Genesis 1:1

VII. (26) Moses says also; "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth:" taking the beginning to be, not as some men think, that which is according to time; for before the world time had no existence, but was created either simultaneously with it, or after it; for since time is the interval of the motion of the heavens, there could not have been any such thing as motion before there was anything which could be moved; but it follows of necessity that it received existence subsequently or simultaneously. It therefore follows also of necessity, that time was created either at the same moment with the world, or later than it--and to venture to assert that it is older than the world is absolutely inconsistent with philosophy. (27) But if the beginning spoken of by Moses is not to be looked upon as spoken of according to time, then it may be natural to suppose that it is the beginning according to number that is indicated; so that, "In the beginning he created," is equivalent to "first of all he created the heaven;" for it is natural in reality that that should have been the first object created, being both the best of all created things, and being also made of the purest substance, because it was destined to be the most holy abode of the visible Gods who are perceptible by the external senses; (28) for if the Creator had made everything at the same moment, still those things which were created in beauty would no less have had a regular arrangement, for there is no such thing as beauty in disorder. But order is a due consequence and connection of things precedent and subsequent, if not in the completion of a work, at all events in the intention of the maker; for it is owing to order that they become accurately defined and stationary, and free from confusion.

We, however, insist on the proper signification of every word, and say that principium means beginning,—being a term which is suitable to represent things which begin to exist. For nothing which has come into being is without a beginning, nor can this its commencement be at any other moment than when it begins to have existence. Thus principium, or beginning, is simply a term of inception, not the name of a substance. Now, inasmuch as the heaven and the earth are the principal works of God, and since, by His making them first, He constituted them in an especial manner the beginning of His creation, before all things else, with good reason does the Scripture preface (its record of creation) with the words, "In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth;" just as it would have said, "At last God made the heaven and the earth," if God had created these after all the rest. Now, if the beginning is a substance, the end must also be material. No doubt, a substantial thing may be the beginning of some other thing which may be formed out of it: thus the clay is the beginning of the vessel, and the seed is the beginning of the plant. But when we employ the word beginning in this sense of origin, and not in that of order, we do not omit to mention also the name of that particular thing which we regard as the origin of the other. On the other hand, if we were to make such a statement as this, for example, "In the beginning the potter made a basin or a water-jug," the word beginning will not here indicate a material substance (for I have not mentioned the clay, which is the beginning in this sense), but only the order of the work, meaning that the potter made the basin and the jug first, before anything else—intending afterwards to make the rest. It is, then, to the order of the works that the word beginning has reference, not to the origin of their substances. I might also explain this word beginning in another way, which would not, however, be inapposite. The Greek term for beginning, which is aρχh, admits the sense not only of priority of order, but of power as well; whence princes and magistrates are called aρχοντες. Therefore in this sense too, beginning may be taken for princely authority and power. It was, indeed, in His transcendent authority and power, that God made the heaven and the earth.

We, however, have but one God, and but one earth too, which in the beginning God made. The Scripture, which at its very outset proposes to run through the order thereof, tells us as its first information that it was created; it next proceeds to set forth what sort of earth it was. In like manner with respect to the heaven, it informs us first of its creation—"In the beginning God made the heaven:" it then goes on to introduce its arrangement; how that God both separated "the water which was below the firmament from that which was above the firmament," and called the firmament heaven,—the very thing He had created in the beginning. Similarly it (afterwards) treats of man: "And God created man, in the image of God made He him." It next reveals how He made him: "And (the Lord) God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Now this is undoubtedly the correct and fitting mode for the narrative. First comes a prefatory statement, then follow the details in full; first the subject is named, then it is described. ... Indeed, how full and complete is the meaning of these words: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth; but the earth was without form, and void,"—the very same earth, no doubt, which God made, and of which the Scripture had been speaking at that very moment.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, one God. This is a transcript of the excellent law. But before beginning to give the transcript of the book of the law, it will be worth while to instruct you, O brother, as to its excellence, and the dignity of its disposition. Its first excellence is, that God delivered it by the hand of our most blessed ruler, the chief of the prophets, and first of the apostles, or those who were sent to the children of Israel, viz. Moses the son of Amram, the son of Kohath, of the sons of Levi. Now he was adorned with all manner of wisdom, and endowed with the best genius. Illustrious in dignity, remarkable for the integrity of his disposition, distinguished for power of reason, he talked with God. And He chose him as an instrument of value. By His leader and prophet, God Most High sent it clown to us, and committed it to us (blessed be His name) in the Syriac tongue of the Targum, which the Seventy translated into the Hebrew tongue, to wit, into the tongue of the nation, and the idiom of the common people. Moses. therefore, received it from the eternal Lord, and was the first to whom it was entrusted, and who obeyed its rules and ordinances. Then he taught it to the children of Israel, who also embraced it. And he explained to them its profound mysteries and dark places. And he expounded to them those things which were less easy, as God permitted him, and concealed from them those secrets of the law, as God forbade him (to reveal them). Nor did there rise among them one who was better practised in His judgments and decrees, and who communicated more clearly the mysteries of His doctrine, until God translated him to Himself, after He had made him perfect by forty whole years in the wilderness.

And these following are the names of the teachers who handed down the law in continuous succession after Moses the prophet, until the advent of Messiah:-

Know, then, my brother, whom may God bless, that God delivered the most excellent law into the hands of Moses the prophet, the son of Amram.

And Moses delivered it to Joshua the son of Nun.

And Joshua the son of Nun delivered it Anathal.

And Anathal delivered it to Jehud.

And Jehud delivered it to Samgar.

And Samgar delivered it to Baruk.

And Baruk delivered it to Gideon.

And Gideon delivered it to Abimelech.

And Abimelech delivered it to Taleg.

And Taleg delivered it to Babin the Gileadite.

And Babin delivered it to Jiphtach.

And Jiphtach delivered it to Ephran.

And Ephran delivered it to Elul of the tribe Zebulon.

And Elul delivered it to Abdan.

And Abdan delivered it to Shimshon the brave.

And Shimshon delivered it to Helkanah, the son of Jerachmu, the son of Jehud. Moreover, he was the father of Samuel the prophet. Of this Helkanah mention is made in the beginning of the first book of Kings (Samuel).

And Helkanah delivered it to Eli the priest. And Eli delivered it to Samuel the prophet.

And Samuel delivered it to Nathan the prophet.

And Nathan delivered it to Gad the prophet.

And Gad the prophet delivered it to Shemaiah the teacher. And Shemaiah delivered it to Iddo the teacher. And Iddo delivered it to Achia.

And Achia delivered it to Abihu.

And Abihu delivered it to Elias the prophet.

And Elias delivered it to his disciple Elisaeus.

And Elisaeus delivered it to Malachia the prophet.

And Malachia delivered it to Abdiahu.

And Abdiahu delivered it to Jehuda.

And Jehuda delivered it to Zacharias the teacher. In those days came Bachthansar king of Babel, and laid waste the house of the sanctuary, and carried the children of Israel into captivity to Babel.

And after the captivity of Babel, Zacharia the teacher delivered it to Esaia the prophet, the son of Amos.

And Esaia delivered it to Jeremia the prophet.

And Jeremia the prophet delivered it to Chizkiel.

And Chizkiel the prophet delivered it to Hosea the prophet, the son of Bazi.

And Hosea delivered it to Joiel the prophet.

And Joiel delivered it to Amos the prophet.

And Amos delivered it to Obadia.

And Obadia delivered it to Jonan the prophet, the son of Mathi, the son of Armelah, who was the brother of Elias the prophet.

And Jonan delivered it to Micha the Morasthite, who delivered it to Nachum the Alcusite. And Nachum delivered it to Chabakuk the prophet.

And Chabakuk delivered it to Sophonia the prophet.

And Sophonia delivered it to Chaggaeus the prophet.

And Chaggaeus delivered it to Zecharia the prophet, the son of Bershia.

And Zecharia, when in captivity, delivered it to Malachia. And Malachia delivered it to Ezra the teacher.

And Ezra delivered it to Shamai the chief priest, and Jadua to Samean, (and) Samean delivered it to Antigonus.

And Antigonus delivered it to Joseph the son of Johezer, (and) Joseph the son of Gjuchanan.

And Joseph delivered it to Jehosua, the son of Barachia.

And Jehosua delivered it to Nathan the Arbelite.

And Nathan delivered it to Shimeon, the elder son of Shebach. This is he who carried the Messias in his arms.

Simeon delivered it to Jehuda.

Jehuda delivered it to Zecharia the priest.

And Zecharia the priest, the father of John the Baptist, delivered it to Joseph, a teacher of his own tribe.

And Joseph delivered it to Hanan and Caiaphas. Moreover, from them were taken away the priestly, and kingly, and prophetic offices.

These were teachers at the advent of Messias; and they were both priests of the children of Israel. Therefore the whole number of venerable and honourable priests put in trust of this most excellent law was fifty-six, Hanan (i.e., Annas) and Caiaphas being excepted.

And those are they who delivered it in the last days to the state of the children of Israel; nor did there arise any priests after them.

This is the account of what took place with regard to the most excellent law.

Armius, author of the book of Times, has said: In the nineteenth year of the reign of King Ptolemy, He ordered the elders of the children of Israel to be assembled, in order that they might put into his hands a copy of the law, and that they might each be at hand to explain its meaning.

The elders accordingly came, bringing with them the most excellent law. Then be commanded that every one of them should interpret the book of the law to him.

But he dissented from the interpretation which the elders had given. And he ordered the elders to be thrust into prison and chains. And seizing the book of the law, he threw it into a deep ditch, and cast fire and hot ashes upon it for seven days. Then afterwards he ordered them to throw the filth of the city into that ditch in which was the book of the law. And the ditch was filled to the very top.

The law remained seventy years under the filth in that ditch, yet did not perish, nor was there even a single leaf of it spoilt.

In the twenty-first year of the reign of King Apianutus they took the book of the law out of the ditch, and not one leaf thereof was spoilt.

And after the ascension of Christ into heaven, came King Titus, son of Aspasianus king of Rome, to Jerusalem, and besieged and took it. And he destroyed the edifice of the second house, which the children of Israel had built. Titus the king destroyed the house of the sanctuary, and slew all the Jews who were in it, and built Tsion (sic) in their blood. And after that deportation the Jews were scattered abroad in slavery. Nor did they assemble any more in the city of Jerusalem, nor is there hope anywhere of their returning.

After Jerusalem was laid waste, therefore, Shemaia and Antalia (Abtalion) delivered the law,-kings of Baalbach, a city which Soliman, son of King David, had built of old, and which was restored anew in the days of King Menasse, who sawed Esaia the prophet asunder.

King Adrian, of the children of Edom, besieged Baalbach, and took it, and slew all the Jews who were in it, (and) as many as were of the family of David he reduced to slavery. And the Jews were dispersed over the whole earth, as God Most High had foretold: "And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and disperse you among the nations."

And these are the things which have reached us as to the history of that most excellent book. The Preface is ended.

And the blessed prophet, indeed, the great Moses, wrote this book, and designated and marked it with the title, The Book of Being, i.e., "of created beings," etc.

"In the beginning God made heaven and earth." What is the beginning of all things except our Lord and "the Savior of all," Jesus Christ, "the firstborn of all creation"? In this beginning, then, that is, in his Word, "God made heaven and earth," just as the Evangelist John also says at the beginning of his Gospel, declaring: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word. This was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made." Here, then, he does not speak of some temporal beginning, but he says that "in the beginning," that is, in the Savior, heaven and earth and all things that were made were made.

In the account of creation it is said, at once, at the very outset: "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." Since Scripture knows the difference between "first" and "beginning," it does not say, "He made as a first thing." The creation had the Demiurge as its beginning, but it was not made by the Demiurge as a first thing, since the Demiurge made many other things before […] All the things that exist had a beginning, whether they were the first or the second in their reckoning. Strictly speaking, one speaks of the first only when there is nothing else that precedes; whereas the word "beginning" takes on its meaning in relation to the things of which it is the starting-point, even if they come at the end.

What is first, this is also a beginning; but what is a beginning is not also first. To arrive at a better understanding of what we are saying, we shall make use of an example that will open for us the road to the meaning. If an architect who had never yet built a house were to set about doing so, we should find with respect to this building both the absolute beginning and the beginning. For since the architect had never before begun to build a house, when he does so, then he builds for the first time, because before this one he had built no other house. And though this very house that he builds is the first of all, it has a beginning, precisely by virtue of being the first, so that the beginning comes to it from its foundation; but it also has a starting-point, since this is the one the builder erects as the first. If he then goes on to build a second or a third house, […] it is not one of these that has the absolute beginning, but the building erected earlier, inasmuch as it was the first.

To understand more clearly we shall give yet another example. Suppose there are many pieces of wood set one beside another. We shall find for all of them a beginning, because each of them has its own beginning, even the last; but only the one that was stacked first has the absolute beginning. This one, which holds first place by reason of the order of arrangement, also has its own beginning, while the subsequent pieces of wood, deprived of first place, each have their own beginning.

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," [ Gen 1:1 ] that is, the substance of the heavens and the substance of the earth. So let no one think that there is anything interpretive (turgama) in the works of the six days. No one can rightly say that the things that pertain to these days were symbolic, nor can one say that they were meaningless names or that other things were symbolized for us by their names. Rather, let us know that just as heaven and earth were created in the beginning, so they were truly heaven and earth. There was no other thing signified by the names "heaven" and "earth". The rest of the works and things made that followed were not meaningless significations either, for the substances of their natures correspond to what their names signify.

"In the beginning God created heaven and earth." [ Gen1:1 ] At this point these comprised the only things that had been made, for there was nothing else created along with heaven and earth. Even the elements that were created on that day had not yet been created. If the elements had been created along with heaven and earth, Moses would have said so. But he did not, lest he give the names of the elements precedence over their substances. Therefore it is evident that heaven and earth came to be from nothing because neither water nor wind had yet been created, nor had fire, light or darkness been given their natures, for they were posterior to heaven and earth. These things were created things that came after heaven and earth and they were not self-subsistent beings for they did not exist before [ heaven and earth ].

1. It is right that any one beginning to narrate the formation of the world should begin with the good order which reigns in visible things. I am about to speak of the creation of heaven and earth, which was not spontaneous, as some have imagined, but drew its origin from God. What ear is worthy to hear such a tale? How earnestly the soul should prepare itself to receive such high lessons! How pure it should be from carnal affections, how unclouded by worldly disquietudes, how active and ardent in its researches, how eager to find in its surroundings an idea of God which may be worthy of Him!
But before weighing the justice of these remarks, before examining all the sense contained in these few words, let us see who addresses them to us. Because, if the weakness of our intelligence does not allow us to penetrate the depth of the thoughts of the writer, yet we shall be involuntarily drawn to give faith to his words by the force of his authority. Now it is Moses who has composed this history; Moses, who, when still at the breast, is described as exceeding fair; Moses, whom the daughter of Pharaoh adopted; who received from her a royal education, and who had for his teachers the wise men of Egypt; Moses, who disdained the pomp of royalty, and, to share the humble condition of his compatriots, preferred to be persecuted with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting delights of sin; Moses, who received from nature such a love of justice that, even before the leadership of the people of God was committed to him, he was impelled, by a natural horror of evil, to pursue malefactors even to the point of punishing them by death; Moses, who, banished by those whose benefactor he had been, hastened to escape from the tumults of Egypt and took refuge in Ethiopia, living there far from former pursuits, and passing forty years in the contemplation of nature; Moses, finally, who, at the age of eighty, saw God, as far as it is possible for man to see Him; or rather as it had not previously been granted to man to see Him, according to the testimony of God Himself, If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house, with him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently and not in dark speeches. It is this man, whom God judged worthy to behold Him, face to face, like the angels, who imparts to us what he has learned from God. Let us listen then to these words of truth written without the help of the enticing words of man's wisdom 1 Corinthians 2:4 by the dictation of the Holy Spirit; words destined to produce not the applause of those who hear them, but the salvation of those who are instructed by them.
2. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Genesis 1:1 I stop struck with admiration at this thought. What shall I first say? Where shall I begin my story? Shall I show forth the vanity of the Gentiles? Shall I exalt the truth of our faith? The philosophers of Greece have made much ado to explain nature, and not one of their systems has remained firm and unshaken, each being overturned by its successor. It is vain to refute them; they are sufficient in themselves to destroy one another. Those who were too ignorant to rise to a knowledge of a God, could not allow that an intelligent cause presided at the birth of the Universe; a primary error that involved them in sad consequences. Some had recourse to material principles and attributed the origin of the Universe to the elements of the world. Others imagined that atoms, and indivisible bodies, molecules and ducts, form, by their union, the nature of the visible world. Atoms reuniting or separating, produce births and deaths and the most durable bodies only owe their consistency to the strength of their mutual adhesion: a true spider's web woven by these writers who give to heaven, to earth, and to sea so weak an origin and so little consistency! It is because they knew not how to say In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Deceived by their inherent atheism it appeared to them that nothing governed or ruled the universe, and that was all was given up to chance. To guard us against this error the writer on the creation, from the very first words, enlightens our understanding with the name of God; In the beginning God created. What a glorious order! He first establishes a beginning, so that it might not be supposed that the world never had a beginning. Then he adds Created to show that which was made was a very small part of the power of the Creator. In the same way that the potter, after having made with equal pains a great number of vessels, has not exhausted either his art or his talent; thus the Maker of the Universe, whose creative power, far from being bounded by one world, could extend to the infinite, needed only the impulse of His will to bring the immensities of the visible world into being. If then the world has a beginning, and if it has been created, enquire who gave it this beginning, and who was the Creator: or rather, in the fear that human reasonings may make you wander from the truth, Moses has anticipated enquiry by engraving in our hearts, as a seal and a safeguard, the awful name of God: In the beginning God created— It is He, beneficent Nature, Goodness without measure, a worthy object of love for all beings endowed with reason, the beauty the most to be desired, the origin of all that exists, the source of life, intellectual light, impenetrable wisdom, it is He who in the beginning created heaven and earth.
3. Do not then imagine, O man! That the visible world is without a beginning; and because the celestial bodies move in a circular course, and it is difficult for our senses to define the point where the circle begins, do not believe that bodies impelled by a circular movement are, from their nature, without a beginning. Without doubt the circle (I mean the plane figure described by a single line) is beyond our perception, and it is impossible for us to find out where it begins or where it ends; but we ought not on this account to believe it to be without a beginning. Although we are not sensible of it, it really begins at some point where the draughtsman has begun to draw it at a certain radius from the centre. Thus seeing that figures which move in a circle always return upon themselves, without for a single instant interrupting the regularity of their course, do not vainly imagine to yourselves that the world has neither beginning nor end. For the fashion of this world passes away 1 Corinthians 7:31 and Heaven and earth shall pass away. Matthew 24:35 The dogmas of the end, and of the renewing of the world, are announced beforehand in these short words put at the head of the inspired history. In the beginning God made. That which was begun in time is condemned to come to an end in time. If there has been a beginning do not doubt of the end. Of what use then are geometry— the calculations of arithmetic— the study of solids and far-famed astronomy, this laborious vanity, if those who pursue them imagine that this visible world is co-eternal with the Creator of all things, with God Himself; if they attribute to this limited world, which has a material body, the same glory as to the incomprehensible and invisible nature; if they cannot conceive that a whole, of which the parts are subject to corruption and change, must of necessity end by itself submitting to the fate of its parts? But they have become vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. Romans 1:21-22 Some have affirmed that heaven co-exists with God from all eternity; others that it is God Himself without beginning or end, and the cause of the particular arrangement of all things.
4. One day, doubtless, their terrible condemnation will be the greater for all this worldly wisdom, since, seeing so clearly into vain sciences, they have wilfully shut their eyes to the knowledge of the truth. These men who measure the distances of the stars and describe them, both those of the North, always shining brilliantly in our view, and those of the southern pole visible to the inhabitants of the South, but unknown to us; who divide the Northern zone and the circle of the Zodiac into an infinity of parts, who observe with exactitude the course of the stars, their fixed places, their declensions, their return and the time that each takes to make its revolution; these men, I say, have discovered all except one thing: the fact that God is the Creator of the universe, and the just Judge who rewards all the actions of life according to their merit. They have not known how to raise themselves to the idea of the consummation of all things, the consequence of the doctrine of judgment, and to see that the world must change if souls pass from this life to a new life. In reality, as the nature of the present life presents an affinity to this world, so in the future life our souls will enjoy a lot conformable to their new condition. But they are so far from applying these truths, that they do but laugh when we announce to them the end of all things and the regeneration of the age. Since the beginning naturally precedes that which is derived from it, the writer, of necessity, when speaking to us of things which had their origin in time, puts at the head of his narrative these words— In the beginning God created.
5. It appears, indeed, that even before this world an order of things existed of which our mind can form an idea, but of which we can say nothing, because it is too lofty a subject for men who are but beginners and are still babes in knowledge. The birth of the world was preceded by a condition of things suitable for the exercise of supernatural powers, outstripping the limits of time, eternal and infinite. The Creator and Demiurge of the universe perfected His works in it, spiritual light for the happiness of all who love the Lord, intellectual and invisible natures, all the orderly arrangement of pure intelligences who are beyond the reach of our mind and of whom we cannot even discover the names. They fill the essence of this invisible world, as Paul teaches us. For by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers Colossians 1:16 or virtues or hosts of angels or the dignities of archangels. To this world at last it was necessary to add a new world, both a school and training place where the souls of men should be taught and a home for beings destined to be born and to die. Thus was created, of a nature analogous to that of this world and the animals and plants which live thereon, the succession of time, for ever pressing on and passing away and never stopping in its course. Is not this the nature of time, where the past is no more, the future does not exist, and the present escapes before being recognised? And such also is the nature of the creature which lives in time,— condemned to grow or to perish without rest and without certain stability. It is therefore fit that the bodies of animals and plants, obliged to follow a sort of current, and carried away by the motion which leads them to birth or to death, should live in the midst of surroundings whose nature is in accord with beings subject to change. Thus the writer who wisely tells us of the birth of the Universe does not fail to put these words at the head of the narrative. In the beginning God created; that is to say, in the beginning of time. Therefore, if he makes the world appear in the beginning, it is not a proof that its birth has preceded that of all other things that were made. He only wishes to tell us that, after the invisible and intellectual world, the visible world, the world of the senses, began to exist.
The first movement is called beginning. To do right is the beginning of the good way. Just actions are truly the first steps towards a happy life. Again, we call beginning the essential and first part from which a thing proceeds, such as the foundation of a house, the keel of a vessel; it is in this sense that it is said, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, Proverbs 9:10 that is to say that piety is, as it were, the groundwork and foundation of perfection. Art is also the beginning of the works of artists, the skill of Bezaleel began the adornment of the tabernacle. Often even the good which is the final cause is the beginning of actions. Thus the approbation of God is the beginning of almsgiving, and the end laid up for us in the promises the beginning of all virtuous efforts.
6. Such being the different senses of the word beginning, see if we have not all the meanings here. You may know the epoch when the formation of this world began, it, ascending into the past, you endeavour to discover the first day. You will thus find what was the first movement of time; then that the creation of the heavens and of the earth were like the foundation and the groundwork, and afterwards that an intelligent reason, as the word beginning indicates, presided in the order of visible things. You will finally discover that the world was not conceived by chance and without reason, but for an useful end and for the great advantage of all beings, since it is really the school where reasonable souls exercise themselves, the training ground where they learn to know God; since by the sight of visible and sensible things the mind is led, as by a hand, to the contemplation of invisible things. For, as the Apostle says, the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. Romans 1:20 Perhaps these words In the beginning God created signify the rapid and imperceptible moment of creation. The beginning, in effect, is indivisible and instantaneous. The beginning of the road is not yet the road, and that of the house is not yet the house; so the beginning of time is not yet time and not even the least particle of it. If some objector tell us that the beginning is a time, he ought then, as he knows well, to submit it to the division of time— a beginning, a middle and an end. Now it is ridiculous to imagine a beginning of a beginning. Further, if we divide the beginning into two, we make two instead of one, or rather make several, we really make an infinity, for all that which is divided is divisible to the infinite. Thus then, if it is said, In the beginning God created, it is to teach us that at the will of God the world arose in less than an instant, and it is to convey this meaning more clearly that other interpreters have said: God made summarily that is to say all at once and in a moment. But enough concerning the beginning, if only to put a few points out of many.
7. Among arts, some have in view production, some practice, others theory. The object of the last is the exercise of thought, that of the second, the motion of the body. Should it cease, all stops; nothing more is to be seen. Thus dancing and music have nothing behind; they have no object but themselves. In creative arts on the contrary the work lasts after the operation. Such is architecture— such are the arts which work in wood and brass and weaving, all those indeed which, even when the artisan has disappeared, serve to show an industrious intelligence and to cause the architect, the worker in brass or the weaver, to be admired on account of his work. Thus, then, to show that the world is a work of art displayed for the beholding of all people; to make them know Him who created it, Moses does not use another word. In the beginning, he says God created. He does not say God worked, God formed, but God created. Among those who have imagined that the world co-existed with God from all eternity, many have denied that it was created by God, but say that it exists spontaneously, as the shadow of this power. God, they say, is the cause of it, but an involuntary cause, as the body is the cause of the shadow and the flame is the cause of the brightness. It is to correct this error that the prophet states, with so much precision, In the beginning God created. He did not make the thing itself the cause of its existence. Being good, He made it an useful work. Being wise, He made it everything that was most beautiful. Being powerful He made it very great. Moses almost shows us the finger of the supreme artisan taking possession of the substance of the universe, forming the different parts in one perfect accord, and making a harmonious symphony result from the whole.
In the beginning God made heaven and earth. By naming the two extremes, he suggests the substance of the whole world, according to heaven the privilege of seniority, and putting earth in the second rank. All intermediate beings were created at the same time as the extremities. Thus, although there is no mention of the elements, fire, water and air, imagine that they were all compounded together, and you will find water, air and fire, in the earth. For fire leaps out from stones; iron which is dug from the earth produces under friction fire in plentiful measure. A marvellous fact! Fire shut up in bodies lurks there hidden without harming them, but no sooner is it released than it consumes that which has hitherto preserved it. The earth contains water, as diggers of wells teach us. It contains air too, as is shown by the vapours that it exhales under the sun's warmth when it is damp. Now, as according to their nature, heaven occupies the higher and earth the lower position in space, (one sees, in fact, that all which is light ascends towards heaven, and heavy substances fall to the ground); as therefore height and depth are the points the most opposed to each other it is enough to mention the most distant parts to signify the inclusion of all which fills up intervening Space. Do not ask, then, for an enumeration of all the elements; guess, from what Holy Scripture indicates, all that is passed over in silence.
8. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. If we were to wish to discover the essence of each of the beings which are offered for our contemplation, or come under our senses, we should be drawn away into long digressions, and the solution of the problem would require more words than I possess, to examine fully the matter. To spend time on such points would not prove to be to the edification of the Church. Upon the essence of the heavens we are contented with what Isaiah says, for, in simple language, he gives us sufficient idea of their nature, The heaven was made like smoke, that is to say, He created a subtle substance, without solidity or density, from which to form the heavens. As to the form of them we also content ourselves with the language of the same prophet, when praising God that stretches out the heavens as a curtain and spreads them out as a tent to dwell in. In the same way, as concerns the earth, let us resolve not to torment ourselves by trying to find out its essence, not to tire our reason by seeking for the substance which it conceals. Do not let us seek for any nature devoid of qualities by the conditions of its existence, but let us know that all the phenomena with which we see it clothed regard the conditions of its existence and complete its essence. Try to take away by reason each of the qualities it possesses, and you will arrive at nothing. Take away black, cold, weight, density, the qualities which concern taste, in one word all these which we see in it, and the substance vanishes.
If I ask you to leave these vain questions, I will not expect you to try and find out the earth's point of support. The mind would reel on beholding its reasonings losing themselves without end. Do you say that the earth reposes on a bed of air? How, then, can this soft substance, without consistency, resist the enormous weight which presses upon it? How is it that it does not slip away in all directions, to avoid the sinking weight, and to spread itself over the mass which overwhelms it? Do you suppose that water is the foundation of the earth? You will then always have to ask yourself how it is that so heavy and opaque a body does not pass through the water; how a mass of such a weight is held up by a nature weaker than itself. Then you must seek a base for the waters, and you will be in much difficulty to say upon what the water itself rests.
9. Do you suppose that a heavier body prevents the earth from falling into the abyss? Then you must consider that this support needs itself a support to prevent it from falling. Can we imagine one? Our reason again demands yet another support, and thus we shall fall into the infinite, always imagining a base for the base which we have already found. And the further we advance in this reasoning the greater force we are obliged to give to this base, so that it may be able to support all the mass weighing upon it. Put then a limit to your thought, so that your curiosity in investigating the incomprehensible may not incur the reproaches of Job, and you be not asked by him, Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? Job 38:6 If ever you hear in the Psalms, I bear up the pillars of it; see in these pillars the power which sustains it. Because what means this other passage, He has founded it upon the sea, if not that the water is spread all around the earth? How then can water, the fluid element which flows down every declivity, remain suspended without ever flowing? You do not reflect that the idea of the earth suspended by itself throws your reason into a like but even greater difficulty, since from its nature it is heavier. But let us admit that the earth rests upon itself, or let us say that it rides the waters, we must still remain faithful to thought of true religion and recognise that all is sustained by the Creator's power. Let us then reply to ourselves, and let us reply to those who ask us upon what support this enormous mass rests, In His hands are the ends of the earth. It is a doctrine as infallible for our own information as profitable for our hearers.
10. There are inquirers into nature who with a great display of words give reasons for the immobility of the earth. Placed, they say, in the middle of the universe and not being able to incline more to one side than the other because its centre is everywhere the same distance from the surface, it necessarily rests upon itself; since a weight which is everywhere equal cannot lean to either side. It is not, they go on, without reason or by chance that the earth occupies the centre of the universe. It is its natural and necessary position. As the celestial body occupies the higher extremity of space all heavy bodies, they argue, that we may suppose to have fallen from these high regions, will be carried from all directions to the centre, and the point towards which the parts are tending will evidently be the one to which the whole mass will be thrust together. If stones, wood, all terrestrial bodies, fall from above downwards, this must be the proper and natural place of the whole earth. If, on the contrary, a light body is separated from the centre, it is evident that it will ascend towards the higher regions. Thus heavy bodies move from the top to the bottom, and following this reasoning, the bottom is none other than the centre of the world. Do not then be surprised that the world never falls: it occupies the centre of the universe, its natural place. By necessity it is obliged to remain in its place, unless a movement contrary to nature should displace it. If there is anything in this system which might appear probable to you, keep your admiration for the source of such perfect order, for the wisdom of God. Grand phenomena do not strike us the less when we have discovered something of their wonderful mechanism. Is it otherwise here? At all events let us prefer the simplicity of faith to the demonstrations of reason.
11. We might say the same thing of the heavens. With what a noise of words the sages of this world have discussed their nature! Some have said that heaven is composed of four elements as being tangible and visible, and is made up of earth on account of its power of resistance, with fire because it is striking to the eye, with air and water on account of the mixture. Others have rejected this system as improbable, and introduced into the world, to form the heavens, a fifth element after their own fashioning. There exists, they say, an æthereal body which is neither fire, air, earth, nor water, nor in one word any simple body. These simple bodies have their own natural motion in a straight line, light bodies upwards and heavy bodies downwards; now this motion upwards and downwards is not the same as circular motion; there is the greatest possible difference between straight and circular motion. It therefore follows that bodies whose motion is so various must vary also in their essence. But, it is not even possible to suppose that the heavens should be formed of primitive bodies which we call elements, because the reunion of contrary forces could not produce an even and spontaneous motion, when each of the simple bodies is receiving a different impulse from nature. Thus it is a labour to maintain composite bodies in continual movement, because it is impossible to put even a single one of their movements in accord and harmony with all those that are in discord; since what is proper to the light particle, is in warfare with that of a heavier one. If we attempt to rise we are stopped by the weight of the terrestrial element; if we throw ourselves down we violate the igneous part of our being in dragging it down contrary to its nature. Now this struggle of the elements effects their dissolution. A body to which violence is done and which is placed in opposition to nature, after a short but energetic resistance, is soon dissolved into as many parts as it had elements, each of the constituent parts returning to its natural place. It is the force of these reasons, say the inventors of the fifth kind of body for the genesis of heaven and the stars, which constrained them to reject the system of their predecessors and to have recourse to their own hypothesis. But yet another fine speaker arises and disperses and destroys this theory to give predominance to an idea of his own invention.
Do not let us undertake to follow them for fear of falling into like frivolities; let them refute each other, and, without disquieting ourselves about essence, let us say with Moses God created the heavens and the earth. Let us glorify the supreme Artificer for all that was wisely and skillfully made; by the beauty of visible things let us raise ourselves to Him who is above all beauty; by the grandeur of bodies, sensible and limited in their nature, let us conceive of the infinite Being whose immensity and omnipotence surpass all the efforts of the imagination. Because, although we ignore the nature of created things, the objects which on all sides attract our notice are so marvellous, that the most penetrating mind cannot attain to the knowledge of the least of the phenomena of the world, either to give a suitable explanation of it or to render due praise to the Creator, to Whom belong all glory, all honour and all power world without end. Amen.

[The Manichaeans assert that] the form of the world is due to the wisdom of the supreme Artificer; matter came to the Creator from without; and thus the world results from a double origin. It has received from outside its matter and its essence and from God its form and figure. They thus come to deny that the mighty God has presided at the formation of the universe and pretend that he has only brought a crowning contribution to a common work, that he has only contributed some small portion to the genesis of beings. They are incapable from the debasement of their reasoning of raising their glances to the height of truth. Here below arts are subsequent to matter—introduced into life by the indispensable need of them. Wool existed before weaving made it supply one of nature's imperfections. Wood existed before carpentering took possession of it and transformed it each day to supply new wants and made us see all the advantages derived from it, giving the oar to the sailor, the winnowing fan to the laborer, the lance to the soldier. But God, before all those things that now attract our notice existed, after casting about in his mind and determining to bring into being time which had no being, imagined the world such as it ought to be and created matter in harmony with the form that he wished to give it. He assigned to the heavens the nature adapted for the heavens and gave to the earth an essence in accordance with its form. He formed, as he wished, fire, air and water, and gave to each the essence that the object of its existence required. Finally, he welded all the diverse parts of the universe by links of indissoluble attachment and established between them so perfect a fellowship and harmony that the most distant, in spite of their distance, appeared united in one universal sympathy. Let those men therefore renounce their fabulous imaginations, who, in spite of the weakness of their argument, pretend to measure a power as incomprehensible to man's reason as it is unutterable by man's voice. God created the heavens and the earth, but not only half—he created all the heavens and all the earth, creating the essence with the form.

It appears, indeed, that even before this world an order of things existed of which our mind can form an idea but of which we can say nothing, because it is too lofty a subject for men who are but beginners and are still babes in knowledge. The birth of the world was preceded by a condition of things suitable for the exercise of supernatural powers, outstripping the limits of time, eternal and infinite. The Creator and Demiurge of the universe perfected his works in it, spiritual light for the happiness of all who love the Lord, intellectual and invisible natures, all the orderly arrangement of pure intelligences who are beyond the reach of our mind and of whom we cannot even discover the names. They fill the essence of this invisible world, as Paul teaches us. "For by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers" or virtues or hosts of angels or the dignities of archangels. To this world at last it was necessary to add a new world, both a school and training place where the souls of men should be taught and a home for beings destined to be born and to die. Thus was created, of a nature analogous to that of this world and the animals and plants which live on it, the succession of time, forever pressing on and passing away and never stopping in its course. Is not this the nature of time, where the past is no more, the future does not exist, and the present escapes before being recognized? And such also is the nature of the creature that lives in time—condemned to grow or to perish without rest and without certain stability. It is therefore fit that the bodies of animals and plants, obliged to follow a sort of current and carried away by the motion that leads them to birth or to death, should live in the midst of surroundings whose nature is in accord with beings subject to change. Thus the writer who wisely tells us of the birth of the universe does not fail to put these words at the head of the narrative. "In the beginning God created"; that is to say, in the beginning of time. Therefore, if he makes the world appear in the beginning, it is not a proof that its birth has preceded that of all other things that were made. He only wishes to tell us that, after the invisible and intellectual world, the visible world, the world of the senses, began to exist.

Why these words? It is because we propose to study the world as a whole, and to consider the universe, not by the light of worldly wisdom, but by that with which God wills to enlighten His servant, when He speaks to him in person and without enigmas. It is because it is absolutely necessary that all lovers of great and grand shows should bring a mind well prepared to study them. If sometimes, on a bright night, whilst gazing with watchful eyes on the inexpressible beauty of the stars, you have thought of the Creator of all things; if you have asked yourself who it is that has dotted heaven with such flowers, and why visible things are even more useful than beautiful; if sometimes, in the day, you have studied the marvels of light, if you have raised yourself by visible things to the invisible Being, then you are a well prepared auditor, and you can take your place in this august and blessed amphitheatre.

ON GENESIS. — In the beginning God made heaven and earth (Gen. 1:1). If He made heaven in the beginning, and the earth, and if heaven is the firmament, as is evident in what follows, then this is not literally true, because light was made first, and therefore the firmament: for it could not signify some other heaven, since it is describing the making of the world as perfected by the working of God. For this reason, because people were misled by various opinions about the cause of the world, Moses, inspired by God, showed what the true ordering of the world was. To some it seemed that it had no beginning; to others that it did have a beginning, but was fashioned by certain Angels; to others again that it was likewise made, but by a certain Saklas, who is also the god of opposing power; but a few, following the path of truth concerning its origin, asserted that God was its maker. Therefore, because of those who were drawn away by false opinions of diversity, Moses was compelled to show what its true cause was, lest the children of Israel, freed from the power of the Egyptians, should still not be released from their false understanding. For they, more than the rest, pursued the study of error: for in ancient times they above others devoted themselves to vain philosophy. Indeed Moses, because he was adopted by Pharaoh’s daughter, is said to have been taught in all the wisdom of the Egyptians (Acts 7:22). What then is the meaning of his words, In the beginning God made heaven and earth? If it signifies the firmament, according to what we showed above, let us see what he says. We think that Moses, so as to remove all error about the lower creation and about the materials of the world’s construction, indicated that in the beginning the very substances from which the world is constituted were made; for if he had kept silence about this, they might perhaps be thought to be eternal substances, considered to be yoked to God. So that the one who receives testimony about this matter cannot doubt that the world was made, since he confesses that the substances which served for the expenditure of the world were subjected in the beginning. Therefore, In the beginning God made heaven and earth, that is, the upper and the lower substance. The upper is that from which heaven consists; the lower, however, is a certain thick dreg-like concretion which advanced into the dry land that is called earth, and into darkness. Therefore He says in the prophet Isaiah, I am God, who made light and created darkness (Isa. 45:6–7). When these were created, He made at the same time the substance, that is, water, darkness, and earth before times: for times are under the firmament. For the firmament, as some think, is the ice of the waters. And it is therefore called firmament, because the waters, being solidified by divine power, are made firm, which, from covering or concealing, is called heaven. And therefore, because water is the greater element, it is mentioned first, since a part of it advanced into the vault of the world. The earth, however, is the pavement: which indeed David, by the Holy Spirit, confesses to have been created. For he says, And the waters that are above the heavens, let them praise the name of the Lord. For He Himself spoke, and they were made; He Himself commanded, and they were created (Ps. 148:4–5). After these elements, before the joining together of the world, God made light, so that His works should go forth in the light, which light, by a fixed arrangement, completed the course of the day. Night came to be according to the measure of the day, which likewise, when the measure of its span was fulfilled, was illumined by the coming of the morning light: and therefore the first day was completed when the second began; for the night is reckoned to the day, so that together they are called one day: for because darkness is subject to light, it lacks authority and cannot make up a number. For thirty days are called one moon, even though nights are included with them. Therefore the service of light, by which it uses up the space assigned to it, is called day. But the substance of darkness, before it is illumined, is called night. And that space which is between the setting and the rising is night. For it is not darkness that makes the night, just as it is not light that makes the day, because darkness remains in its own nature. The coming of light makes day, and its departure makes night. Not without reason, therefore, is the night subject to the day. So, when light was made, and the course of twelve hours completed, and likewise the space of the night of twelve hours also passed, there was an equinox on the first day: and from then the day began to grow longer than the night, namely throughout three months, which are the spring season. From that increase the day then diminishes through three other months, which are the summer season. And again there is an equinox, so that from then the night grows longer than the day through another three months, which are the autumn season. And again the night, from the greatness by which it surpasses the day, begins to diminish until the end of the fourth season, which is winter. And the equinox returns to the first season, when God created the world, which day is understood to be the eleventh day before the Kalends of April, when the first day of Passover is, that is, the first day of the first month. For in the Law it is commanded that on the tenth day of the first month in the evening they should prepare themselves to celebrate Passover on the fourteenth day of the month, that is, from the eleventh. For already the evening of the tenth day shines into the eleventh, so that from the eleventh day before the Kalends of April the beginning of the first month should be. For at the beginning the moon was made on the fourteenth, because all things were made full. Add three days from the evening of the tenth, and these are the three days before the luminaries that were made, so that the world was made on the eleventh day before the Kalends of April; for the number of the moon from the eleventh comes to the fourteenth, to which the first month of Passover in its entirety is assigned, so that on the solemn day of Passover it should be neither beyond the eleventh day before the Kalends of April, nor beyond the fourteenth moon, because the world was made on the eleventh, and on the fourteenth the moon was made brighter with greater light. Between the beginning, therefore, and the brightness with which the world was illumined, our Savior both suffered and rose again; for He suffered on the fourteenth moon, and rose on the first day, which is therefore called the Lord’s Day, because the Lord Himself made it, who made the multiplied months, and the seasons, and the years. And so that it might never be celebrated in exactly the same way, the course of the moon in its wanings and waxings brings this about. But the earth was invisible and unformed. It is clear that the earth, after it was made, was invisible and unformed: for it was covered by waters, and therefore was invisible; and it was unformed because, being fluid, it was not suitable for cultivation. And darkness was upon the abyss. He says that darkness was upon the abyss, that is, upon the boundless water on every side. And the spirit of God was borne above the water (Gen. 1:2). This water he signifies as the extremity, above which the spirit of God, because it was borne above it, shows that the darkness was upon the infinite depth. As for the spirit of God above the waters, since where the spirit of God was, there was no obscurity, it illuminated the water as far as it could. But it could not illuminate the abyss, that is, the immense depth: that is, it illuminated the higher waters, and beneath there was darkness, and over the abyss. He therefore calls this the spirit of God not because he wishes this to be understood as the Holy Spirit, but because he wishes it to be understood spiritually over the material creation, and by calling him the spirit of God who was moving above the waters, he signifies that he is wholly of God, so as to overturn the perverse assertion used by some, who say there is something that is not of God. For it is neither orderly nor reasonable that the Holy Spirit should be said to have been over the waters, since he is over all creation. For whatever is of God is above all powers and principalities and likewise above all spiritual powers. Nor should anyone’s mind be disturbed because he is called the spirit of God, when it is established that all things are God’s. For God, among other things when he was about to make the flood, says: My spirit shall not remain in these men, because they are flesh (Gen. 6:3); and in Ezekiel, among other things: Therefore says the Lord to these bones, I will spread skin over you, and I will give my spirit in you, and you shall live (Ezek. 37:5). Do these things belong to the office of the Holy Spirit, and not to the soul? Therefore this spirit of God is indeed, like the rest, but is the governor of material substances; for his appointed order is to preside over these. When light was made, and the course of day set in order, and the second day completed, he made the firmament, that is, heaven, so that the light in the earth of the firmament might govern the day, so that it might be as a lamp in a house. This firmament, I say, was made from the aforesaid substance of water. For now the world is being joined together in form, so that from the confusion of things, with substances distinguished, individual parts might be fitted which would contribute to the members of the world. For the substances which we said were first made are expended upon the world. And therefore it is called “world” (mundus), because the things that were mixed together, once separated from one another and brought into form, made it called “world,” to whose structure they contributed. Therefore the firmament, that is, heaven, was made in the midst of the waters, so that it might divide between the water that was above the firmament and the water that was below the firmament; so that by God’s power the firmament might stand in the midst of the waters, having water beneath itself, and within itself, and above and around itself; so that it might be concave on the outside and fortified within, lest the waters, whether inner or outer, should penetrate its concavity, so that it might be as a house fortified and strengthened, that those dwelling in it might be secure. On the third day he commanded the water that was under heaven, that is, within the capacity of the firmament, to be gathered into one place, so that the dry land, which is the earth, might appear, and therefore it came to pass. For the breadth of the earth having been drawn out, there was made as it were a basin, in which all the water that was within the firmament might be sunk down, and the dry land appeared. When the water receded, it was necessary that the earth, made visible, should appear, which before had been invisible. Then the dry land was called earth, and the gatherings of the waters seas. And he commanded the earth to bring forth grass for food, and fruit-bearing trees for seed upon the earth. Then on the fourth day God commanded luminaries to be made in the firmament of heaven, that they might shine upon the earth: the greater luminary at the beginning of the day, and the lesser luminary at the beginning of the night, and the stars. These relate to the conception and birth and nourishment of those things which are begotten in the world, and to the signs of seasons needed for fixed intervals, and also to the adornment of the whole world. For just as it belongs to the adornment of a house if its ceiling has panels marked with gold, so also the stars, shining with diverse light, provide adornment to the world. Therefore to the light which was first made, the brightness of the sun is added, so that these are joined and inseparable. And to the night, which was dark, a luminary is given; and because the moon was at the fourteenth day when it was made, therefore he says, The lesser luminary at the beginning of the night: for when it was made, it shone the whole night. From the part, therefore, it is said “at the beginning of the night,” because it does not always shine in the evening. But the greater luminary, which we call the sun, remains at the beginning of the day, because it was compacted together with the prior light. For three days the world existed without these luminaries; for as yet there were not those for whose benefit their functions would serve. But when the earth brought forth grass for food and fruit-bearing trees, there was need of things that would nourish or preserve what had been brought forth. Because all generation of these is completed through their intervention, it was not fitting that these should be made first, lest, by the effect of those things produced from the earth, they should be thought to have arisen; but he made those first, so that therefore these might be without doubt understood to have been made without them. Then on the fifth day he commanded the waters to bring forth creeping things of living souls, and winged creatures flying over the earth beneath the firmament of heaven, and it was so. And among other things, And God saw, he says, that they were good, and he said, Increase and multiply (Gen. 1:21–22). He added, And God saw that they were good, because some say they are evil, so that at least in this way they may feel shame. For when they please God and their maker, surely they ought to displease no one. For fools are accustomed to say, Therefore, they say, he saw, and they pleased him, because previously he did not know. O dull ones, how could He not know? Whatever He willed came forth. Can anyone will what he does not know? And can He who is able to act be said not to know what He is doing? And what is more, He did not make them Himself, but commanded that they be made; and is He who commands not possessed of the power to make? But because all things are possible for Him, when He commanded that what could not do so should begin to be able, it was in order that it might contribute to His praise. There is therefore a double power, that He should command what is insensible to bring forth what is sensible. On the sixth day He commanded the earth to bring forth living soul, quadrupeds, and beasts of the earth; and so it was done, and they were brought forth. And God saw that they were good, and very good, because all are necessary. On the day mentioned above, therefore, God said: Let us make man in our image and likeness, and, He said, let him have power over all things that have been made upon the earth (Gen. 1:26). First indeed God made the substances out of which He would frame the world; when it was compacted, adorned with all its embellishments, and furnished with what was necessary, He then made man, who would enjoy it and all that is in it. For whereas He had commanded that everything on earth should be brought forth from water and earth, yet when He made man, He is described as having taken clay of the earth in His hands, so that He might teach how greatly man differs from the things He had already made. He wishes it to pertain to the honor of man that he is described as being made by the hands of God, and made in the image and likeness of God, that is, of the Father and the Son. What it is to be in the image and likeness of God, although we have said elsewhere, yet this place and its occasion require that we say it again. The words are from the Father to the Son, saying, Let us make man in our image and likeness: although in the work the person of both is understood, of Him who speaks and of Him who hears. This then is the image of God in man, that one man was made as it were a lord, from whom the rest would arise, having the dominion of God as His vicar; for every king bears the image of God. Therefore woman was not made in the image of God. Therefore it says, And God made man; in the image of God He made him. Therefore it is that the Apostle says, A man indeed ought not to cover his head, because he is the image and glory of God; but the woman covers it for this reason, because she is not the glory or image of God (1 Cor. 11:7). The likeness of God in man is this, that just as from the Father is the Son, so from man is woman. In this plainly there is a difference, because she was made, whereas He was born. Yet to some it seems that God made all things at once. For, they say, if He made by His word, why is it not said that He made everything at once? For it is the custom among men to believe that things are made in stages. For the power of God it seems more fitting if it is said that He made all things in one day. However, we see great providence in this work and order. For He could certainly have made all things together; but diverse reason forbade it, and with all these matters set apart, faith must be given to divine Scripture, which says, and often says, For in six days, it says, the Lord your God made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them (Exod. 20:11). First then, they ought to have been made in such a way that they might feel and know that they had been made: for when they did not all see themselves at once, but one today, another tomorrow, they recognized that they are contained in a beginning, and in no way could they suspect eternity, since they recognize each other in parts. For if all things had existed at once, there would be no sense of weakness for them, but they would think that they had not begun. For those things which suddenly exist all together by the word of God do not feel themselves being made, unless they see something before themselves and something after themselves. And lest that which was made first might think itself unmade, by seeing greater things made after itself, it believes of itself what it has seen in the other that is nobler. Finally, the light which is called day has before itself heaven and earth, that is, water and dry land. But when water itself and dry land and the confused darkness had been made, they could not claim eternity for themselves, because none of these dared to claim for itself fixedness and identity. Again, the sun and moon, though they are most bright, have many things before them. Therefore it was brought about that the greater things are later, and the earlier lesser things, when they see each other, none of these claims eternity for itself. Furthermore, the work completed in six days contains within itself the whole age of the world, so that the works of six days have the figure of six thousand years: because what in each age was going to happen is contained in order in the works of the six days; for instance, because in the earlier ages there was not going to be such great knowledge of God upon the earth, the earlier days appear without splendor; and that cattle were made before man, because our forefathers, uncultivated and rural, were going to live in the manner of cattle; but that man should be made on the sixth day, this event was brought about because in the sixth millennium of years the coming of Christ made man so that he should not be subject to death. And that man should be the image of God, because by God’s gift he would be conformed in image to the Son of God, as the apostle John says, We know, he says, that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him (1 Jn. 3:2). And the Vessel of election: being conformed, he says, to the image of the Son of God (Rom. 8:29). Moreover, the tree of life which was set in paradise was the image of God’s future grace, which is the body of the Lord; whoever eats it will live forever. For the tree of the knowledge of good and evil signifies that the Law was given through Moses, which, when it made sin known that previously lay hidden, gave the knowledge of good and evil. For it showed what was good and what was evil. And as to the fact that on the seventh day He rested from His works, this signifies that, once the sixth millennium of years is completed, in the seventh millennium He will rest, with the world ceasing from all secular work. We have said these few things out of many, so that we might open a path for understanding according to what we have shown above.

WHY DID GOD CREATE THE WORLD? — He made it because He is a craftsman; or else it must be denied that He is, if He did not. But His very works show that He exists. He therefore made what previously did not exist, because without doubt it is better to be than not to be. If it is said, “Was there some empty place where He could make it, or what was there before He made it?” The Vessel of Election resolves this briefly. For when speaking of God he says, “In Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28); that is, all things are in God, because He is everywhere, and before all things He alone is eternal, invisible to every creature. And lest we seem to have passed over the mystery, or rather to have been ignorant why the world was made, we say that the apostasy of the Devil drew many angels, that is, spiritual powers, with him into transgression, when he willed by wicked presumption to defend a kingdom for himself. This the prophet Isaiah signifies, saying, “How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who used to rise in the morning?” (Isa. 14:12); that is, you who appeared brighter than the rest. For he was a sort of prince of many, among whom he was more splendid, and with whose company he descended into wicked conflict. Seeing beneath himself many spiritual powers, since in the paradise of God he was more excellent in the knowledge of the heavenly mystery, swollen with pride itself, he wished to be called god. In this, moreover, we see in the present life that some have imitated his example: men who, puffed up by the contemplation of the troops of soldiers gathered around them, and with their attendants supplying fuel for conspiracy in this matter, have tried to claim dominion for themselves. From this it came about that God, in order to destroy his presumption not by power but by reason, created matter which would be a confusion of things, from which He would make the world. For the things that were together in confusion, once distinguished, yielded this adornment which we see. When the substances were separated from one another, and a structure made, it is called “world”; because each thing, set apart from another, appeared in the world: so that man, placed here, created from what is above and what is below, that is, from heavenly and earthly elements, might show by the dominion of the one God, not only by voice but also by the image in which one man was made by the one God, from whom the rest would arise, that all things are from one. For One made one, so that He might teach that all are from one, and that therefore God is one; so that the higher creature might learn in man, to its own confusion, truth, he who was formed from the earth. From this the Devil became man’s enemy. For he foresaw that man was made to be his accuser; and so by his subtlety he worked to bring man into the same transgression into which he himself fell, so that he might make his accuser a sharer in his own condemnation. For in the transgression he promised man divinity, from which he himself, when he aimed to it, was cast down. And since every nature is free from guilt, it takes its names from what happens from it. First come things, afterwards their designation; and so “Satan” and “Devil” are names formed from his deeds, so that they signify not his nature but his will. Therefore, so that the purpose of God, which He decreed in the case of created man, should stand firm, and so that the deed of the Devil, by which he deceived man, might increase the weight of his own guilt, Christ agreed to come down from the holy seats even to earth: so that He might free man from the sentence of transgression, and might show the future perdition of the Devil, lest anyone imitate his deed. For this reason the apostle John said, “For this the Son of God came, that He might destroy the works of the Devil” (1 Jn. 3:8). If he were evil by nature, then to promise him punishment would be madness or injustice. For who reproves one whom he sees do nothing except what his nature allows? Can fire be blamed because it burns, or water because it cools, when it does this not by will but by nature? Therefore if the Devil was evil by nature, he would have no will. Nor could he discern; instead, in one and the same way he would rush upon all, like a blind creature. But in fact he acts with a kind of judgment: he spares those who do his will, conceals toward certain beginners, sets obstacles and hindrances before those who seek to flee to God’s help, lays snares for the servants of God, and is more hostile to those who are more zealous in His service. From this it is clear that his will lies in crime. Therefore the apostle Peter says, “Be sober and watchful, because your adversary the Devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). He does not seek the Gentiles, he does not seek the Jews, he does not seek those of evil life and conduct; he seeks the servants of God and the followers of Christ, whom he knows to be his enemies, because they condemn his deed and his presumption. Indeed, once the Law was given, envy burned more fiercely against those who were under the Law, knowing that the teachings of the Law proclaim one God and good conduct for men. Therefore, if he is thought to do this by nature, he cannot be held guilty: because he does what belongs to his nature and what he can do, and does not do what he cannot do, because it does not belong to his nature. Therefore he is neither to be praised nor condemned. He is not to be praised, because what he does harms; but he is not to be condemned, because he does these things not by will but by the force of nature. For we know that some have suddenly gone mad, and with clubs, iron, stones, and bites have injured many, even killed some; yet when they were captured by skill and brought before judges, they were not held guilty, because they had done these things not by will, but driven by some unknown force, not knowing what they did. For how can he be made guilty who does not know what he has done? So also if the Devil does not know good, why is he judged condemnable for not doing what he does not know? Rather, if it could be so, he would deserve praise because he does what he does not know. We, however, are rightly made guilty, because we do not do what we know we ought to do, or because we do what we know we ought not to do. But since we see throughout all of Scripture that the Devil is presented as guilty, and therefore we read that Hell has been prepared for him, that he is to be condemned by the law, we know this: because when he knew and was able to do good, he did evil. For God, who is just, would not condemn him for not doing the good which he did not know; but because he did the evil which he did know. Therefore I think it is clear that no nature ought to be called evil, because every evil, as has been made evident, arises from the will, which through the senses befalls nature.

WHAT CAN WE SAY TO THOSE WHO CLAIM THAT THIS WORLD EXISTS NATURALLY FROM ALL ETERNITY, AND THAT IT HAS NEITHER BEGINNING NOR END? — That the world has existed from eternity and is subject to no authority is unlikely and impossible. We see it made up of bodies in such great diversity; yet nothing divine and eternal can be anything but simple, in which no diversity is seen, but only unity. For the world does not even preserve the regular cycles of the seasons, so that it is not only changeable in time or composed of contrary substances, but even in those very cycles of time; whereas what is eternal shuns all diversity and cannot be grasped by touch or sight, being incorporeal. This world, however, is subject to suffering, since water resists fire, and fire, if it grows stronger, overcomes water; and the earth, being by nature dry and cold, suffers burning, as a corporeal thing. Therefore it is inappropriate to call the world eternal, since we see it subject to suffering and failing through age as the ages go by, and we believe that it will come to an end. What is to be thought of the person who believes the world is eternal? Certainly man began in the world: without man, for whom did the yearly fruitfulness of the world profit? Or did it generate without any providence? And how did what is eternal generate corruptible and mortal things, when from what is eternal only what is eternal ought to arise? And that which is visible, felt, and touched, by what boldness is it called eternal? And that which is dispensed in the cycles of time, so that even time itself sometimes does not perform its proper functions, how is it called eternal? For eternity is neither corrupted nor changed.

WHAT NEED WAS THERE FOR MOSES TO EXPLAIN LATER, AND NOT EARLIER, THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD AND THE ORDER OF CREATION? — It was not fitting that it should be described before, because for this reason so great an error did not yet exist among humans. But when error had already grown in the human race, so that even the sons of Israel in Egypt heard from the philosophers of the Egyptians a teaching contrary to this account, those same Egyptians from whom Moses had also learned all Egyptian knowledge, that a certain Apis had fashioned this world through evil angels, and that this one too seems to be the prince of the world, that is, Satan, this view Marcion followed and rushed into death. For the Manichaeans also say that man was made by this same Satan, not this world, being more foolish than the others. For since it is agreed that the world was made for the sake of man, they say that the world was made by God, though from foreign substance; but that man was created by the adversary, as though in another’s house another master were set. It was therefore necessary that Moses, in order to expose and remove this error, should make it clear that God is the author of the world and of man who was made. Having received authority through the signs and wonders that he performed, he taught that what he transmitted with attesting signs was without doubt true. For who would not believe him whose deeds produced such great signs? Therefore it is that those who think contrary to this teaching are known to err, because they strive to support their assertion with bare words. Therefore, in order to teach that nothing is coeternal with God, he sets forth the very order of created things, so that while he mentions that the lesser things were made first, and afterwards the greater, none of these may be thought uncreated: for those that are later in time are greater in power; so that if the former think they have superiority by reason of time, they are refuted by the very weakness by which they are subjected to the latter; or if the latter, presuming on their power, claim primacy for themselves, they are humbled by their posteriority, so that none of these may appear not to have been subject from the beginning. First indeed heaven and earth were made; then light, which serves for day; after that the firmament, which was called heaven, and the gatherings of the waters, which he called seas, so that the earth might appear in which it could be possible to live. By “earth,” which he says was made after heaven, he does not wish us to understand earth alone, but he signified matter, that is, all the lower things which brought forth the whole appearance of the world. “Heaven,” however, he maintains to be not this bodily one, but that higher one which is spiritual, made in the beginning; so that when he says that heaven was first made, then earth, he meant that in heaven all things invisible, and on earth all things visible, were created by God. For he includes the highest and the lowest of the whole of nature, so that whatever lies between is without doubt also believed to have been made. The luminaries moreover, which he appointed for the governance of the world, he declares were made on the fourth day, so that the greater they are in power, the later they are in time. But man he established on the sixth day, so that he might introduce an inhabitant into a house already prepared. And man is far more exalted, who indeed is declared to have been made on the sixth day; whom I therefore called more exalted because his inner nature is invisible and capable of understanding. Yet in strength the sun is greater, and in light the moon is more excellent than the earth. Therefore it is that some are displeased by the statement, “And he saw the light, that it was good”: for since all things were said by them to have been made by evil, they could not be believed to be good. Moses, in order to prove that the things which were made are good, shows that what he made was pleasing to God himself, so that whoever was displeased by them might be shown guilty. For how could he be ignorant of the light, who said, “Let there be light,” and there was light? Or who makes what he does not know? The light that was made pleased him who made it. What craftsman does not rejoice in his work? Therefore it is said, “God saw the light, that it was good” (Gen. 1:3–4). And there is no lack of those who say that it is evil. What, if it had been left without testimony? Therefore, after the structure of the world had been described, the line of the race was carried through from the origin of the first man by Seth, who was given in place of Abel, and in due order it comes down to Abraham, the father of the Jews: so that it might be shown that Abraham believed in this God, who is the maker of the world, and that he himself gave the Law, in which the Christ who was to come was promised, who would free the human race from the dominion of the Devil. From these things our faith is proved reasonable. For the described genealogy bears witness to this, because from the beginning there has been a race of Christians. For from Seth, the son of Adam, one comes to Enoch, from Enoch to Noah, from Noah to Abraham, from Abraham one descends to David, from David to Mary, from Mary Christ is born of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, all those in former times, as many as had faith in the one God whom the Savior proclaimed, are rightly to be called Christians. For from the beginning the coming Savior was promised. Therefore John in the Apocalypse says, “The Lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev. 13:8). Therefore there have always been Christians. For all those, whom I mentioned above, from the first man created in the world, through whom the line reaches to the Savior, had faith in this God, of whom Christ spoke when he said: “Now this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (Jn. 17:3). It may be said by way of objection: If even those earlier people were Christians, what new knowledge came through Christ? The coming of Christ brought this advance in understanding: that the preaching of the one God revealed the mystery, showed what belongs to each person (of the Trinity), and, to the fulfilling of the righteousness of the Law, added what had been reserved.

ON THE BEGINNING. — In the beginning was the Word (Jn. 1:1). What is “in the beginning”? For we also read in the ancient Books: In the beginning God made heaven and earth (Gen. 1:1). And in the Epistle of him whose Gospel it is, and about whose “beginning” we are trying to say something, it is signified in the same sense; for he says: That which was from the beginning. (1 Jn. 1:1) The Epistle therefore and the Gospel have one and the same meaning. For it is one thing that is said in the old text, In the beginning God made heaven and earth; and another when he says, In the beginning was the Word; and, That which was from the beginning (1 Jn. 1:1). For to be in the beginning, and to be from the beginning, mean one and the same thing, in the case of that which from the beginning was what it was, and did not begin to be. For that which begins to be, was not from the beginning; and therefore it is subjected to a beginning, that is, to be the first among other things in order, because, being itself made at the beginning, it began to have others after itself, which were made after it. As we read that in the beginning God made heaven and earth: he did not say, In the beginning were heaven and earth; because when they did not yet exist, and God was disposing Himself to make the world, in the beginning, that is, among the other things which were to contribute to the construction of the world, God first made heaven and earth; because beginning is the starting point of one who undertakes something that is first in order. But that which is said, that in the beginning it was, that is, the Word, is meant to have existed before the beginning of the higher and lower creation; so that it should by no means be understood as having been made first among these things which have been created, as if it were made earlier, when God was disposing Himself to make creation. Therefore, if in the beginning it was, that is, it was before all things, it always was. And so too it was the Word. Where? With God, he says, lest it should be thought unworthy and in any way subject to a beginning, it which always was with God. For it is fitting that what was before all things with God should not be subjected to any beginning. Therefore he added: And the Word was God. Now he shows plainly that what was said above applies to the Word; for he says, The Word was God: and concerning God one must not think otherwise than that He should always be said to have been. For if He began to be, He is a creature; if He is a creature, He is not God. For whatever exists is either God or a creature; and therefore the name of God does not belong to a creature. But because He did not begin to be (He was, in fact), He is rightly said to be God. But He is said to have always been with God because He is God not from Himself, but from God. On this account His name is said to be the Word of God, as the faith of the same evangelist shows in his Revelation. For he says among other things: And His name is the Word of God (Rev. 19:13). For in order that He might not be signified as the One from whom are all things, but as the One through whom are all things, that is, not as the Father but as the Son, He is called the Word of God: so that, because God cannot be without His Word, this One who is called the Word of God may be believed to have always been with God; and because the Word is not outside Him whose Word it is, this Word which was with God may be understood as signified to be not from elsewhere, but from God; and because He is from God, He is not absurdly called God. Therefore he does not make two gods by saying that God was with God. For if there were two, they would be different in nature and not of one will. For if we men, though we are of one nature, are nevertheless of different wills, how much more, where the natures are different? and neither would God be said to be with God. For the God who was and is with God does not have from Himself that He is God; otherwise, neither would He be said to be God with God, nor would the Word of God be called God the Word; but because that which is from God does not signify any other kind of being than that which God Himself is, the Word of God is called God, so that, because He is said to be the Word of God, He should not be referred to another God. And the fact that He is called God happens for this reason, lest it should tend to the injury of God, if that which was from God were not at all called God. Therefore both the unity of God has been preserved, and the fitting honor has been rendered, since He who is God from God has not been received in His own glory, but in that of Him from whom He is God. For this reason the Gospel begins to speak of the Word before it speaks of God the Father; because questions arise not concerning God, but concerning the Word of God. No one doubts about God, but about Him who is God from God. For every tongue of those in heaven and on earth confesses one God; but it is disturbed in the mystery of the one God. It trembles when it hears the Word of God called God; for it is struck by bodily representations, because the word of a man cannot be called a man; whereas God is by nature simple, not composed of members, nor having an inside and an outside, nor a before and after, nor top and bottom; but, if it can be said, He is wholly and entirely the same in all respects, nowhere variable or unlike Himself; and His one brightness is measureless. For if fire has neither front nor back, nor inside and outside, how much more its Creator? Therefore, because everything that God is, is entirely one and simple, it does not conflict, when something that is from God is called God. Therefore, partly according to a human example, and partly not according to a human example, the Son of God who is the Word of God is God. For in the same way in which sons of men are men, the Son of God is God; but because sons of men are men by mixture, in this respect the Son of God is not God by that example; because from the simple God He is simply born. And just as our word is from us, by this example it is understood that the Word of God is from Him; but because our word is not what we ourselves are, in this respect the Word of God is not from God in the same manner; because the Word of God is a reality, not a sound that fades away. Nor, because we and God share common words, will there be one and the same explanation for us and for God in the actual effect of things. For we read, In the beginning God made heaven and earth. How did He make? Perhaps as we make our works with the hand? And further on it says: And God said, Let there be light; and there was light (Gen. 1:3). Whom do we suppose God spoke to? For He surely did not speak to man, but to Him who could make, who was also going to make man, as indeed He did. But how did He speak? Perhaps as we speak, with a bodily organ? Far from it. You see, then, that certain words are indeed shared between us and God, but they differ in their effect: for God acts in a different way than we do; and He is said to speak, but not in our manner. So also the Word of God is not a word of the kind we use, which, once it is spoken, no longer exists; that Word, however, remains, because it is such a Word that it hears, and speaks, and works. Moreover, it is not only the Word of God, but also the Power and the Wisdom of God, this is the Son of God. In respect to effect, He is called the Son of God; in respect to the speech by which God addresses us through Him, He is called the Word of God; in respect to the wisdom by which God teaches us His mystery through Him, He is called the Wisdom of God; and in respect to the operation by which God made and makes all things through Him, He is called the Power of God. These titles could fit no one except the Son of God. Precisely because He is God from God, He is said to possess all that is God’s. For by being born He obtained all things of God. It would not be fitting that the Word of God, and the Power and Wisdom of God, should be called degenerate: for this is what “God the Word, the Power, and the Wisdom” means. But Christ, because He is wholly God from the whole God, is God; and He is called the Wisdom of God, and the Power, and the Word: that is, He is God from God, and with God. Therefore it is said, This was in the beginning with God. In order to overcome the minds of unbelievers, Scripture burst forth under force, to show that Christ is God, since everywhere, for the sake of the unity of God, it intends Christ to be understood as God. Now, however, in plain words it has said that He is God, and that He has always been with God, laying open the mystery of God, lest God be thought utterly solitary. It has declared that God is not called one in order that He be considered solitary, but that, although there be two or three, yet from the one, the unity is not discriminatory, because whatever is from the one is referred back to that very one, since He is one, even though all things are said to be from God. Yet there is a difference between that which properly came forth from God and that which was created from outside at His command: that is, there is a difference between that which proceeded from His substance and that which, when it in no way existed, was created by His will. For that which proceeded from the substance of God was never subsequent to His substance; whereas that which was created began to be a substance when it was created: and therefore the Trinity alone has no beginning. Therefore, the disclosure of the mystery has diminished the merit of faith: for the more hidden that which is believed is, the greater is the reward of the believer, and the lesser the punishment of the doubter. But the disclosure of the mystery, while it has made the merits of believers lesser, has stirred up greater punishments for the unbelieving. For a clearer law makes one more guilty. The testimony of the Saviour Himself, by which He called God His own Father, would have sufficed. For which of the believers would doubt that the Son in substance is in no way different from the Father? But because the unreasonableness of heretics, by inventions of unbelief, began to assail the laws of faith by receiving the Son of God otherwise than He is proclaimed, it was added, for the sake of making this known, that He was before all things with God and is God, so as to reveal what the concept of a true Son mystically contained. By this, divine mercy appears to have provided for human weakness, by unveiling what had been reserved, as enclosed, for the merits of a stronger faith. Therefore it added, saying, All things were made through Him, so that if anyone from what had been said above still hesitated in any respect, since human understanding is narrow for grasping divine things, from this he might become capable, when he hears, All things were made through Him. Therefore he would by no means think Him to be a thing made, since he hears that all things were made through Him by God; for if He Himself were a thing made, it would not have said that all things were made through Him by God: nor indeed was He made through Himself. To reveal this more fully still, it added, And without Him, it says, was made nothing: in saying this, it excluded all controversy and earthly arguments. Although there are still those who refuse to believe, nevertheless, when it shows that nothing was made without Him, it has taught that in no way ought He to be suspected of being a creature. For how can He Himself be said to be a creature, when it is said that God made nothing without Him? If God made Him, Scripture lies. But far be it. For Scripture is faithful, and, in order to cut off error, it uses as much clarity as it can for the redemption of human beings unto salvation. Finally it subjoined, What was made in Him was life (Jn. 1:2–4): in Him, that is, in the Word, it signifies that what was made is life. As the Lord Himself also says: As the Father has life in Himself, so He has given to the Son to have life in Himself (Jn. 5:26). It is not that the Word was without life, and afterwards life was either given or made in Him; rather, He wishes the Word itself to be understood as life. If one can say of God the Father that He Himself is one thing and has in Himself another; so also of His Son: for just as the Father has life in Himself, so He gave the Son to have life in Himself. Human words are not fit to explain divine realities. Therefore what is said seems flawed, in that, while the Son of God is not a creature, that which is, is said to have been made in Him. And if it had said, “what was begotten in Him,” even so it would have seemed flawed. But to show His substantial generation, it pointed to the work made in it by such language as it could use, by which it exists, demonstrating that His generation has life in itself. For we indeed live, but we cannot give life to others, since that same life is not in our power. He, however, is said to have life in Himself precisely because He is able to give life and to create what He wills to exist and to live. For this He is said to be born, that He might be able to do all that the Father does; because He has life in Himself just as the Father has. For this is what it means that He made all things through Him and in Him: He so begot Him as to have in Himself life, through which He can make all things, not because He Himself is something other than life, but since His life can both live and create others to live, He is said to have life in Himself. For we indeed live, but we do not have life itself in us in such a way that we also give life to others. This reality the Apostle Paul also recalls among other things when he says: “Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn before every creature; for in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers; all things were created through him and in him” (Col. 1:15–16). Now the Gospels agree with this teaching of the two Apostles, John and Paul: for they say the same thing, that the Son of God was begotten before every creature, so that he might create spiritual powers, and the world, and the visible things that are in it. For what John said, that “what was made, in him is life,” Paul signified in the same way when he said that “in him all things in heaven and on earth were created.” And further on: “All things were created through him and in him.” “Through him” he created, because in substance he is the same God, that is, the Father in the Son; but “in him,” because he so begot the Son that he might have the power to make all things visible and invisible. This consisted in making life in him, so that he might both live, and bestow life on others for living, understanding, acting, and upon the other living beings according as he willed, as the image of God. For when he is called the image of God, this refers to both aspects: for by his express birth he possesses in himself the full likeness of the Father, and he can do whatever the Father can do, so that it is truly the Father who is seen in the Son, who is the image of the invisible God. Surely, because he called the Father invisible, he did not thereby make the Son visible, since the Son is by nature what the Father is. And since the heavenly creature is invisible, how much more its Creator? But he meant this of what is in heaven, not of what is on earth; for although the Son is invisible, yet he is seen there, that is, in the heavenly realms, by the Apostles or by others of that kind, of whom he said: “Father, I will that where I am, they also may be with me, and may see my glory” (Jn. 17:24). And elsewhere: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt. 5:8); that is, the Father in the Son, God in the image; which is God in God. As the body is the image of a bodily thing, so God is the image of God: for the Father is the pattern, and the Son is the pattern taken from the pattern, which he communicates to the Holy Spirit; “For he shall take of mine,” he says (Jn. 16:14). And therefore in the Son God is seen as in his own image. For just as no one was found worthy to open the book and its seals except the Word of God (Rev. 5:4–8), so no one is worthy to see God the Father, neither by nature nor by merits, except his true Son. For there is nothing in between that could stand as an obstacle between the Father and the Son, as he himself bears witness when he says: “Neither has anyone seen the Father, except he who is from God; he has seen the Father” (Jn. 6:46). But if in the Son the Father is seen, why is it said that no one is worthy to see God, since he is seen in the Son, because the Son does not differ from the Father? He does not differ at all in substance, because he is the true Son; it differs, however, in the degree of origin [causalitatis], because all power is from the Father in the Son; and in substance the Son is not lesser, yet in authority the Father is greater, as the Lord himself testifies, saying: “If you loved me, you would indeed rejoice, because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I” (Jn. 14:28). Keeping this order, the Apostle Paul also says: “One God, the Father, from whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus, through whom are all things, and we through him” (1 Cor. 8:6): so that the first degree is “from whom are all things”; the second, “through whom are all things”; the third, “in whom are all things.” And because none of these is inferior, they are signified in the unity of God, as the Apostle says: “For from him and through him and in him are all things; to him be glory forever and ever” (Rom. 11:36).

Even if it is granted that the God of all things followed an order [in the creation], he is shown to be God and Creator and to have brought all things into being out of nothing.

Notice this remarkable author, dearly beloved, and the particular gift he had. I mean, while all the other inspired authors told either what would happen after a long time or what was going to take place immediately, this blessed author, being born many generations after the event, was guided by the deity on high and judged worthy to narrate what had been created by the Lord of all from the very beginning. Accordingly he began with these words: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." He well nigh bellows at us all and says, "Is it by human beings I am taught in uttering these things? It is the one who brought being from nothing who stirred my tongue in narrating them." Since we therefore listen to these words not as the words of Moses but as the words of the God of all things coming to us through the tongue of Moses, so I beg you, let us heed what is said as distinguished from our own reasoning.

Let us accept what is said with much gratitude, not overstepping the proper limit nor busying ourselves with matters beyond us. This is the besetting weakness of enemies of the truth, wishing as they do to assign every matter to their own reasoning and lacking the realization that it is beyond the capacity of human nature to plumb God's creation.

Why does it proceed, first heaven then earth? The temple's roof made before its pavement? God is not subject to nature's demands nor to the rules of technique. God is the creator and master technician of nature, and art, and everything made or imagined.

I have received the desired letters of my Desiderius, who in a foretelling of things to happen has obtained with Daniel a certain name [see Vulgate Daniel 9.23: quia vir desideriorum es tu, "for you are a man of desires"], beseeching that I might hand over to our hearers a translation of the Pentateuch in the Latin tongue from the Hebrew words. Certainly a dangerous work, open to the barkings of detractors, who accuse me of insult to the Seventy to prepare a new interpretation from the old ones, thus approving ability (or "genius") like wine. As has very often been testified by me, I, for my part, am able to offer a portion in the Tabernacle of God, without the riches (or "abilities") of one being damaged by the poverties of others.
But that I may have dared, the effort of Origen provoked me, who mixed the translation of Theodotion to the ancient edition, with asterisk and obelus, that is, star and spit, a work distinguishing everything, while he either makes to shine those things which were previously lacking, or he slays and pierces through everything superfluous. And especially by the authority of the Evangelists and the Apostles, in which we read many things from the Old Testament which are not found in our books, as it is (with): "Out of Egypt I have called My Son," and "For He shall be called a Nazarene," and "They will look on Him Whom they have pierced," and "Rivers of living waters shall flow from his belly," and "Things which no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor has arisen in the heart of man, which God has prepared for those loving Him," and many others which are desiring a proper context (or "book" [Jerome uses a Greek word here: συνταγμα]).
Therefore let us ask them where these are written, and when they are unable to say, we may produce them from the Hebrew books. The first witness is in Hosea, the second in Isaiah, the third in Zechariah, the fourth in Proverbs, the fifth is also in Isaiah, of which many are ignorant, the follies of apocrypha being followed, preferring Iberian dirges to authentic books.
The cause of the error is not for me to explain. The Jews say it was done wisely in deliberation, so Ptolemy, the worshipper of one god, might not yet discover a double divinity with the Hebrews; he made them (do so) chiefly for this reason, because he was seen to fall into the dogma of Plato. Accordingly, wherever anything sacred in Scripture is witnessed of the Father and Son and Holy Spirit, they are either translated otherwise, or they have passed over all in silence, so they might both satisfy the king, and might not divulge the secret of the Faith.
And I don't know who was the first author to construct with his lying the seventy cells in Alexandria, into which were divided those who wrote, with Aristeas the champion [another Greek word: υπερασπιστης] of the same Ptolemy, and many after the time of Josephus having reported no such thing, but rather (for them) to have gathered in groups, writing in one basilica, (and) not to have prophesied.
For it is one thing to be a seer, another to be an interpreter. In that one the Spirit predicts things to come; in this one by his learning and abundance of words he translates those things he has understood. Unless Tullius (Cicero) is understood to have translated, by inspiration of the spirit of rhetoric, the Economics of Xenophon, the Protagoras of Plato, and the For Ctesiphon by Demosthenes. Or the Holy Spirit wove together the witnesses of these books one way through the Seventy interpreters and another way through the Apostles, so that what they passed over in silence, what was written by these was invented [? - obscure].
Therefore, what? We condemn the ancients? By no means! But after those earlier in the House of God, we work at what we can. They are interpreted before the coming of Christ and what they didn't know, they tranlated in ambiguous (or "uncertain") sentences. We write after His Passion and Resurrection, not so much prophecy as history. For in the one are told what things were heard, in the other what were seen. What we understand better, we also translate better.
Hear, therefore, O rival; listen, O detractor! I do not condemn, I do not censure the Seventy, but I confidently prefer the Apostles to all of them. Christ speaks to me through their mouth, who I read were placed before the prophets among the Spiritual gifts, among which interpreters hold almost the last place. Why are you tortured by spite? Why do you incite ignorant souls against me? If anywhere in the translation I have been seen by you to err, ask the Hebrews. Consult the teachers of the many different cities. What theirs have of Christ, yours do not have. It is another matter if they have afterward removed the testimonies used by the Apostles against them, and the Latin copies are more correct than the Greek, (and) the Greek than the Hebrew! Truth is against these enviers.
Now I pray you, dearest Desiderius, so that in such a great work which you have made me undertake and take up a beginning from Genesis, you might help in (your) prayers, how I might, by the same Spirit by Whom the books were written, be able to translate them into Latin words.

Chapter 1, Verse 1. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Many people believe, as it is also written in the Altercation of Jason and Papiscus, and Tertullian in his book against Praxeas argues: and also Hilary in the exposition of a certain Psalm affirms, that it is found in Hebrew: 'In the son, God created the heavens and the earth', which is false, as the truth of the matter itself proves. For even the Seventy Interpreters, and Symmachus, and Theodotion translated it as 'In the beginning'. And it is written in Hebrew, Bresith (); which Aquila interprets, in the chapter: and not Baben (), which is called ((Al. interpreted)), in the son. Therefore, it can be understood more according to the meaning than according to the literal translation about Christ: who is approved both in the very beginning of Genesis, which is the head of all books, and also in the beginning of the Gospel of John, as the creator of heaven and earth. Hence, in the Psalms (Psalm 39:9), he says about himself: In the chapter ((Al. chapter)) of the book it is written about me, that is, in the beginning of Genesis. And in the Gospel: All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made (John 1:3). But it should also be known that among the Hebrews this book is called B'reishit: having the custom of giving names to their volumes from their beginnings.

Scripture called heaven and earth that formless matter of the universe, which was changed into formed and beautiful natures by God's ineffable command.… This heaven and earth, which were confused and mixed up, were suited to receive forms from God their maker.

For on the first day He made the matter out of which things were created; but on the other days He gave their form and arrangement to the things created. For example, He made the heaven which was before non-existent—not this visible heaven, but the one above it, for the visible was made on the second day. God made the higher heaven—the heaven of heavens to the Lord, and it is higher than this visible heaven, and, as in a house of two stories, between it and the earth another heaven is interposed. God having thus created the world as one house, placed this visible heaven as a roof in the middle, and the waters above it. Wherefore, David says: Who covereth his upper chambers with waters. God then made the heaven when it was not, the earth when it was not, the abysses when they were not, and wind, air, fire, water; of all the things that came into existence He made their matter on the first day.

Two and twenty works, O lover of the good and the beautiful, did God make from the beginning until the seventh day, namely these. On the first day He made the higher heaven, the earth, the waters from which come snow, ice, hail, frost and dew; then the spirits which minister before His face, such as these—the angels standing in His presence, the angels of glory, the angels of the clouds and darkness and snows and hail and frost—the angels of sounds, of thunder and lightning; the angels of cold and heat, of winter and autumn, and the angels of all the spirits of His creatures which arc in heaven and upon earth and in Chaos; then the darkness and the brooding over the abyss, the waters which once covered the earth, out of which darkness comes evening and night, the light of day and of the dawn. These seven mighty works did God make on the first day. On the second day was made the firmament which is in the midst of the waters. On the same day the waters were divided, one half of which ascended above the firmament, while the other half was underneath the firmament, upon the face of all the earth. This was the only work which God made on the second day.

In the beginning, God created heaven and earth. By introducing the creation of the world, the divine Scripture aptly and immediately demonstrates the eternity and omnipotence of God the Creator. Indeed, by stating that He created the world at the beginning of time, it designates that He existed eternally before time. And by narrating that He created heaven and earth at the very beginning of creation, it declares that He is omnipotent in such a swift act of operation, to whom wanting is doing. For human frailty, when it operates; for example, when we build a house, we first prepare the material at the beginning of the work, and after this beginning, we dig deep, then lay stones in the foundation, then build walls by adding rows of stones, and thus gradually progressing, we reach the perfection of the intended work. But God, whose hand is omnipotent to execute His work, did not need the delay of time, because it is written: "He has made all that He desired" (Psalm 113:3). Hence, it was well-pleasing, because in the beginning, God created heaven and earth, to be clearly understood that both were made by God simultaneously, although both cannot be said by man at the same time. Finally, the prophet says: "In the beginning, you have laid the foundation of the earth, Lord" (Psalm 102:26). However, here it is narrated that the Lord created heaven and earth in the beginning; from which it is clearly inferred that the creation of both elements was accomplished together, and this with such speed of divine power that not even the first moment of the nascent world was surpassed. However, it may not improbably be understood that in the beginning, God made heaven and earth in His Only Begotten Son, who, when asked by the Jews what they should believe about Him, replied: "The beginning, who is speaking to you" (John 8:25). Because in Him, as the Apostle says (Colossians 1:16), all things were created in heaven and on earth. But it must be carefully considered, so that whoever devotes attention to allegorical senses may not, by allegorizing, forsake the evident truth of history. But what and of what nature the heaven was, which was made in the beginning along with the earth, is hinted at in the following words when it is said:

Corporeal nature was brought into being in six days, such that in the beginning, before every day, "God created heaven and earth." Since things flow from the first and most perfect principle, and such a principle is most omnipotent, most wise, and most benevolent: therefore it was necessary that they be brought into being in such a way that in their production the aforesaid threefold nobility and excellence would shine forth. And therefore the divine operation for producing the world-machine was threefold, namely creation, which is appropriately attributed to omnipotence; distinction, which corresponds to wisdom, and adornment, which corresponds to the most generous goodness. And since creation is from nothing, therefore it was in the beginning, before every day, as the foundation of all things and all times.

To intimate the order of nature, Scripture determines, according to what was fitting for God to work: that in the beginning, before the course of time, that threefold nature was brought from non-being into being, when it says: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth" and "the Spirit of God moved over the waters." Where by the name of heaven the luminous nature is intimated; by the name of earth, the opaque; by the name of water, the pervious or transparent, whether subject to contrariety or elevated above contrariety. Where also the eternal Trinity is intimated, namely the Father in the name of God creating, the Son in the name of the beginning, the Holy Spirit in the name of the Spirit of God. And thus is to be understood that which is said: "He who lives forever created all things simultaneously": not because He created them in a chaos of every kind of confusion, as the poets imagined, since He brought forth this threefold nature, the highest in the highest place, the middle in the middle, and the lowest in the lowest: nor indeed into a being of every kind of distinction, since heaven was perfect, and the earth unformed, and the middle nature, as it were holding a middle position, had not yet been brought to perfect distinction.

Three errors are to be guarded against in the sciences, which destroy sacred Scripture and the Christian faith and all wisdom. The error against the cause of being concerns the eternity of the world, namely to posit that the world is eternal. This first error is refuted by what is written: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." For you hold that God is the cause of all things either in part or in whole. If in part: then you take away from God his primacy of causing. If in whole: then God is the cause of every other thing; therefore he produces it not from himself, not from something else, because nothing else exists; therefore from nothing. Likewise, it follows according to this error that a thing had being and non-being simultaneously, and that being was before non-being; and many other absurdities. Whence it is certain that God created all things.

It is manifest that a beginning should be made from the One from whom the two greatest Wise Men began: Moses, the originator of wisdom, and John, its consummator. The former said: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," and, in Augustine's opinion, this means the Son. And John said: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God; and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him." If, therefore, it is impossible to understand a creature except through that by which it was made, it is necessary that the true Word go before thee.

These, then, are the mysteries concerned with the Tree of Life, that is, Holy Scripture, because it begins with eternity and ends in the direction of eternity. Hence, "in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth"; and at the end, "I saw a new heaven and a new earth." These are the forty-eight boards of the dwelling — twenty on one side, and twenty on the other, and eight in the back — within which is placed the Ark, that is, Christ, containing in Himself "all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge," upon whom the Cherubim gaze.

1) "Of time." Things are said to be created in the beginning of time, not as if the beginning of time were a measure of creation, but because together with time heaven and earth were created.
2) In the Son." In the Son by reason of wisdom, in order that, as it is said (Psalm 103:24), "Thou hast made all things in wisdom," it may be understood that God made all things in the beginning--that is, in the Son; according to the word of the Apostle (Colossians 1:16), "In Him"--the Son--"were created all things.
3) Before all things--Nothing is made except as it exists. But nothing exists of time except "now." Hence time cannot be made except according to some "now"; not because in the first "now" is time, but because from it time begins.
God: That is to say the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The Hebrew original has "Elohim," which may be rendered "Gods" or "Judges": Various languages have diverse modes of expression. So as by reason of the plurality of "supposita" the Greeks said "three hypostases," so also in Hebrew "Elohim" is in the plural. We, however, do not apply the plural either to "God" or to "substance," Though the name "God" signifies a being having Godhead, nevertheless the mode of signification is different. For the name "God" is used substantively; whereas "having Godhead" is used adjectively. Consequently, although there are "three having Godhead," it does not follow that there are three Gods.
Created: To be created is, in a manner, to be made. Creation is not change, but is understood as first not existing at all, and afterwards as existing. The gloss has, "To create is to make something from nothing." To create belongs to God according to His being, that is, His essence, which is common to the three Persons of the whole Trinity. The angels were created at the same time as corporeal creatures. For the angels are part of the universe: they do not constitute a universe of themselves; but both they and corporeal natures unite in constituting one universe. At the same time the contrary is not to be deemed erroneous; especially on account of the opinion of Gregory Nazianzen. For Jerome says (In Ep. ad ***. i, 2): "Six thousand years of our time have not yet elapsed; yet how shall we measure the time, how shall we count the ages, in which the Angels, Thrones, Dominations, and the other orders served God?" Damascene also says (De Fide Orth. ii): "Some say that the angels were begotten before all creation; as Gregory the Theologian declares, He first of all devised the angelic and heavenly powers, and the devising was the making thereof."
Heaven: According to Chrysostom (Hom. iii in Genes.), Moses prefaces his record by speaking of the works of God collectively, in the words, "In the beginning God created heaven and earth," and then proceeds to explain them part by part; in somewhat the same way as one might say: "This house was constructed by that builder," and then add: "First, he laid the foundations, then built the walls, and thirdly, put on the roof." In accepting this explanation we are, therefore, not bound to hold that a different heaven is spoken of in the words: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth," and when we read that the firmament was made on the second day.
We may also say that the heaven recorded as created in the beginning is not the same as that made on the second day; and there are several senses in which this may be understood. Augustine says (Gen. ad lit. i, 9) that the heaven recorded as made on the first day is the formless spiritual nature, and that the heaven of the second day is the corporeal heaven. According to Bede (Hexaem. i) and Strabus, the heaven made on the first day is the eternal one, and the firmament made on the second day, the starry heaven. According to Damascene (De Fide Orth. ii) that of the first day was spherical in form and without stars, the same, in fact, that the philosophers speak of, calling it the ninth sphere, and the primary movable body that moves with diurnal movement: while by the firmament made on the second day he understands the starry heaven. According to another theory, touched upon by Augustine [Gen. ad lit. ii, 1] the heaven made on the first day was the starry heaven, and the firmament made on the second day was that region of the air where the clouds are collected, which is also called heaven, but equivocally. And to show that the word is here used in an equivocal sense, it is expressly said that "God called the firmament heaven"; just as in a preceding verse it said that "God called the light day" (since the word "day" is also used to denote a space of twenty-four hours). Other instances of a similar use occur, as pointed out by Rabbi Moses.
Earth: The earth stands in relation to the heaven as the centre of a circle to its perimeter. But as one center may have many perimeters, so, though there is but one earth, there may be many heavens.

Nobody can imagine how nothing could turn into something. Nobody can get an inch nearer to it by explaining how something could turn into something else. It is really far more logical to start by saying 'In the beginning God created heaven and earth' even if you only mean 'In the beginning some unthinkable power began some unthinkable process.' For God is by its nature a name of mystery, and nobody ever supposed that man could imagine how a world was created any more than he could create one.

And the root phrase for all Christian theism was this, that God was a creator, as an artist is a creator. A poet is so separate from his poem that he himself speaks of it as a little thing he has "thrown off." Even in giving it forth he has flung it away. This principle that all creation and procreation is a breaking off is at least as consistent through the cosmos as the evolutionary principle that all growth is a branching out. A woman loses a child even in having a child. All creation is separation. Birth is as solemn a parting as death.

It was the prime philosophic principle of Christianity that this divorce in the divine act of making (such as severs the poet from the poem or the mother from the new-born child) was the true description of the act whereby the absolute energy made the world. According to most philosophers, God in making the world enslaved it. According to Christianity, in making it, He set it free. God had written, not so much a poem, but rather a play; a play he had planned as perfect, but which had necessarily been left to human actors and stage-managers, who had since made a great mess of it.

In one respect, as many Christians have noticed, contemporary science has recently come into line with Christian doctrine, and parted company with the classical forms of materialism. If anything emerges clearly from modern physics, it is that nature is not everlasting. The universe had a beginning, and will have an end. But the great materialistic systems of the past all believed in the eternity, and thence in the self-existence of matter. As Professor Whittaker said in the Riddell Lectures of 1942, "It was never possible to oppose seriously the dogma of the Creation except by maintaining that the world has existed from all eternity in more or less its present state." This fundamental ground for materialism has now been withdrawn. We should not lean too heavily on this, for scientific theories change. But at the moment it appears that the burden of proof rests, not on us, but on those who deny that Nature has some cause beyond herself.

[Distinguishing the Christian doctrine of creation from Pantheism — God is not identical with the universe but its Maker, as a painter is not his picture]

The Christian idea is quite different. They think God invented and made the universe—like a man making a picture or composing a tune. A painter is not a picture, and he does not die if his picture is destroyed. You may say, 'He's put a lot of himself into it,' but you only mean that all its beauty and interest has come out of his head. His skill is not in the picture in the same way that it is in his head, or even in his hands.

For the first time in my life I began to look at the question with both eyes open. In the world I know, the perfect produces the imperfect, which again becomes perfect — egg leads to bird and bird to egg — in endless succession. If there ever was a life which sprang of its own accord out of a purely inorganic universe, or a civilization which raised itself by its own shoulder-straps out of pure savagery, then this event was totally unlike the beginnings of every subsequent life and every subsequent civilization. The thing may have happened; but all its plausibility is gone. On any view, the first beginning must have been outside the ordinary processes of nature. An egg which came from no bird is no more 'natural' than a bird which had existed from all eternity. And since the egg-bird-egg sequence leads us to no plausible beginning, is it not reasonable to look for the real origin somewhere outside sequence altogether? You have to go outside the sequence of engines, into the world of men, to find the real originator of the Rocket. Is it not equally reasonable to look outside Nature for the real Originator of the natural order?

Evidently, then, something beyond Nature exists. Man is on the border line between the Natural and the Supernatural. Material events cannot produce spiritual activity, but the latter can be responsible for many of our actions on Nature. Will and Reason cannot depend on anything but themselves, but Nature can depend on Will and Reason, or, in other words, God created Nature.

I won't admit without a struggle that when I speak of God "uttering" or "inventing" the creatures I am "watering down the concept of creation." I am trying to give it, by remote analogies, some sort of content. I know that to create is defined as "to make out of nothing," ex nihilo. But I take that to mean "not out of any pre-existing material." It can't mean that God makes what God has not thought of, or that He gives His creatures any powers or beauties which He Himself does not possess. Why, we think that even human work comes nearest to creation when the maker has "got it all out of his own head."

Nor am I suggesting a theory of "emanations". The differentia of an "emanation"—literally an overflowing, a trickling out—would be that it suggests something involuntary. But my words—"uttering" and "inventing"—are meant to suggest an act.

This act, as it is for God, must always remain totally inconceivable to man. For we—even our poets and musicians and inventors—never, in the ultimate sense, make. We only build. We always have materials to build from. All we can know about the act of creation must be derived from what we can gather about the relation of the creatures to their Creator.