The Lᴏʀᴅ created the fish and birds.

Genesis 1.20-23.

Growing up, I was taught animals don’t have souls; only we humans do. I don’t know who first started teaching this idea, but obviously ’twasn’t an educated person. Anyone who knows Latin will recognize our word “animal” comes from anima, “soul.” And here in Genesis, we see God refers to the first sea creature he created as a swimming, living נֶ֣פֶשׁ/nefeš, “soul.” Says it right there in the bible…

Well, assuming your bible bothers to translate nefeš as “soul.” The KJV doesn’t. Straight-up skips the word. Oddly, when I use my bible software—which shows you the original-language word whenever you move your mouse over the English-language word—“hath” is apparently the word which translates nefeš in “the moving creature that hath life.” Ge 1.20 KJV Now no, that’s not accurate. The translators of the KJV weren’t translating word-for-word.

And neither are many bible translators. I’ve found most bibles translate the Hebrew phrase נֶ֣פֶשׁ חַיָּ֑ה/nefeš khayíh, “living soul,” as “living creatures.” Sometimes you mouse over the word “living” and find it translates nefeš and “creatures” translates khayíh; sometimes it’s flipped.

A soul is a lifeforce. The point the author of Genesis (whom I’ll call “Moe” from here on) was trying to make, is these are living creatures. Not that plants aren’t alive; not that they don’t breathe too. But these creatures move around. They swarm. They fly. They’re obviously alive; they obviously have souls. Now, whether these souls are meant to live forever like us humans—that’s a whole other thing. But it’d be wrong to say animals lack souls.

Although you’ll still get some Christians who say so, and they’ll point out their bibles never describe an animal as having one. Well yeah, if your favorite bible translation prefers to render nefeš as “life” so you can’t tell it’s actually talking about the lifeforces of animals—like when the LORD forbids the Hebrews from eating blood because it’s an animal’s nefeš, Lv 17.14, Dt 12.23 or when you take an animal’s nefeš you have to make restitution for it, nefeš for nefeš Lv 24.18 —then of course you’re never gonna see that idea in the bible; it’s been hidden from you. Wonder why.

Well, I’m hiding nothing, so when I come across nefeš I’m translating it “soul,” and here it is in today’s passage.

Genesis 1.20-23 KWL

20God said, “Swarm the waters,

you swimming, living soul.

Fly, bird, over the land,

upon the face of the ceiling of the skies.

21God created the great serpents

and every living, crawling soul which swarms the waters,

by species.

And every winged bird,

by species.

God saw how good it was.

22God blessed them, saying, “Bear fruit. Be many.

Fill the waters of the seas.

And bird: Be many on the land.”

23It was dusk, then dawn.

Day five.

How many living souls is this now?

Another thing I should point out is nefeš in verse 20 isn’t plural. It’s singular. Same as the KJV has it, “the moving creature that hath life”—not creatures. God isn’t creating souls in this passage to swarm the waters; he’s creating one soul. Just the one. Which he commands to swarm the water—which is kinda impossible to do when there’s only one of you, but God does command this sea creature to multiply in verse 22, so he doesn’t intend for there to remain just the one of ’em.

Same deal with the birds. In verse 20 he only creates the one bird. The one soul. Even though the CSB, ESV, GNB, NET, NIV, and NLT have “birds.” The KJV has “fowl,” which is singular, and correct. The NKJV has “birds,” which is plural, and not.

So… what’s with the plurals? Well, some of the argument is Moe was writing poetry. He put “living soul” and “bird” in the singular, but he meant plural. It’s like when old-timey writers refer to “man,” like when the Westminster Catechism asks, “What is the chief end of man?” but it properly means all of humanity, not just one specific man. So “bird” represents all of birdkind, and “living soul” represents every living soul in our planet’s waters. And the translators are just reflecting that.

But let’s be honest here: Some of the argument is the translators don’t want God to have created only one sea creature and one bird, from whom all the sea creatures and birds descended. Because there are thousands upon thousands of species of sea creature and bird. So… every last sea creature, whether fish or amphibian or sea mammal, has a common ancestor? Whose descendants have differentiated into all these diverse species? Holy shnikes, this sounds like evolution.

Same with the birds. So wait, is the bible saying the evolutionists are right? That every bird and dinosaur has one common ancestor, stretching back to creation? The young-earth creationists are wrong about special creation, and the bible proves it?

No, no, no. As I’ve always said, the bible’s not a science textbook. It’s not written to describe and defend evolution, whether by natural selection or special God-directed circumstances. I seriously doubt evolution ever entered into Moe’s mind. The ancients knew nothing about cells and DNA. Anything in their worldview which looked evolution-like has no comparison with our current scientific understanding of how evolution works. The bible doesn’t support young-earth creationism, but it doesn’t support proper science either. Wasn’t written for that!

Moe was likely trying to show how, same as all humans are descended from the first humans created by God, likewise all birds come from the first bird created by God, and all sea creatures come from the first sea creature created by God. All our progenitors were specially created by God.

Again, I’m gonna remind you Genesis 1 was written to correct the pagan mythologies of Moe’s day. Pagans didn’t believe the gods created every creature: Some creatures actually pre-dated the gods, and the gods had to fight them to become masters of the universe. A number of mythologies talk about the gods battling the great sea serpents. Moe’s making it obvious God instead created these sea serpents. And didn’t have to battle any of them.

Same with birds. Some mythologies have one bird created by one god as his own special pet, and another bird created by another god as her own special pet. Every god created its own personal zoo, and added it to the world. And again, rubbish: There’s one God, and only this God created the animals. And us.

Clearly this fish-Adam and bird-Adam idea is not what young-earth creationists teach. They claim either God created every species individually, or God created certain uber-species… which devolved, if anything, into multiple species. True, the devolution argument is not popular with creationists—no matter how reasonable it sounds—because they really hate how it resembles evolution. But it’s kinda consistent with the devolution of humanity, isn’t it? In Genesis 4.20-22 we read about Lamech ben Methusael’s kids:

• Jabal ben Lamech was the first to live in a tent and be a nomadic herdsman.
• Jubal ben Lamech was the first to play the harp and reed instruments (KJV “organ”).
• Tubalcain ben Lamech was the first bronze- and ironsmith.

Humans began to differentiate in what they did and how they lived, and the animals obviously did the same. The first sea creature was the progenitor of “the great serpents,” and all the other implied creatures of verse 21. God may not have been their first cause, but he was most definitely the cause of their first cause.

But bible translators, who don’t want to deal with the outrage of any of the conservatives who might buy their bibles, avoid this whole kerfuffle by fudging their translations of Genesis 1 into something which won’t offend young-earthers. There: Now it says God created sea creatures, plural, and birds, plural. Now it caters to you.

Which is, sad to say, what most Christians want most in their bible translations. Not honesty and authenticity.

Moving on.

And they’re good!

As usual, God declares the day’s work good. Sea creatures are good. Birds are good. And not just for food; they’re good in and of themselves. So if you’re into bird-watching or scuba-diving, go right ahead.

This also means if we hunt any birds to extinction, or overfish or pollute the oceans till there are no fish left, we’re violating God’s intentions for the fish and birds. There are those who teach the destruction of sea life and bird habitats, while not good, aren’t necessarily sin. After all, God put us humans in charge of the planet, Ge 1.26-28 so we can pollute it or kill off species if we wish. But that’s like saying, “Daddy gave me a puppy, so I can put it in the microwave if I wish.” Maybe you can, but that would be evil and sick. And there’s something profoundly twisted about a person who thinks it’s far more important that we be free than good.

And now I’ll stop before I get to ranting about libertarians.