This fact was noted by Martin Luther in his commentary on Genesis: It is impossible for these “Waters above the Firmament” to be the water of the clouds. But here we see that “the expanse of the Heavens” CONTAINS the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars.
The water cycle doesn’t even extend beyond the troposphere. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
And God made the two great lights-the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night-and the stars. And God set them in the expanse ( raqia) of the heavens ( shamayim) to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And then we see what is placed in “the Heavens” on the fourth day:Īnd God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. All you must do is see that this “expanse” ( raqia) is re-named “the Heavens” ( shamayim) by God. This comes from our modern scientific understanding of the water cycle:īut even a casual reading will show that this is NOT what is happening. It is typical for a modern reader (and even a modern pastor) to equate the “Waters above the Firmament” with clouds. We’re going to explore the “Waters above the Firmament.” Are They Clouds? WHY DOESN’T ANYBODY EVER TALK ABOUT THIS SUPPOSEDLY ENORMOUS BODY OF WATER EVER AGAIN ? WHAT ABOUT THE WATERS ABOVE THE FIRMAMENT? Instead, this post is about something much bigger: These small issues of word translation are interesting to nerds like me (and maybe you, too, if you’re reading this). Things get a little bit better with the word “Heavens” ( shamayim) because that word is a bit more consistent in scripture, even though it does not break down to our modern differentiation between “atmosphere” and “space.” (For the record, I am not a fan of the translation “sky,” because - as I will explain below - I think that puts a modern atmosphere-looking square peg into the Hebrew shamayim-looking round hole.) That doesn’t affect a casual reader, but if you want a technical understanding, that difference becomes quite relevant. That is confusing enough, because there are definitely minor differences between a “vault” or a “firmament” (which create the word picture of a dome on a building) and an “expanse” (which creates the word picture of empty space). Regardless of what you call this thing initially, we see that God names it later as “Heavens” (ESV, ASV, KJV,) or “sky” (NIV, CSB). The weird part is the fact that this “expanse” (Hebrew: raqia) separates “the waters from the waters.” The traditional word for raqia is “the firmament” (KJV, ASV),” while the “expanse” (ESV, CSB) or “vault” (NIV) have been more recent ways to translate. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.Īnd God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.Īnd God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” And God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And God separated the light from the darkness. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.Īnd God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. The second day of creation is… …strange, even for those who believe that God created the world out of nothing.
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