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?
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?
