The Highway Forums General Discussion Open Forum Creation

Brian,
I have been following the discussion as it has moved along, but, just so I can understand you, let me summarize what I think you are saying about your understanding of YOM in the Hebrew text.

Taken from you March 3rd post to Tom, you stated:
"The Hebrew term 'yom' NEVER refers to a 24-hour day in the Bible. Anywhere."

You then go on to state (and this is where I am attempting to summarize) Genesis cannot be defining days as 24 hour periods, because Jews understand a normal day as sunset to sunset or sunrise to sunrise, and since there is no sun, this cannot be what Moses is talking about. Moreover, no Jew had any concept of what an hour was, especially 24 of them to make a day as is expressed in our culture, so that is further proof that the 24/6 view is abnormal, as you put it. Is that roughly what you have in mind?

I understand "day" depending upon context, especially those context where day is used to mark off time, to mean what all mankind has understood historically what "day" means and that is 24 hour period. The chronological markers in the genealogies, feastival season and the like would be meaningless if YOM meant anything other than a period of 24 hours. Granted, Jews may not have used 24 hours to express a day, but they did, as you point out, recognize the turning of the earth on its axis, which results in light and day being actualized. An event that takes 24 hours in our reckoning. Seeing that nothing in the historic narrative of Genesis suggest that YOM should not be undertood as anything other than a chronological progression of God creating from one day to the next until He completes His work, any other explanation to re-read the text appears to be contrived.

Moreover, I am not sure you can make such a dogmatic claim that YOM is never used in the Hebrew text to mean a period of 24 hours. I would be curious to have your Hebraist sources for that claim. At any rate, just checking Bible Works I found several references where YOM is certainly being used to express a 24 hour period of time, or morning to morning, day-light to day light. Checking Nehemiah 8:18 as one example, the Bible states,

"Also day by day, from the first day unto the last day, he read in the book of the law of God. And they kept the feast seven days; and on the eighth day was a solemn assembly, according unto the manner."

I take that to mean simply one week of 7 days, all 24 hours in length. Why would it be otherwise?

Fred