What is the difference between the greater light and the light?
The light, as intellect, is unlimited and timeless, while the intellect represented by the greater light is capable of knowing further laws connected to the laws known so far, according to the network of relationships between the laws.
The meaning of the light is intellect, and the meaning of the greater light is also intellect. At first, this may seem like a small confusion of concepts, but the difference can be defined very precisely by interpreting their place in the text.
The light was defined on the first day, directly after the definition of heaven and earth. Thus, the light is one of the most fundamental definitions, signifying the network of relationships between the laws and the way the laws build upon one another. The fact that the laws build upon one another means that new laws appear among the laws that already exist.
The appearance of a new law has no effect on the previously defined laws, but it does affect their appearance. The previous laws defined something, and those definitions also appeared in the material world. The new law likewise defines something, but it has no effect on the previous law; however, what appeared in the material world as a result of the previous law changes as a result of the new law.
Thus, more laws act upon the reality that has appeared in the material world, and it changes. The change in the appearance of the material world manifests the network of relationships that is created between the laws. Thus, the previous law fulfills a limiting and regulating role for the new law, but the new law has no effect on the previous law; it only regulates its material form of appearance according to the meaning of the new law.
The network of relationships, in the order in which the laws are created, determines how each law changes the reality appearing in the material world, which has already been defined by the previously created laws, while the new laws further regulate it.
Without the order, it would not be possible to define how the laws build upon one another, and if we interpreted the effects of the laws in a different order, a different reality would appear. The network of relationships between the laws and the order of their creation is therefore not a chronological order, but an order of building upon one another that can be established by interpreting the appearance of reality, where reality is determined by the order in which the laws define the material world.
The light is therefore one of the first laws, because the first verse merely defined that the definitions should appear in material form, and the second verse already defines that the reality appearing in material form is further shaped by additional laws; that is, the newly created laws act upon the material world that already exists, a world that already exists according to the previously created laws.
This is already clear in itself, but at this point there was not yet time in the material world, because the definitions of time only come later. On the second day, that is, in the second cycle of creation, time was defined, and within it the present, the firmament, which became the specifically defined point of the perception of reality in both space and time.
After the definition of time, in the third cycle the sequence of experiences in time was defined, where, after the definition of the present, time organizes experiences into a process. The sequence of experiences thus became specifically definable according to the light, that is, according to the order in which the laws build upon one another, because the appearing reality is the way we experience it because the laws appeared in the material world according to the defined order, and through observation of the material world this is the only order that can be established, since, due to the order in which the laws build upon one another, precisely one kind of reality can appear.
The greater light defined in the fourth cycle thus defines the appearance of intellect in a world where the order in which the laws build upon one another is already given, time exists, and within time there is the present moment, where reality appears perceptibly.
The experiences appearing in time and appearing in the reality that can be experienced in the present also appear in a defined sequence, so that the laws and the network of relationships between them may become recognizable and understandable through repetitions.
Consciousness therefore experiences the world as a process in time, where experiences follow one another and repeat, and thus the laws and the network of relationships between them also become recognizable. In time, however, the amount of information is limited, and in space the amount of information that we can perceive is also limited according to the sensitivity of our perception.
The greater light is thus the same intellect that was defined on the first day, but due to the temporal and spatial limitation of consciousness, it is available to consciousness only in such an amount as the information that consciousness is capable of receiving.
The greater light is the appearance of intellect for consciousness, which creates definitions from the available information, recognizes laws through repetitions, and, as time passes, recognizes more and more laws and discovers more and more relationships between the laws through the ever-increasing number of experiences and the increasing amount of information.
According to the meaning of the verses, therefore, the light, as intellect, has existed from the beginning, timeless and unlimited, and concretely determines the appearance of the laws and their effects upon one another. The greater light, on the other hand, is this same intellect, but after the appearance of time, it is available to consciousness in the amount of information available to consciousness.