Mark recently posted about hermeneutics, and how it isn’t always the case that the ‘plain reading’ isn’t always the correct reading. I agree with that principle, but in part of the post he says the following…

Indeed one must concede that if someone opened a Bible for the first time and read through Genesis 1 they would most likely assume that the author was using “day” just as we would normally use it in English, to refer to one 24-hour period. However, as the supporters of the other two views covered in the book (day age and framework) point out, the ‘plain reading’ faces some very significant problems if one pays attention to the ‘œillogical’ ordering of creation events as recorded in the text (such as light and vegetation existing before light sources were created). These difficulties raise the possibility that something other that literal 24-hour days were intended by the author of Genesis 1.

Because my comments don’t really have anything to do with his main point, I’m not leaving this as a comment. But I was irked enough to say something. Also, I haven’t read The Genesis Debate, so I can’t comment on the book at all.

I don’t think the “problem” suggested (light before light source) is at all “significant”. In fact, I donâ’t even consider it a problem.

The text is quite clear, “And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” Whatever someone may think about logic, the Bible is explicitly clear that there was light before the sun. And the sun (and moon) were then created to rule the day (and the night). The light existed, and then the sun and moon were made for the light that was already present.

The only reason this question would be a “significant problem” is if someone first brings a skeptical eye to the text, judging (with their own reason conviently being the standard) whether or not it can be true and accurate. The question that those author’s bring to the table is not ‘what does the text say’, but rather, ‘can we really believe what the text says?’

There is no hermenutical or logical error present in the literal interpretation.