Genesis 1:14-23 (Vespers, 1st reading)
- 14
- Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years;
- 15
- “and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so.
- 16
- 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.
- 17
- God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth,
- 18
- and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.
- 19
- So the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
- 20
- Then God said, “Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens.”
- 21
- So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
- 22
- And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.”
- 23
- So the evening and the morning were the fifth day.