Charles Ellicott Commentary Genesis 1:11

"And God said, Let the earth put forth grass, herbs yielding seed, [and] fruit-trees bearing fruit after their kind, wherein is the seed thereof, upon the earth: and it was so." — Genesis 1:11 (ASV)

Let the earth bring forth grass. — This is the second creative act. The first was the calling of matter into existence, which, by the operation of mechanical and chemical laws imposed upon it by the Creator, was arranged and digested into a cosmos—that is, an orderly and harmonious whole. These laws are now and always in perpetual activity, but no secondary or derived agency can either add one atom to the world-mass or diminish anything from it.

The second creative act was the introduction of life, first vegetable and then animal; and for this, nothing less than an Almighty power would suffice. Three stages of it are enumerated. The first is deshe—not “grass,” but a mere greenness, without visible seed or stalk. This greenness can still be seen today on the surface of rocks and, when examined by the microscope, is found to consist of a growth of plants of a minute and lowly type.

But all endogenous plants belong to this class and are merely the development of this primary greenness. Far higher in the scale are the seed-bearing plants that follow, among which the most important are cereals. In the third class, vegetation reaches its highest development in the tree with a woody stem and the seed enclosed in an edible covering. Geologists inform us that cryptogamous plants, which were the higher forms of the first class, prevailed almost exclusively until the end of the carbonaceous period. However, even independently of this evidence, we could scarcely suppose that fruit-trees came into existence before the sun shone upon the earth, while cereals are found only in surface deposits in connection with traces of humans.

Vegetation, therefore, did not reach its perfection until the sixth day, when animals were created that needed these seeds and fruits for their food. However, far from there being anything in the creative record to require us to believe that the development of vegetation was not gradual, it is absolutely described as being so. With that first streak of green, God also gave the law of vegetation, and under His fostering hand, all that the first bestowal of vegetable life contained came to pass in due time. It is the constant rule of Holy Scripture to include in a narrative both the ultimate and the immediate results of an act. Moreover, in the record of these creative days, we are told what on each day was new, while the continuance of all that preceded is understood.

The dry land called into existence on the third day was not dry enough to be the habitat of terrestrial animals until the sixth day; not until then would it bear vegetation that requires a dry soil. The evidence of geology shows that the atmosphere, created on the second day, was not sufficiently free from carbonic acid and other vapors to be suitable for animals to breathe until long ages of rank vegetation had converted these gases into coal.

When, then, on the third day, God said, Let the earth bring forth grass ... herb yielding seed ... tree, He gave the perfect command. However, the complete fulfillment of that command would be gradual, as the state of the earth and the necessities of the living creatures brought forth upon it required. For in God’s work there is always a fitness, and nothing with Him is hurried or premature.