3. And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear; (9) or, as Castellio renders it, [And God commanded] that the water flow together into one place that the dried land might appear. These words make it clearly evident that, on the first and second day or time of creation, the universal globe, which was to become terrestrial, was, as it were, purely aqueous; and that it finally superinduced on itself a crust. Thus the waters were gathered together under heaven, that is, under the proximate or aerial atmosphere (vs. 8), into one place; and the surface of this globe became Earth.
When this was done, God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas, (10) or, as Castellio renders it, He called the flowing together or conflux of the water, Sea.
And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed. (11) The elementary particles which came up from the waters, or sank down to their surface and formed that crust, or that dry, or dried up land, could not as yet be such earthly particles as we now find in meadows, and which constitute soil; but they were mere seeds; for the dust of our earth is born of the ashes of withered or dead grasses, plants, and trees. And therefore, since the whole surface of the earth that had now come into existence was a seminary, no other result could follow than that, from its universal bosom, it should bring forth grass, or produce the vegetable kingdom, which would afterwards serve the winged fowl and the beast for nourishment. The productions follow each other in such order that, first were raised herbs, then shrubs or small trees, and then the larger trees. For God then said that the earth should bring forth fruit trees which should give fruit, each after its own kind, and in which should be its own seed, upon the earth.
And the earth put forth shoots, that is, different kinds of fruitful herbs and fruit-bearing trees, in which was its own seed (Castellio). (12) The time of creation, or the space of time, in which the dried up land appeared, or in which this globe came to view as an earth, and in which was produced the vegetable kingdom with its fruits, is called the third day; for when these things had been finished, from the evening and the morning came the third day. (13) That this day was not an ordinary day is very clearly indicated by the words that follow.
