let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years." And it was so done. God made the sun, moon, and countless stars, and set them in the firmament of heaven, to shine upon the earth, and to rule the day and the night.
The fifth day God said: “Let the waters bring forth the creeping creatures having life, and the fowl that may fly over the earth under the firmament of heaven.” And God created fish and birds of every kind, and He blessed them saying: “Increase and multiply.” [1]
On the sixth day God said: “Let the earth bring forth the living creature [2] in its kind: cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so done. At last God created man, and gave him dominion over all the rest. And God saw all the works that He had made, and they were very good[3].
The seventh day God rested[4], and He blessed[5] that day and made it holy.
COMMENTARY.
The beautiful Order of Creation. The very manner and order in which the sacred writer relates the creation, serves to bring out the order and mutual relation of things created. God had already created light on the first day, but this light was not the light of the sun. It was on the fourth day that God made the sun, to be the giver of light to the earth. God made light first, because without light and without warmth, which is connected with it, there could be no growth, no life, no order in nature.
- ↑ Multiply. They were to multiply of themselves, ever increasing in number. As plants propagate themselves by means of their seeds, so birds and fishes can, by the blessing of God, lay eggs, which in their turn become birds and fishes.
- ↑ Living creature, i. e. God created the mammals which are the highest race of beasts. God first created the lower and then the higher classes of animals; and, last of all, He created man, the highest of all visible creatures. How God created man, will be told in the third chapter.
- ↑ Very good. Everything was as God’s goodness and wisdom desired it to be; everything fulfilled the end for which He had created it. He disposed everything in such a way that nothing could be better or more exactly adapted to its purpose than it was.
- ↑ Rested. Man requires rest after he has worked hard, because he is tired. Can God then be tired ? No, God could create thousands of worlds, without being tired. The words, ‘He rested’, mean this: that after the sixth day, after the creation of man, God created no new kind of being.
- ↑ Blessed. He ordained that this day should bring a blessing both to soul and body on those who keep it holy.
