[Sabertooth]

You are misreading the verse. In Genesis 2, it is spoken of as being a general time, as in 'the general period of time when', not as if it was the same day.

Seems to me that's exactly how I read the verse. Hence my question...

Why is "day" not a twenty-four hour period in Genesis 2:4, yet it must be in Genesis 1?

[monkeyshine]

I believe you are tricking yourself. Gen 1: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth". You think this is the order of creation? Not so at all. Gen 1:2 "...The spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters" -- so when did he create the waters? They had to pre-exist the heavens and the earth, according to Gen 1:2.

I believe your problem is you are taking it, AND trying to make it, too literal. It is not sequential, nor exclusively literal. It is poetic.

[irishtenor]

Because God bracketed them with the phrase "Morning and Evening", thus establishing the time frame.