3. The history of creation commences from chaos, both the universal chaos of the mundane system and the particular chaos of our planet. For in the very beginning of things it is said, that the deep was overspread with darkness, or that darkness was upon the faces of the abyss (vs. 2); while afterwards, when the earth, which in the same verse is described as inert and formless or waste and void, had emerged from its universal chaos, and the ether had arisen, which transmits the solar rays and is here signified by the Divine Spirit moving to and fro over the waters (vs. 2), light existed (vs. 3); then, when, in the vicinity or confines of the sun its parent, the earth had commenced its axillary or diurnal rotations, it is said that God distinguished between the light and the darkness, and that he called the light Day and the darkness Night (vs. 4 and 5). This whole time of creation, from the dense darkness of the universe to the risen light, is called a day, and therefore the evening and the morning were the first day (vs. 5). These days are to be called Days of creation, and they signify entire spaces of time; but the ordinary days of our earth began from light and not from darkness, according to verse 5: And he called the light Day and the darkness Night. An age is called a day or year in many places, as in Genesis 5:5, 8, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, 27, 31; 9:29; 10:25.
