What Does Genesis 1:7 Mean?

Day three contains two distinct creative acts: the gathering of the lower waters to reveal dry land, and the command for the earth to produce vegetation. The gathering of the seas is a governmental act, God sets a boundary for the waters and commands them into their place. The land does not generate itself from the receding water; God speaks it into appearance. Psalm 104:9 will celebrate this boundary: "You set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth." The sea does not overwhelm the land because God bounded it here.

The vegetation command introduces the principle of "according to its kind" (leminehu) that runs through the rest of the creation account. Each plant produces seed that will produce more of the same kind; each fruit tree produces seed in its fruit after its own kind. The diversity of the plant world is structured by this internal reproductive principle. God does not command a specific number of species; he establishes the principle of regulated self-replication within kinds, and the extraordinary diversity of the plant world is the outworking of that single command.

Day three bears the evaluative refrain twice: "and God saw that it was good" appears for the land (v.10) and again for the vegetation (v.12). This is the day that compensates for day two's missing declaration: the water-ordering that began on day two is complete when the land appears, and for the first time the week moves faster than one tov per day. Day three double-confirming the goodness of the land creation suggests the double work is double evaluated. The creation of the land is the necessary precondition for everything else day six will place on it.