Some Christians have expressed doubt about a literal 24 hour day, before the sun and moon were created in: >Genesis 1:16 KJV And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. Advocates of the gap theory have based much of their argument on verses 1 and 2 of Genesis, because there was no light. Gen 1:1 and 2 >In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. In Genesis 1:3 God created light: >Genesis 1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. However: the light was not separated from the darkness (and even I have a hard time imagining that even though I do not question it). Then in verse 4 Go does separate the light from the darkness. >Genesis 1:4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. In verse 5 God designates day and night, and calls the combination of the two the first day. > Genesis 1:5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. Do any Denominations believe that up until verses 4 and 5 there was an indefinite period which had no specific number of hours, or days, or years by our concept of time?

According to Dante, in his Divine Comedy (Inferno), the fall of Satan caused a geological upheaval. The Devil fell on his head in the Southern Hemisphere, causing the lands to the south to rise to the north and to the south to form the Mountain of Purgatory. Dante also said that the fall of Satan formed Hell in the center of the Earth. The Gap Theory is a vision that tries to interconnect the great eras of the geological column of evolution with the biblical timeline, inserting the 14 billion years and the long prehistoric periods. Furthermore, Gap theorists mostly believe that the fall of Satan and his fallen angels to Earth wiped out the dinosaurs (about 65 million years ago - Cretaceous Period). Only after that period did God "recreate" the Earth in 6 literal days (about 6,000 years ago). My question is whether the Bible really teaches that Satan fell from Heaven in this catastrophic way to Earth, whether the "fall" just means that he fell from his position in Heaven, or is it both alternatives.

I have stumbled on this essay [(The Genesis Gap)](https://ichthys.com/sr2-copy.htm) on the site *ichthys* from which I am quoting a passage: > ....5. The Timing of the Satanic Rebellion: Finally, it should be > mentioned that, in addition to the compelling reasons listed above for > placing Satan's rebellion within the time frame of the Genesis Gap > (that is, between original creation and the eventual re-creation of > the earth – a period of unspecified length), there is, in fact, no > other period in which it can reasonably be located. After the angels > sing for joy with obvious relief at earth's re-creation (and the sea's > restriction: Job 38:4-11), the temptation of Adam and Eve by Satan > follows their creation in apparently rapid succession, leaving scant > time for Satan's own fall and seduction of a large portion of angelic > kind (Genesis 1-3; see Part 1 of this series). > > > > III. Creation and Re-Creation: Before all else, God created the > heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1 > > Genesis 1:1 describes the original creation of the heavens and the > earth. The author , who seems extremely competent and well-informed, holds up the idea that there have been 2 separate creation of the world, the original one of Eden, followed by the revolt of the angel(s) which caused the revolt of man , and a second, the actual earth and universe, after the first had been destroyed > .....As we have seen, however, the second verse of the Bible, Genesis > 1:2, is split grammatically from verse one with an abrupt, adversative > construction. Verse two propels us untold eons forward in time from > the original, awesome act of creation, and moves us to the other side > of the Genesis Gap, describing for us the state of the universe as it > existed before God re-created the earth: > > But the earth came to be ruined and despoiled – darkness lay upon the > face of the abyss while God's Spirit brooded over the surface of its > waters. Genesis 1:2 > > Original creation had been marred by Satan's revolt, and cast into > darkness by God's judgment upon the rebellious angels. In order to > make the universe habitable once more for creatures with physical > bodies (the attempted possession of which was a major issue in Satan's > pre-fall propaganda, it will be remembered from Part 1 of our study), > a re-creation of the earth was essential. Genesis 1:3 - 2:3, the > account of the seven days, is a description of this renewal of the > heavens and the earth. The objective behind this process of the seven > days is also quite clear: the creation of Man. Everything God > accomplishes within the period of re-creation is specifically designed > to make life supportable for this His second category of creature > possessing free will: > > > > 1. The Seven Days of Re-Creation.... the essay consists of four extended articles which make an easy and interesting reading. I have never heard of this hypothesis, and ask you expert to give an assessment of the reliability of the quotations but most of all ond the validity of the theory. It makes a lot of sense, and surely solves a lot of problems arising from the usual interpretation of the Bible description, in which the presence of satan in the garden is inexplicable, unjustifiable, unbelievably illogical and totally absurd. But the main problem is that a second re-creation is absolutely necessary because it is literally impossible that this material world with decaying matter and inert mass etc, can possibly have been the location of Eden. Has this idea ever gained currency? what are its weak points ?

According to the [Gap Theory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gap_creationism) there was a large gap in time between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2. Two aspects of the theory are: 1. Rather than Genesis 1:1 being a summary for what follows, it is a distinct event in time, followed by another distinct event in time in Genesis 1:2ff. 2. Satan is thought to have sinned and fallen during the gap, which God judged through a cataclysmic flood (often called Lucifer's flood) that left the world in the empty and void state we read in Genesis 1:2. What *other* verses in the Bible support these two propositions?