Genèse 8:22

Until all the days of the earth, sowing in the season of Tishri, and harvest in the season of Nisan, and coldness in the season of Tebeth, and warmth in the season of Tammuz, and summer and winter, and days and nights shall not fail.

עוד כל ימי הארץ זרע וקציר, וקור וחום, וקיץ וחורף, ויום ולילה, לא ישבתו; nature will not cease to function dependably as it had prior to the deluge. The sun will orbit predictably, its orbit will be subject to calculation in advance, so will be its position relative to other phenomena in the sky. All the time periods mentioned in this verse will somehow be related to the position of the sun at different times during the year. It would be different from before the deluge. Whereas prior to the deluge the sun had remained at a fixed distance relative to the earth all year round, its orbit being circular, resulting in eternal spring in the populated parts of the earth, now there would be all these changes, though at predetermined intervals, resulting in alternating seasons of relative warmth and cold due to the elliptical nature of the sun’s orbit [Although the author lived approximately at the time of Copernicus having determined that the earth moves around the sun instead of being the center of our galaxy, the basic concept even according to the ancient world view does not invalidate the author’s description of antediluvian and postdiluvian climatic conditions. Ed.. כל ימי הארץ, until such time as G’d would correct this deterioration in living conditions on earth due to the effect of the deluge. This “correction” is what the prophet Isaiah 66,22 had in mind when he spoke of the הארץ החדשה אשר אני עושה, “the new earth which I am going to make.” In that future foreseen by the prophet, the sun will once more orbit like a circle instead of like an ellipsis, a configuration responsible for the uneven temperatures on earth during different parts of the year. At that time, the whole vegetation on earth will undergo an upgrading, the curse earth experienced both after Adam’s sin and after Kayin’s murder of his brother Hevel being lifted. Conditions of length of human life will revert to what they had been before the deluge, as the prophet said that a נער, a youth, if he dies at a hundred years old will be considered as having died in his adolescence and more verses there describing this future. This is also what David referred to in Psalms 65,9 מוצאי בוקר וערב תרנין, “You make the lands of sunrise and sunset shout for joy.”

עוד כל ימי הארץ, Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra writes that the formulation of כל ימי הארץ here is proof that the duration of this earth is finite, in fact that G’d had already set a time limit to its existence.

זרע וקציר, the year is divided into basically 2 periods, the time to plant and the time to harvest. In the immediately following words the year is divided into 4 seasons. Still later the Torah speaks of the alternating periods of day and night. The meaning of all this is that during the four seasons the relative length of day and night constantly change, summer and winter being indicated by the relative longer periods of daylight and darkness, depending on the part of earth on which one lives, whereas even in higher latitudes when there is no true summer or in the equatorial zones when there is no true cold season, the relative length of days and nights are a guide to the season, i.e. whether it is time to sow, etc. Regardless of which season, the combined total of darkness and daylight always amounts to the same number of hours, minutes, etc, i.e. a day has 24 hours of 60 minutes each..

עוד כל ימי הארץ, “as long as earth will continue in existence, etc.;” this verse refers to what we read in the previous verse, where G–d promised never again to bring on a deluge. He added now that from that time on, nature will prove more or less predictable, each part of the earth experiences regular cycles of seasons and crops which ripen during those seasons will provide mankind with it needs. [The Torah states –after the Exodus and the giving to the Jewish people of the Torah- that as far as the Jewish people will be concerned, the earth producing its yield would depend on their keeping the terms of the covenant they had entered into with G–d at the revelation on Mount Sinai. Ed.]