Gunton on Genesis 1

In his Triune Creator, Colin Gunton offers this “argument” against reading Gen 1 as an account of six literal days of divine activity: “the sophistication and complexity of the writings make it clear that the authors, and that includes those who wrote the books in their canonical form, exclude - for example - any interpretation that insists that by the six days of the creation is meant six periods of twenty-four hours.” Apparently, everyone knows - at least Gunton did - that a literal interpretation of Gen 1 has to be unsophisticated.