Rabbi Yehuda bar Simon said: “It will be evening” is not written here, but rather, “it was evening” – from here we learn that there had been an order to time even beforehand.17Even before the creation on the fourth day of the sun and the moon, which are the conventional means of marking time. “It will be evening” would have meant that on the first few days, it was noted that later on there would be evening and morning.
Rabbi Abahu said: This teaches that He continuously created worlds and destroyed them, until He created the current one, and said: ‘This one pleases Me, those did not please Me.’ Rabbi Pinḥas said: The source for Rabbi Abahu is: “God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31) – this pleases Me, those did not please Me.18“Behold” implies that there was a new, improved situation that had not been there before.