Genesis 1:20-25

 

Genesis 1:20-25

20. And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

21. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

22. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.

23. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

24. And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.

25. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

comments:

I've always thought it interesting that all the animal life was described as divided between two days of creation, and that birds (fowl) were listed in the first of those two days, along with living creatures in the waters (aquatic life) and that the second of those days (the 6th of creation) includes when the living things that move upon the earth (including creeping things, and as will be seen thereafter in other verses, humans) were created.

Like plants, the animals were gifted the ability to multiply and perpetuate themselves, to reproduce each "after his kind" which is to have children each of the same species as the parents.

I believe that God does everything in wisdom and order, and there would likely be a great many good reasons for creating and placing animal life on the earth in that order generally, rather than all at once in an instant. An account like this (as I have mentioned) is not necessarily factual in every way, but however may be generally true in at least some ways and not entirely symbolic only. There's the description of animal life being created in stages with three general groupings apparently based mainly around animals' movement types and dwelling places. This is further subdivided into various general categories such as whales, cattle, or creeping things, which can indicate not everything in the larger groupings is counted as being part of the same categories of what type of creatures they are. This all may be mostly symbolic, but also in part could be an account of how some of the process may have actually been in a literal and factual way, but in any case I don't think it could by any means be assumed to be a complete account of the entire process - after all, it's not as if every single species of animal created by God was listed in the way that later parts of the Bible may list every descendant in a line from one particular notable person to another. The world is far too large and wondrous a place to ever be able to describe or list everything that was included in the creating of it, without such an account becoming ponderously large and essentially overwhelming all the rest of Moses' writings if he should have even undertaken to try it.

I don't believe the purpose of this account was to tell the complete story or detail the entire process of creation used by God in creating the Earth and furnishing it with life. Even if many of the details written might have been intended to be taken as facts and not solely symbolic, I believe it represents only what was passed down from an account written by Moses, who being a descendant of Adam, would not have been expected to be present and personally remember something that happened before Adam himself was created. Moses instead, being a prophet of God and writing what God wished for him to teach to the people in his time, would have been writing what God taught to him or showed him in visions, being in either case not likely to have been reasonably able to write down every detail of every moment of creation even if it was shown to him. I think instead, he would have been writing what God had taught him were the most or more important points to teach to the people, or what Moses felt inspired to emphasize and put importance on; what the people of his time needed to know and what would be beneficial to pass down to future generations of Israelites and others who would believe in the same God.

Therefore, I think it not unreasonable to think that we shouldn't assume what is said in this relatively simple and not terribly detailed account of the creation is not the whole story and does not describe the entire process by which God created the world and everything in it. I do believe, however, that it is reasonable to assume that for the spiritual life and development of humanity, we don't need to know more about the specific details, until God sees fit to tell them. I trust that God knows and understands it all, and I may hope to learn more someday, but understand that in some things it's not important for me to know all the details, so I try to identify what is most important for me to understand about it.

Credit for the creation goes to God.

God organized the creation according to divine wisdom, and at every step checked or "saw that it was good."

God provided all things necessary for life on Earth, such as water and light, time and seasons for plants to grow, and whatever else was needed.

God gave to living things (both plant and animal life) the ability to multiply, reproduce, and generally maintain their own existence and continue each one's own species or kind.