May fly

1:20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

Ok, we've got exciting new stuff here.  Two creations, and more information about heaven.

In verse 11, God asked the earth to bring forth plants.  Here he's asking the water to bring forth animals.  The first is "the moving creature that hath life"; that's pretty broad.  It's not clear here whether it means a single animal, or one species, or pretty much all animals.  Well, maybe "abundantly" rules out a single animal.  The second is "fowl", or birds.  If this were limited to sea animals, it would perhaps make sense for the water to bring them forth.  But, it definitely includes birds, so it's rather odd that they come from the water.

Of course, all animals coming from the ocean agrees with modern evolutionary theory, at least to some degree.  As does the plants predating the animals.  But the plants not coming from the ocean would be a conflict; not to mention the plants predating the stars.  I think it's safe to say the two viewpoints are fairly independent.

We know that God placed the sun, moon and stars in heaven.  But here we get more.  First, heaven is described as "open"; this is a bit startling for two reasons.  One, it's full of stars.  Two, it's dividing the waters above from those below.  Beyond that, heaven here is where birds fly.

So this clarifies the layout of the world as viewed by the author.  At the bottom we have earth and sea, with the earth now covered in plants, and birds and animals coming from the sea.  Above that we have heaven, which is full of air and flying birds.  In heaven, presumably toward the top, are the sun and moon and stars.  And above that, more water.

This reminds me somehow of pictures drawn before perspective, but this is perhaps more before gravity.

What does it mean that fowl are not considered moving creatures that have life?  Just some more random inconsistency.