What Does the Bible Actually Say About the Days of Genesis One?

The primary criticism leveled against “day-age” interpreters of the creation periods of Genesis one, is that we are compromising with the current atheistic fad of Darwinian theory.  My previous blogs have lain out a host of reasons why this criticism is not valid.  So I believe it is time to turn the question of interpretation back onto the young-earth (24-hour-creation-day) creationist camp to reconcile their interpretation of the creation days with the actual text of the Bible.  The fundamental question therefore is, what does the Bible actually say?

As a day-age creationist myself, I do agree with my detractors on five counts.  First, I too believe the heavens and the earth were created out of nothing by God.  Second, I agree that God the Creator is intelligent and all-powerful, and that He can create any way He so wishes.  Third, I too believe that God did not create the universe in its present form in an instant, but used the duration of time to complete His creative activity.  Even young-earth creationists believe God did His work in six days.  Fourth, I too do not believe in Darwinism; neither do I embrace theistic evolution.  Fifth, I agree with 24-hour-day creationists that the Bible is God’s inerrant and revealed word, including the text of Genesis 1.  So when I challenge the young-earth (24-hour-creation-day) view of Genesis, I am NOT criticizing the Bible.  I am instead reverently upholding it.  And I am calling them to accountability to the very Scriptures we together believe in.

In spite of their laudable motives to defend the Bible, the young-earth interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis fundamentally contradicts what the passage in question actually conveys.  Consider the following challenges to their 24-hour-day position:

Genesis 1:1 states that on the first creation day “God created the heavens and the earth.”  Not only does this passage include the heavens as well as the earth, but by naming it first, verse 1 gives priority to the heavens over the earth.  Genesis 1:1 is part of the first creation day, and not a heading like the title of a chapter in a book.  We know this both because verse 2 begins with the word “and,” and also because it assumes the earth is already in existence.  If 1:1 had actually been a heading, there would indeed be no reference within the narrative that follows, to the actual creation of either the heavens or the earth. 

The appearance of the “two lights” later on day four is not conveyed by the Hebrew word," bara,” which means created by God (implying out of nothing, as in 1:1).  It is instead conveyed by weaker words that suggest the sun and moon, already existent from Day One, finally became visible from the surface when the dark gaseous atmosphere finally cleared.  This interpretation reconciles Day Four with the opening declaration of Day One.  The notion that the two lights were created on Day Four is irreconcilable with the declaration of 1:1. 

If the sun was not in existence on day 1, as young-earth-creationists argue, then it is meaningless for the text to apply the term “day” to any of the first four creation days in a literal sense. The primary definition of a 24-hour cycle is one complete rotation of the earth with respect to the sun.  No Sun, no rotation, and no “day” by normal definitions. 

The repeated stanza, “…and there was evening and there was morning,” is not an indicator of 24-hour days.  For one thing it cannot function as a kind of bracket that encloses both ends of a day.  The grammar doesn’t allow it.  And while a Hebrew day does begin at evening, it does not close at morning.  Neither does morning continue until the evening.  Hebrew days to the contrary are always measured from evening to evening (Leviticus 23:32).  And although the Bible occasionally uses phrases such as “from morning to evening” to express duration, it does not use the “evening and morning” phrase as a means to express a normal 24-hour day. 

The meaning of day (yom in Hebrew) in the Biblical languages covered an array of ideas, much as “day” is used in modern English.  But Biblical Hebrew had a far, far, smaller vocabulary than does modern English.  Therefore even more so, the words used in the Old Testament had to cover a large range of meanings from daylight, to a literal day, to an era or an aeon. 

The very first usage of the word yom, in Genesis 1:5, applied to the period of daylight hours only, not a 24 hour day. 

The creation days, almost without exception, lacked the accompanying definite article, “the.”  Words without such an article are understood to be indefinite.  However, the seventh day is accompanied with a definite article, even though that day is never brought to a close. 

On Day Three the entire life-cycles of trees in 1:11,12, from germination out of the ground all the way to the bearing of fruit, suggests this day was longer than 24 hours long. 

The extensive list of activities accomplished by Adam over a given passage of time (1:27 and ch. 2) on Day Six, suggest it was not 24 hours duration. 

In the single verse at the close of the creation narrative, Genesis 2:4, the duration of creation is described both in terms of “generations,” (2:4a) and as all having happened on one day (2:4b).

For a much fuller treatment of these matters in a manner that is thoroughly documented, please write to me for a copy of my essay, “The Biblical Demand to Take Another Look: Ten Compelling Exegetical Reasons the Days of Creation are Non-24-Hour.”