A Day, Not “The First Day”
Some translations of Genesis 1:5 erroneously read, “The evening and the morning were the first day.” The Hebrew word for first, רִאשׁוֹן ri´shown, does not appear until Genesis 8:13. Genesis never mentions “the first day,” though it does speak of the second day, the third day , and so forth. The Hebrew word for “a” or “one,” אֶחָד´ echad, applies to the word day in Genesis 1:5. Two correct translations are there was evening and there was morning, one day or the evening and the morning were a day . The word אֶחָד ´echad appears again in verse 9 to say that the waters were gathered together in one place. Saying that the waters were gathered together in “the first place” would not make sense.
The Hebrew expression for the first day does not appear anywhere in Genesis. In Exodus 12:15–16 Moses says what must be done on the first day of the Passover celebration. The Hebrew says בַּּיּ֣וֹם הָרִאשׁוֺן ba-yowm ho-ri´shown. Following the Hebrew word order literally this is on-day, the-first. In Exodus 40:2 God commands Moses to erect the tabernacle on the first day of the first month of the coming year.
Using a day or one day makes Genesis 1:5 a criterion for observing the passing of a day. The criterion applies whenever darkness and light are cyclic. The verse makes no reference to hours or to any definite period of time.
The word “day” may also mean an epoch of long or short duration. In Genesis 6:4 we read, The Nephilim were on the earth in those days. By days we understand a rather long but indefinite period of time. The word day is not used the same way in Genesis 1 and Genesis 6:4. Each day of Genesis 1 was definite, delimited by successive onsets of darkness. The days were filled with particular events, but Moses never says how long they lasted. Some people are surprised to find that the word day may in the same passage refer to long days or short days. But Moses’ observational criterion allows for that possibility.
Making the heavens and the Earth took six days, according to Genesis 2:2 and Exodus 20:11. A very literal translation of Genesis 2:4 speaks of the day He [the LORD God] made the heavens and the earth. Note that the word day is singular. The expression the day appears to include all of the first six days of Genesis 1. Those six days were an epoch of unspecified duration. Moses refers to that epoch as a day.
The Hebrew word day by itself does not usually refer to the duration of an interval of time. It must be part of a longer expression to refer to a time interval. The Hebrew for about a full day, כְּיֽוֺם תָּמֲים ka-yowm tamiym, is found in Joshua 10:13. This is the only place the Bible uses this expression. The reference could be to 12 hours, a usual daytime’s duration, or 24 hours, the usual duration of one cycle of darkness and daylight.
Not “Literal, 24-Hour Days”
The matter-of-fact tone of the Mosaic creation narrative calls for a literal interpretation. However, it is illogical to say that the days of the Genesis creation narrative were “literal, 24-hour days.” The word “literal” means that one takes the words of the text in their simple, ordinary meaning. But nowhere in the Hebrew Scriptures does the word “hour” occur. One cannot therefore interpret the word “hour” literally. No Bible interpretation can be literal if it interprets a word that is never mentioned in the ancient text and that refers to a concept unknown at the time of the writing. A literal, Scriptural definition of a day cannot include the word “hour” because the Hebrew Scriptures never use it.
The Romans defined something like the modern hour when they invented reliable artifacts to measure the passing of time. When Moses wrote, such technology did not exist. Without artifacts people use the apparent movement of the Sun or the stars to measure time.
Since the Hebrew Scriptures do not use the word “hour” we must look in an English dictionary for a definition. There we read that an hour is “any of 24 equal parts of a day.” If a day were defined as 24 hours, there would be no definition at all, neither of a day nor an hour. It would be like saying a foot is twelve inches, and an inch is one twelfth of a foot.
If one defines a day as 24 hours, then the definitions go around in a circle. The scientific criterion astronomers use for observing the passing of a day is primary, and the hour is derived from it.
The second part of the Bible begins when the Romans ruled the ancient world. Narratives of that time mention the hour because the Romans divided daytime into twelve equal parts. (They divided the night into four watches.) The Roman definition made an hour that varied with the seasons and with the observer’s latitude on the Earth. In Rome the hour was long in summer and short in winter.
The inclination of the Earth’s axis makes the durations of nighttime and daytime vary throughout the year. However, the sum of nighttime and daytime is nearly constant. Science eliminated most of the variation of the hour by defining a day as one complete cycle of darkness and light. An hour is any one of twenty-four equal parts of a day.
Because the Earth’s orbit is not exactly circular, complete cycles of darkness and light also vary slightly in duration with the season of the year. To eliminate this additional variation, astronomers chose the specific cycle in the tropical zone of the Earth between noon on 31 December 1899 and noon on 1 January 1900. They divided that cycle in 24 equal parts and called any one of those parts an hour. The minute is any of 60 equal parts of an hour, and the second is any of 60 equal parts of a minute. To define the hour precisely, astronomers used Moses’ criterion for observing the passing of a day. Have they ever acknowledged their debt to him?
How Long Did the First Three Days Last?
In the first three days God governed the day by separating the light from the darkness. Only later, on the fourth day, did He delegate to the Sun the authority to govern the day. The Bible does not say how long the first three cycles lasted, but in Isaiah 40:26 God invites us to look up and see--Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. In the 20th century we built the first telescopes and satellites that allow us to see all the way back to the last light of the first morning. Before the first morning was the first evening. It may have been very brief, but there was certainly darkness before there was light, just as the Bible says. We will also see that it took three cycles of darkness and light to form the Earth. We have already begun to describe those cycles. We will later devote a chapter to each of the three evenings and to each of the three mornings and examine more details.
At first God separated the light from the darkness. He was not obliged to limit the duration of any of the first three days to what would later become the usual duration of a day on the surface of the Earth. Before the Earth was formed it didn’t have a surface. Later, on the fourth day, He delegated the function of separating light from darkness to the Sun. We know how the Sun separates light from darkness. We know, though Moses did not, that the Earth spins on its axis and revolves around the Sun. The Sun cannot rise one morning and say “Today will be a special day.” At present the Sun is separating light from darkness on the Earth. It has been doing so from day four on. We may be sure that all days the Sun has governed between the polar circles of the Earth have been 24-hour days. That is the way the Sun does it.
The Hebrew expression for the first day does not appear anywhere in Genesis. In Exodus 12:15–16 Moses says what must be done on the first day of the Passover celebration. The Hebrew says בַּּיּ֣וֹם הָרִאשׁוֺן ba-yowm ho-ri´shown. Following the Hebrew word order literally this is on-day, the-first. In Exodus 40:2 God commands Moses to erect the tabernacle on the first day of the first month of the coming year.
Using a day or one day makes Genesis 1:5 a criterion for observing the passing of a day. The criterion applies whenever darkness and light are cyclic. The verse makes no reference to hours or to any definite period of time.
The word “day” may also mean an epoch of long or short duration. In Genesis 6:4 we read, The Nephilim were on the earth in those days. By days we understand a rather long but indefinite period of time. The word day is not used the same way in Genesis 1 and Genesis 6:4. Each day of Genesis 1 was definite, delimited by successive onsets of darkness. The days were filled with particular events, but Moses never says how long they lasted. Some people are surprised to find that the word day may in the same passage refer to long days or short days. But Moses’ observational criterion allows for that possibility.
Making the heavens and the Earth took six days, according to Genesis 2:2 and Exodus 20:11. A very literal translation of Genesis 2:4 speaks of the day He [the LORD God] made the heavens and the earth. Note that the word day is singular. The expression the day appears to include all of the first six days of Genesis 1. Those six days were an epoch of unspecified duration. Moses refers to that epoch as a day.
The Hebrew word day by itself does not usually refer to the duration of an interval of time. It must be part of a longer expression to refer to a time interval. The Hebrew for about a full day, כְּיֽוֺם תָּמֲים ka-yowm tamiym, is found in Joshua 10:13. This is the only place the Bible uses this expression. The reference could be to 12 hours, a usual daytime’s duration, or 24 hours, the usual duration of one cycle of darkness and daylight.
Not “Literal, 24-Hour Days”
The matter-of-fact tone of the Mosaic creation narrative calls for a literal interpretation. However, it is illogical to say that the days of the Genesis creation narrative were “literal, 24-hour days.” The word “literal” means that one takes the words of the text in their simple, ordinary meaning. But nowhere in the Hebrew Scriptures does the word “hour” occur. One cannot therefore interpret the word “hour” literally. No Bible interpretation can be literal if it interprets a word that is never mentioned in the ancient text and that refers to a concept unknown at the time of the writing. A literal, Scriptural definition of a day cannot include the word “hour” because the Hebrew Scriptures never use it.
The Romans defined something like the modern hour when they invented reliable artifacts to measure the passing of time. When Moses wrote, such technology did not exist. Without artifacts people use the apparent movement of the Sun or the stars to measure time.
Since the Hebrew Scriptures do not use the word “hour” we must look in an English dictionary for a definition. There we read that an hour is “any of 24 equal parts of a day.” If a day were defined as 24 hours, there would be no definition at all, neither of a day nor an hour. It would be like saying a foot is twelve inches, and an inch is one twelfth of a foot.
If one defines a day as 24 hours, then the definitions go around in a circle. The scientific criterion astronomers use for observing the passing of a day is primary, and the hour is derived from it.
The second part of the Bible begins when the Romans ruled the ancient world. Narratives of that time mention the hour because the Romans divided daytime into twelve equal parts. (They divided the night into four watches.) The Roman definition made an hour that varied with the seasons and with the observer’s latitude on the Earth. In Rome the hour was long in summer and short in winter.
The inclination of the Earth’s axis makes the durations of nighttime and daytime vary throughout the year. However, the sum of nighttime and daytime is nearly constant. Science eliminated most of the variation of the hour by defining a day as one complete cycle of darkness and light. An hour is any one of twenty-four equal parts of a day.
Because the Earth’s orbit is not exactly circular, complete cycles of darkness and light also vary slightly in duration with the season of the year. To eliminate this additional variation, astronomers chose the specific cycle in the tropical zone of the Earth between noon on 31 December 1899 and noon on 1 January 1900. They divided that cycle in 24 equal parts and called any one of those parts an hour. The minute is any of 60 equal parts of an hour, and the second is any of 60 equal parts of a minute. To define the hour precisely, astronomers used Moses’ criterion for observing the passing of a day. Have they ever acknowledged their debt to him?
How Long Did the First Three Days Last?
In the first three days God governed the day by separating the light from the darkness. Only later, on the fourth day, did He delegate to the Sun the authority to govern the day. The Bible does not say how long the first three cycles lasted, but in Isaiah 40:26 God invites us to look up and see--Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. In the 20th century we built the first telescopes and satellites that allow us to see all the way back to the last light of the first morning. Before the first morning was the first evening. It may have been very brief, but there was certainly darkness before there was light, just as the Bible says. We will also see that it took three cycles of darkness and light to form the Earth. We have already begun to describe those cycles. We will later devote a chapter to each of the three evenings and to each of the three mornings and examine more details.
At first God separated the light from the darkness. He was not obliged to limit the duration of any of the first three days to what would later become the usual duration of a day on the surface of the Earth. Before the Earth was formed it didn’t have a surface. Later, on the fourth day, He delegated the function of separating light from darkness to the Sun. We know how the Sun separates light from darkness. We know, though Moses did not, that the Earth spins on its axis and revolves around the Sun. The Sun cannot rise one morning and say “Today will be a special day.” At present the Sun is separating light from darkness on the Earth. It has been doing so from day four on. We may be sure that all days the Sun has governed between the polar circles of the Earth have been 24-hour days. That is the way the Sun does it.