Light has returned to the surface of the waters upon the earth, the earth has begun to spin, and now God is going to create an environment that is perfect for the creations He is about to make.
And Elohim said, "Let there be an expansion (firmament) between the waters and let it separate between the waters from the waters." and Elohim made the expansion (firmament) and He caused a separation between the waters which under the expansion and between the waters which were above the expansion. and it was good, Genesis 1:6,7.
The division between the waters is very interesting. God has, in essence, just created a very large green house, over the entire earth. This green house affect is going to cause the entire earth to warm to a fairly comfortable temperature for humans and animals. We see evidence of a warm earth even today, under many layers of ice, where animals have been found with green vegetation still in their mouths. The Berezovka Mammoth is one example of an animal that was instantly frozen, and the content of his stomach provides evidence that his environment was warm and full of vegetation.
(I am going to add more evidence of the ice dome in this section after further study.)
God called the firmament, or expansion, between the earth and the stars heaven. This is what is known to us as the sky, or first heaven. Although the ice dome no longer exists, we still have a separation from our atmosphere and space. (What happened to this ice dome will be discussed in chapters 6 and 7.) This layer, which we know as the ozone layer, offers some protection from the sun and other objects that may collide with the earth; however, it does not retain the heat from the sun like the ice dome did. Therefore, we live in a world that is not like the world of Adam and Eve's time. Our world has large temperature shifts. Their world stayed within a moderate temperature all the time. As we continue through the book of Genesis, keeping the environment in mind will help us understand life at this time in man's history.
and the second day came to an end...
