The Deeper Meaning of Day Two of Creation: Waters Above & Below

Scripture

Genesis 1:6-8

And God said, “Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.” 

So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. 

God called the vault “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day.

The Deeper Meaning of Day Two of Creation: Waters Above & Below

by Rev. Cory Bradford-Watts

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Today we continue our exploration of the inner meaning of the seven-day creation story with the second day. “And God said, ‘Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.’ So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault ‘sky.’ And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day.” (Genesis 1:6-8)

At the root of our interpretation is the idea that Divinity speaks in parables through the scriptures, as it says that’s how God speaks: in ways that are symbolic and invitational toward our spiritual growth. Through this lens, we find that perhaps God invites all peoples through their cultural mythologies and scriptures into heavenliness and peace within, instead of granting only one religious label with salvation. Our tendency to twist religion to serve only our identities and selfish habits is often the crux of what God criticizes under his many names throughout the ages (as Jesus did with the Pharisees!).

Our tradition believes that the creation story is a beautiful example of Divinity encouraging and describing our spiritual growth, as well as God’s Divine growth in his incarnation as the Christ. On the first day, we explored how our spiritual journeys often start with us completely “in the dark” about a deeper reality beyond our relatively shallow conception of the material world. And then God finds the opportunity in our lives to speak “Let there be light,” and we start to open to a perception of him and his wisdom, as well as to deep levels of transformation and renewal of life in our spirit.

God’s light is wisdom sprouting from divine love and care. And when we start to receive it within us it partially starts as an ability to see beyond our own self-obsessed abyss and towards others and Divinity as real beings, with the goal of caring for, supporting and furthering them. We hear this reflected in Jesus’ description of the two greatest commandments, “'Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind’ – this is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it, ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40) I’ll note that Christ quotes the Hebrew Bible (Deuteronomy and Leviticus) here and so these ideas weren’t new in their culture, although this type of emphasis might have been.

On the second day, we continue to receive a description of what it means to start to awaken (or “become a new creation”) spiritually, which is also when we begin to live by those commandments in greater and greater ways. This story eventually concludes by describing how, if we allow God to develop our hearts, minds, and spirits, he’ll lead us to a state of true inner peace called a Sabbath.

We see that on the second day the waters are separated by a vault called the sky, with waters below and waters above. This relates to the earthly phenomenon of having water on the earth and water in the sky as clouds, etc. But there’s also a long legacy of water representing Godly truth in scripture, of which we’re told we must be born again through (see John 3:1-9), leading to eternal life. The lower waters in our lives are the earthlier truths that we know, and the higher waters are those higher truths that start to be truly separated and developed once we “see the light” and a newfound spiritual awareness and orientation has entered our lives.  

I can relate to this phenomenon! As a kid I heard many lectures and sermons about God and scripture through this religion or that, as my grandfather was a Baptist minister and my father was into Islam, Baha’i, Hinduism, and on. My dad took it as his duty to share as much spiritual knowledge as he could with me, but as a child this landed nowhere! It didn’t help that all of my family’s religious perspectives were often somehow still, “My way or the highway” (i.e. Hell).

When I finally had my “Let there be light” experiences and realizations, the spiritual truths that spoke the most to me from my youth started to rise to the surface. These ideas and new ones began to find a type of fruition in my mind and spirit, becoming more than the earthly memories that they were before. Further, as these ideas became rooted deeper or higher into my mind, they even started to bring renewal and a new life to the waters or truths and memories below – just as the clouds and the rain play their part in refreshing and empowering the water on the earth.

Our own experiences can help to point to what the Lord means when he tells the woman at the well to drink of his water to find eternal life. When we begin to be deepened and developed by Divinity we find a greater life inside, one that has many phases or “days” (some of which coincide) leading to a true state of Sabbath and humanity. Further, the truths that the Lord shares, those about Divine love, praising God, compassion for others, openness toward the stranger, and support for the poor, are the types of truths that can start to be implanted “above the sky.” Through many of the world’s scriptures, the Lord shares the higher ideas that find true life in the deep recesses of our motives and hearts if we allow them to rise and not just sit below, within our memories.

Sometimes I look at the politics of today even amidst this pandemic and am still somewhat shocked by what I often see! And despite our subject today, I wasn’t quite born yesterday, and yet, I think all of us are early in our journeys with God. Many of our cultures and politicians still use religion as if its truths were below our inner sky, meant to be used shallowly instead of from a place of deep reception of its radical calls for love, transformational openness, and compassion. Many of our scripture-thumping leaders behave as though that’s all that’s needed, thumping religious labels, as if that’s all it truly means to be a new creation in the likeness of Divinity, in the likeness of the great social justice warrior called the Christ (“the-one-who-uplifts”).

May we all start to further embody the second day of creation, taking the truths that God shares with us to heart. May we allow that new creation to bring a renewing circle of life into our minds and spirits. Refreshing us, sustaining us, and empowering us to nourish and uplift the thirsty, both materially and in the spirit.

Peace and care,

Rev. Cory