Genesis 2:16-17 (KJV)
Adam and Even Could Not Eat From the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
Genesis 5:3-5 (KJV)
Adam Lived to Be Nine Hundred and Thirty Years
3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, and after his image; and called his name Seth:
4 And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:
5 And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died.
Yom is the Hebrew word for day...And many take Genesis literally is the use of God creating the world in seven literal days...Yom has several meanings...Yom can mean a twenty four hour day or an unspecified time...Yom can mean a period of Light, versus a period of darkness...How we interpret Yom is important in how we read the Bible, and most specifically the first few books of Genesis and its use of yom for day...For instance, here in chapter two of Genesis the LORD told Adam they could eat anything in Eden, except they could not eat from the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil: for in the day that they would eat from that specific tree they shall surely die...
The question some have ask is why did Moses write that if Adam or Eve ate from this tree, for "in the day" that they eat from that tree they shall surely die...So Yom is used here in a different way, with the word in the day...Was God talking about one day when He is said "in the day" they would surely die or did He mean something else (in reference to a time period)?...Moses could have used Yom here to mean in a generation or an unspecified period of time...Because we know that Adam lives to be 930 years old, we know He did not die in a day or on that day...God waited a long period (in our terms of aging) before He brought Adam home...We are not told how old Eve lived but Adam was one hundred thirty years when Eve had Seth as a son...So they both lived to be quite old...But we can see from their ages that they did not die right after they ate the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil...And by today's terms Adam lived an extremely long life...
So, as we literally read Genesis, we now must believe something else about Yom and "in the day" and what Moses meant...Moses could mean many things but all would be conjecture about the lives of Adam and Eve and their deaths...Moses might mean before they ate the fruit, they would not die and after they ate the fruit from the tree the aging process began...It could mean that they started or did die spiritually, and needed to be reborn and be made right with God again...But any ideas are conjecture and not in the Bible, because we are not given in detail what in the word day meant for Adam and Eve...So each of us must interpret what this day and in the day means as far a time period or its symbolism...
So how we define Yom in Genesis, affects how many people read Genesis...It may be read literally, and it might be read symbolically...The reader has to decide as he reads through Genesis and the Bible...