history in Genesis roots our connection with God in palpably real terms; if it were not so, and there were no solid foundation to God's claims to creator, or the terms of his being creator were not congruent with the terms of our experience of his creation, and of himself, then our faith would be based, not in creation (Hebrews 11:3), but in fantasy and have no connection with the real world that we live in, or any bearing on our relationship either with the creation (cosmos) or God. God would cease to be real in terms that we know 'real' and recede to being lost in the mists where nothing is certain or credible, or can be known at all!
