Genesis 101
Lesson Ten

Genesis 1:6-8

"Firmament"

Gen 1:6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 
Gen 1:7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. 
Gen 1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

 
Now, starting with verse six, we start the second day of God's creation of Earth as we know it. As you know, when God created the Heaven and Earth, the Earth was covered with a layer of deep water (V. 2). And then, everything above the layer of deep water was an expanse of space God called "heaven". Now, God takes the water that is on and above the earth and separates it, leaving some water on earth, and creating a layer of water up in the heaven above the earth. The space between these two layers of water is called "heaven", thus splitting the single heaven He created in verse one up into two heavens... The space directly above earth we know as our "atmosphere", where our clouds are and the birds fly, and the space above this we know as "outer space" where the stars, sun and moon are.  So, prior to God separating the water and creating this expanse between the two that He called “heaven”, there was only ONE heaven.  Genesis 1:1 in the King James Version (KJV) says, “in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth”.  Notice the word heaven is singular.  He didn't create a second heaven until here in verse six.  So, if your bible reads in Genesis 1:1, “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”…  (plural heavens) then it is incorrect.

It is believed that this expanse of water separating the two heavens filtered the suns rays and caused the heavy "mist" that watered everything before rain started (Chapter 2:6). It is also considered the cause of the longevity of life on earth prior to the flood (see chapter five). And, it is also believed that this layer of water above the earth is where all the rain came from during the flood (7:11), which combine with all the water that was below the Earths crust bursting forth, was able to flood the whole earth.
And then again we see the phrase "and the evening and the morning...." which reminds us that God did this during the time frame of the sun coming up one day, and coming up the second day (ie. 24 hours), or one full circulation of the sun around the earth.