And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
Let there be light, х Yªhiy (H1961) 'owr (H216)]. It is deserving of particular notice that the substantive verb is used here, and not either х baaraa' (H1254)] 'created' or х `aasaah (H6213)] 'made.' It was manifestation of what had been previously in existence-`Let light be,' or rather, 'Light shall be;' not the formation of an element or matter which had no being at all until this divine command was issued. The effect, which immediately followed, is described in the name DAY, which in Hebrew signifies warmth, heat; while the name NIGHT signifies a rolling up, as night wraps all things in a shady mantle.
Divided the light from the darkness - literally, 'divided between the light and between the darkness' - i:e., where all had been involved in darkness, there was an alternation of light; and since unbroken gloom had reigned previous to this happy change, so, in describing the physical arrangement that was now established, this natural sequence is preserved, and the "evening" is reckoned before the "morning," These two words are not to be considered here in precisely the sense in which we use them, but as meaning only periods of darkness and of light. "The first day," х yowm (H3117) 'echaad (H259)], 'day one,' for the cardinal number is used, not the ordinal, "first;" and the clause literally translated should stand thus:-`And the evening was and the morning was, one day.' In the account of all the successive creations, the days are mentioned by the ordinal numbers, as 'second, third,' etc. But here there is a singularity in the language; and it has been shrewdly conjectured that the use of the cardinal for the first day may have been adopted to show that the existence of a day then was not an occurrence out of the course of nature, but only that one was singled out and particularized as a starting-point for the rest (Crofton).