“God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night.’ And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.” This verse, Gen. 1:5, is often appealed to as the principal factor in favor of the calendar-day interpretation. Apparently the reasoning is that the immediate context trumps the surrounding contexts. But this is incorrect: the immediate context is certainly the most important element, but if the surrounding contexts more clearly define the issue, then they take precedence. One of the key principles of exegesis is to interpret the unclear in light of the clear.
Another line of thought is that since this verse describes the first day of creation with various terms for parts of a calendar day—in particular the Hebrew terms for “evening” and “morning”—this verifies that a normal calendar day is in view. However we have to bear in mind that the creation narrative is describing God’s workweek: his six days of work and one day of rest. In this context, the use of these terms could just as easily have been intended to emphasize the parallel between God’s and humankind’s workweeks, rather than to emphasize an identity between them. The mere use of these terms by itself does not allow us to conclude which of these two interpretations was the intended meaning of the author. Before we can draw a conclusion, we have to find biblical evidence to support either the thesis that God’s experience of time is the same as ours, or that it is not.
Another contextual issue involves the nature of light and darkness. When Gen. 1:5 says “God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night,’” we tend to insert our concepts of day as a temporal period of light and night as a temporal period of darkness into the text, and then add them up to another definition of “day”: the period of light plus the period of darkness. This is certainly understandable, since these periods make up the days that we experience. But this is not what the text actually says. “Day” merely refers to the phenomenon of light and “night” to the phenomenon of darkness, without reference to their temporal length.
The reason this is a contextual issue is because the concept of day as a temporal period is introduced later in Gen. 1:14-17 on the fourth day of creation. Here, the sun, moon, and stars are established as calendrical markers, specifically “to separate the day from the night,” and to “serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years.” In other words, the concept of the calendar day is explicitly introduced on day four. This makes it very difficult to maintain that the three days preceding it should be understood as calendar days. This point has been recognized since at least the time of the early Church.{i}
So, to reiterate, on day one light is introduced, and is contrasted with the darkness that had been present up to that point. But the concept of day as a specific period of time is not introduced until later (on day four). Therefore, we should not read this concept into Gen. 1:5. To do so is eisegesis rather than exegesis.
A further argument
To my mind, these points make a strong case against understanding the first day of creation as a calendar day. However, I think we can go a step further: I believe a good argument can be made that not only was the first day not a calendar day, but that Gen. 1:5 even distinguishes the first day from the phenomena of light and darkness. For our purposes, this verse can be divided into three segments: the first, verse 5a, we have just gone over as defining the concepts of light and darkness: “God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night.’” The third, 5c, names the first day of creation: “The first day” (yom echad). It is my contention that verse 5b, the second segment in this verse, “And there was evening, and there was morning” (vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer), creates a strong discontinuity between the segments on either side of it. This suggests that a specific, albeit implicit, distinction is being made between the concepts of day/night or light/darkness (in verse 5a) and the first day of creation (in 5c). This discontinuity consists of five elements: 1) the unique use of the verb vayahi; 2) the use of the terms ‘ereb and boqer; 3) the ordering of the terms ‘ereb and boqer; 4) the presence of the phrase vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer in its entirety; and 5) the use of the phrase yom echad in verse 5c.
The unique use of “vayahi”
The phrase “vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer” (“and there was evening, and there was morning”) has the unique characteristic of having the verb vayahi connected via a “maqqeph” (like a hyphen in English, which ties two words together to form a single unit) to a term, and then having the same pattern immediately repeated with another term. This is an anomaly. First of all, vayahi is the vayyiqtol form of the Hebrew verb “to be” (hayyah), and this form of this particular verb is usually employed as an introductory statement, similar to a new paragraph in English. To use it twice in such close quarters is extremely unusual.
The introduction of independent narratives, or of a new section of the narrative, by means of an imperfect consecutive, likewise aims at a connexion, though again loose and external [i.e. antithetical], with that which has been narrated previously. Such a connexion is especially often established by means of [vayahi] and it came to pass. … This loose connexion by means of [vayahi] is especially common, when the narrative or a new section of it begins with any expression of time.{ii}
Nowhere else in the entire Old Testament is vayahi used like it is in Gen. 1:5. While there are other instances in which it is repeated in relatively close proximity, they either represent clear breaks in which the second example begins a new focus (frequently seen at the end of a chapter and the beginning of the next), or they are examples of vayahi being used in an idiom (such as vayahi Adonai et [“and Adonai was with…”], vayahi bebayet [“and he was in the house of…”], or vayahi-ken [“and it was so”]) which is employed in concert with another idiom or with a more customary use of vayahi. But even if we ignore this, these examples still don’t have vayahi being used in such a close proximity with itself as Gen. 1:5 does, in which it is tied to a word via a maqqeph and then immediately repeated with another term by means of another maqqeph.
Second, in the Hebrew language the verb “to be” does not even have to be present once but is frequently assumed. In fact, the past tense of this verb is assumed several times in Gen. 1.{iii} This doesn’t mean that there is some special meaning implied whenever the verb is used, but it certainly suggests that there is some out of the ordinary meaning being conveyed when it’s used twice. The author could have eliminated this difficulty by simply writing va‘ereb vaboqer, or even vayahi-‘ereb vaboqer. Instead, he chose to employ a usage which is virtually unique.
Third, when a verb is repeated in close proximity in Hebrew, the first one is in the imperfect form (vayyiqtol), and the second one is perfect and doesn’t have a vav (or waw) prefix (the vav prefix essentially reverses the mode so vav plus an imperfect verb [or vayyiqtol], is understood as perfect and vice-versa). But this is not the case here: we have vav plus yahi (vayyiqtol) and then vav plus yahi again. This goes against the standard grammatical pattern of ancient Hebrew. “It is a fundamental rule of Biblical narrative style that verbs describing acts that took place in sequence should head their respective clauses, and take the form of the imperfect with consecutive Waw [or vav]. … But when the same verb occurs twice in two consecutive clauses, then the second verb usually occupies the second or third place in the sentence and is in the perfect.”{iv}
In other words, if the verb had to be repeated we would expect it to say “vayahi … hayyah …” instead of “vayahi … vayahi …” The fact that this repetition does not fit into the normal use of verbs in Hebrew implies that we are not supposed to understand this passage in the way we normally would.
The use of “‘ereb” and “boqer”
While it is often thought that the use of the words “evening” (‘ereb){v} and “morning” (boqer){vi} virtually confirms that a day/night cycle is in view, these terms seem very awkward given the context. We have just had the phenomena of light and darkness defined in verse 5a: “God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night.’” From this, it is assumed that “the first day” refers to a single cycle of these events.{vii} But if we were meant to understand the first day as referring to these phenomena, why didn’t the author describe it by using two of the terms he just used to define these phenomena? Why not write, “And God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness He called ‘night.’ And there was day and there was night—day one”? Or, “And there was light and there was darkness—day one”? The author goes out of his way to use different terms to define the first day of creation from the terms he just defined as light (or){viii} and darkness (choshek).{ix} This strongly implies that, whatever the first day is, it is not referring to the experience of these phenomena, much less an individual cycle of them.
This maneuver is particularly significant when we recall how small the vocabulary of ancient Hebrew was (a few thousand words). While biblical poetry often repeats a statement with different terminology, I don’t believe there is any reason to think that Gen. 1 is written in a poetic, non-literal genre. It is written as narrative.{x}
It may be objected that if the author were trying to distinguish the first day of creation from the phenomena of light and darkness, he would not have used terms that evoke these concepts to some degree, such as “morning” and “evening.” There are other words he could have used which would not have suggested them. But this is not as evident as one may think. For one thing, the small vocabulary of ancient Hebrew severely limits the possibilities here, and just as yom has more than one meaning in Hebrew, so do ‘ereb and boqer.{xi} Moreover, in all but a few verses,{xii} whenever boqer and ‘ereb appear together in close proximity in the Old Testament, they are used with prepositions which relate them to each other (i.e. from morning to evening; etc.). This, of course, doesn’t mean that these words can’t have their usual meaning unless they’re used in concert with prepositions, it just means that the biblical evidence does not commit us to one side or the other due to common use. The objection seems to assume that there are better words to use in Hebrew, but this is by no means clear. In fact, the point being made here is that there are better words which could have been used to define the first day as the phenomena of light and darkness; namely the two pairs of terms that were just defined as the phenomena of light and darkness: or and choshek (light and darkness), and yom and layelah{xiii} (day and night).
Another point to make here is one that has already been made: Gen. 1 is showing the parallel between God’s workweek and our own. The use of ‘ereb and boqer has the positive effect of being able to emphasize this parallelism, while simultaneously distinguishing the first day from the phenomena of light and darkness that have just been defined.
It may be the case that evening and morning are functioning here as a merism in which two opposites are used to express entirety, in the same way that the phrase “heavens and earth” is used to refer to the entire physical universe.{xiv} Otherwise we are left with the conspicuous absence of all the intervening time between sunset and sunrise.
The phrase “there was evening, there was morning…” is actually a Sumerian literary figure that pairs opposites together to describe totality. Thus “evening-morning” means a complete phase of time within the total creative cycle; it emphasizes the completeness or comprehensiveness of the process, not the specific period of time in which that process was accomplished. The totality of creation, phase by phase, may have been thus depicted without any necessary reference to a defined time period. … If the early Genesis material reflects Sumerian culture, the use of “evening-morning” would preclude current concepts of a day and point instead to a phase or general time period.{xv}
In other words, it may very well be that when ‘ereb and boqer were used together without being linked to each other via prepositions, they were understood idiomatically to represent collectivity and completeness rather than the elements of a calendar day and, thus, were the best two terms the author could have used to distinguish the first day of creation from a 24-hour period.
Excursus: Daniel 8:13-14, 26
Above, I claimed that in all but a few verses, whenever ‘ereb and boqer are used in conjunction, they are used with prepositions which relate them to each other. One of these exceptions is significant: Dan. 8:13-14, 26. Here we have a prophecy that the temple will be desecrated and the tamid (“continual”) sacrifices will be suspended for 2,300 “‘ereb boqer.” This may be understood to mean 2,300 days, in which case we have a biblical example of these two terms being used in conjunction to refer to a 24-hour period—and thus the same interpretation could be defended in Gen. 1:5. Most scholars, however, believe that, since the tamid sacrifices were offered in the evening and morning, this prophecy is saying that 2,300 of these sacrifices wouldn’t be offered. Three of the primary reasons for maintaining this latter view are that 1) there does not appear to be any reason to use the phrase ‘ereb boqer instead of just yom if this is a prophecy about a period of 2,300 days; 2) the evening and morning sacrifices are the specific contextual referent; and 3) if we understand ‘ereb boqer as referring to 2,300 tamid sacrifices (which would then correspond to a period of 1,150 days), then this prophecy was fulfilled in 164 BC (the first Hanukkah) when Judas Maccabaeus rededicated the temple and reestablished the tamid sacrifices three years after Antiochus Epiphanes abolished them and erected an idolatrous altar in the temple in 167 BC (1 Macc. 4:52-4). If we understand ‘ereb boqer as 24-hour periods, however, there is no apparent terminus a quo to which this fulfillment would correspond (171 BC), much less anything as specific as the abolition of the tamid sacrifices. Thus, the preponderance of evidence supports the view that the reference to 2,300 ‘ereb boqer in Dan. 8:13-14, 26 does not refer to 2,300 days, but rather to 2,300 tamid sacrifices.{xvi}
The ordering of “‘ereb” and “boqer”
In addition to the mere use of these two terms, their ordering is very unusual: for the ancient Hebrews, the calendar day was calculated from evening to evening (Exod. 12:18; Lev. 23:32; Neh. 13:19; Ps. 55:17).{xvii} Thus, to end the first day of creation with “and there was evening, and there was morning” would seem to contradict the Hebraic concept of the calendar day, since it would have the first creation day ending at morning instead of at evening. In fact, this detail has troubled many rabbinical commentators throughout history: “In order to remove this inconsistency, Jewish exegetes, both medieval and modern … sought to place forced and improbable interpretations on the words, and there was evening and there was morning.”{xviii} The author could have written “there was morning and there was evening,” or, better, he could have clearly defined the first day of creation as a calendar day by writing “there was evening and there was evening.” The fact that the first day of creation is represented as concluding at morning, and not at evening in accordance with the Hebrew definition of a calendar day strongly implies that it is not meant to be understood as a calendar day.
What are the options with these terms? Well, if we ignore the previous issue involving their use in the first place, if the author had written “and there was morning and there was evening,” the days of creation would probably be referring to daylight, since this is what comes between morning and evening. If he had written “and there was evening and there was evening,” the days of creation would clearly refer to calendar days, since this was the Hebrew definition of a calendar day. The only unusual statements would have been to write “and there was morning and there was morning,” or “and there was evening and there was morning.” The first would have been problematic, since it’s opposed to the Hebrew concept of a calendar day, and thus could be interpreted as distinguishing the creation days from calendar days. However, one could also argue that it may just be referring to the interval between two consecutive occurrences of this phase.
And this leaves us with what the Bible actually says: “and there was evening and there was morning.” This phrase isn’t referring to the interval between evening and morning, since this would neither be a period of daylight nor a 24-hour period. Nor can it be referring to the end of a calendar day, since it then would not be ending the day at evening, in accordance with the Hebrew calendar, but at morning. The placement of evening before morning is extremely problematic as long as we try to understand the days of creation as calendar days. If we understand it as an interruption in the flow of the passage, and as making up a discontinuity between the previous statement (which defines the phenomena of light and darkness) and the following statement (which names the first day of creation), it makes perfect sense.
Perhaps, it may be suggested, ‘ereb and boqer are only being used to symbolically represent the phenomena of darkness and light respectively. While there are a few biblical examples of this, the only other passages that use both terms and could reasonably be understood in this way are clearly poetic (Ps. 30:5), whereas Gen. 1 is, again, narrative. Not to mention the fact that this runs up against the prior objection that the author had just defined the phenomena of darkness and light with different terminology. Moreover, when these concepts are referred to elsewhere in Gen. 1, the term signifying light comes first, and the term signifying darkness comes second.{xix} But this is obviously not the case with the phrase “and there was evening and there was morning.” If “evening” was meant to symbolically refer to darkness, and “morning” was meant to symbolically refer to light, then their order is reversed from the rest of Gen. 1. Besides, proponents of the calendar-day interpretation tend to insist that their view is the literal one, and any denial of it is a refusal to take the Bible literally. So it would seem odd to defend this position by insisting that “evening” and “morning” are being used symbolically.
Another difficulty is that, if the first day of creation is ending at morning, it consisted of a period of darkness (vs. 2: “darkness was over the surface of the deep”), followed by a period of light (vs. 3-5a: “And God said, ‘Let there be light’”), followed by another period of darkness (vs. 5b: “and there was evening, and there was morning”). This strongly suggests that ‘ereb and boqer are not referring to parts of a calendar day at all. They are probably either referring to the completion of the first period of creation and the dawning of the next, or are being used as a merism to refer to the first day of creation as a whole, without reference to its temporal length. Either way, they are not referring to the phenomena of light and darkness, and thus cannot be used to defend the calendar-day interpretation.
Thus, by ending the first day of creation at morning, the author contradicts the Hebrew calendar in which each 24-hour period ended at evening. Therefore, the first day of creation is probably not referring to a calendar day.
Excursus: “yom” and “layelah”
Note that these difficulties do not arise with yom (day) and layelah (night), since when these two terms are mentioned together in Hebrew (as well as in most ancient Semitic languages), they are merely being used idiomatically in reference to a calendar day. That is, they are not meant to be understood sequentially (as a day followed by a night), but rather as a simple reference to a calendar day:
It is obvious from [a] cursory survey of Babylonian literature that there is no correlation between the type of calendar used and the use of the formula “day and night” or its inverse. The universal preference for the formula “day and night” reflects, as Segal remarks, “the ordinary course of human behaviour. It is at dawn that man begins the active work of the day, and, for that reason, a phrase current in man’s mouth is ‘day and night.’” It is not surprising, then, that the formula “day and night” is much more commonly attested than “night and day” in the pre-exilic biblical literature, regardless of the type of calendar used. And for the same reason it continues to be more common in the post-exilic books as well. … The language of the NT points in the same direction, namely that the use of the stereotyped expression “day and night,” or its inverse, bears no relation to the way of reckoning the day.{xx}
Thus, the author of Genesis could have said “and there was day and there was night, day one,” without implying a sequential pattern that would define the first day of creation differently from the Hebrew calendar in which each 24-hour period concluded at evening. Indeed, these two words would have been especially appropriate: not only are they usually understood as a reference to a 24-hour period, but they have also just been defined as referring to the phenomena of light and darkness in verse 5a.
The presence of the phrase “vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer”
Thus far, the three contentions I have raised are independent of one another; if one should be disproved, the other two still have to be dealt with before my premise can be disregarded. This next contention, however, is not independent, but rather takes the previous three into account without being merely a combination of them. What is at stake here is why the author would include the phrase vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer at all. If he had simply written “And God called the light day, and the darkness He called night—the first day,” it would strongly suggest that he intended the first day to refer to either the phenomena of light or that of light and darkness together. But instead he includes a phrase in which the three difficulties mentioned above arise. If the first day of creation was meant to be understood as a 24-hour period, the phrase vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer is completely superfluous and ambiguous.
The use of “yom echad”
In addition to the discontinuity in verse 5b, the phrase yom echad (“day one”) in verse 5c is also problematic. This corroborates the conclusion that the syntax in Gen. 1:5 is extremely unusual, and thus shouldn’t be understood superficially. There are two significant factors here: first, the definite article is absent (similarly, the other creation days are “a second day,” “a third day,” etc., except for “the sixth day”). “In Hebrew prose of this genre, the definite article was generally used where the noun was intended to be definite; only in poetic style could it be omitted.”{xxi} If the days of creation were meant to be understood as calendar days, there would be no reason for the definite article to be absent (unless Gen. 1 is considered poetic rather than narrative). Contrast this with the use of numerical qualifiers with each creation day: this does not imply or limit us to any particular definition of yom over another. All it seems to imply is that the days are sequential. As stated earlier, probably the best way to delineate long periods of time in ancient Hebrew is to use the word yom with a numerical qualifier, exactly as Gen. 1 does.{xxii}
Second, contrary to the other creation days, this phrase employs the cardinal number (echad—one) rather than the ordinal number (rashon—first). Elsewhere in the Old Testament, the ordinal number is nearly always used when enumerating periods of time. The only places where the cardinal could be used in place of the ordinal were in two specific idioms: the day of the month, or the year of a king’s reign. Since Gen. 1 is not using one of these idioms, the use of the cardinal in verse 5c is extremely unusual, and so suggests that the first day of creation should not be understood in the usual way.
[Echad] may be used in place of the ordinal [rashon] when enumerating time periods, but only in two special idioms. One of these designates the day of a month, the other the year of a reign of a king. In all other cases of periods of time (days, months or years) the ordinal number is used. Moreover, this use of the cardinal number [echad] is not exclusive to it, since any Hebrew cardinal number may be used in the same expressions, and only in those expressions. In addition, it should be noted that in every case for numbering a time period where a cardinal number is used to represent an ordinal number as well as in every case where a cardinal number is used to number a time period, the number is always explicitly definite, either by the presence of the article or by the governing noun having a pronominal suffix or because the governing noun is a proper noun.{xxiii}
So, in addition to the absence of the definite article and the use of the cardinal number, these two factors combine to form another anomaly. In the rare occasions when the cardinal number is substituted for the ordinal in reference to a period of time, the noun is always definite. But this is not the case for the phrase yom echad. The number is a cardinal, and the noun is indefinite. In fact, this exact phrase is used in only one other place in the Old Testament—in which it refers to a long period of time: Zech. 14:7-8.{xxiv}
Needless to say, this is not a new discovery. Origen (third century) and Basil (fourth century) both noted the unusual use of the cardinal instead of the ordinal number, and apparently Josephus (first century) did as well.{xxv}
The best explanation
Most calendar-day proponents freely admit that understanding yom as an undefined period of time is well within its semantic range, and is even understood as a longer period of time within the biblical creation narrative itself (Gen. 2:4).{xxvi} They maintain, however, that the context in Gen. 1 does not allow the days of creation to be understood as such. Henry Morris makes this point quite forcefully:
If the reader asks himself this question: “Suppose the writer of Genesis wished to teach his readers that all things were created and made in six literal days, then what words would he use to best convey this thought?” he would have to answer that the writer would have used the actual words in Genesis 1. If he wished to convey the idea of long geological ages, however, he could surely have done it far more clearly and effectively in other words than in those which he selected. It was clearly his intent to teach creation in six literal days.{xxvii}
As we have seen, however, this is simply false. In fact, it goes in precisely the opposite direction: if the author of Genesis was trying to communicate that the first day of creation was a 24-hour period, he could have made this point more clearly and effectively. To review: regarding the verb usage, he could have employed the customary method when a verb is repeated (vayahi … hayyah …); he could have simply used it once at the beginning of the phrase (vayahi … va-…); or he could have excluded it entirely (va-…va-…). This makes three alternatives. Regarding the nouns, he could have used either of the two pairs of terms he had just employed to define the phenomena of light and darkness (or and choshek or yom and layelah) in any order. This makes four alternatives. Or he could have made the terms he did use correspond to the Hebrew concept of a 24-hour period which ended at evening (boqer … ’ereb; ‘ereb … ’ereb). This makes two alternatives. Additionally, he could have simply written vayahi ‘ereb or va‘ereb or just excluded the phrase altogether.
I realize it’s petty to count up all the alternate ways the author could have written this phrase, but Morris’s claim, and many similar ones throughout the young-earth literature, calls for a complete response. So far we have twelve alternate ways the author could have more clearly represented the first creation day as a calendar day, or at least to the phenomena of light and darkness. But we also have to take into account that any combination of the verb alternatives with the noun alternatives would also be a more effective method (i.e. vaor vachoshek; vayahi ‘ereb va’ereb; etc.). Three verb alternatives times six noun alternatives (four alternatives with other terms, and two with ‘ereb and boqer) makes 3 × (4 + 2) = 18. Adding these to the twelve alternatives used independently, there are 30 different ways the author of Genesis could have written verse 1:5 to communicate more clearly and effectively that the first day of creation was meant to be understood as a calendar day. This is not even taking into account the unusual nature of the phrase yom echad.
In short, the fact that he includes the phrase vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer with all of the difficulties it presents, and that the first day of creation is described as yom echad, contrary to how cardinal numbers and definite articles were used in ancient Hebrew, creates a discontinuity which serves to distinguish verse 5a from 5c—in other words, which dissociates the concepts of light and darkness from the first day of creation.
Conversely, if the author was trying to communicate that the first day of creation was not a calendar day, could he have stated this more clearly and effectively? As mentioned in the previous chapter, it seems fairly obvious to me that he could have made it clearer by simply inserting a qualifying statement after verse 5 or some kind of adjective to modify yom to emphasize that since the first day is God’s day and is a part of God’s week, it was not a calendar day. Of course, this would have been redundant, since this is at least implied by the discontinuity, and it seems pretty clear from the overall context of Gen. 1 that the days of creation are God’s days and make up God’s week; but it would have made the point clearer. However, in order to accomplish this, the author would have had to augment what he had already written, which would, paradoxically, complicate the text. While the first day of creation could have been defined more simply and efficiently as a calendar day, it could only have been distinguished from a calendar day more effectively by making it less simple, that is, by stating such explicitly after having already done so implicitly.
Objections and responses
Objection: The most natural reading of Gen. 1 is that the days of creation are 24-hour periods. Construing them as long periods of time is a forced interpretation.
Response: First, this chapter has provided exegetical evidence that the days of creation are not 24-hour periods. One must deal with this evidence before it can be dismissed as a forced interpretation.
Second, the elements of the discontinuity that I’ve stated in this chapter would have been obvious to the ancient Hebrews—they knew their own language better than we ever can, after all, and so would recognize extremely unusual departures from its normal use. Moreover, at least some of the early Church fathers thought the days of creation were periods of a thousand years each, so it clearly wasn’t a forced reading for them.{xxviii} Besides, it could equally be argued that to try to understand the first day of creation as a calendar day, when calendar days are explicitly introduced later on the fourth day, is at least as forced an interpretation as understanding the days of creation as long periods of time.
Third, the most natural reading is not always the correct reading. Just because the Bible is perspicuous (clear) it doesn’t mean that we can interpret it superficially. There are plenty of places in Scripture which seem to be saying something that they’re not: for example, Matt. 24, Mark 13, and Luke 17 seem to identify the fall of Jerusalem (which occurred in AD 70) with Christ’s return. In fact, it’s largely, if not exclusively, through extra-biblical evidence (secular history) that we know that these are two distinct events. When he is approached by the rich, young ruler Jesus seems to flat-out deny that he is God (Matt. 19:17; Mark 10:18; Luke 18:19). While I would argue that we should assume the simplest interpretation is correct unless it presents difficulties, the calendar-day interpretation certainly presents significant difficulties.
Fourth, God frequently obscures himself so that those who don’t want to believe in him can close their eyes to the evidence (Isa. 45:15; Mark 4:10-12; Luke 10:21; Rom. 11:7-8). Pascal wrote that God has given evidence which is sufficiently clear to convince those whose hearts and minds are open, but which is sufficiently vague so as not to compel those whose hearts and minds are closed.{xxix} As every Christian knows, God’s Word is, in one sense, very simple, and in another sense, incredibly complex. That’s why the gospel can be clearly understood by anybody, but at the same time we can spend the rest of our lives plumbing its depths without ever coming close to the bottom.
Objection: When the word yom is used in conjunction with either ‘ereb, boqer, or both elsewhere in the Bible (such as Exod. 10:13; Josh 8:29; 1 Sam 9:19; 1 Kgs. 22:35; 2 Chr 18:34; Prov 7:9), it’s meaning is limited to a calendar day.
Response: Well, first of all, this is false: Zech. 14:7 has yom echad and ‘ereb, but yom echad refers to a long time period.{xxx} Moreover, as was pointed out above, when ‘ereb and boqer are used together, they are usually related to each other by means of prepositions. The point being that the specific manner in which they are used in Gen. 1:5 is very unusual, and we should allow this to inform our interpretation.
Another point to make here is that the Old Testament sometimes uses yom in conjunction with choshek (darkness), one of the terms in Gen. 1:5, in reference to an extended period of time, i.e. a day of darkness (Joel 2:2; Zeph. 1:15), similar to the English phrase, “it will be a dark day when…”
Objection: The term vayahi is not just used as an introductory statement, but as a summarizing statement as well. Therefore, it is entirely appropriate to use at the conclusion of each creation day.
Response: But it’s used twice at the conclusion of each creation day. That’s what is so unusual. And while it is often used to summarize, it still has the general function of being an antithetical connection between what precedes it and what follows it. It is still similar to a new paragraph, regardless of whether the new paragraph is introductory or summarizing in nature. Vayahi can be translated as “and thus it came about.” If Gen. 1:5 simply said
And God called the light day and the darkness he called night.
¶And thus day one came about.
that would more in line with its common use. But Gen. 1:5 says:
And God called the light day and the darkness he called night.
¶And thus evening came about.
¶And thus morning came about. Day one.
The point being that this is a very unusual construction.
Objection: In Dan. 8:13-14, 26, the 2,300 ‘ereb boqer are referring to the usual understandings of “evening” and “morning,” whether you interpret it collectively (as 2,300 calendar days) or separately (as 2,300 evenings and mornings, and thus as 1,150 calendar days). This, then, is an example of these two terms being used in conjunction without prepositions, and referring to the normal definition of “evening” and “morning” as parts of a calendar day.
Response: But ‘ereb and boqer aren’t referring to evenings and mornings in the usual sense in this passage: they’re referring to the tamid sacrifices. They aren’t being used in conjunction to refer to calendar days idiomatically, as would be necessary in order to defend such a usage in Gen. 1:5. The context determines how they should be understood, and since the context is the evening and morning sacrifices, they should be interpreted as referring to these sacrifices, not to the parts of a calendar day. Similarly, if the context of Gen. 1 is that the days of creation are distinct from calendar days, ‘ereb and boqer don’t refer to the parts of a calendar day.
Objection: If we were meant to understand the days of creation as long periods of time, we wouldn’t have the “normal” meaning of day right there in the same verse. The context implies that the days of creation are 24-hour periods.
Response: First, if by the “normal” meaning of day we mean a calendar day, then it is not in the same verse. It’s specifically introduced several verses later on day four, and so should not be read into the text before this point. Second, the calendar day interpretation holds that yom has two different definitions in Gen. 1:5, just as much as the day-age interpretation does: daylight and a 24-hour period. Third, the context of Gen. 1 is God’s activity as opposed to human activity. Yom frequently refers to long time spans in this context. Moreover, Gen. 1 is clearly God’s workweek, and as I’ve already stated, God’s experience of time is radically different than ours.
If part of the purpose of Gen. 1 is to show the parallel between God’s workweek and humanity’s (which it is), and if yom is the best Hebrew word that could have been used to delineate long periods of time (which it is), and if some of the main events God wanted to describe were the differentiation between light and darkness, as well as between days, seasons, and years (as they were), we would expect Gen. 1 to say exactly what it says. Additionally, this objection fails to recognize how elastic the usage of yom, as well as most ancient Hebrew words, was. As has already been stated, the word yom is used twice in Zech. 14:7 to represent two different concepts: daylight and a long period of time, just like Gen. 1:5. What it comes down to is this: if the syntax, grammar, and structure of a passage is particularly unusual and out of the ordinary, it probably wasn’t intended to be understood in the usual and ordinary way.
Notes:
{i} Origen, De Principiis 4:1:16.
{ii} E. Kautzsch (1910), 327. He defines “loose and external” as “antithetical” in the preceding paragraph.
{iii} vs. 2, 4, 7, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, and 31.
{iv} Umberto Cassuto (1961), 27. Cassuto tries to explain the present anomaly by stating that “…the brevity of the clauses and the tendency to stress the parallelism resulted in the verbs appearing twice…” (ibid.). However, it is unclear what he means by this: if he means that the evening/morning pair are meant to parallel the light/darkness and day/night pairings found throughout Gen. 1, then it is evident that this fails since in the latter examples the term representing light comes first, and in the former the term representing darkness does (note {xix} below). Plus, such a parallelism would not have any bearing on the use of the verb. On the other hand, if he’s just referring to the fact that the phrase vayahi-‘ereb vayahi-boqer is repeated several times throughout Gen. 1, then, again, I don’t see why this should require such an unusual use of the verb: any repeated phrase would function as parallelism in this case. On the third hand (!), if he means that the author was trying to create a parallelism within the clause itself by having a repeated term, this simply strikes me as enormously implausible: parallelism is used as an aid to memorization. To augment an extremely short clause in order to create a parallelism within it would make it harder to memorize, since it would add more terms which one would have to commit to memory. Moreover, the mere use of va- (and) before each of the two terms (va’ereb vaboqer) would create just as much of a parallelism without using a verb in a manner that contradicts a “fundamental rule of Biblical narrative style.”
{v} BDB, 787-8; TWOT, 694 (1689a); GHCL, 652.
{vi} BDB, 133-4; TWOT, 125 (274c); GHCL, 137.
{vii} Ignoring for the moment the point raised earlier that day and night as calendar concepts are not defined until the fourth day of creation.
{viii} BDB, 21; TWOT, 25-6 (52); GHCL, 23-4.
{ix} BDB, 364-5; TWOT, 770 (769).
{x} John Sailhamer (1992).
{xi} See notes {v} and {vi}.
{xii} Deut. 28:67; 2 Chr. 31:3; Ps. 55:17; Isa. 17:14; Dan. 8:13-14, 26.
{xiii} BDB, 538-9; TWOT, 478-9 (1111); GHCL, 438.
{xiv} See chapter 1.
{xv} R. K. Harrison (1988), 587-8.
{xvi} G. C. Aalders (1965), 165; James A. Montgomery (1972), 342-4; Louis F. Hartman and Alexander A. Di Lella (1978), 227; Gleason Archer (1985), 102-3; John J. Collins (1993), 336. For contrary views, see C. F. Keil (1949), 301-8; John E. Goldingay (1989), 213; and S. J. Schwantes (1978).
{xvii} See also, “Day” (1903); “Day and Night” (1971); and Bonnie Blackburn and Leofranc Holford-Stevens (1999), 661, 722.
{xviii} Cassuto (1961), 28, italics in original.
{xix} vs. 4, 5a, 14, 16, and 18.
{xx} Schwantes (1978), 383. His quotation is from J. B. Segal (1957), 254.
{xxi} Gleason Archer (1982), 61.
{xxii} See chapter 1.
{xxiii} Andrew E. Steinmann (2002), 580-1, italics in original. Steinmann goes on to claim that we should understand the first day of creation as a calendar day anyway because of the use of the terms “evening” and “morning.”
{xxiv} This passage is discussed in chapter 5.
{xxv} Origen, Homilies on Genesis and Exodus 71:48; Basil, The Hexaemeron, p. 64; Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews, p. 32. Josephus only says that he plans to comment on the phrase yom echad, which of course suggests that there is something about it that requires commenting. He never got back to it.
{xxvi} Henry Morris (1985), 223; John C. Whitcomb Jr. (1972), 27. This verse is discussed in chapter 5.
{xxvii} Henry Morris (1981), 54. Morris doesn’t supply any reasons why defining yom as a long period of time doesn’t qualify as a literal definition.
{xxviii} See chapter 8 and the appendix.
{xxix} Blaise Pascal, Pensées, § 430.
{xxx} See chapter 5.