And God said: “Let there be light.†Then there was light. After that God saw that the light was good, and God began to divide the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, but the darkness he called Night. Genesis 1:3-5b Whoa, heresy, this is God creating the sun right? Not likely! The sun, moon and stars are created in verses 14 - 18 And God went on to make the two great luminaries, the greater luminary for dominating the day and the lesser luminary for dominating the night, and also the stars. 17 Thus God put them in the expanse of the heavens to shine upon the earth 18 and to dominate by day and by night and to make a division between the light and the darkness Compare this to John 1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god. And also: And the light is shining in the darkness, but the darkness has not overpowered it. The true light that gives light to every sort of man was about to come into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into existence through him, but the world did not know him. And in the end: The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. Revelation 21:23 Full circle!
So the 'light' is the universe .. which seems obvious on the surface, but the stars were created in verse 17. First we see earth, in a void (presuming we are imposing *some* science on this text) then the 'light', then back to earth... THEN the sun, moon, stars. Jehovah produced me as the beginning of his way, The earliest of his achievements of long ago. Proverbs 8:22
The way I see it, it seems a bit like the big bang. You have a big flash of light, then as the energy and matter spreads there becomes areas of darkness.
Interesting though that Jesus was the firstborn of creation, is called the light, and divides between 'light and dark'. Non-earth matter is created in verses 14 - 17 [and for that reason, I see all of chapter 1 as metaphorical, and conveying intention and not 'scientific method'] So, it's plausible that the light was Jesus, given that sun, moon, stars and day/night cycle is covered elsewhere.
It would appear that verses 14-17 are speaking of our solar system itself and or our entire galaxy as well. Keep in mind that the only stars we can see from earth are those in our galaxy. So quite literally the scriptures could be talking about our system and galaxy without speaking of the entire universe. I don't see enough information to conclude Genesis is speaking of any other creations other the in our universe. Light and the lack of light is the main structure of our universe. Keep in mind that if the big bang is correct then stars would not have formed for millions of years after the initial big flash. As well if your going to say that Jesus is light and darkness is evil that goes back to our discussion of sin and Jehovah having created it. As you know I believe that Jehovah never created anything that wasn't absolutely perfect and he chose not to know those would sin against him.
Hi All: Check these out... 7 I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil. I am Jehovah, that doeth all these things American Standard 7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things. KJV 7 Forming light, and preparing darkness, Making peace, and preparing evil, I [am] Jehovah, doing all these things.' Young’s Literal 7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these [things]. Webster Bible 7 I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things. English Standard Version I form light+ and create darkness,+ I make peace+ and create calamity;+ I, Jehovah, am doing all these things. NWT I chose these rather randomly from here. Link does not work http://www.biblestudytools.com/esv/isaiah/45.html that one does! frank
The scripture explains itself, it says Jehovah makes peace and calamity. We all know of Jehovah's vengeful side, but he offers peace first. Does this however mean that Genesis Ch1 is speaking of the light and darkness metaphorically? Of course not, and why you may ask? Because Genesis never connects the use of "o-wr" (light) to the word (piece) "Salowm" such as Isaiah does. As well the word for darkness in Isa 45:7 denotes a specific darkness while the word in it's text in Gen is meant to denote darkness in general. Compare "hosek" & "hahosek". Gen is clearly speaking of the light and darkness in our physical universe because that is the subject it is speaking of. You cannot connect light to Jesus in Genesis any more then you can connect the light of the earth and moon to Jesus or the night to evil. These would be simply interpretations.
Have you forgotten the logic explanation to Genesis 1 in the Creation book? Genesis 1 is written from human standpoint. That verses 14 to 18 speaks about appearance of sun and moon is well explained in the creation book. It explains as I remember that because of thick clouds and may be smoke it was first dark on the earth's surface. Later it became clearer gradually and there was some light , and then in the stage of verses 14-18 it became completely clear in the atmosphere and you could see the moon, stars and the sun.
Jan and Joshua are likely correct - but there is a conundrum, because there are two 'lights' that divide darkness. The first light, which is not identified in verse 3. And the sun, moon and stars in 14 - 18. I'm not sure this mystery is solved necessarily. But maybe it's not a mystery at all
I agree SingleCell that it would appear to show two different lights, but think about it this way. Light does not have to come from only stars/fusion. Light can be created in different ways, from electricity, bio-electric, simple friction, light existed before the stars. So it would appear that the point of the first mention of light and darkness is just making a generality. Light pretty much incubuses all of the forces known in our universe. So Gen 1 is saying that he created light itself, not necessarily stars. Also keep in mind that darkness really isn't something within itself but the lack of light, and as well this is also a good way of thinking of evil. Evil isn't anything within itself, it is simply the lack of Jehovah.
Is Jesus the light ??? just throwing this one out there for you to consider .. John 3. 16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. in this respect it reflects the "nature" of something or character ..
I'm not so sure! If we are calling that first light 'physical', and eons before Jehovah was 'in the darkness', then we run into a whole host of other issues (logical issues). The Bible starts with the light. The Bible ends with the light, except the light is Jehovah and the lamp is the lamb. Symbolism in the tail end but not the front end? I'm wondering if Jesus is verse 3, and Jehovah uses Jesus to divide between light and dark in this universe? Then, the physical separation from light and dark in verse 14 - 18.
There has been many generations of stars exploding into supernovas before the Sun and our solar system came into existence. As Hubert Reeves said, we are but stellar dust !
Light is made up of photons. Strictly speaking, light is only a convenient way to name what the human eye can pick up, or thereabouts. Light as we usually understand it only came to existence once the universe was cold enough to allow photons to exist and go through it. * I had started a discussion about it all with Tsaphah a few weeks ago but I gave up because I didn't feel like making research and typing a post for hours about cosmology and physical laws during and after the Big Bang that nobody may find of interest and read, after all... All the information about this subject is available online.
How do you see the creation happening? Universe (sometime before Genesis) -> earth -> our solar system? -> earths inhabitants?
It's late here and gotta have some shuteye BUT... in the meantime, you might have a hint about what I think if you read again "what is truth, what is faith ?"
I think it's time to move to the US Utuna. This late night / mid-day disconnect just isn't working for us I'll search for the thread!