And the evening and the morning were the first day. Genesis 1:5
OT scholar Gordon Wenham, though he
denies that Genesis 1 is chronological history, makes this clear with respect to Genesis 1:
There can be little doubt that here [Genesis 1] “day” has its basic sense of a 24-hour period. The mention of evening and morning, the enumeration of the days, and the divine rest on the seventh show that a week of divine activity is being described here. Elsewhere, of course, “in the day of” and similar phrases can simply mean “when” (e.g., Gen 2:4; 5:1, etc.). Ps. 90:4 indeed says that a thousand years are as a day in God’s sight. But it is perilous to try to correlate scientific theory and biblical revelation by appeal to such texts. Rather, it is necessary to inquire more closely into the literary nature of Gen 1 and whether chronological sequence and scientific explanation are the narrator’s concern.
However, the Scriptures go further than merely depicting a six-day timeframe for God’s creative activity. They plausibly assert it self-referentially." CMI
