“yom” - the Hebrew Word for “day”
In my post, Genesis 1:5b - What is a Day?, I explain how a day in Genesis 1 is defined by when Jesus (at Creation) intentionally experienced evenings and mornings. However, I have received numerous responses of the following form: that “yom”, the word for day, always means 24-hour days, because its use in other scriptures are always meant to be treated as 24-hour days. Therefore, the argument goes, creation days, which use the same word “yom”, must by necessity be 24-hour days. In conclusion, I am twisting scripture to mean something it does not. Naturally, I disagree.
Following are the scriptures people primarily use to argue for a meaning of 24-hours for the word “yom”:
For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. — Exodus 20:11
[The sabbath] will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested. — Exodus 31:17
To strengthen the argument, people site the New Testament as well:
For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.” — Hebrews 4:4
Now, I will concede several aspects of this argument. First, I totally agree that people understood “yom” to mean solar days. I also agree that God meant the Hewbrews/Jews to celebrate the sabbath every seventh solar day. Finally, I agree that the earth rotates once every 24 hours. However, I do not believe that the day’s length is part of the intended meaning of “yom” in these verses. Furthermore, I believe the definition depends on the perspective of the one observing the sunset. After all, observing the sunset from two different locations yields two different times for the start of evening.
Let me address the day’s length first. The sabbath day (or sabbath “yom” if you will), as it turns out, is marked by sunset, the beginning of evening, as are all “yoms” of the week, and all “yoms” of creation. Read Genesis 1, and that is all it says to define a “yom” (”… there was evening and morning… one yom”). But, here’s the thing. Consecutive sunsets are never exactly 24 hours apart… unless you are on the equator, which Israel is not. Therefore, the Hebrews/Jews were never meant to understand a solar day (in the verses above) as being the passing of 24-hours. Never. “Yom” was always meant to be the duration from one sunset to the next, and that varies.
Now I will concede that even if no day is ever exactly 24 hours, and no two consecutive days are exactly the same duration, they are all very close to 24 hours in duration. For some, the fact they are so close is the point. However, it’s the fact that aren’t equal that is the real point. It proves that physical perspective is the real determining factor.
In Exodus, sunset is experienced based on ones physical location on earth at a particular moment. Now, suppsed Jesus hovered with the Holy Spirit over the earth, watching it rotate by Him for, say, a million years, before hovering into the sunset. Well Then, His “yom”, based on the definition and usage of “yom” in Exodus 20:11 and Exodus 31:17, is the time elapsed between consecutive sunsets, from His perspective… a million years in this case. We cannot use our experience of a “yom” negate His.
In conclusion, the usage of “yom” in Exodus 20:11 and Exodus 31:17 does not negate, but confirms my use of “day” to describe the time, however long (whether it be 24 hours or a million years), between creation evenings.