E.W. Bullinger's Companion Bible Notes - Genesis 1:21
whales = great sea-creatures. creature = soul. Hebrew. nephesh. Compare Genesis 1:20 and App-13 . read more
Genesis 1:21 Asv
E.W. Bullinger
James Burton Coffman
Coffman Commentaries on the Bible - Genesis 1:20-23
THE FIFTH DAY"And God said, Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the firmament of heaven. And God created the great sea-monsters, and every living creature that moveth, wherewith the waters swarmed, after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth. And there was evening and there... read more
Thomas Coke
Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible - Genesis 1:21
Genesis 1:21. Created great whales— The word התנינם hathaninim, which we render great whales, signifies "any kind of large aquatic or amphibious animals;" under which, whales, crocodiles, and the like, may properly be classed. The sacred writer intends only to inform us by that expression of the creation of that class of aquatic or amphibious creatures which are of the more enormous size. REFLECTIONS.—The greatest, as well as the least, owe to God their breath and being; and the whale, which... read more
Thomas Constable
Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Genesis 1:1-26
I. PRIMEVAL EVENTS 1:1-11:26Chapters 1-11 provide an introduction to the Book of Genesis, the Pentateuch, and the whole Bible."What we find in chaps. 1-11 is the divine initiation of blessing, which is compromised by human sin followed by gracious preservation of the promise: blessing-sin-grace." [Note: Mathews, p. 60.] "His [Moses’] theological perspective can be summarized in two points. First, the author intends to draw a line connecting the God of the Fathers and the God of the Sinai... read more
Thomas Constable
Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Genesis 1:3-31
3. The six days of creation 1:3-31Cosmic order consists of clearly demarcating the various elements of the universe. God divided light and darkness, waters and dry land, the world above from the world below. Likewise people should maintain the other divisions in the universe. [Note: See Mathews, p. 124.] In three "days" God made the uninhabitable earth productive, and in three more "days" He filled the uninhabited earth with life. The process of creation, as Moses described it, typically... read more
Thomas Constable
Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Genesis 1:20-23
The fifth day 1:20-23"Great sea monsters" (Heb. tauninim, Genesis 1:21) were large fish, whales, squid, and all large creatures living in the water. The pagans worshipped these, but they are under God’s authority. The Old Testament writers adopted pagan imagery, but not pagan theology.Note that Moses wrote that God created both marine animals and birds on the same "day". Evolution claims that birds evolved from reptiles and that this process took millions of years."The blessing of God is one of... read more
John Dummelow
John Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible - Genesis 1:1-31
The Creation'The foundation of foundations and pillar of all wisdom is to know that the First Being is, and that He giveth existence to everything that exists! 'Thus wrote Moses Maimonides, a Jewish scholar of the 12th cent, a.d., concerning whom the Jewish proverb runs: 'From Moses to Moses there arose none like Moses.' He had in his mind the opening chapter of the Bible, the object of which is to lay this foundation; to declare the existence of the One God; to teach that the Universe was... read more
Charles John Ellicott
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Genesis 1:1-31
EXCURSUS B: ON THE NAMES ELOHIM AND JEHOVAH-ELOHIM.Throughout the first account of creation (Genesis 1:1 to Genesis 2:3) the Deity is simply called Elohim. This word is strictly a plural of Eloah, which is used as the name of God only in poetry, or in late books like those of Nehemiah and Daniel. It is there an Aramaism, God in Syriac being Aloho, in Ohaldee Ellah, and in Arabic Allahu—all of which are merely dialectic varieties of the Hebrew Eloah, and are used constantly in the singular... read more
Charles John Ellicott
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Genesis 1:21
(21) God created great whales.—Whales, strictly speaking, are mammals, and belong to the creation of the sixth day. But tannin, the word used here, means any long creature, and is used of serpents in Exodus 7:9-10 (where, however, it may mean a crocodile), and in Deuteronomy 32:33; of the crocodile in Psalms 74:13, Isaiah 51:9, Ezekiel 29:3; and of sea monsters generally in Job 7:12. It thus appropriately marks the great Saurian age. The use, too, of the verb bârâ, “he created,” is no argument... read more
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Bridgeway Bible Commentary - Genesis 1:1-31
THE STORY OF CREATIONThe Bible and scienceModern science has revealed so much about the wonders and the size of the physical universe that human beings may seem almost to be nothing. The Bible takes a different view. Human beings are its main concern, for they alone are made in God’s image. The story of creation is but an introduction to the story of God’s dealings with the human race. The Bible demonstrates this order of importance from the outset by fitting the story of creation into a mere... read more