God called the light “day”, and the darkness he called “night”. There was evening and there was morning, the first day.
Parallel translations
- KJV And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
- BSB God called the light “day,” and the darkness He called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.
- ESV God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
- NKJV God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.
- NASB God called the light “day,” and the darkness He called “night.” And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
- NLT God called the light “day” and the darkness “night.” And evening passed and morning came, marking the first day.
Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Ps 74:16The day is yours, the night is also yours. You have prepared the light and the sun.
- Isa 45:7I form the light, and create darkness. I make peace, and create calamity. I am Yahweh, who does all these things.
- Ps 104:20You make darkness, and it is night, in which all the animals of the forest prowl.
- 1 Th 5:5You are all children of light, and children of the day. We don’t belong to the night, nor to darkness,
- Jer 33:20“Yahweh says: ‘If you can break my covenant of the day, and my covenant of the night, so that there shall not be day and night in their season;
- Gen 8:22While the earth remains, seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”
- Ps 19:2Day after day they pour out speech, and night after night they display knowledge.
- Gen 1:8God called the expanse “sky”. There was evening and there was morning, a second day.
- Eph 5:13But all things, when they are reproved, are revealed by the light, for everything that reveals is light.
- 1 Cor 3:13each man’s work will be revealed. For the Day will declare it, because it is revealed in fire; and the fire itself will test what sort of work each man’s work is.
- Gen 1:31God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. There was evening and there was morning, a sixth day.
- Gen 1:23There was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
- Gen 1:19There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.
- Gen 1:13There was evening and there was morning, a third day.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Lay
The single best free starting point for Genesis 1–11 — clear, visual, and faithful to the literary design.
Pastoral
The beloved devotional-pastoral classic, free and public domain — warm, quotable, verse by verse.
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
From the first promise that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent (3:15), through Abraham's blessing to all nations and Judah's coming ruler, Genesis sows every seed that flowers in Christ — the true offspring, the better Adam, the ram caught for Isaac.
How Genesis 1:5 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.