Genesis 1:16

God made two great lights ¹  – the greater light to rule over the day and the lesser light to rule over the night. He made the stars also. ² 

God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.

God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night; He made the stars also.

For God made two great lights, the sun and the moon, to shine down upon the earth. The greater one, the sun, presides during the day; the lesser one, the moon, presides through the night. He also made the stars.

God made two big lights, the larger to take charge of Day, The smaller to be in charge of Night; and he made the stars.

And God made the two great lights: the greater light to be the ruler of the day, and the smaller light to be the ruler of the night: and he made the stars.

God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars.

Then 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.

God made two great lights ¹  – the greater light to rule over the day and the lesser light to rule over the night. He made the stars also. ² 

¹ sn Two great lights. The text goes to great length to discuss the creation of these lights, suggesting that the subject was very important to the ancients. Since these “lights” were considered deities in the ancient world, the section serves as a strong polemic (see G. Hasel, “The Polemical Nature of the Genesis Cosmology,” EvQ 46 [1974]: 81-102). The Book of Genesis is affirming they are created entities, not deities. To underscore this the text does not even give them names. If used here, the usual names for the sun and moon [Shemesh and Yarih, respectively] might have carried pagan connotations, so they are simply described as greater and lesser lights. Moreover, they serve in the capacity that God gives them, which would not be the normal function the pagans ascribed to them. They merely divide, govern, and give light in God’s creation.

² tn Heb “and the stars.” Now the term “stars” is added as a third object of the verb “made.” Perhaps the language is phenomenological, meaning that the stars appeared in the sky from this time forward.