The phrase “And there was evening and there was morning” is used on all six days of creation except the seventh day rest. What is being communicated by those words? What are some apparent discrepancies between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2?
The following is basically my talk on the days in Genesis 1: you can listen to the audio above. I’m including the below notes for reference and study.
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Specifically for this session I plan to cover the meaning of “day” (yom) in Genesis 1 and a little of the way Genesis 2 is a different creation account from Genesis 1.
I think a strong case can be made to show that “day” in Genesis 1 is intended to denote a literal 24-day by utilizing the criteria for biblical interpretation outlined by Pope Leo XIII and Vatican II.
[Review Principles of Biblical Study.]
Content and unity of all of scripture regarding “day” in Genesis 1
Let us start by taking a look at the first criteria regarding the content and unity of all of scripture as it bears upon the word “day” in Genesis 1.
1. What does yom denote in Genesis 1?
If yom “normally denotes a 24-hour day” but the “’days’ of creation are not intended to be read as literal history”, then what does yom denote in Genesis 1?
If yom is not intended to denote a 24-hour day, then what is intended by the phrase “And there was evening and there was morning”?
That phrase is used on all six days of creation with the Hebrew word yom.
And there was evening and there was morning, one day. (Genesis 1:5)
And there was evening and there was morning, a second day. (Gen. 1:8)
And there was evening and there was morning, a third day. (Gen. 1:13)
And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day. (Gen. 1:19)
And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day. (Gen. 1:23)
And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. (Gen. 1:31)
What evidence can be offered to show that when that phrase is used in conjunction with yom in Genesis 1 (as shown in the six sentences above) that yom is not intended to denote a 24-hour day in a literal historical sense? Dr. Robert Sungenis points out that in the handful of instances where this phrase construction is used elsewhere in scripture it always refers to a sequence of dark and light that comprise one 24-hour day. (Exodus 16:8-13; 27:21; 29:39; Leviticus 24:3; Numbers 9:21; Daniel 8:26) [https://kolbecenter.org/the-case-against-theistic-evolution/ (Accessed April 19, 2025)]
If the creation of the world did actually take place in a sequence of six 24-hour historical days and God wanted to communicate that historical sequence to mankind, how would the language of the above six sentences from the Word of God in Genesis 1 be different from what they are? In other words, if the sacred author wanted to communicate that the duration of each day of creation was the length of a regular 24-hour day with an evening and morning, what other language could the author have used to communicate that concept with any greater precision without sounding like a science textbook?
2. Where’s the Proof?
In Exodus 20:8-11 God says to Moses and the Israelites:
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work,…for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. [Emphasis added.]
I see nothing in the text of Exodus 20:8-11 suggesting that God is intending the “six days” in which He said He made heaven and earth to be “a literary device” symbolizing an unspecified lengthy period of time. Rather, I see God making a direct one-to-one correspondence between the six-day work-week and the six days of creation; and the seventh day Sabbath and God’s seventh day rest. In other words, I don’t see the seven-day structure of the creation account (with six days of creation work followed by one day of rest) to be a mere literary device or sign that confirms the command to man to lay aside his labor and honor the Creator every seventh day; I see it as a record of the origin of that obligation. God set the pattern when He created the cosmos.
The commandment to observe the Sabbath is reiterated in Exodus 31:16-17 where God says:
Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a perpetual covenant. It is a sign for ever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.
[Emphasis added.]
The ICSB commentary on Genesis 1:1-2:4 says that “the seven-day structure of the [creation] account is best viewed as a literary device for communicating… the obligation of man to…honor the Creator every seventh day”—in other words it is a sign to observe the Sabbath. But the text of Exodus 31:16-17 shows God Himself saying that observing the Sabbath is a sign of the timeframe in which He created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. So it looks to me like God again makes a one-to-one correspondence between that and the literal six-day work-week followed by a seventh day Sabbath rest. We are to do our work in six literal days and then remember to rest on the seventh literal day because it is a sign that God set the pattern at the beginning when He “worked” six literal days to make heaven and earth and then “rested” on the seventh literal day. The sign points to the literal reality—God’s six-day length of creation followed by a seventh day rest. And scripture tells us that God (Whose “word is truth” (John 17:17) and Who can neither deceive nor be deceived) went so far as to write this down on stone tablets with His own finger. (Exodus 31:18)
Can it be shown beyond a reasonable doubt that the text of Genesis 1 and the chronological six days of creation are symbolic, figurative, or “best viewed as a literary device” to the exclusion of being understood as literal, historical 24-hour days? What is the proof beyond a reasonable doubt that God did not actually create the world in six days as described in Genesis 1 and reaffirmed in Exodus 20 & 31? What is the proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the “'days' of creation are not intended to be read as literal history”?
Taking the text as it is, it is quite plain to me that Exodus 20:8-11 and 31:16-18 clearly show God regarding the six days of creation to be literal history. Given that, I don’t see why the Genesis account of creation “should not be interpreted as a revealed timetable about the actual historical sequence of creation” since Genesis is a divinely inspired historical document and Pope Leo XIII in paragraph 20 of his encyclical Providentissimus Deus said that
“it is absolutely wrong and forbidden, either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture or to admit that the sacred writer has erred.”
3. Scientific Laws of Nature vs. Supernatural Events.
Regarding the ICSB Genesis commentary assertion that “the fact that light is created on day 1, together with evening and morning, and yet the sun and the moon are not created until day 4” as “the clearest indication that Genesis employs temporal language in a figurative way”—The assumption here is that the scientific laws of nature now in operation were in full operation during the six days of creation. But why should that be the case?
I agree with that Genesis 1 does not offer “a scientific description of how the world was made” because how the world was made was a supernatural event—not a scientific event. Genesis 1 is clearly describing supernatural acts of God rather than scientific natural processes. Supernatural acts of God—miracles —by definition do not adhere to the scientific laws of nature. The six days of creation are supernatural events that do not follow the laws of nature; they establish the laws of nature. “In creation God laid a foundation and established laws that remain firm…” (CCC 346)
To a certain extent, we see the natural laws of the universe being established as God creates the parts of the universe. For instance, we see the law of light and dark sequence constituting a day after God creates light on the first day. But the laws of nature did not go into complete operation until the seventh day. As St. Thomas Aquinas says,
“…the completion of the universe as to the completeness of its parts belongs to the sixth day, but its completion as regards their operation, to the seventh.”
[Summa Theologiae, Part I, Ques. 73. Article 1. Reply to Objection 2. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1073.htm (Accessed 01/28/25)]
Following St. Thomas Aquinas’ explanation, the fact that light is created on day 1, and the sun and the moon on day 4, is no indication whatsoever “that Genesis employs temporal language in a figurative way” since Genesis 1 is describing literal supernatural acts of God rather than natural processes, and the scientific laws of nature were not in complete operation until day 7.
God is just as much the Author of Genesis as is the sacred human author. God, as the Author of Genesis, said that He made light on day one, and the sun and moon on the fourth day. If before the creation of the world there was only God and if “God is light and in Him there is no darkness” (1 John 1:5), then what is the darkness of Genesis 1:2 if not that which is darkness to human eyesight? If God is light, then what is the light of Genesis 1:3 if not light which is visible to human eyesight?
Is it impossible for Almighty God to create visible light without the sun to produce a day-night sequence? “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” (Genesis 18:14) According to the Angel Gabriel, nothing is impossible for God. (Luke 1:37) Why could God not have created visible light on the first day without the help of the sun just as He incarnated His Son in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary without the help of a man? Revelation 21:23 says, And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine upon it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. If God can produce visible light without the sun at the end of time, why could He not produce visible light without the sun at the beginning of time just as He says in Genesis 1:3?
4. Sources of Light.
I do not see why it would take a “scientific mind” to know that there is light that comes from the sun but that there are also other sources of light other than the sun.
When He led the Israelites out of Egypt and during their wanderings in the desert “the Lord went before them…by night in a pillar of fire to give them light”. (Exodus 13:21-22; Numbers 14:14; Nehemiah 9:12, 19) As the Haydock Bible Commentary says regarding Genesis 1:3, “…the particles of fire were created on the first day, and…served to discriminate day from the preceding night, or darkness,…Perhaps this body of light might resemble the bright cloud which accompanied the Israelites, Ex. xiv. 19…”
5. Why Light on Day 1 and Sun on Day 4?
The reason why God created light on the first day instead of the sun can be found in the Catechism of Perseverance by Monsignor Gaume, published in 1853 and used by St. Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church. In the section on “The Knowledge of God Considered in His Works,” she would read:
Q. Why were the sun, moon and stars not created until the fourth day?
A. They were not created until the fourth day, in order to teach man that they are not the authors of the productions of the earth. God wished thereby to prevent idolatry.
This is in accord with what the St. Thomas Aquinas said on the subject:
As to the fact that the lights are not mentioned as existing from the beginning, but only as made on the fourth day, Chrysostom (Hom. vi in Gen.) explains this by the need of guarding the people from the danger of idolatry: since the lights are proved not to be gods, by the fact that they were not from the beginning.
[Summa Theologiae, Part I, Ques. 70. Article 1. Reply to Objection 1. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1070.htm (Accessed 08/14/25)]
6. Could, Said, Believe.
Finally, is it not possible for Almighty God to create the world in six literal 24-hour days? “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” (Genesis 18:14) If God could create the world in six days (Luke 1:37); and God said He created the world in six days (Genesis 1:1-31; Exodus 20:11, 31:17), then why not believe God created the world in six days—in the literal and obvious meaning of the word “day”?
The Fathers and Doctors of the Church regarding the “day” in Genesis 1
Proceeding now to the second criteria of biblical interpretation, let us read about the days of creation in “the Scripture within ‘the living Tradition of the whole Church’” by looking at what the Fathers and Doctors of the Church have said, because the introduction to the ICSB Genesis states that biblical interpretation “stands accountable to Sacred Tradition, the Magisterium, and the wider community of biblical interpreters (both living and deceased).”
Regarding “Sacred Tradition…and the wider community of biblical interpreters,” the Baltimore Catechism No. 2 says that “Divine Tradition is the unwritten word of God…given to the church through word of mouth by Jesus Christ or by the apostles…Divine Tradition has been committed to writing…by saintly writers called Fathers…these are the eight most important…St. Athanasius, St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. John Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, St. Gregory the Great.”
Pope Leo XIII in paragraph 14 of his encyclical Providentissimus Deus says of the Church Fathers,
the Holy Fathers, We say, are of supreme authority, whenever they all interpret in one and the same manner any text of the Bible, as pertaining to the doctrine of faith or morals; for their unanimity clearly evinces that such interpretation has come down from the Apostles as a matter of Catholic faith.
In other words, if Christ had intended to teach the apostles that the six days of creation were merely symbolic representations of long ages rather than literal 24-hour days, one would expect the Church Fathers who wrote down Divine Tradition to echo this teaching. But they do not.
Following are some quotes from the eight most important Church Fathers listed in the Baltimore Catechism No. 2. In case you are concerned that I may be quoting them out of context, I have supplied the links to the documents from which I obtained the quotes listed below.
Church Fathers on the Days of Creation in Genesis 1
“Scripture established a law that twenty-four hours, including both day and night, should be given the name of day only.” - St. Ambrose
[Hexaemeron, Ch. 10. Par. 37. https://www.scribd.com/doc/46349268/Hexaemeron-of-Saint-Ambrose-of-Milan (Accessed 01/28/25)]
“In the creation God finished His works in six days, and rested on the seventh.”
- St. Augustine [Contra Faustum, Book XII, Par. 8. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/140612.htm (Accessed 07/08/25)]
“Thus under the form of history the law is laid down for what is to follow. And the evening and the morning were one day…If it therefore says “one day,” it is from a wish to determine the measure of day and night, and to combine the time that they contain. Now twenty-four hours fill up the space of one day — we mean of a day and of a night…” - St. Basil the Great
[Hexaemeron (Homily 2) Par. 8. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/32012.htm (Accessed 01/28/25)]
“Whenever I handle [St. Basil’s] Hexaemeron, and take its words on my lips, I am brought into the presence of the Creator, and understand the words of creation…” - St. Gregory Nazianzen
[Oration 43, “Funeral Oration for St. Basil the Great”, Par. 67. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310243.htm (Accessed 07/08/25)]
“…all the visible creation was made in six days…” - St. Athanasius
[Against the Arians, Discourse II, Par. 19. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/28162.htm (Accessed 07/08/25)]
“…we must enquire how God created all things at once, when Moses describes them as created separately with the varying change of six days.” - St. Gregory the Great [Moralia, Book XXXII, xii, Par. 16. https://www.lectionarycentral.com/GregoryMoralia/Book32.html (Accessed 07/22/25)]
“When God formed man out of slime, and through the grace of His own inspiration gave him a soul, had that soul previously existed and subsisted which was afterwards bestowed by the inspiration of God, and where was it? Or did it gain its capacity both to exist and to live from the power of God, on the sixth day, when the body was formed out of the slime?” - St. Jerome
[To Pammachius Against John of Jerusalem, par. 18. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3004.htm (Accessed 07/31/25)]
“...he brought the second day to a close, and said, ‘Evening came and morning came, a second day.’ See how he teaches us with precision, calling the end of the light evening and the end of the night morning, and naming the whole period day lest we be misled into thinking the evening is the end of the day, instead of having a clear understanding that one day comprises the duration of both parts.” [Emphasis added.] - St. John Chrysostom
[Homilies on Genesis, IV, Par. 14. https://www.scribd.com/doc/173756670/Homilies-on-Genesis-Saint-John-Chrysostom (Accessed 07/22/25)]
The eight most important Fathers of the Church quoted above are also Doctors of the Church. Here are quotes from eight more Doctors of the Church.
Doctors of the Church on the Days of Creation in Genesis 1
“In the first age, when the world was first created, and on the first day of this age, God made the light, and called it day…the beginning of these six days.”
- St. Bede the Venerable
[Chronicles of the Six Ages of the World, “The First Age”. https://www.elfinspell.com/MedievalMatter/Bede/Giles-MinorHistoricalWorks/ChronicleOfTheSixAgesOfTheWorld-1.html#first (Accessed 07/22/25)]
“In six days God made the world.” - St. Cyril of Jerusalem
[Catechetical Lecture 12. Par. 5. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310112.htm (Accessed 01/28/25)]
“So let no one think that there is anything allegorical in the works of the six days.” - St. Ephraim the Syrian [Emphasis added.]
[Sec. 1. Par. 1. Second sentence. https://www.scribd.com/doc/314476717/St-Ephraim-the-Syrian-Commentary-on-Genesis (Accessed 01/28/25)]
“God created everything in six days.” - St. Isidore of Seville
[Chronicon, First Age of the World. Par. 1. https://tertullian.org/fathers/isidore_chronicon_01_trans.htm (Accessed 07/22/25)]
“And from the beginning of day till the next day is one complete period of day and night. For the Scripture says, And evening and the morning were one day.”
- St. John Damascene [Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, Book II, Chapter VII. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/33042.htm (Accessed 07/08/25)]
“For as it is now day time and now night time, so the Creator has constituted various kinds of luminaries, although even before they were made there had been days without the sun and nights without the moon.”
- Pope St. Leo the Great [Sermon 27. On the Feast of the Nativity, Par. 5. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/360327.htm (Accessed 07/08/25)]
“We must specifically hold that physical nature was brought into existence in six days…” - St. Bonaventure [Emphasis added.]
[Breviloquim, Part II, Ch. 2:1. https://www.scribd.com/document/81234816/The-Breviloquium (accessed 01/28/25)]
“The words ‘one day’ are used when day is first instituted, to denote that one day is made up of twenty-four hours. Hence, by mentioning ‘one,’ the measure of a natural day is fixed.” - St. Thomas Aquinas
[Summa Theologiae, Part I, Ques. 74. Article 3. Reply to Objection 7. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1074.htm (Accessed 08/13/25)]
I could quote another dozen or so saints and scholars of the Church on this matter, but I think this is an ample overview of what one finds.
Magisterial Teaching on “day” in Genesis 1
Proceeding now to the third criteria of biblical interpretation, that of being “attentive to the analogy of faith”, let us ascertain whether an understanding of literal 24-hour days of creation is “internally coherent and consistent with all the doctrines that Christians believe” by examining some Church teachings that touch on these matters.
Catechism of the Council of Trent
The Catechism of the Council of Trent is probably the most authoritative catechism ever produced by the Church. In the introduction it states that…
…the Fathers [of the Council of Trent] deemed it of the first importance that a work should appear…that, as there is one Lord, one faith, there may also be one standard and prescribed form of propounding the dogmas of faith…[Emphasis in original.]
In this “one standard and prescribed form of propounding the dogmas of faith” under the section titled “The Sabbath, Why Changed to Sunday” we read:
But the Church of God has thought it well to transfer the celebration and observance of the Sabbath [Saturday] to Sunday. For, as on that day [Sunday] light first shone on the world, so by the Resurrection of our Redeemer on the same day [Sunday], by whom was thrown open to us the gate to eternal life, we were called out of darkness into light; and hence the Apostles would have it called the Lord’s day. We also learn from the Sacred Scriptures that the first day of the week [Sunday] was held sacred because on that day [Sunday] the work of creation commenced, and on that day [Sunday] the Holy Ghost was given to the Apostles. [Emphasis added.]
The Catechism of the Council of Trent, (New York: Preserving Christian Publications, 2023), pp. 402-403.
Here we are taught that the first day of creation was a Sunday (a literal day) and that on that literal day God created light. Since the first day of creation was Sunday, then the seventh day of creation (when God rested) must have been a Saturday which God blessed and called “the Sabbath day” in Exodus 20:11.
This same catechism also defined the Sabbath Day as a commemoration of a literal seventh day of rest after a literal six-day creation. Under the heading “Sabbath” it teaches that:
…the seventh day [of creation] was called the Sabbath [which is a literal day originally celebrated on Saturdays], because God, having finished the creation of the world, rested on that day [Saturday, a literal day] from all the work which He had done. Thus it is called by the Lord in Exodus. [Emphasis added.]
The Catechism of the Council of Trent, (New York: Preserving Christian Publications, 2023), pp. 400.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
Continuing this teaching of the Christian observance of the Sabbath, the Catechism of the Catholic Church in paragraph 2174 quotes St. Justin Martyr.
We all gather on the day of the sun [Sunday, a literal day], for it is the first day…when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day [Sunday] Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead. [Emphasis added.] [St. Justin, I Apol. 67: PG 6, 429 and 432.]
The context for whenever day is mentioned in this passage is a literal day, Sunday. So if the first day of creation is a literal day (Sunday), and the seventh day is a literal day (Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath) as these catechisms teach, then what are the other days of creation but literal days?
Some commentaries on Genesis 1 seem to justify a symbolic view of the six days of creation account by referencing paragraph 337 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church where it says:
Scripture presents the work of the Creator symbolically as a succession of six days of divine ‘work’, concluded by the ‘rest’ of the seventh day.
Rather than seeing that as referring to the six “days” as symbolic, I understand that to be referring to God’s “work” as symbolic in the sense that God does not do “work” the way that we humans must exert ourselves physically in order to do work. God need only will for something He wants accomplished to be accomplished. Psalm 33:9 puts it this way: For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood forth. That CCC 337 does not abrogate the traditional interpretation of “day” in Genesis 1 as a literal 24-hour day as understood by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church can be further demonstrated by a careful reading of CCC 2168-2174.
In addition, catechisms are supposed to be summaries of established Church teaching; not vehicles for introducing novel ideas or understandings that have no basis in Sacred Tradition or Sacred Scripture.
Pope Leo’s witness to the Literal Six Days of Creation
Indeed, I don’t see how the Church could abrogate the traditional interpretation of “day” in Genesis 1 given what Pope Leo XIII said in paragraph 5 of his encyclical Arcanum Divinae Sapientiae (February 10, 1880). In that paragraph it appears to me that Pope Leo XIII affirms that the Church has always held to the literal six days of creation described in Genesis 1.
The true origin of marriage, venerable brothers, is well known to all. Though revilers of the Christian faith refuse to acknowledge the never-interrupted doctrine of the Church on this subject, and have long striven to destroy the testimony of all nations and of all times, they have nevertheless failed not only to quench the powerful light of truth, but even to lessen it. We record what is to all known, and cannot be doubted by any, that God, on the sixth day of creation, having made man from the slime of the earth, and having breathed into his face the breath of life, gave him a companion, whom He miraculously took from the side of Adam when he was locked in sleep. God thus, in His most far-reaching foresight, decreed that this husband and wife should be the natural beginning of the human race, from whom it might be propagated and preserved by an unfailing fruitfulness throughout all futurity of time. And this union of man and woman, that it might answer more fittingly to the infinite wise counsels of God, even from the beginning manifested chiefly two most excellent properties—deeply sealed, as it were, and signed upon it—namely, unity and perpetuity. [Emphasis added.]
[https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_10021880_arcanum.html]
[The Latin original says “perpetuam”, ie. perpetual. Later in the same paragraph “perpetuitatem” is translated “perpetuity”.]
I see a number of historical truths assumed (if not explicitly asserted) that can be drawn or derived from Pope Leo XIII’s statements in defense of the origin of marriage on the sixth day of creation. Pertinent to this case I see that…
1. It was within a literal, historical, 24-hour day in which God created man and woman since there is nothing in the text of paragraph 5 of the encyclical indicating that Pope Leo views “the sixth day of creation” in Genesis 1 in any way other than the plain and obvious meaning of the word “day”. In addition, Eve being taken from Adam’s side could hardly be considered “miraculous” if “day” is suppose to symbolize some unspecified lengthy period of time and evolutionary process.
2. The previous five days of creation must also be 24-hour days given…
a. #1 above and what I have already referenced above in The Catechism of the Council of Trent and the Catechism of the Catholic Church regarding the first day of creation and the seventh day Sabbath rest.
b. that each time the ordinal number day phrase (”one day”, “a second day”, “a third day”, etc.) is used in Genesis 1 (as it is in Genesis 1:31 for the sixth day) it is preceded by the phrase “and there was evening and there was morning”—a phrase construction which always refers to a sequence of dark and light that comprise one 24-hour day when used elsewhere in scripture (Exodus 16:8-13; 27:21; 29:39; Leviticus 24:3; Numbers 9:21; Daniel 8:26) as pointed out by Dr. Robert Sungenis.
[https://kolbecenter.org/the-case-against-theistic-evolution/ (Accessed April 19, 2025)]c. that Pope Leo XIII also told biblical interpreters that unless reason or necessity require it, “not to depart from the literal and obvious sense.” (Providentissimus Deus, par. 15)
3. Genesis 2:4-25 is not merely a second account of creation but a more detailed account of what took place on the sixth day of creation since it is in Genesis 2:4-25 that God…
a. “made man from the slime of the earth” (ADS referring to Genesis 2:7)
b. “breathed into his face the breath of life” (ADS referring to Genesis 2:7)
c. “gave him a companion, whom He miraculously took from the side of Adam when he was locked in sleep.” (ADS referring to Genesis 2:21-22)
…all of which Pope Leo XIII says took place “on the sixth day of creation”.
4. All of the foregoing points are part of “the never-interrupted doctrine of the Church on this subject” [of the true origin of marriage] or derived from it.
Given the above, an interpretation of the days of creation as literal 24-days is certainly “internally coherent and consistent with all the doctrines that Christians believe” thus meeting the third criteria: “the analogy of faith”.
The Burden of Proof
Therefore, given…
1. the statements in magisterial documents, traditional catechisms, faithful and revered Catholic biblical commentary, Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and corroborating scripture passages that support the view that the six days of creation in Genesis 1 refer to a literal six days;
2. that there is no discernable reason or necessity to depart from the literal and obvious sense; and
3. that biblical interpretation “stands accountable to sacred tradition, the Magisterium, and the wider community of biblical interpreters (both living and deceased)”,
it is clear to me that the burden of proof is on those who would challenge the genuine history of Genesis 1-11 and the plain and obvious meaning of the words “evening”, “morning”, and “day” in Genesis 1.
They must show that there is a clear reason or necessity to depart from the literal and obvious sense of those words.
They must show beyond a reasonable doubt that Genesis 1 is not a genuine history of how God created the world in six days in the literal and obvious sense of the word “day”.
They must show beyond a reasonable doubt that Genesis 1 intends to convey historical origin events with a literary device of mythopoeic expression such that the “’days’ of creation are not intended to be read as literal history” in the sense of actual 24-hour days.
Next class session: Resolving the apparent discrepancies between the creation narratives in Genesis 1 & 2.
