In the coming days, we will spend some time to share God’s original will as stated in the first three chapters of Genesis. We first emphasize again that we should look at things from God’s perspective, not from human perspective, and once again give examples to illustrate the difference between heavenly and earthly things. Second, we talked about God’s creation of the heavens, because the heavens are mentioned in Genesis 1:1, which means that each planet had its own sky when it was created, not that there would be heavens when viewed from the earth, because things on earth were only talked about after Genesis 1:1. Moreover, under another assumption that we thought was reasonable before, we will come to the wrong conclusion that the Bible says that there is a four-dimensional space. This is another mistake we make. We cannot use just one example to generalize it into a logical hypothesis. This is illogical. In order to prevent others from making our previous mistakes, we will put our past derivation in the appendix. Today we will use the Strong’s Concordance which we talked about last time to help with Bible reading to discuss some controversial issues in Genesis 1:1-5. Finally, we can explain many things from how the word “light” is spoken in verse 3, which includes a seemly obvious contradiction mentioned in the fourth day.
1. Preface: Seeing things in the aspect of God, not in the aspect of human
We are human. Naturally, we see things in the aspect of human. Thus, a non-Christian has no choice but to see things in the aspect of human. A Christian, “…having been justified by faith…,” (Romans 5:1) “…He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son.”(Colossians 1:13) But on the way of sanctification, we can temporarily not in Christ often, such as in examples of not repenting due to certain sins. Often when we try to be on the side of God and work with Him, but “The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?”(Jeremiah 17:9) We often cheat ourself to the extent that we even don’t know that we are really seeing things in the aspect of human. Even in this case, a Christian do have a choice either seeing things in the aspect of God or in the aspect of human since the Bible is inspired by God. Logic tells us that seeing things in the aspect of the Bible is the same as seeing things in the aspect of God. However, due to the fact that God is infinite and the words in the Bible are finite, it is impossible to have infinite equal to finite. Thus, seeing things in the aspect of God contains more than that in the aspect of the Bible. We cannot draw an equality sign between them. But everything regarding what we should know is in the Bible, like what said in Psalms 103:6-7, “The Lord …made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the sons of Israel.” The Bible says, “Do not quench the Spirit.”(1 Thessalonians 5:19) If we are indeed in faith and can distinguish that the guidance is truly from the Holy Spirit and follow it, then we are seeing things in the aspect of God since the Holy Spirit is the one in Holy Trinity and is infinite.
We see that the only way to read the Bible described in the Bible is through the leading of the Holy Spirit. The Bible says clearly that the way to understand the Bible is in Luke 24:45, “Then He (Jesus) opened their minds (G3563, nous) to understand the Scriptures.” At that time, it is possible that mind was opened by Jesus Himself. But nowadays only the Holy Spirit can do it. If we indeed believe that the Bible is inspired by God, then don’t discount the words said in the Bible which are written in black and white. Using the Concordance can help those who don’t know the original languages to read the Bible more accurately. Thus, there is a possibility to see things in the aspect of God, instead of in the aspect of human. The difference is huge as one is heavenly and the other worldly. Paul himself can give us such an example. Before Paul saw the light, he was enthusiastic to the extent of persecuting Christians. This is seeing things in the aspect of human, which is wrong and worldly. After he saw the light, revelation led him to read the Bible as said clearly in Galatians 1:12, “For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” It is heavenly, and of course correct.
We know that the revelation is not all supernatural in its origin. Sometimes, they are through other’s words. God at most started the revelation, and we need to be actively willing to work with Him. Otherwise, it is as though like a robot, which acts only by instructions. If we behave this way, God would not create man with free will to start with. Last time we talked about how to use the Strong’s Concordance to help those who don’t know original languages to read Bible. Today, we’ll see again how to apply it.
2. God created the heavens – Corrected (1/27/24)
There are only five verses related to the first day, so we will first list all the verses and then explain them. 1:1 In the beginning (in the beginning H7225) God created (created H1254) the heavens (H8064, plural) and the earth (H776, singular). 1:2 The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep (darkness H2822); and the Spirit of God was upon the waters. 1:3 God said, “Let there be light (light H216).” There was light (H216). 1:4 God saw that the light (H216) was good, and separated the light (H216) from the darkness (darkness H2822). 1:5 God called the light (H216) day, and the darkness he called night. There is evening and there is morning. This is the first day.
In 1:1, in the beginning God used creation (created H1254) when God created the heaven and earth, which was creation that made nothing into something. The word earth is in the singular since there is only one earth. But the word “heavens” is used in the plural. This means that each planet had its own sky when it was created. We cannot say that the heavens can be seen from the earth, because the things on earth are talked about only after this verse. Someone may ask, “But Abraham (to the rich man of Hades) said, ‘…And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.’”(Luke 16:25-26) What does this great chasm mean? If Abraham and the rich man were on different planets far away, there would naturally be a great chasm between them. But they could definitely talk to each other because they were already in spiritual bodies at that time, which was obviously different from the physical body (see 1 Corinthians 15:50-54). Because God created time and space in the beginning, for us time can only move forward, but for God it is different. He can walk in time. If time is viewed as a one-dimensional space, it is in a four-dimensional space, but we cannot do this and live in a three-dimensional space.
We have also seen that the existence of dinosaurs can be known from archeology. If archaeological time estimates are correct and dinosaurs existed before the creation of the present world, then God created at least three worlds at that time, namely the world of Satan, the world of dinosaurs at that time, and the world today. Starting with the third verse, we can see how the today’s world is created. In case that the time estimation is wrong, dinosaurs were one of the animals created with others, but they are now extinct. Whatever the case may be, it is not true to say that the existence of dinosaurs proves what the Bible says is wrong.
3. What the ‘light’ means in verse 3?
Let us take a look at how verse 3 talks about the word ‘light.’ In the original languages, the word ‘light’ uses H216, which appears in the Book of Genesis only six times. The first five are already mentioned in the first five verses. The last one is in Genesis 1:18. It says, “and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light (H216) from the darkness; …” The verse belongs to the fourth day. We now list all verses associated with the fourth day in Genesis 1:14-19, “Then God said, “Let there be lights (H3974) in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years; and let them be for lights (H3974) in the expanse of the heavens to give light (H215) on the earth”; and it was so. God made (H6213) the two great lights (H3974), the greater light (H3974) to govern the day, and the lesser light (H3974) to govern the night; He made the stars also. God placed them in the expanse of the heavens to give light (H215) on the earth, and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light (H216) from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.”
This looks like there is an apparent contradiction since the sun was made in the fourth day and then how come there is light in the first day? Where did the light come from? First, notice that the same word cannot have different meanings here. We notice also the light of the sun uses a different word H3974. Furthermore, the word ‘made’ uses H6213, which is not the same as ‘created (H1254)’ which creates something from nothing. The only logical explanation is the light (H216) already existed. That means that the sun, moon, and stars were created already. They are the leftovers from previous worlds already created. Thus, they now need only to be made.
Let us now take a look at verse 5, “God called the light (H216) day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.” Since there was evening and there was morning, it is obviously talking about the same one day as today’s one. Someone may say that it is impossible to create the sun etc. in one day. It is too brief and thus not has enough time. In view of His might, it is always possible. Actually, the amount of work is not really huge compared with creation. The Bible actually says that in the first day it is just to make the light of the created sun etc. appear. That was it. Before this, verse 2 describes the situation after the previous world was destroyed, “The earth was formless and void, and darkness (H2822) was over the surface of the deep, …” As stated before, under the assumption of the estimated time is correct, there were at least two worlds created in verse 1 and 2. They are the spiritual world with Satan in it, and the material world before today’s one with dinosaurs on earth. We can see in verse 1 God’s mighty power of creation.
Appendix: Previous erroneous derivation
2. God created heavens and the space with at least four dimensions
There are only five verses associated with the first day. We list all the verses first, and then explain them. In Genesis 1:1-5, it says, “[1:1] In the beginning (H7225) God created (H1254) the heavens (H8204) and the earth (H776). [1:2] The earth was formless and void, and darkness (H2822) was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. [1:3] Then God said, “Let there be light (H216)”; and there was light (H216). [1:4] God saw that the light (H216) was good; and God separated the light (H216) from the darkness. [1:5] God called the light (H216) day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.”
In the beginning, God created time and space. To us, time can only go forward. But to God, He can walk anywhere in time. Thus, time can be considered as one dimension for Him. Here, we only talk about the dimensions of space. In [1:1], the word ‘created’ is used in the beginning, which talks about creating from things that don’t exist. The earth is singular since there is only one. But heavens are plural. What does it mean? We can see only one heaven on earth. How can we explain the plural?
Let us use schematic figures to illustrate the dimensions. In the figures, the one-dimensional space (1D) is represented by a line, and the two-dimensional space (2D) a plane. The intersection of an object in 2D and the line is the corresponding 1D object. Therefore, like what was indicated in figure 1, according to the orientation of a 2D object, the corresponding 1D object could be a changeable line, a point, or even disappeared. Of course, the size of the 2D object can affect the 1D object. Assume the relationship of our 3D space and the 4D one is the same.
Figure 1: One-dimension space and two-dimension space
We can see from John 20:26 that the body of Jesus after resurrection has no restrictions as we have since it says “After eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.” The door was shut, and He appeared from nowhere. If we make a reasonable extension to this observation, we see that there are no restrictions in the same dimension for a spiritual body. Then, the following verses tell us that there has at least 4D. In Luke 16:25-26, it says, “But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your life you received your good things, …And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.'” Abraham is dead and in a spiritual body. It is impossible to have a great chasm unless they are in different dimensions; otherwise, it will be contradicted to our hypothesis. So, no matter in which dimensional space they are, we have to add one dimension to our 3D. In other words, there are at least four dimensions. Other than this, we cannot think of a better logical explanation. Of course, the Bible doesn’t say clearly that there exists 4D. However, many things can be explained easily by the existence of 4D, and we’ll share this in the future.
Here, we only present one example. In the 3D space we know there is only one heaven no matter how large the universe is. Then, how do we explain there are at least two heavens stated in the Bible? If there is the existence of 4D, it is easy to explain. In analogy, the former has a changeable line, one point, or totally disappeared in 1D, the latter has one-dimension higher 2D. In fact, what we see in our daily life is in macro-viewpoint, and is continuous. We’ll discuss in the future the relationship in continuity and logic, and what the Bible says.
Someone may say that if we stand on other planets, then there are their individual heavens. Isn’t that ‘heavens?’ No, not really. In space with three dimensions, there is only one heaven on earth and they are part of it. Another explanation is that it says ‘heavens’ means there are heavens beyond the heaven we see. I am not sure if it is the correct explanation since this statement is similar to the previously mentioned. The so called ‘heavens’ are still part of the heaven we see.
We also surely see the world of dinosaurs’ existence which is known by archeology. If the estimated time by archeology is correct, dinosaurs exist before today’s world which started in verse 3 to be discussed in the next section. Then, God created at least three worlds, which are the world of Satan, the world of dinosaurs’, and today’s world starts from verse 3. Otherwise, the estimated time is wrong. Dinosaurs are among the animals created after verse 3, but now they are distinct. Someone says that the existence of dinosaurs proves that the Bible is wrong. It is not true.
(Verses refer to those in NASB unless otherwise specified.)
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