Day One The work of day one at first appears to include only the creation of light. Howeve

Day One                                                                
                                                                       
    The work of day one at first appears to include only the creation  
of light. However, if in keeping with Exodus 20:11 all things were     
created within this week, then day one actually begins in verse one,   
with the creation of the watery void called "Earth." Besides the       
initial creation of the Earth in a waste and void (i.e., unformed and  
unfilled) condition on day one, the Creator also calls light out of    
nowhere into existence. Henry Morris suggests what this may have       
involved:                                                              
                                                                       
    It is obvious that visible light is primarily meant, since         
    it was set in contrast to darkness. At the same time, the          
    presence of visible light waves necessarily involves the           
    entire electromagnetic spectrum.... In turn, setting the           
    electromagnetic forces into operation in effect completed          
    the energizing of the physical cosmos. All the types of            
    force and energy which interact in the universe involve            
    only electromagnetic, gravitational, and nuclear forces;           
    and all these had now been activated (1976, p 56).                 
                                                                       
Moses makes no excuses for teaching that light existed prior to the    
luminaries. H.C. Leupold appropriately comments, "If scientists now    
often regard light as merely enveloping the Sun but not as an intrinsic
part of it, why could it not have existed by itself without being      
localized in any heavenly body?" (1942, p 55).                         
    The discussion of day one concludes with the phrase, "And there was
evening and there was morning, one day" (ASV). Many have taken this to 
mean that the creation days were reckoned from evening to evening in   
keeping with the Hebrew custom. However, this view, "...fails utterly, 
because verse 5 reports the conclusion of this day's work not its      
beginning" (Leupold, p 56). Thomas Aquinas agrees and explains further:
                                                                       
    The reason for mentioning the evening first is that as the         
    evening ends the day, which begins with the light, the             
    termination of the light at evening precedes the termination       
    of the darkness, which ends with the morning (`Summa I,' p 377).   
                                                                       
Derek Kidner comments: "The [King James Version's] `the evening and the
morning were' gives the misleading impression that the reckoning starts
with evening. Rather translate it `evening came and morning came'..."  
(1967, p 47). These considerations lead to the conclusion that the days
of the Earth's first week were not reckoned according to Hebrew custom 
(from sunset to sunset) or like the current practice (from midnight to 
midnight), but instead from sunrise to sunrise ("" is used figuratively
for days one to three since the Sun was not created until day four).   
Keil concurs: "The first day commenced at the moment when God caused   
the light to break forth from the darkness..." (1980, p 51).  This     
point is significant when one considers the false charge that God is   
here pictured as going about His activities as a faithful Jew. This is 
further proof that Genesis 1 is not Hebrew myth; for what spinner of   
Jewish folklore would dream of Jehovah beginning His days in the       
morning?