Why did the author of Genesis 1 choose six + one (seven) days of creation and not three or ten or twelve–or no days at all? He plainly tells us why. Part 2 of 5 in the series on Gen. 1-11.

Starting off, your and my interpretations of Gen. 1-11 are secondary issues or even below that and are not tests for orthodoxy. Since our interpretations are peripheral, let’s remember this wise statement:

In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; and in all things charity (love)

Now let’s get started.

For every person who attends a mega-church, a mid-sized or a small one, there are millions who don’t. Blame them? Bad idea. That’s like blaming the customers for not walking into your shop. Maybe they don’t like what you’re selling.

There are many excuses and reasons why they don’t come, but surely what follows is one of them. A survey shows that, in part, narrow creationism drives people, particularly the young, away from church. Another survey says it hurts Christian colleges.

This reaction is understandable. Let’s see if we can answer their concerns by reexamining Genesis 1. It’s time to cease from expending our energy to keep all the plates spinning–spinning because we interpret it scientifically, while the ancient author knew nothing of modern science. Reading Gen. 1 thus becomes exhausting, not restful or joyful!

Interpreting Genesis 1

To see the ancient author’s explanation for choosing six days, let’s lay out the basic structure of the text. It is rhythmical and poetic in its repetition and cadence.

• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.” (verse 5)
• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day.” (v. 8)
• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day.” (v. 13)
• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the fourth day.” (v. 18)
• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the fifth day.” (v. 23)
• “And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.” (v. 31)

Here is the culmination and purpose of the six-day creation structure of Gen 1:

¹ Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. ² By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. ³ And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done (Gen. 2:1-3)

(The verses throughout the Bible were numbered by Robert Stephanus [lived 1503-59]. In Gen. 2:1-3, he got it wrong, for those verses should have been included within Gen 1, at the end.)

This seventh-day significance is confirmed in the precise same section of Scripture in verse 14:

And God said, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years. (Gen. 1:14 emphasis added)

Clearly the original Hebrew author, divinely inspired when he put writing instrument to writing material, had in his mind religious practice.

The Sabbath lesson is reinforced in Ex. 20:8-11, in the middle of the mighty Ten Commandments. God kept the Sabbath after he created / worked six days when he made the world. Verse 11 looks very similar to Gen. 2:1-3.

⁸ “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. ⁹ Six days you shall labor and do all your work, ¹⁰ but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. … ¹¹ For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Ex. 20:8-11)

So in Gen. 1 and 2:1-3, God, leading by example, shows the ancient Hebrew reader or listener that he must keep the Sabbath, and in Ex. 20:8-11, he tells him. In both, he is depicted as a creator / worker. The Sabbath is so important that even God instituted and kept it by ceasing from his labor of creating and making in six days!

Other poetic elements involve the number seven or its multiples (from Wenham in the book Genesis, ed. by Charles Halton):

• 1:1 contains seven (Hebrew) words and verse 2 contains fourteen words (2 x 7).
• The closing verses 2:1-13 contain thirty-five words (7 x 5).
• In 1:1 to 2:1-3, the word God appears thirty-five times (7 x 5).
• In the same long section the word earth twenty-one times (7 x 3).
• In the same long section these clauses appear seven times: “and it was so” and “God saw that it was good.”

This appearance of seven and its multiples draws attention to the seventh day, the Sabbath (sabbath = seven).

Clearly, then, the six-and-seven days framework and other sevens (confirmed by other religious festivals or days in v. 14) mean that the entire section of Scripture is run through the filter of religious practice and is not intended to be forced into the meat grinder of modern science.

Thus these poetic, theological elements no longer bind us to interpret Gen. 1:1 to 2:3 scientifically and certainly not historically; we can be free of this modern concern and anachronism (out of sequence or bad chronology).

What I get out of Genesis 1: (1) God is the creator; (2) the universe had a beginning; (3) humankind is made in God’s image; and (4) God is the Ultimate Sabbath keeper. The fourth point is time bound or has an expiration date, becoming unnecessary in the New Covenant. The first and third are timeless. The second point is confirmed by science, but who knows? Maybe science will change, so the second point is potentially timeless, but not on the same level as God being the creator and humankind are made in God’s image, which are timeless.

Psalm 148 is clearer and simpler

This psalm does without the Sabbath concerns of Genesis 1. In contrast, let’s very quickly look at Psalm 148, which mentions one decree:

Reduced to its essence, Gen. 1 is about creation and its Creator. Also, God is shown, poetically and metaphorically, to have become a Hebrew worker who instituted and honored the Sabbath long before actual Hebrews lived and this ritual law existed at Mt. Sinai, but also at creation! This inspired anachronism (out-of-sequence chronology) opens the door to alternative interpretations that are not scientific.

Psalm 148, also reduced to its essence on creation, shows that God is the Creator. This interpretation is more streamlined and clearer (to me at least). I like it.

What is another reason for the seven days?

Perhaps there is a profounder meaning to the seven days.

John H. Walton sees that in the cultural context of the Ancient Near East, Gen. 1 shows that God put order and function (roles for sun, moon, stars, etc.) into the formless and void cosmos and from its material built a temple into which he entered. Entering his cosmic temple on the seventh day is his Sabbath rest. Now order rules, and humans are his representatives or images to take care of his creation. Walton writes:

When God rests on the seventh day, he is taking up his residence in the ordered system that he has brought about in the previous six days. It is not something that he does only on the seventh day; it is what he does every day thereafter. Furthermore, his rest is not just a matter of having a place of residence—he is exercising his control over this ordered system where he intends to relate to people whom he has placed there and for whom he has made the system function. It is his place of residence, it is a place for relationships, but, beyond those, it is also a place of his rule…. (Lost World of Adam and Eve, 48)

Walton’s main thesis in Lost World of Genesis One can be boiled down thus:

Cosmos = Temple

Six days of making and creating = Inaugurating, building order and function and roles into chaotic cosmos;

Seventh day of rest = God’s inaugurating and taking up residence in cosmic temple;

Humans = Appointed representatives (images) and caretakers of God’s world / temple;

Material origins of universe = not mentioned or involved in Gen. 1;

Therefore, “the seven days concern the inauguration of the functional cosmic temple rather than the time over which the material cosmos came into existence.” (Source)

Therefore, let’s stop imposing modern science on Gen. 1

Walton agrees with the Sabbath lesson, but says it does not go far enough (pp. 111-12). He also agrees that Gen. 1 has deeper theological purposes than modern science. Gen. 1 fits in its ancient historical context, not a modern one.

Ben Stanhope provides the biblical evidence for the parallels between the creation of the cosmos and the construction of the desert tabernacle and Solomon’s later temple  (pp. 150-51).

Here are the data points:

1. Moses built the tabernacle (Exod. 40:17-33), and seven times it is repeated throughout the process that God tells him he has carried out the commands of God. That is, the tabernacle was constructed by seven commands of God.
2. The tabernacle priests were ordained in a seven-day process. (See Ordination of Aaron and Sons in Leviticus 8 from a NT Perspective)
3. Gen 2:2 says “when God finished the work”; Exod. 40:33 reads: “When Moses had finished the work” (Exod. 40:33)
4. Gen. 2:3 says that when God completed the creation, He “blessed the seventh day.” After the tabernacle was completed, Moses “blessed them.” (Exod. 40:9)
5. After the blessing, God sanctified creation (Exod. 2:3). Moses sanctified the tabernacle and all its furnishing (Exod. 40:9)
6. God’s presence was in Eden as it was in the tabernacle. He “walked” in the Garden (Gen. 3:8). God “walked” about in the tabernacle (Lev. 26:12; Deut. 23:15). It’s the same verb in Hebrew.
7. Adam and Eve were to “work and keep” the garden (Gen. 2:15). Those two verbs in Hebrew are used only together to describe the job obligations of the priests who kept the tabernacle and later temple (Num. 7-8; 8:25-26; 1 Chron. 23:32; Ezek. 44:14).
8. The furnishings of the tabernacle resemble garden imagery; that is, the seven branched lampstand was modeled after the tree of life. Solomon’s architectural temple carvings enhanced the garden imagery (1 Kings 6). Both the Garden and the temple were guarded by cherubim (Gen. 3:24; 1 Kings 6 and 8).

Now let’s look briefly at the inauguration of the temple of Solomon.

• The temple took seven years to construct (1 Kings 6:36)
• The inauguration was dedicated during a seven-day festival which occurred on the seventh month (1 Kings 8:2).
• Solomon’s speech in the temple included seven petitions (1 Kings 8:31-53)
• God rested on the seven day of creation. In Ancient Near Eastern religions, the deity came to rest, that is, cease from work within it. Ps. 132:13-14 says that God rests on Zion (the mountain where the temple was).

One important verse among many about the parallels:

He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth that he established forever. (Ps. 78:69, NIV)

This evidence is very convincing. It is always the right interpretation to look at the text in its ancient context and in light of other Scriptures. Therefore, let’s not impose modern science on Gen. 1. Once again, that’s like demanding that Shakespeare must write about cars and jet planes. That’s not a fair demand placed on him.

Instead, let’s draw from Gen. 1 theological and moral truths.

Replying to Objections and Questions

1. Objection:

This is nothing but an old interpretation called the “framework hypothesis.”

Reply:

It goes deeper than that old (but still relevant) hypothesis. It is a Sabbath lesson as well as honoring other sacred days and seasons: God kept it and honored them, and so should ancient Hebrews! And whether this interpretation is old or recent, it is the clearest one of Gen. 1:1-2:1-3, since the entire passage states it explicitly–the framework of six-and-seventh days. It has stood the test of time.

2. Objection:

Do Christians have to keep the Sabbath?

Reply:

Christians don’t have to keep the Sabbath or other OT sacred days, unless they want to (Matt. 12:1-14, Rom. 14:5 and Col. 2:16-17). God’s keeping the Sabbath in Gen. 1:1-2:1-3 (and Ex. 20:8-11) is merely an object lesson or illustration that leads by example. And noted, the seventh day of rest could be interpreted as the inauguration of his cosmic temple.

Please see:

Do Christians Have to ‘Keep’ the Ten Commandments?

What Does the New Covenant Retain from the Old?

3. Question:

Are you saying Gen. 1 is a (false) myth and anti-historical?

Not a myth at all! The living God really did create those things. However, the Sabbath structure showing God to be a devout Hebrew worker (at creation before the Hebrews and their law existed!) who honored and kept the Sabbath—indeed instituted it!—is incidental to the eternal truth that God is the Creator, large and in charge. The inspired biblical author also used the seven-day framework to show that God was creating a Cosmic temple.

As for the Gen. 1’s historicity, how could this writing be historical in the modern or ancient senses when the author was no eyewitness? How could any human witness creation at the beginning? How could the traditions about creation be handed down at all, let alone reliably? The author’s status as a non-eyewitness gave him permission, as noted, to create a poetic narrative about God being the Creator and keeping the Sabbath and ordering and inaugurating a cosmic temple). It is–and can only be–a free interpretation.

Some biblical authors knew how to do historical research. Here is how Luke describes his research:

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, ² just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.³ With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account…. (Luke 1:1-3, NIV)

And yes, the ancient Hebrews knew how to keep historical records. Here is one verse among many:

As for the other events of Rehoboam’s reign, and all he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? (1 Kings 14:29; cf. 1 Kings 11:41; 1 King 15:7; 1 Kings 15:23; 1 Kings 15:31; and so on)

Gen. 1 is not an historical account, for they describe events that happened 13.7 billion years ago, so how could it be historical? Gen. 1 is dominated by theology and practical / moral behavior. Therefore, let’s keep a loose grip on Gen. 1 and not force it through the meat grinder of modern science and history, biblical or modern.

4. Objection:

The text plainly says six days of twenty-four hours. So we must scientifically interpret it within that stated timeframe, or else Gen. 1 is a lie.

Reply:

One’s interpretation can be mistaken. The twenty-four hour day is clear (“and there was evening, and there was morning”). But how do we dare ignore the author’s stated intention of God’s Sabbath keeping or temple building? A Sabbath teaching required him to use the structure of six days and the seventh day. And temple building also was traditionally set with the number seven. And how could the author be said to lie when he fulfilled his stated purpose? Therefore, the word lie is misguided here, and so is scientific demands imposed on six days of twenty-four hours.

As for the belief that God actually and really completed (in the real world outside the poetic narrative of Gen. 1) his work 6,000 to 10,000 years ago in literal twenty-four hour, six days (but made things look old for some strange, deceptive reason), consider these established facts: The evidence is overwhelming that the universe is about 13.7 or 13.8 billion years old, and the earth is about 4.5 billion years old, facts which can be tested and confirmed several ways. Paleontology and fossils say that dinosaurs and other living organisms lived tens and hundreds of millions and even over a billion years ago. Paleontology and genetics tell us that humans like us appeared about 100,000 to 150,000 years ago.

If certain Christians keep promoting silliness about a young earth, they will make Gen. 1 appear discredited—by their scientific interpretation—and scare off honest and intelligent seekers from the eternal theological truths of Scripture, like God the Creator, humankind made in his image, salvation and the kingdom of God.

5. Question:

Can’t the six days be worked out to be six ages of millions or even billions of years? After all, Psalm 90:4 says, “A thousand years in your sight are like a day just gone by.”

Reply:

The text in Gen. 1 is clear that a day is not a thousand years, for this refrain is repeated six times: “and there was evening, and there was morning.” However, once we understand the ancient author’s original purpose, then we do not have to perform interpretive gymnastics just to make modern science dominate or interpret this premodern text. And it’s not clear that the author of Gen. 1 understood millions of years between each day. It is a sure thing he understood day and evening as everyone of his contemporaries did.

Therefore, in light of the temple inauguration (and Sabbath keeping), the seven days are literally twenty-four hours, says Stanhope, but that’s not the point because Gen. 1 is a story about God creating the cosmic temple. Stanhope writes: “Therefore, it turns out that the seven days of Genesis, which the church has been in an insecure frenzy over for centuries, were chiefly selected by the biblical authors because they were a common cultural form for the inauguration period of a temple” (p. 154),

6. Objection:

If we don’t interpret Gen. 1 literally, then we cannot consistently and rightly interpret the resurrection of Christ literally.

Reply:

Now that’s a non sequitur! Creation could not have any human eyewitness, so God inspired the author of Gen. 1 to frame it freely, non-scientifically (in the modern sense), and analogically. (Think of a clock whose hands point to the right time; that’s analogical.) On the other side, Christ’s life, death, and resurrection had plenty of eyewitnesses. The earliest eyewitness preachers preached it literally and digitally. (Think of a clock that gives you the time with actual digits: 11:59.)

³ For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴ that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵ and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. ⁶ After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷ Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸ and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. (1 Cor. 15:3-8 NIV)

So there is absolutely no necessary connection between how Gen. 1 was written (analogically) and the preaching of the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Christ (digitally).

7. Objection:

But all truth is God’s truth. He inspired Gen. 1, so we can cross-examine it by modern science, which is also God’s truth.

Reply:

Remember, when Gen. 1 was written (and before), no human was an eyewitness to creation, nor could he be. Therefore, that infallible, inspired biblical chapter is definitely a free interpretation. God inspired the ancient author to write Scripture infallibly, yes, but the author kept his brain intact and was not an android under the influence of dictation or spooky auto-writing. He wrote to his ancient Jewish culture in the Ancient Near East. Despite this divine inspiration, he did not know and could not have known about modern science. Imposing it is a Category Mistake.

The Bible may have been written for all humans in all times, but it was not written originally to them.

As for “science” in Gen. 1, here is a list of some created things: light; water in the sky above the (hard) vault; land and vegetation; greater light (the sun), the lesser light (the moon), and stars; the seas and waters and living creatures in the sea and water; birds, animals, and humans.

That list of rudimentary “science,” observable by ancient humans, is purposed merely to show the theological truth that God created them. The how he did it (other than speaking) takes second place to the truth that he did it and why.

Thus, forcing those natural elements through the filter of six sequential days in a progression (simple to complex) may work sometimes, but such hard concordism (harmonizing the Bible and modern science) can stretch the original purpose too far. For example, land produced vegetation before “the greater light to govern the day” (the sun) was created. So the author did not factor in normal photosynthesis by the sun. And astronomy can now tell us that the sun, moon, stars, and the other lights are not literally “set in” a hard sky vault (Gen. 1:14-19). The author believed in the vault because Ancient Near Easterners also believed it; the author of Gen. 1 lived in his own historical context, not ours. Concordism over-burdens the Gen. 1 beyond the existence of those natural and visible and created things stated in the text.

8. Objection:

Are you saying concordism (harmonizing the Bible with modern science) is always wrong?

Reply:

Some argue that concordism should not be done at all. And too much or hard concordism looks desperate and silly to harmonize what was never intended to be taken scientifically by modern standards and goes beyond the ancient, original author’s purpose.

Thus Walton says Gen. 1 does not even deal with the age of the earth or universe (Lost World of Genesis). Instead the author of Gen. 1 was concerned with demonstrating how God built order and function into the universe in six days and inaugurated the cosmic temple on the seventh day (and a Sabbath lesson).

I add–how could an ancient author determine the real and actual age of the universe? He did not have modern science to help him.

However, in many passages, the Bible describes the very, very basics of Ancient Near Eastern agriculture, like cattle grazing and crops growing and sheep producing wool. (Today, agriculture is a science.) Concordism is possible here. (But caution must also be used even in harmonizing the Bible with modern agricultural science, because Jesus said the mustard seed was smallest of all seeds, even though orchid seeds were smaller, so we accommodate him within his first-century Israelite agriculture, where the mustard seed really was the smallest.)

In the areas of astronomy and geology, one must use extreme caution. Better yet, don’t force agreement or concord or harmony at all in those and other areas (e.g. molecular biology), some would wisely say.

9. Objection:

It sounds like you believe truth and error is relative to a culture.

Reply:

Knowledge can be restricted to one’s culture. What people in the Ancient Near East did not or could not know (black holes or molecular biology) cannot be held against them. The list of created items, above, conforms to the barest of minimal science. But once again, the original author did not intend to present modern astronomy—he knew nothing about it. He was inspired to write infallibly, but not more deeply about science than what appeared to his eyes every day and night, from his limited, earth-bound perspective.

The author believed his words were true and error-free, to the best of his (limited) knowledge, with the added poetic structure of a Sabbath lesson and sacred days and seasons or inaugurating God’s cosmic temple.

Once again, accommodationism is the answer.

Interpreting the Bible and Accommodation

10. Question:

What is accommodationism?

Reply:

I wrote about it in the post linked above, but a quotation from it follows:

Accommodationism or to accommodate means these things: To allow for their ancient culture and outlook; to adapt our interpretation of their claims of the world of nature to their own time; to make room for their limited knowledge about advanced science; to relax about imposing our modern science on their limited knowledge of science.

Once again, see this link: Interpreting the Bible and Accommodation

Let’s not impose a modern scientific interpretation when it is not originally intended. Instead, let’s accommodate the premodern science of Gen. 1.

Conclusion

We live in the Age of Modern Science, and apparently this intellectual context gives permission to certain interpreters to place on the ancient text a science burden so heavy that the author’s original purpose gets distorted and over-interpreted. The fault lies not in inspired, infallible ancient Genesis, but in the modern science interpreters.

It is unfair and anachronistic to impose modern science on ancient Gen. 1. The ancient author was a devout Hebrew who was more interested in God’s creative power and the Sabbath and sacred days and seasons and the cosmic temple than modern astronomy. Therefore, Gen. 1 is a poetic narrative about the Sabbath and sacred days and seasons and God the Creator and the cosmic temple; Gen. 1 was true and error-free for him by the standards of his purpose, expressed through his experience with the natural world (what he saw with his own eyes); Gen. 1 was part of the ideas about origins circulating around the Ancient Near East.

Once again, imposing modern science on an ancient text is, in my view, a Category Mistake.

Therefore, accommodating the author in his historical context—as the historical-grammatical method demands—means that scientism and hard concordism and accusations of errors about modern science are misplaced and ungenerous.

Those two linked surveys, above in the introduction, about narrow creationism scaring people away from church show that if we don’t drop our hard scientific interpretations and concordism of Gen. 1; if we don’t interpret it by the author’s stated purpose of keeping the Sabbath and sacred days and seasons and building and inaugurating the cosmic temple; and if we don’t accommodate the inspired, infallible ancient author’s limited knowledge of modern science; then we will be responsible for scaring away honest and intelligent seekers from biblical, eternal, theological truths expressed in these incidental vehicles like the Sabbath lesson and creation. And we will drive Christian thinkers away from church and hurt Christian colleges.

Finally, Augustine (lived 354-430) said that the main mission of Bible interpretation is not to avoid errors or a mistake. It is not about correct interpretation primarily—though that is important in a secondary way. Rather, the main goal is charity or love. Augustine writes:

If he [the interpreter] is deceived in an interpretation that builds up charity [love], which is the end [goal or purpose] of the commandments, he is deceived in the same way as a man who leaves a road by mistake, but passes through a field in the same place towards which the road itself leads. (qtd. in Charles Halton, Genesis, p. 161, originally from On Christian Doctrine, trans. D. W. Robertson, Jr., p. 31)

Love should be the goal of our interpretation, not fighting. In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; in all things charity (love). Our interpretation of Gen. 1 is nonessential.

To the honest and intelligent seekers of Christ and his claims: don’t be scared off by narrow interpretations of an ancient, premodern poetic narrative.

SERIES ON GENESIS 1-11

1. Genesis 1-11 in Its Ancient Religious Environment

2. Reading Genesis 1 as Originally Intended

3. Adam and Evolution: Five Options

4. Save Our Ship! Rescuing Noah’s Ark from Flood of Science

5. The Real Significance of Genealogies in Genesis 5-11

RELATED POSTS

Is Our Sin Nature Embedded in Our Mammal Nature?

Christian Scientists Comment on Young Earth Creationism

Billy Graham and Evolution

Interpreting the Bible and Accommodation

Augustine Says No to Silly Interpretations of Genesis

Evolution = Intelligent Design = God’s Design

SOURCES

If any of the links below goes dead, just copy and paste the titles into a search engine.

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Alexander, Denis. Creation or Evolution: Do We Have to Choose? Rev. ed. (Monarch, 2014).

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Lam, Joseph. “The Biblical Creation in its Ancient Near Eastern Context.” BioLogos. (Jan. 2010).

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