Is It Necessary to Believe That the Six Days of Creation Were Equal in Length?
Answered by Shaykh Abdul-Rahim Reasat
Question
Is it necessary to believe that the six days mentioned in the Quran regarding the creation of the heavens and the earth were equal in length, or that they were standard twenty-four-hour days?
Answer
I pray you are well.
No, it is not necessary to believe that. What we know is what Allah Most High has informed us. Allah says:
“Indeed your Lord is Allah Who created the heavens and the earth in six Days (ayyam).” [Quran, 7:54]
The term ayyam is often translated as “days,” but it does not necessarily mean twenty-four-hour days.
The Meaning of “Yawm”
In Arabic, the word “yawm” does not inherently mean a fixed twenty-four-hour period. Rather, it refers to a finite span of time. This span can range from a very short moment to an extremely long duration.
Allah, Most High, mentions a yawm whose measure is fifty thousand years. He Most High says:
“…will ascend to Him on a Day (yawm) fifty thousand years in length.” [Quran, 70:4]
This clearly indicates that a yawm is not restricted to the length of a single day as humans measure it.
Allah also says,
“Day in and day out He has something to bring about.” [Quran, 55:29]
In this context, “yawm” refers to the smallest division of time, meaning that at every moment, Allah is bringing about something tremendous and significant. This further demonstrates that the term yawm is flexible in meaning and is not limited to a specific unit of time.
Creation in Six Stages
When Allah states that He created the heavens and the earth in six ayyam, this cannot refer to six twenty-four-hour days in the conventional sense. At that point, there was no Earth rotating on its axis or orbiting the sun by which such a measurement could even exist.
Rather, what is meant is six stages or six spans of time. These stages can be as long or as short as Allah wills. They could range from moments to millennia, or even millions of years.
There is nothing in the Quran that indicates these six stages had to be of equal duration, or that they had to be of any specific or minimum length.
What One Is Required to Believe
A believer is only required to affirm that Allah, Most High, created the heavens and the earth, the universe and beyond, in a span of time that can be divided into six stages.
Observation and reflection also show that creation did not occur in six sets of twenty-four-hour days. Importantly, there is nothing in the Quran that compels us to adopt such an understanding.
For this reason, it is not necessary to believe that the six ayyam of creation were equal in length or that they were standard days. They are best understood as six stages or eons.
And Allah knows best.
[Shaykh] Abdul-Rahim
Shaykh Abdul-Rahim Reasat began studying Arabic Grammar and Morphology whilst studying for a degree in English and History. After graduating, He traveled to Damascus and studied Arabic, Hanafi Fiqh, Usul al-Fiqh, Theology, and Logic with Shaykh Adnan Darwish, Shaykh ‘Abd al-Rahman Arjan al-Binsawi, Shaykh Husayn Darwish, Shaykh Muhammad Darwish, the late Shaykh Rashad Shams, and others. He then moved to Amman to continue his studies in those fields, as well as in Tafsir, Quranic Sciences, Hadith Methodology and Commentary, Prophetic Biography, Prophetic Perfections and Traits, Rhetoric, Arabic Literature, and Tajwid. His teachers include Shaykh Ali Hani, Dr. Hamza al-Bakri, Dr. Salah Abu al-Hajj, Dr. Mansur Abu Zina, Shaykh Ahmad Hasanat, Shaykh Ahmad Jammal, and others.
