God createth Heaven and Earth, and all things therein, in six days.
God createth heauen and earth, and al things therin; distinguishing and bevvtyfying the same; 26. last of al the sixth day he createth man: to vvhom he subiecteth al corporal things of this inferior vvorld.
1In the beginning God created heaven, and earth.Al principio creò Dio il cielo e la terra.IN THE beginning GOD created heauen and earth.In principio creavit Deus cælum et terram. 2And the earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God moved over the waters.E la terra era informe e vota, e le tenebre erano sopra la faccia dell'abisso: e lo spirito di Dio si movea sopra le acque.And the earth was voide & vacant, and darkenes was vpon the face of the deapth: and the Spirite of God moued ouer the waters.Terra autem erat inanis et vacua, et tenebræ erant super faciem abyssi: et spiritus Dei ferebatur super aquas. 3And God said: Be light made. And light was made.E Dio disse: Sia fatta la luce. E la luce fu fatta.And God said: Be light made. And light was made.Dixitque Deus: Fiat lux. Et facta est lux. 4And God saw the light that it was good; and he divided the light from the darkness.E Dio vide, che la luce era buona: e divise la luce dalle tenebre.And God saw the light that it was good: & he diuided the light from the darkenes.Et vidit Deus lucem quod esset bona: et divisit lucem a tenebris. 5And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night; and there was evening and morning one day.E la luce nominò giorno, e le tenebre notte. E della sera e della mattina si compié il primo giorno.And he called the light, Day, and the darkenes, Night: and there was euening & morning, that made one day.Appellavitque lucem Diem, et tenebras Noctem: factumque est vespere et mane, dies unus. 6And God said: Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters.Disse ancora Dio: Sia fatto il firmamento nel mezzo alle acque: e separi acque da acque.God also said: Be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it diuide betwene waters & waters.Dixit quoque Deus: Fiat firmamentum in medio aquarum: et dividat aquas ab aquis. 7And God made a firmament, and divided the waters that were under the firmament, from those that were above the firmament, and it was so.E fece Dio il firmamento, e separò le acque, che eran sotto il firmamento da quelle che erano sopra il firmamento. E fu fatto così.And God made a firmament, and diuided the waters, that were vnder the firmament, from those, that were aboue the firmament. And it was so done.Et fecit Deus firmamentum, divisitque aquas, quæ erant sub firmamento, ab his, quæ erant super firmamentum. Et factum est ita. 8And God called the firmament, Heaven; and the evening and morning were the second day.E al firmamento diede Dio il nome di cielo. E della sera e della mattina si compié il secondo giorno.And God called the firmament, Heauen: and there was euening & morning that made the second day.Vocavitque Deus firmamentum, Cælum: et factum est vespere et mane, dies secundus.
9God also said; Let the waters that are under the heaven, be gathered together into one place: and let the dry land appear. And it was so done.Disse ancora Dio: Si radunino le acque, che sono sotto il cielo, in un sol luogo: e l'arida apparisca. E così fu fatto.God also said: Let the waters that are vnder the heauen, be gathered together into one place: and let the drie land appeare. And it was so done.Dixit vero Deus: Congregentur aquæ, quæ sub cælo sunt, in locum unum: et appareat arida. Et factum est ita. 10And God called the dry land, Earth; and the gathering together of the waters, he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.E all'arida diede Dio il nome di terra, e le raunate delle acque le chiamò mari. E Dio vide, che ciò bene stava.And God called the drie land, Earth: and the gathering of waters together, he called Seas. And God sawe that it was good.Et vocavit Deus aridam Terram, congregationesque aquarum appellavit Maria. Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum. 11And he said: let the earth bring forth green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth. And it was so done.E disse: La terra germini erba verdeggiante, e che faccia il seme, e piante fruttifere, che diano il frutto secondo la specie loro, che in sé stesse contengono la lor semenza sopra la terra. E così fu fatto.And said: Let the earth shootforth grene herbes, and such as may seede, & fruite trees yelding fruit after his kinde, such as may haue seede in it selfe vpon the earth. And it was so done.Et ait: Germinet terra herbam virentem, et facientem semen, et lignum pomiferum faciens fructum juxta genus suum, cujus semen in semetipso sit super terram. Et factum est ita. 12And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yieldeth seed according to its kind, and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.E la terra produsse l'erba verdeggiante, e che fa il seme secondo la sua specie; e le piante, che danno frutto, e delle quali ognuna ha la propria semenza secondo la sua specie. E vide Dio, che ciò bene stava.And the earth brought forth grene herbe, such as seedeth according to his kinde, & tree that beareth fruite, hauing seede eche one according to his kinde. And God saw that it was good.Et protulit terra herbam virentem, et facientem semen juxta genus suum, lignumque faciens fructum, et habens unumquodque sementem secundum speciem suam. Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum.
13And the evening and the morning were the third day.E della sera e della mattina si compié il terzo giorno.And there was euening & morning that made the third day.Et factum est vespere et mane, dies tertius. 14And God said: Let there be lights made in the firmament of heaven, to divide the day and the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years:E disse Dio: Sieno fatti i luminari nel firmamento del cielo, e distinguano il dì, e la notte; e segnino le stagioni, i giorni e gli anni.Againe God said: Be there lightes made in the firmament of heauen, to diuide the day & the night, and let them be for signes & seasons, and dayes and yeares:Dixit autem Deus: Fiant luminaria in firmamento cæli, et dividant diem ac noctem, et sint in signa et tempora, et dies et annos: 15To shine in the firmament of heaven, and to give light upon the earth, and it was so done.E risplendano nel firmamento del cielo, e illuminino la terra. E così fu fatto.to shine in the firmament of heauen, & to giue light vpon the earth. And it was so done.ut luceant in firmamento cæli, et illuminent terram. Et factum est ita. 16And God made two great lights: a greater light to rule the day; and a lesser light to rule the night: and the stars.E fece Dio due luminari grandi: il luminar maggiore, che presedesse al giorno; e il luminar minore, che presedesse alla notte: e le stelle.And God made two great lights: a greater light, to gouerne the day: and a lesser light to gouerne the night: and starres.Fecitque Deus duo luminaria magna: luminare majus, ut præesset diei: et luminare minus, ut præesset nocti: et stellas. 17And he set them in the firmament of heaven to shine upon the earth.E le collocò nel firmamento del cielo, affinché rischiarasser la terra.And he set them in the firmament of heauen, to shine vpon the earth.Et posuit eas in firmamento cæli, ut lucerent super terram, 18And to rule the day and the night, and to divide the light and the darkness. And God saw that it was good.E presedessero al dì, e alla notte, e dividesser la luce dalle tenebre. E vide Dio, che ciò bene stava.and to gouerne the day & the night, and to diuide the light & the darkenes. And God sawe that it was good.et præessent diei ac nocti, et dividerent lucem ac tenebras. Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum. 19And the evening and morning were the fourth day.E della sera e della mattina si compié il quarto giorno.And there was euening and morning that made the fourth day.Et factum est vespere et mane, dies quartus. 20God also said: let the waters bring forth the creeping creature having life, and the fowl that may fly over the earth under the firmament of heaven.Disse ancora Dio: Producano le acque i rettili animati e viventi, e i volatili sopra la terra sotto il firmamento del cielo.God also said: Let the waters bring forth creeping creature hauing life, and flying foule, ouer the earth vnder the firmament of heauen.Dixit etiam Deus: Producant aquæ reptile animæ viventis, et volatile super terram sub firmamento cæli.
21And God created the great whales, and every living and moving creature, which the waters brought forth, according to their kinds, and every winged fowl according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.E creò Dio i grandi pesci, e tutti gli animali viventi, e aventi moto: prodotti dalle acque secondo la loro specie, e tutti i volatili secondo il genere loro. E vide Dio, che ciò bene stava.And God created huge Whales, and al liuing & mouing creature, that the waters brought forth, according to eche sorte, & al foule according to their kinde. And God sawe that it was good.Creavitque Deus cete grandia, et omnem animam viventem atque motabilem, quam produxerant aquæ in species suas, et omne volatile secundum genus suum. Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum. 22And he blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the waters of the sea: and let the birds be multiplied upon the earth.E li benedisse dicendo: Crescete, e moltiplicate, e popolate le acque del mare: e moltiplichino gli uccelli sopra la terra.And he blessed them saying: Increase and multiplie, and replenish the waters of the sea: and let the birds be multiplied vpon the earth.Benedixitque eis, dicens: Crescite, et multiplicamini, et replete aquas maris: avesque multiplicentur super terram. 23And the evening and morning were the fifth day.E della sera e della mattina si compié il quinto giorno.And there was euening & morning that made the fifth day.Et factum est vespere et mane, dies quintus. 24And God said: Let the earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, according to their kinds. And it was so done.Disse ancora Dio: Produca la terra animali viventi secondo la loro specie; animali domestici, e rettili, e bestie salvatiche della terra secondo la loro specie. E fu fatto così.God said moreouer: Let the earth bring forth liuing creature, in his kind, cattle, & such as creepe, & beastes of the earth according to their kindes: and it was so done.Dixit quoque Deus: Producat terra animam viventem in genere suo, jumenta, et reptilia, et bestias terræ secundum species suas. Factumque est ita. 25And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and cattle, and every thing that creepeth on the earth after its kind. And God saw that it was good.E fece Dio le bestie salvatiche della terra secondo la loro specie, e gli animali domestici, e tutti i rettili della terra secondo la loro specie. E vide Dio, che ciò bene stava.And God made the beastes of the earth according to their kindes, and cattle, & al that crepeth on the earth in his kind. And God saw that it was good,Et fecit Deus bestias terræ juxta species suas, et jumenta, et omne reptile terræ in genere suo. Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum,
26And he said: Let us make man to our image and likeness: and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts, and the whole earth, and every creeping creature that moveth upon the earth.E disse: Facciamo l'uomo a nostra immagine e somiglianza; ed ei presieda a' pesci del mare, e a' volatili del cielo, e alle bestie, e a tutta la terra e a tutti i rettili, che si muovono sopra la terra.and he said Let vs make Man to our image, & likenes: and let him haue dominion ouer the fishes of the sea, and the foules of the ayre, and the beastes, and the whole earth, and al creeping creature, that moueth vpon the earth.et ait: Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostram: et præsit piscibus maris, et volatilibus cæli, et bestiis, universæque terræ, omnique reptili, quod movetur in terra. 27And God created man to his own image: to the image of God he created him: male and female he created them.E Dio creò l'uomo a sua somiglianza: a somiglianza di Dio lo creò: lo creò maschio, e femmina.And God created man, to his owne image: to the image of God he created him, male & female he created them.Et creavit Deus hominem ad imaginem suam: ad imaginem Dei creavit illum, masculum et feminam creavit eos. 28And God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth.E benedisseli Dio e disse: Crescete e moltiplicate: e riempite la terra, e assoggettatela: e abbiate dominio sopra i pesci del mare: e i volatili dell'aria, e tutti gli animali, che si muovono sopra la terra.And God blessed them, and saith: Increase and multiplie, & replenish the earth, and subdew it, and rule ouer the fishes of the sea, and foules of the ayre, & al liuing creatures, that moue vpon the earth.Benedixitque illis Deus, et ait: Crescite et multiplicamini, et replete terram, et subjicite eam, et dominamini piscibus maris, et volatilibus cæli, et universis animantibus, quæ moventur super terram. 29And God said: Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat:E disse Dio: Ecco ch'io v'ho dato tutte l'erbe, che fanno seme sopra la terra e tutte le piante, che hanno in sé stesse semenza della loro specie, perché a voi servano di cibo.And God said: Behold I haue giuen you al maner of hearbe that seedeth vpon the earth, and al trees that haue in them selues seede of their owne kinde, to be your meate:Dixitque Deus: Ecce dedi vobis omnem herbam afferentem semen super terram, et universa ligna quæ habent in semetipsis sementem generis sui, ut sint vobis in escam:
30And to all beasts of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to all that move upon the earth, and wherein there is life, that they may have to feed upon. And it was so done.E a tutti gli animali della terra, e a tutti gli uccelli dell'aria, e a quanti si muovono sopra la terra animali viventi, affinché abbiano da mangiare. E così fu fatto.and to al beastes of the earth, and to euerie foule of the ayre, & to al that moue vpon the earth, and wherein there is life, that they may haue to feede vpon. And it was so done.et cunctis animantibus terræ, omnique volucri cæli, et universis quæ moventur in terra, et in quibus est anima vivens, ut habeant ad vescendum. Et factum est ita. 31And God saw all the things that he had made, and they were very good. And the evening and morning were the sixth day.E Dio vide tutte le cose, che avea fatte, ed erano buone assai. E della sera e della mattina si formò il sesto giorno.And God sawe al things that he had made, and they were very good. And there was euening & morning that made the sixt day.Viditque Deus cuncta quæ fecerat, et erant valde bona. Et factum est vespere et mane, dies sextus.
1:1
Year of the World 1, Year before Christ 4004.
Haydock
Beginning. As St. Matthew begins his Gospel with the same title as this work, the Book of the Generation, or Genesis, so St. John adopts the first words of Moses, in the beginning; but he considers a much higher order of things, even the consubstantial Son of God, the same with God from all eternity, forming the universe, in the beginning of time, in conjunction with the other two Divine Persons, by the word of his power; for all things were made by Him, the Undivided Deity. (Haydock)
Calmet
Elohim, the Judges or Gods, denoting plurality, is joined with a verb singular, he created, whence many, after Peter Lombard, have inferred, that in this first verse of Genesis the adorable mystery of the Blessed Trinity is insinuated, as they also gather from various other passages of the Old Testament, though it was not clearly revealed till our Saviour came himself to be the finisher of our faith. (Calmet)
Haydock
The Jews being a carnal people and prone to idolatry, might have been in danger of misapplying this great mystery, and therefore an explicit belief of it was not required of them in general. See Collet. etc. (Haydock)
Calmet
The word bara, created, is here determined by tradition and by reason to mean a production out of nothing, though it be used also to signify the forming of a thing out of pre-existing matter. (ver. 21, 27.) (Calmet)
Haydock
The first cause of all things must be God, who, in a moment, spoke, and heaven and earth were made, heaven with all the Angels; and the whole mass of the elements, in a state of confusion, and blended together, out of which the beautiful order, which was afterwards so admirable, arose in the space of six days: thus God was pleased to manifest his free choice in opposition to those Pagans who attributed all to blind chance or fate. Heaven is here placed first, and is not declared empty and dark like the earth; that we may learn to raise our minds and hearts above this land of trial, to that our true country, where we may enjoy God for ever. (Haydock)
1:2
Calmet
Spirit of God, giving life, vigour, and motion to things, and preparing the waters for the sacred office of baptism, in which, by the institution of Jesus Christ, we must be born again; and, like spiritual fishes, swim amid the tempestuous billows of this world. (V. Tert.[See Tertullian?], etc.) (Worthington) (Haydock)---This Spirit is what the Pagan philosophers styled the Soul of the World. (Calmet)
Haydock
If we compare their writings with the books of Moses and the prophets, we shall find that they agree in many points. See Grotius. (Haydock)
1:3
Haydock
Light. The sun was made on the fourth day, and placed in the firmament to distinguish the seasons, etc.; but the particles of fire were created on the first day, and by their, or the earth's motion, served to discriminate day from the preceding night, or darkness, which was upon the face of the deep. (Haydock)
Calmet
Perhaps this body of light might resemble the bright cloud which accompanied the Israelites, Exodus 14:19, or the three first days might have a kind of imperfect sun, or be like one of our cloudy days. Nothing can be defined with certainty respecting the nature of this primeval light. (Calmet)
1:4
Good; beautiful and convenient:
Calmet
he divided light by giving it qualities incompatible with darkness, which is not any thing substantial, and therefore Moses does not say it was created. (Calmet)
Haydock
While our hemisphere enjoys the day, the other half of the world is involved in darkness. St. Augustine supposes the fall and punishment of the apostate angels are here insinuated. (L. imp. de Gen.) (Haydock)
1:6
Challoner
A firmament. By this name is here understood the whole space between the earth and the highest stars. The lower part of which divideth the waters that are upon the earth, from those that are above in the clouds. (Challoner)
Calmet
The Hebrew Rokia is translated stereoma, solidity by the Septuagint., and expansion by most of the moderns. The heavens are often represented as a tent spread out, Psalm. 103:3. (Calmet)
1:7
Calmet
Above the firmament and stars, according to some of the Fathers; or these waters were vapours and clouds arising from the earth, and really divided from the lower waters contained in the sea. (Calmet)
1:11
Menochius
Seed in itself, either in the fruit or leaves, or slips. (Menochius)
At the creation, trees were covered with fruit in Armenia, while in the more northern regions they would not even have leaves: Calmet hence justly observes, that the question concerning the season of the year when the world began, must be understood only with reference to that climate in which Adam dwelt. Scaliger asserts, that the first day corresponds with our 26th of October, while others, particularly the Greeks, fix it upon the 25th of March, on which day Christ was conceived; and, as some Greeks say, was born and nailed to the cross. The great part of respectable authors declare for the vernal equinox, when the year is in all its youth and beauty. (Haydock) See Tirinus and Salien's Annals, B.C. 4053.
1:14
Menochius
For signs. Not to countenance the delusive observations of astrologers, but to give notice of rain, of the proper seasons for sowing, etc. (Menochius)
Haydock
If the sun was made on the first day, as some assert, there is nothing new created on this fourth day. By specifying the use and creation of these heavenly bodies, Moses shows the folly of the Gentiles, who adored them as gods, and the impiety of those who pretend that human affairs are under the fatal influence of the planets. See St. Augustine, Confessions 4:3. The Hebrew term mohadim, which is here rendered seasons, may signify either months, or the times for assembling to worship God; (Calmet) a practice, no doubt, established from the beginning every week, and probably also the first day of the new moon, a day which the Jews afterwards religiously observed. Plato calls the sun and planets the organs of time, of which, independently of their stated revolutions, man could have formed no conception. The day is completed in twenty-four hours, during which space the earth moves round its axis, and exposes successively different parts of its surface to the sun. It goes at a rate of fifty-eight thousand miles an hour, and completes its orbit in the course of a year. (Haydock)
1:16
Challoner
Two great lights. God created on the first day light, which being moved from east to west, by its rising and setting made morning and evening. But on the fourth day he ordered and distributed this light, and made the sun, moon, and stars. The moon, though much less than the stars, is here called a great light, from its giving a far greater light to earth than any of them. (Challoner)
Menochius
To rule and adorn, for nothing appears so glorious as the sun and moon. (Menochius)
Calmet
Many have represented the stars, as well as the sun and moon, to be animated. Ecclesiastes 1:5, speaking of the sun says, the spirit goeth forward surveying all places: and in Esdras[2 Esdras?] 9:6, the Levites address God, Thou hast made heaven and all the host thereof; and thou givest life to all these things, and the host of heaven adoreth thee. St. Augustine Ench. and others, consider this question as not pertaining to faith. See Spencer in Origen, contra Cels. V. (Calmet)
Whether the stars be the suns of other worlds, and whether the moon, etc. be inhabited, philosophers dispute, without being able to come to any certain conclusion: for God has delivered the world to their consideration for dispute, so that man cannot find out the work which God hath made from the beginning to the end, Ecclesiastes 3:11. If we must frequently confess our ignorance concerning the things which surround us, how shall we pretend to dive into the designs of God, or subject the mysteries of faith to our feeble reason? If we think the Scriptures really contradict the systems of philosophers, ought we to pay greater deference to the latter, than to the unerring word of God? But we must remember, that the sacred writings were given to instruct us in the way to heaven, and not to unfold to us the systems of natural history; and hence God generally addresses us in a manner best suited to our conceptions, and speaks of nature as it appears to the generality of mankind. At the same time, we may confidently assert, that the Scriptures never assert what is false. If we judge, with the vulgar, that the sun, moon, and stars are no larger than they appear to our naked eye, we shall still have sufficient reason to admire the works of God; but, if we are enabled to discover that the sun's diameter, for example, is 763 thousand miles, and its distance from our earth about 95 million miles, and the fixed stars (as they are called, though probably all in motion) much more remote, what astonishment must fill our breast! Our understanding is bewildered in the unfathomable abyss, in the unbounded expanse, even of the visible creation.
Walker
Sirius, the nearest to us of all the fixed stars, is supposed to be 400,000 times the distance from the sun that our earth is, or 38 millions of millions of miles. Light, passing at the rate of twelve millions of miles every minute, would be nearly 3,000 years in coming to us from the remotest star in our stratum, beyond which are others immensely distant, which it would require about 40,000 years to reach, even with the same velocity. Who shall not then admire thy works and fear thee, O King of ages! (Walker.)
Haydock
Geog. justly remarks, "we are lost in wonder when we attempt to comprehend either the vastness or minuteness of creation. Philosophers think it possible for the universe to be reduced to the smallest size, to an atom, merely by filling up the pores;" and the reason they allege is, "because we know not the real structure of bodies." Shall any one then pretend to wisdom, and still call in question the mysteries of faith, transubstantiation, etc., when the most learned confess they cannot fully comprehend the nature even of a grain of sand? While on the one hand some assert, that all the world may be reduced to this compass; others say, a grain of sand may be divided in infinitum! (Haydock)
1:20
Menochius
Creeping: destitute of feet like fishes, which move on their bellies. (Menochius)
Fowl. Some assert that birds were formed of the earth, but they seem to have the same origin as fishes, namely, water; and still they must not be eaten on days of abstinence, which some of the ancients thought lawful, Socrates 5:20. To conciliate the two opinions, perhaps we might say, that the birds were formed of mud, (Calmet) or that some of the nature of fish, like barnacles, might be made of water and others of earth. (Chap. 2:19.)
Haydock
Under: Hebrew: on the face of the firmament, or in the open air. (Haydock)
1:22
Blessed them, or enabled them to produce others.
Multiply: the immense numbers and variety of fishes and fowls is truly astonishing.
1:26
Challoner
Let us make man to our image. This image of God in man, is not in the body, but in the soul; which is a spiritual substance, endued with understanding and free-will. God speaketh here in the plural number, to insinuate the plurality of persons in the Deity. (Challoner)
Calmet
Some of the ancient Jews maintained that God here addressed his council, the Angels; but is it probable that he should communicate to them the title of Creator, and a perfect similitude with himself? (Calmet)
Worthington
Man is possessed of many prerogatives above all other creatures of this visible world: his soul gives him a sort of equality with the Angels; and though his body be taken from the earth, like the brutes, yet even here the beautiful construction, the head erect and looking towards heaven, etc. makes St. Augustine observe, an air of majesty in the human body, which raises man above all terrestrial animals, and brings him in some measure near to the Divinity. As Jesus assumed our human nature, we may assert, that we bear a resemblance to God both in soul and body. Tertullian (de Resur. 5.) says, "Thus that slime, putting on already the image of Christ, who would come in the flesh, was not only the work of God, but also a pledge." (Haydock) See St. Bernard on Psalm 99. (Worthington)
1:27
Calmet
Male and female. Eve was taken from Adam's side on this same day, though it be related in the following chapter. Adam was not an hermaphrodite as some have foolishly asserted. (Calmet)
Haydock
Adam means the likeness, or red earth, that in one word we may behold our nobility and meanness. (Haydock)
1:28
Challoner
Increase and multiply. This is not a precept, as some protestant controvertists would have it, but a blessing, rendering them fruitful: for God had said the same words to the fishes and birds, (ver. 22.) who were incapable of receiving a precept. (Challoner)
Blessed them, not only with fecundity as he had done to other creatures, but also with dominion over them, and much more with innocence and abundance of both natural and supernatural gifts.
Haydock
Increase. The Hebrews understand this literally as a precept binding every man at twenty years of age (Calmet); and some of the Reformers argued hence, that Priests, etc. were bound to marry: very prudently they have not determined how soon! But the Fathers in general agree that if this were a precept with respect to Adam, for the purpose of filling the earth, it is no longer so, that end being sufficiently accomplished. Does not St. Paul wish all men to be like himself, unmarried? (1 Corinthians 7:1, 7, 8.) (Haydock)
1:29
Menochius
Every herb, etc. As God does not here express leave to eat flesh-meat, which he did after the deluge, it is supposed that the more religious part of mankind, at least, abstained from it, and from wine, till after that event, when they became more necessary to support decayed nature. (Haydock) (Menochius)
Calmet
In the golden age, spontaneous fruits were the food of happy mortals. (Calmet)
1:6
A firmament.... By this name is here understood the whole space between the earth, and the highest stars. The lower part of which divideth the waters that are upon the earth, from those that are above in the clouds.
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Two great lights.... God created on the first day, light, which being moved from east to west, by its rising and setting, made morning and evening. But on the fourth day he ordered and distributed this light, and made the sun, moon, and stars. The moon, though much less than the stars, is here called a great light, from its giving a far greater light to the earth than any of them.
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Let us make man to our image.... This image of God in man, is not in the body, but in the soul; which is a spiritual substance, endued with understanding and free will. God speaketh here in the plural number, to insinuate the plurality of persons in the Deity.
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Increase and multiply.... This is not a precept, as some Protestant controvertists would have it, but a blessing, rendering them fruitful; for God had said the same words to the fishes, and birds, (ver. 22) who were incapable of receiving a precept.
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1. In the beginning.] Holie Moyses telleth what was done in the beginning The Church had only Traditions & no Scripture aboue 2400. yeares. of the world, and so forward euen til his owne time, writing aboue two thousand and foure hundreth yeares after the beginning. Al which being incomprehensible by humaine witte or discourse, he knew partly by Reuelations from God, for he had the gyft of Prophecie in most excellent sorte: partly by Traditions from his elders, who lerned of their fathers. For vntil that time the Church had only Traditions of such things, as were reueled to special men, wherby we see the great authoritie of Traditions, before there were Scriptures. Tradition⸢s⸣ necessarie for three causes. And since Scriptures were written they are also necessarie, for three special reasons. First for that we are only assured by Tradition of the Church, that those bookes are in dede holie Scriptures, which are so accounted, and not by 1 the Scripture it selfe, for that were to proue the same by the same, vntil we be assured of some part, that proueth some other partes. And this made S. Augustin to say plainly, that he could not beleue the Gospel, except the Church told him •••. Epist. •und. c. •5 vvhich is the Gospel. Secondly holie Scriptures being once knowen to be the 2 word of God, and so of most eminent authoritie of al writings in the world, Scripture of most eminent authoritie. as S. Augustin S. Ierome, & al other Fathers agree, yet for the true vnderstanding of the same, both the Scripture it selfe, and the ancient Fathers remitte vs to the Church, namely to those in the Church, that are appointed by Gods ordinance, in the high place that he hath chosen. VVhich were the High Priests in the old Testament, as appeareth: Deut. 17. Mat. 23. Ioan. 11. And in the new Testament, S. Peter and his Successors for whom Christ prayed that his faith should not faile: and therfore commanded him to confirme his bretheren Luc. 22. Thirdly for things not expressed in particular in holie Scripture, the Scripture Luc. 10, 16. Act. 15, 28. 2. Thess. 2. Origen. super. Gen. c. 1. Aug. li. 2. de Gen. cont Manich. ca. 2. and Fathers do likewise remitte vs to Traditions, and to the iudgement • and testimonie of the Church. Christ saying to his Apostles: he that heareth you heareth me. The Apostles doubted not to say: It semed good to the Holie Ghost and to vs. And S. Paul willed the Thessalonians to hold the traditions, vvhich they had lerned, whether it were by word, or by his Epistle.
1. In the beginning God made heauen and earth.] Al writers ancient and later Scriptures hard. find such difficulties in these first chapters, that some otherwise very lerned haue thought it not possible to vnderstand the same according to the proper and vsual signification of the wordes, as the letter may seme to sound, but expound al allegorically, as that by the waters aboue the firmament should be vnderstood the blessed Angels, by the waters vnder the firmament wicked spitites, and the like. So did Origen and diuers that folow him therein. Yea S. Augustin in his bookes vpon Genesis against the Manichees, written shortly after his conuersion, when he could not find as he desired a good and probable sense agreable to the wordes, in their proper signification, expounded them mystically, but afterwards in his other bookes de Genesi ad literam, lib. 1. c. 18. & lib. 8. c. 2. he gratfully acknowledgeth that God had geuen him further sight therin, and that now he supposed he could interprete al according to the proper signification of the wordes. yet so that he durst not nor would not addict him selfe to one sense, but that he was readie to imbrace an other, lest by sticking to his owne iudgement he might faile. So likewise S. Basil, S. Chrisostom, Bas. ho. 9. in Genes. Chrisost. epist. 44. Amb. & Beda in examen. Ieron. Epistol. ad Eustoch. Gen. 1. v. 3. & 14. Exo. 20, 5. & 18, v. 20. Ioan. 8, 25. Rom. •. S. Ambrose, S. Ierome, S. Bede, and other greatest Doctors found & confessed great difficulties in these first chapters, which they with much studie endeuored to explicate. And therfore it is a wonder to see our Protestants & Puritans hold this Paradox, that Scriptures are easie to be vnderstood. VVheras both by testimonie of those that haue in deede studied & laboured in them, and by a why Scriptures are hard. litle due consideration, the cōtrarie is most euident. For whosoeuer wil looke into the holie Scriptures, shal find that some times in shew one place semeth contrarie to an other; some times the letter & phrase are obscure & ambiguous; Three spiritual senses besides the Literal. some times the sentences vnperfect. Againe manie speaches are prophetical, manie parabolical, metaphorical, and vttered vnder other tropes and figures, and that in the literal sense. Moreouer there are three spiritual senses besides the literal, very frequent in holie Scripture. Allegorical pertayning to Christ and the Church; Moral pertayning to maners; and Anagogical Allegorical Moral. Anagogical. pertayning to the next life. As this word Ierusalem literally signifieth the head citie of Iewrie: Morally the soule of man: Allegorically the Church militant: and Anagogically the Church triumphant. And sometimes this (and the like of others) metaphorically in the literal sense signifieth the Church militant, and not the citie of Iewrie, as in the 12. chapter to the Hebrewes: and some • times the Church triumphant, as in the 21. of the Apocalips.
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2. The Spirite of God.] In the Hebrew it is signified, that the Spirite of God was on the waters to make them fertile, for that fishes and birdes were to be procreated therof; the word is merahepheth, incubabat, sate vpon, to produce fruict (saith S. Ierom) from the waters, as a henne by her heate, produceth Ieron. Epistol. 8•. ad Ocea. Tert. d• Baptis. life in the egges. And the same S. Ierom, and before him Tertullian teach, that this was a figure of Baptisme, which consisteth of water and the Holie Ghost. A figure of Baptisme. For as water in the beginning of the world receiued a certain vital vertue of the Holie Ghost to produce liuing creatures: so also Baptisme receiueth vertue of the same Holie Ghost to procreate new men. VVherupon Tertullian calleth Christians called fishes. Christians fishes, because they are gotten from the waters, and thence haue their first spiritual life. Let it not therfore seme strange (saith he) that in Baptisme VVaters geue life.
Act. 14, 15. 17, 24. Psalm. 32, 6. 135, 5. Eccli. 10, 1. •eb. 11, 3.
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The firmament is al the space from the earth to the hieghest starres. the lowest part diuideth betwene the waters on the earth and the waters in the ayer. S. Aug. li. II. de Gen. ad lit. c. 4
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Concordance Iob. 38. Ier. 10, 13.
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Likewise heauē is al the space aboue the earth. in whose lowest part are birdes and waters, in the higher part starres. the hieghest is the Empyrial heauen. Esa. 66.
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The lights made the first day, are disposed the fourth day in their proper courses for more distinction of times. S. Dionys. ca. 4. de diuin. nom. S. Tho. p. 1. q. 67. a. 4. & q. 70. a. 2.
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16. Tvvo great lights, and starres.] Here occurreth an other example of the hardnes of holie Scripture. For if the two great lights (towit the Sunne & the Moone) and also the starres, vvere made the fourth day, and not before, as it m•y seme by the wordes in this place, then what was that light, and in what Light being an accident remayned without subiect, by the iudgement of some lerned Fathers. subiect was it, that was made the first day? S. Basil, S. Gregorie Nazianzen, Theodoret, and some others, writing vpon this place do thinke that the light, which was made the first day, remayned though an accident without his subiect til the fourth day. And albeit most other Doctors rather think that the substance of the Sunne & Moone, & of other planets and starres were created the first day, and the fourth day set in that order and course which now they kepe, with more distinction for signes and seasons, and dayes and yeares: yet it is clere that the foresaid ancient Doctors iudged it possible, that accidents may remaine without their subiect. which a Sacramentarie wil be loath to grant, The accidents of breade and wine can remaine by Gods power without their subiectes. Tenne prerogatiues of man in his creation. 1. made like to God. 2. The Mysterie of the B. Trinitie insinuated in his creation. 3. produced by God him selfe. lest it might be proued possible, as both these & al other Catholique Doctors beleued and taught, that the accidents of bread and wine remaine in the blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist without their subiects. VVhich Protestants denie.
The Sūne & Moone: for though the moone be the least visible starre except Mercurie, yet it geueth more light on the earth by reason it is nerer, and so Moyses speaketh according to the vulgar capacitie and vse of things. S. Aug. li. 2. de Gen. ad lit. ca. 16.
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26. Let vs make man to our Image.] For better consideration of Gods bountie towards vs, and sturring our selues to gratitude towards him, we may here note tenne prerogatiues bestowed on vs, by our Lord & maker in our creation aboue al other earthlie creatures. First, wheras God by an imperial word of commandment made other creatures, Fiat lux, Fiat firmamentum: Be there light: Be there a firmament: intending to make man, he procedeth familiarly, by way, as it were, of consultation, and as to his owne vse and seruice to make man saying: Let vs make man to our image and likenes, that is to say, a reasonable creature with vnderstanding and free wil, which beastes haue not. Secondly, in this worke God first insinuateth the high Mysterie of the B. Trinitie, or pluralitie of Persons in one God (because man is to beleue the same) signifying the pluralitie of Persons by the wordes Let vs make, and to our: and the vnitie in substance, by the wordes Image and likenes, the first in the plural number, the later in the singular. Thirdly, other creatures were produced by the waters and earth, Let the vvaters bring forth (fishe and soule) Let the earth bring forth (grasse and cattle, & other beastes) but God brought forth man, not by the earth, though of the earth, nor by water, nor by heauen, nor by Angels, but by him selfe, geuing him a reasonable soule, not sensual only as to beastes, and the same not produced of anie creature, but created immediatly of nothing. Fourthly, God 4. placed in paradise. 5. Lord of al earthlie creatures. 6. innocencie. gaue man Paradise a most pleasant place to dwel in. Fiftly, God gaue man dominion and imperial authoritie ouer alliuing creatures vnder heauen. Sixtly, man was created in that innocencie of life, and integritie of al vertues, that his mind was wholly subiect to God, his sense to reason, his bodie to his spirite, and al other liuing creatures obedient to him: euen the terrible Lions, the cruel Tigres, the huge Elephants, and the wildest birdes. Seuently, God 7. excellent knowlege. brought them al to man, as to do him homage, and to take their names of him. VVhich by his excellent knowledge he gaue them conformable to their natures. Eightly, God gaue man in some sorte an immortal bodie, that if he had 8. powre to liue euer. 9. gift of prophecie. kept Gods commandment, he had liued long and pleasantly in this world, and so should haue bene translated to eternal life without dying. Ninthly, God did not only adorne man with al natural knowledge, and supernatural vertues, but also with the gift of prophecie. VVherby the knew that Eue was a bone of his bones, and flesh of his flesh, though being a slepe he knew not when 10. God conuersed familiarly with man. she was made. Tenthly (which was the chiefe benefite of al) God conuersed familiarly with man, and that in shape of man, which was a token of his meruelous great loue to man, and a singular incitment of him to loue God. Reade more, if you please, of the dignitie of man, and the benefites of God towards him in his creation, in S. Bernard vpon the 99. Psalme. And vpon the 61. chapter of Esaie.
Concordance Col. 3, 10.
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Concordance Mat. 19, 4.
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28. Increase and multiplie.] VVhether this be a commandment or no, at least Gods blessing alwayes effectual. it is a blessing, for so the wordes before conuince, God blessed them and said: Increase and multiplie. He said the same also to brute creatures, which are not capable of a precept, but by this were made fertile. VVherby we see that Gods Especially in the holie Eucharist. blessing alwayes worketh some real effect: as of fertilitie in this and other places, of multiplication of the loaues and fishes, Ioan 6. And some real effect Christs blessing must nedes worke also in the blessed Sacrament. Mat. 26. VVhich can be no other but changing bread and wine into his bodie & bloud, seing him selfe expresly sayeth: This is my bodie. this is my bloud.
And though Gods blessing in this place, be also a precept, yet it is not to al men for euer, but for the propagation of mankind, which being long since Not al men & ⸢w⸣emen commanded to marie. abundantly propagared, the obligation of the precept ceaseth the cause ceasing. So S. Cyprian, S. Ierome, S. Augustin, and other Fathers expound this place. And confirme the same by the text, for immediatly God signifying to what end he spoke, saith: and replenish the earth. VVhich benig replenished, Gods wil is therin fulfilled.
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Euerie creature in nature is good, but al considered together make the whole world perfect. most apt to mans vse and Gods glorie. S. Aug. li. 1 de Gen. cont. Manich. ca. 21.
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Theodotus † fl. AD 160 Excerpts of Theodotus 1
III. “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth,”
St Justin Martyr † AD 165 Hortatory Address to the Greeks 28
… To show that the poet transferred to his own poem much of what is contained in the divine writings of the prophets. And first he transferred what Moses had related as the beginning of the creation of the world. For Moses wrote thus: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 1.18.1
… Moses, then, they declare, by his mode of beginning the account of the creation, has at the commencement pointed out the mother of all things when he says, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 2.2.5
… He at first narrated the formation of the world in these words: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 3
… Do I seem to you to be weaving arguments, Hermogenes? How neatly does Scripture lend us its aid, when it applies the two titles to Him with a distinction, and reveals them each at its proper time! For (the title) God , indeed, which always belonged to Him, it names at the very first: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 19
… 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;”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 20
… Now in this there is all the greater reason why there should be shown the material (if there were any) out of which God made all things, inasmuch as it is therein plainly revealed by whom He made all things. “In the beginning was the Word” —that is, the same beginning, of course, in which God made the heaven and the earth
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 22
… Therefore, just as He shows us the original out of which He drew such things as were derived from a given source, so also with regard to those things of which He does not point out whence He produced them, He confirms (by that silence our assertion) that they were produced out of nothing. “In the beginning,” then, “God made the heaven and the earth.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 26
We, however, have but one God, and but one earth too, which in the beginning God made.
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 29
… It therefore follows that the sentence, “Now the earth was without form, and void,” applies to that same earth which God mentioned separately along with the heaven.
Tertullian † AD 220 On Baptism 3
… For water is one of those things which, before all the furnishing of the world, were quiescent with God in a yet unshapen state. “In the first beginning,” saith Scripture , “God made the heaven and the earth. But the earth was invisible, and unorganized, and darkness was over the abyss; and the Spirit of the Lord was hovering over the waters.”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 8.2
… (Now this figure is) a life-giving fire, which is generated from light, from whence the Great Archon originated. And respecting this (Archon) Moses observes: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 2.9.1
… These, then, are the things which we are to believe were created by God in the beginning, i.e., before all things. And this, we think, is indicated even in that beginning which Moses has introduced in terms somewhat ambiguous, when he says, “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 3.6.8
… For if we rightly understand the matter, this is the statement of Moses in the beginning of his book, when he says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John 1.17
Again, there is a beginning in a matter of origin, as might appear in the saying:
St Methodius † AD 311 Fragments 2
VIII. The saint says that the Book of Job is by Moses. He says, concerning the words, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,”
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 2.13
… What means this In the beginning was? He ranges backward over the spaces of time, centuries are left behind, ages are cancelled. Fix in your mind what date you will for this beginning; you miss the mark, for even then He, of Whom we are speaking, was. Survey the universe, note well what is written of it, In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 On the Incarnation of the Word 2
… For it knows that it was not spontaneously, because forethought is not absent; nor of existing matter, because God is not weak; but that out of nothing, and without its having any previous existence, God made the universe to exist through His word, as He says firstly through Moses: “In
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 De Decretis. (Defence of the Nicene Definition.) 3
… but rather he will confess that the son is an image of the father, but the house a work of art, unless his mind be disordered, and he beside himself. Plainly, divine Scripture, which knows better than any the nature of everything, says through Moses, of the creatures, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 2.21
… but the Offspring is not from without nor a work, but from the Father, and proper to His Essence. Wherefore they are creatures; this God’s Word and Only-begotten Son. For instance, Moses did not say of the creation, ‘In the beginning He begat,’ nor ‘In the beginning was,’ but ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 On the Symbols 'Of the Essence' And 'Coessential.' 1
… for they are not offsprings in their nature, but works. Thus, it is said, ‘in the beginning God,’ not ‘generated,’ but ‘made the heaven and the earth, and all that is in them’ (
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 1.2
2. “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 Answer to Eunomius' Second Book 1
… “In the beginning,” he says, “God created,” not the names of heaven and earth, but, “the heaven and the earth
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 1.2
2. These, moreover, were first framed before other things, according to the Divine wisdom, to be as it were a beginning of the whole machine, the great Moses indicating, I suppose, where he says that the heaven and the earth were made by God “in the beginning
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Holy Spirit 2.5
… For it is written: “By the Word of the Lord were the heavens established, and all the strength of them by the Spirit of His Mouth.” Observe what he says, that all the strength of the heavens is to be referred to the Spirit. For how should He Who was moving
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch 8
Ye have lately heard, how all Scripture bringeth consolation and comfort, although it be an historical narrative. For instance, “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth,”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John 4
… For neither Father nor Son are limited in any way. Since, if “there is no end of His greatness” ( Ps. cxlv. 3 ), and if “of His wisdom there is no number” ( Ps. cxlvii. 5 ), it is clear that there cannot be any beginning in time to His Essence. Thou hast heard, that “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth” (
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 57.11
… or, because Hebrew has in addition to the article other prefixes as well, he must with an unhappy pedantry translate syllable by syllable and letter by letter thus: σὺν τὸν ὀυρανὸν καὶ σὺν τὴν γήν , a construction which neither Greek nor Latin admits of,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions the-opinion-of-st-augustin-con
… What some think of them they may have seen, but that they have given much pleasure, and do give pleasure, to many brethren I know. From the First to the Tenth they have been written of myself; in the remaining three, of the Sacred Scriptures, from the text, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,’ even to the rest of the Sabbath (
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 4.9
… Blessed be he who loveth Thee, and his friend in Thee, and his enemy for Thy sake. For he alone loses none dear to him to whom all are dear in Him who cannot be lost. And who is this but our God, the God that created heaven and earth,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 11.3
5. Let me hear and understand how in the beginning Thou didst make the heaven and the earth.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 11.5
… And he assigns to it already existing, and as it were having a being, a form, as clay, or stone, or wood, or gold, or such like. And whence should these things be, hadst not Thou appointed them? Thou didst make for the workman his body,—Thou the mind commanding the limbs,—Thou the matter whereof he makes anything,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.17
24. For they say, “Although these things be true, yet Moses regarded not those two things, when by divine revelation he said, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.’
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 8.11
… What warrants this supposition are the opening verses of Genesis: “In the beginning God made the heaven and earth. And the earth was invisible, and without order; and darkness was over the abyss: and the Spirit of God moved over the waters.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 11.4
… of all invisible, the greatest is God. But, that the world is, we see; that God is, we believe. That God made the world, we can believe from no one more safely than from God Himself. But where have we heard Him? Nowhere more distinctly than in the Holy Scriptures, where His prophet said, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 12.15
… if at least the angels are intended by that light which was first made, or, rather, by that heaven of which it is said, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 1.12
… For, according to the form of God, He is the beginning, that also speaketh unto us, in which “beginning” God created the heaven and the earth;
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Catechising of the Uninstructed 3
5. The narration is full when each person is catechised in the first instance from what is written in the text, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Harmony of the Gospels 1.25
… For if they deny His deity, they are very easily refuted by His works, both in prophecy and in fulfilment. I do not speak of those works which they deem themselves at liberty not to credit, such as His work in the beginning, when He made heaven and earth, and all that is in them.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 68
1. All ye who are looking for a man’s many words, understand the One Word of God, “In the beginning was the Word.” Now, “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 69.2
… “In the beginning was the Word.” If the Word had been made (for made indeed that was not by which all things were made); if the Word had been made, the Scripture would have said, “In the beginning God made the Word;” as it is said in Genesis, “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 85.4
… By the day-star times are signified. So then before times, before all that is called “before;” before all that is not, or before all that is. For the Gospel does not say, “In the beginning God made the Word;” as it is said, “In the beginning God made the Heaven and the earth;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 9.6
6. But observe what Himself saith, “The things which were written in the law, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning me.” And we know that the law extends from the time of which we have record, that is, from the beginning of the world: “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 26.8
… If I, being a man, do teach him who hears my word, the Father also teacheth him who hears His word. And if the Father teacheth him that hears His word, ask what Christ is, and thou wilt find the word of the Father. “In the beginning was the Word.” Not in the beginning God made the Word, just as “in the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 43.17
… but “am” to the Divine essence. “He was made,” because Abraham was a creature. He did not say, Before Abraham was, I was; but, “Before Abraham was made,” who was not made save by me, “I am.” Nor did He say this, Before Abraham was made I was made; for “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;”
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.10
The earth is one of the four elements, dry, cold, heavy, motionless, brought into being by God, out of nothing on the first day. For in the beginning , he said, God created the heaven and the earth
Pseudo-Clement The Recognitions of Clement 1.27
“In the beginning, when God had made the heaven and the earth,
Pseudo-Clement The Recognitions of Clement 6.7
… but iron is wrought by fire, which fire is extinguished by water. But water is moved by spirit; and spirit has its beginning from God. For thus saith the prophet Moses: ‘In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth. But the earth was invisible, and unarranged; and darkness was over the deep: and the Spirit of God was upon the waters.’
Pseudo-Clement The Clementine Homilies 16.8
… for thus it is written: ‘Let the gods who did not make the heavens and the earth perish.’ And He said thus, not as though some had made the heavens and were not to perish, as you interpreted the passage. For it is plainly declared that He who made them is one in the very first part of Scripture:
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Theodotus † fl. AD 160 Excerpts of Theodotus 1
VII. Now, regeneration is by water and spirit, as was all creation: “For the Spirit of God moved on the abyss.”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 1.18.1
… Indicating also its invisible and hidden nature, he said, “Now the earth was invisible and unformed.”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 4.26
… Or to Him, who, by making and fashioning me, became my parent? Of whom can I ask for His Holy Spirit? Of him who gives not even the mundane spirit; or of Him “who maketh His angels spirits,” and whose Spirit it was which in the beginning hovered upon the waters.
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 23
But he draws an argument from the following words, where it is written: “And the earth was without form, and void.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 25
He accordingly maintains that there are two earths set before us in the passage in question: one, which God made in the beginning; the other being the Matter of which God made the world, and concerning which it is said, “And the earth was without form, and void.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 30
The following words will in like manner apparently corroborate the conjecture of Hermogenes, “And darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water;”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 32
… Of darkness, indeed, the Lord Himself by Isaiah says, “I formed the light, and I created darkness.” Of the wind
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 6.9
… Now this seventh power, which was a power existing in the indefinite power, which was produced prior to all the Ages, this is, he says, the seventh power, respecting which Moses utters the following words: “And the Spirit of God was wafted over
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 8.7
… And this (tittle) constitutes a perfect son of a perfect man. When, therefore, he says, Moses mentions that the rod was changeably brandished for the (introduction of the) plagues throughout Egypt —now these plagues, he says, are allegorically expressed symbols of the creation
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Discourse on the Holy Theophany 9
9. This is the Spirit that at the beginning “moved upon the face of the waters;”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis iv.section24
… “In the beginning God made heaven and earth; and the earth was invisible, and not arranged:”
St Gregory Thaumaturgus † AD 270 A Sectional Confession of Faith 10
… “By the word of the Lord were the heavens stablished, and all the power of them by the breath (spirit) of His mouth.” And in the beginning of the book of the creation it is written thus: “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
Aphrahat † AD 346 Aphrahat: Select Demonstrations 6.14
… Remember the warning that the Apostle gives us:— Grieve not the Holy Spirit whereby ye have been sealed unto the day of redemption. For from baptism do we receive the Spirit of Christ. For in that hour in which the priests invoke the Spirit, the heavens open and it descends and moves upon the waters .
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 2.4
4. “Darkness was upon the face of the deep.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 2.6
6. And the Spirit of God was borne upon the face of the waters .
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 3.5
… For water is a grand thing, and the noblest of the four visible elements of the world. Heaven is the dwelling-place of Angels, but the heavens are from the waters : the earth is the place of men, but the earth is from the waters: and before the whole six days’ formation of the things that were made, the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 2.81
81. Everything has reverted to the original state of things
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Mysteries 3
9. Consider, however, how ancient is the mystery prefigured even in the origin of the world itself. In the very beginning, when God made the heaven and the earth, “the Spirit,” it is said, “moved upon the waters.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John 3
However, let us see the proofs which they produce to us. “In the beginning,” it is said, “God made the Heaven and the earth, and the earth was invisible and unformed.” (
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 69.6
… In the beginning the earth was without form and void, there was no dazzling sun or pale moon, there were no glittering stars. There was nothing but matter inorganic and invisible, and even this was lost in abysmal depths and shrouded in a distorting gloom. The Spirit of God above moved, as a charioteer, over the face of the waters,
St Jerome † AD 420 The Dialogue Against the Luciferians 1
… How is a soul purged from its former stains which has not the Holy Ghost? For it is not mere water which washes the soul, but it is itself first purified by the Spirit that it may be able to spiritually wash the souls of men.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.3
3. And truly this earth was invisible and formless,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.8
8. But that heaven of heavens was for Thee, O Lord; but the earth, which Thou hast given to the sons of men, to be seen and touched, was not such as now we see and touch. For it was invisible and “without form,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.12
… But this Thou didst not leave to be formless, since before all days, in the beginning Thou createdst heaven and earth,—these two things of which I spoke. But the earth was invisible and without form, and darkness was upon the deep.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.2
3. How has corporeal matter deserved of Thee, to be even invisible and formless,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.4
… For to Thee, being perfect, their imperfection is displeasing, and therefore were they perfected by Thee, and were pleasing unto Thee; but not as if Thou wert imperfect, and wert to be perfected in their perfection. For Thy good Spirit was borne over the waters,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Reply to Faustus the Manichæan 22.8
8. How shall I make those whose minds are full of vanity understand that the actions of the prophets were also mystical and prophetic? The vanity of their minds is shown in their thinking that we believe God to have once existed in darkness, because it is written, "Darkness was over the deep."
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Baptism, Against the Donatists 6.12
… and drink not of a strange fountain, that thou mayest live long, and that years may be added to thy life.’ And in the gospel our Lord Jesus Christ spake with His own voice, saying, ‘Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.’ This is the Spirit which from the beginning ‘moved upon the face of the waters.’
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians 2.15
… He maketh to differ, who, when the darkness was upon the face of the abyss, said, “Let there be light; and there was light, and divided”—that is, made to differ—“between the light and the darkness.”
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.8
It does not derive its light from itself, but is illuminated by sun, and moon, and stars, and fire. And this is just what the Scripture means when it says, And darkness was upon the deep
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.9
Water also is one of the four elements, the most beautiful of God’s creations. It is both wet and cold, heavy, and with a tendency to descend, and flows with great readiness. It is this the Holy Scripture has in view when it says, And darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.10
In the beginning, then, as the Holy Scripture says
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.9
For from the beginning the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
1:3
Theodotus † fl. AD 160 Excerpts of Theodotus 1
XXXVIII. Against Tatian, who says that the words, “Let there be light,”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 4.32
… But if any one believes in [only] one God, who also made all things by the Word, as Moses likewise says, “God said, Let there be light: and there was light;”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 5.11
… Now he did not observe how much this clause of the sentence made against him: “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to (give) the light of the knowledge (of His glory) in the face of (Jesus) Christ.” Now who was it that said; “Let there be light?”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 3
… For (the title) God , indeed, which always belonged to Him, it names at the very first: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;” and as long as He continued making, one after the other, those things of which He was to be the Lord, it merely mentions God. “And God said,” “and God made,” “and God saw;”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 7
Then, therefore, does the Word also Himself assume His own form and glorious garb, His own sound and vocal utterance, when God says, “Let there be light.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 12
… But in respect of the previous works of the world what says the Scripture? Its first statement indeed is made, when the Son has not yet appeared: “And God said, Let there be light, and there was light.”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 7.10
… And this, as these men assert, is that which has been stated by Moses: “Let there be light, and there was light.”
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Illud Omnia, &c. (On Luke x. 22.) 2
… Suffering Himself, He gave us rest, hungering Himself, He nourished us, and going down into Hades He brought us back thence. For example, at the time of the creation of all things, their creation consisted in a fiat, such as ‘let [the earth] bring forth,’ ‘let there be’ (
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 2.18
… For instance, God said, as Moses relates, ‘Let there be light,’ and ‘Let the waters be gathered together,’ and ‘let the dry land appear,’ and ‘Let Us make man
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 3.26
… like a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross .’ Any one, beginning with these passages and going through the whole of the Scripture upon the interpretation which they suggest, will perceive how in the beginning the Father said to Him, ‘Let there be light,’ and ‘Let there be a firmament,’ and ‘Let us make man
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 2.7
… The divine word gives every object a more cheerful and a more attractive appearance, just as when men in deep sea pour in oil they make the place about them clear. So, with a single word and in one instant, the Creator of all things gave the boon of light to the world.
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 Against Eunomius 2.7
… For thus the mighty Moses in the record of creation instructs us about the Divine power, ascribing the production of each of the objects that were manifested in the creation to the words that bade them be. For “God said,” he tells us, “Let there be light, and there was light
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Holy Spirit 2.13
… For the divine operation works by the power of a command, not in the execution of a ministry; for God, when He works, does not fashion anything by toil or art, but “He spake and they were made.” He said, “Let there be light, and there was light,”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.5
37. They say that He was created. But who would reckon an author with his works, and have him seem to be what he has himself made?
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 4.6
… Further, the Father hath seen the things that the Son made, and pronounced them very good; for so it is written in Genesis: “And God said, Let there be light; and there was light. And God saw the light that it was good.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom 52
This was akin to that voice that said, “Let the Heaven be, and it was.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Hebrews 2
“And upholding all things by the word of His power.” Tell me, “God said” (it is written), “Let there be light” (
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.3
4. But what Thou saidst in the beginning of the creation, “Let there be light, and there was light,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.12
… Yea, and our earth, before it received the “form of doctrine,” was invisible and formless, and we were covered with the darkness of ignorance. For Thou correctest man for iniquity, and “Thy judgments are a great deep.” But because Thy Spirit was “borne over the waters,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Letters of St. Augustin 37.2
… and the Giver and Dispenser of all spiritual gifts designs by your approbation to confirm my obedience to Him. For whatever in these writings of mine merits your approbation is from God, who has by me as His instrument said, “Let it be done,” and it was done; and in your approval God has pronounced that what was done is “good.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 75.4
… Let them read, and tell me how could God be wearied, who said, “Let it be made, and it was made.” To-day if a man could so do, as God did, how would he be wearied? He said, “Let there be light, and the light was made.” Again, “Let there be a firmament, and it was made:”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 20.2
… If He commanded and some one resisted Him, if He commanded and it was not done, and labored that it might be done, then justly He should be said to have rested after labor. But when in that same book of Genesis we read, “God said, Let there be light, and there was light; God said, Let there be a firmament, and the firmament was made,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 44.4
… Hearken why He did so. “The night cometh when no man can work.” Not even Thou, Lord. Will that night have such power that not even Thou, whose work the night is, wilt be able to work therein? For I think, Lord Jesus, nay I do not think, but believe and hold it sure, that Thou wast there when God said, “Let there be light, and there was light.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 7.19
… Thus then he says, “I will confess to the Lord according to His justice,” as one who saw that darkness was not made by God, but ordered nevertheless. For God said, “Let light be made, and light was made.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 67.9
… Ought by any means that earth alone to give her fruit? “May there bless us God, our God, may there bless us God” ( ver. 7 ). Still may He bless us: for blessing in multiplication is wont most chiefly and properly to be perceived. Let us prove this in Genesis; see the works of God: God made light,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 94.2
… we find light: what was created on the second day; we find the firmament, which God called heaven: what was created on the third day; we find the form of earth and sea, and their separation, that all the gathering together of the waters was called sea, and all that was dry, the earth. On the fourth day, the Lord made the lights in heaven:
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.7
Fire is one of the four elements, light and with a greater tendency to ascend than the others. It has the power of burning and also of giving light, and it was made by the Creator on the first day. For the divine Scripture says, And God said, Let there be light, and there was light
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.13
If then the Word of God is quick and energising , and the Lord did all that He willed ; if He said, Let there be light and there was light, let there be a firmament and there was a firmament
1:4
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 8.2
… But (he acted in quite a contrary manner), for he subjected (darkness) to the Æons. After, then, he had formed the firmament over the nether world, “he both divided the darkness from the light, and called the light which was above the firmament day, and the darkness he called night.”
St Cyprian of Carthage † AD 258 The Seventh Council of Carthage under Cyprian. Concerning the Baptism of Heretics 1
Lucianus of Rucuma said: It is written, “And God saw the light, that it was good, and divided between the light and the darkness.”
Archelaus † fl. AD 278 The Acts of the Disputation with the Heresiarch Manes 23
… If God is seated in His kingdom, and if the wicked one in like manner is seated in his kingdom, who can have constructed the wall between them? For no object can divide two substances except one that is greater than either, even as it is said in the book of Genesis, that “God divided the light from the darkness.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 2.7
And God saw the light, that it was good .
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.20
… that being set over them as an authority, under which they were to fly whithersoever they were to go. For “there is no speech, nor language, where their voice is not heard;” seeing their sound “hath gone through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world,” because Thou, O Lord, hast multiplied these things by blessing.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 4.6
… For as the first days of all were reckoned from light to night, on account of the future fall of man;
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Baptism, Against the Donatists 7.7
Chapter 7.— 12. Lucianus of Rucuma said: "It is written, ‘And God saw the light that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness.’
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John 44.4
… and therefore it is said, “All things were made by Him; and without Him was nothing made.” “God divided between the light and the darkness: the light He called Day, and the darkness He called Night.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 7.19
… For God said, “Let light be made, and light was made.” He did not say, Let darkness be made, and darkness was made: and yet He ordered it. And therefore it is said, “God divided between the light, and the darkness: and God called the light day, and the darkness He called night.”
1:5
St Hippolytus † AD 235 On Genesis 1
Gen. i. 5 And it was evening, and it was morning, one day.
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 2.8
8. “ And God called the light Day and the darkness he called Night .”
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 13.24
… That day is neither day nor night? what then shall we name it? The Gospel interprets it, by relating the event. It was not day; for the sun shone not uniformly from his rising to his setting, but from the sixth hour till the ninth hour, there was darkness at mid-day. The darkness therefore was interposed; but God called the darkness night
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.14
… Betwixt whom and us, in this as yet uncertain state of human knowledge, Thou only dividest, who provest our hearts and callest the light day, and the darkness night.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 71.14
… Do we when we say, for example, thirty days have gone by, mention the nights also; do we not under the very term days include the nights also? In Genesis what was said? “The evening was made, and the morning was made, one day.”
Pope St Leo I the Great † AD 461 Sermons 27
… one of which is of greater brightness and the other of lesser light? For as it is now day time and now night time, so the Creator has constituted divers kinds of luminaries, although even before they were made there had been days without the sun and nights without the moon
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.7
… In the beginning, then, that is to say on the first day, God created light, the ornament and glory of the whole visible creation. For take away light and all things remain in undistinguishable darkness, incapable of displaying their native beauty. And God called the light day, but the darkness He called night
Anonymous The Teaching of the Apostles 4
4. The apostles further appointed: On the eve of the Sabbath ,
Ecumenical Councils The Canons of the Council in Trullo 90
… and the custom of keeping feasts and whole days generally from evening to evening is believed to have been an Apostolic tradition, received by them from the Jews. At the end of the VIII th Century the Synod of Frankfort declared in its xxj. canon, that “the Lord’s day should be kept from evening to evening.”
1:6
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 12
… From that moment God willed creation to be effected in the Word, Christ being present and ministering unto Him: and so God created. And God said, “Let there be a firmament,…and God made the firmament;”
Tertullian † AD 220 On Baptism 3
… water alone—always a perfect, gladsome, simple material substance, pure in itself—supplied a worthy vehicle to God. What of the fact that waters were in some way the regulating powers by which the disposition of the world thenceforward was constituted by God? For the suspension of the celestial firmament in the midst He caused by “dividing the waters;”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 5.22
… For there has been a separation made between water and water; and there is water, that below the firmament of the wicked creation, in which earthly and animal men are washed; and there is life-giving water, (that) above the firmament,
St Hippolytus † AD 235 On Genesis 1
Gen. i. 6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water.
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 4.16
… His words are, And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water, and let it divide the water from the water. And it was so, and God made the firmament and God divided the water through the midst
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Heathen (Contra Gentes) 46
… and God said, “let us make man in our image and after our likeness:” for also when He was carrying out the creation of the heaven and earth and all things, the Father said to Him
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.2
2. And God said “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.4
4. “ And God said, let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.5
5. But let us continue our explanation: “ Let it divide the waters from the waters .”
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 9.5
… they, who ought to have worshipped Him who reared the sky as a dome, who out of the fluid nature of the waters formed the stable substance of the heaven. For God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Decease of His Brother Satyrus 2.85
85. Divine action has no need of human assistance. God commanded that the heavens should come into existence, and it was done; He determined that the earth should be created, and it was created.
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.3
… “Serve not two lords.” And the Law saith: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord thy God is one God;” moreover, in the same Testament it is written: “The Lord rained from the Lord.” The Lord, it is said, sent rain “from the Lord.” So also you may read in Genesis: “And God said,—and God made,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.8
… For very wonderful is this corporeal heaven, of which firmament, between water and water, the second day after the creation of light, Thou saidst, Let it be made, and it was made.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.15
16. Or who but Thou, our God, made for us that firmament
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 11.34
Some, however, have supposed that the angelic hosts are somehow referred to under the name of waters, and that this is what is meant by “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters:”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 48.1
… For on the second day of the week, that is, the day after the first which we call the Lord’s day, which also is called the second week-day, was made the firmament of Heaven.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 102.29
… the heavens are the works of His hands. For do not imagine that God doth one thing with His hand, another by His word. What He doth by His word, He doth by His hand: for He hath not distinct bodily members, who said, “I Am That I Am.” And perhaps His Word is His hand, assuredly His hand is His power. For inasmuch as it is said, “Let there be a firmament,”
1:7
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 26
… 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,”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 5.4
… For this, he says, is the nature of respiration. “But the fourth river is Euphrates.” This, they assert, is the mouth, through which are the passage outwards of prayer, and the passage inwards of nourishment. (The mouth) makes glad, and nurtures and fashions the Spiritual Perfect Man. This, he says, is “the water that is above the firmament,”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.4
… But do not let us forget to remark that, after these divine words “let there be a firmament,” it is not said “and the firmament was made” but, “and God made the firmament, and divided the waters.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch 9.8
… but this star, great and marvellous as it is, bends downward, and looks toward the earth, which is contrary to the nature of fire; owing to the power of Him who hath commanded it. Wouldest thou have me speak of another thing of the like kind? Waters embrace the back of the visible heaven
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 51.5
… “When he mentions the third heaven, and then adds the word paradise, he shows that heaven is in one place and paradise in another.” Must not every one reject and despise such special pleading as that by which Origen says of the waters that are above the firmament
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.20
… and the voices of Thy messengers flying above the earth, near to the firmament of Thy Book; that being set over them as an authority, under which they were to fly whithersoever they were to go. For “there is no speech, nor language, where their voice is not heard;” seeing their sound
1:8
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 26
… 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,
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.8
8. “ And God called the firmament heaven .”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 68.10
… after it had been said, “The Heavens are telling forth the glory of God:” after the manner of Scripture repeating the same sense in different words, subsequently there is said, “And the firmament telleth the works of His hands.” First he said “Heavens,” not “Heaven:” and yet afterwards not “firmaments,” but “firmament.” For God called the firmament Heaven,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 68.38
… Therefore above the Heaven of Heaven He sitteth at the right hand of the Father. This is what the Apostle saith, “the Same is He that hath ascended above all Heavens.” For what of Heavens doth remain after the Heaven of Heaven? Which also we may call the Heavens of Heavens, just as He hath called the firmament Heaven:
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.6
… But further, God called the firmament also heaven
1:9
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 29
… Then it forthwith becomes “visible,” God saying, “Let the water be gathered together into one mass, and let the dry land appear.”
Tertullian † AD 220 A Strain of the Judgment of the Lord 1
70 Disjoined; and man’s dear form with His own hands
St Hippolytus † AD 235 Doubtful Fragments on the Pentateuch 4
… And the floodgates of heaven were opened, and the rains broke upon the earth. And that same voice, in sooth, which had said of old, “Let the waters be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear,”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 4.2
2. “ And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear, and it was so .” And the water which was under the heaven gathered together unto one place; “And God called the dry land earth and the gathering together of the waters called He seas.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.22
… For those waters, which we perceive flowing in so beautiful a manner, remain not formless and invisible. But if, then, they received that beauty when God said, Let the water which is under the firmament be gathered together,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.17
20. Who hath gathered the embittered together into one society? For they have all the same end, that of temporal and earthly happiness, on account of which they do all things, although they may fluctuate with an innumerable variety of cares. Who, O Lord, unless Thou, saidst, Let the waters be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear,
1:10
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 29
… “Dry,” because it was about to become such by its severance from the moisture, but yet “land.” “And God called the dry land Earth ,”
Tertullian † AD 220 Genesis 1
(Its name assigned ) the dry land’s story ’gins:
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 4.5
“ And God called the dry land earth; and the gathering together of the waters called He seas .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 4.6
… fair too, when, ruffled by a light breeze of wind, its surface shows tints of purple and azure,—when, instead of lashing with violence the neighbouring shores, it seems to kiss them with peaceful caresses. However, it is not in this that Scripture makes God find the goodness and charm of the sea. Here it is the purpose of the work which makes the goodness.
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 48.19
19. I will come now to the passage in which I am accused of saying that—at least according to the true Hebrew text—the words “God saw that it was good”
1:11
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 22
… “Let the earth,” says He, “bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree yielding fruit after its kind, whose seed is in itself, after its kind. And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after its kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after its kind.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 29
… And so, when it afterwards attains its perfection, it ceases to be accounted void, when God declares, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed after its kind, and according to its likeness, and the fruit-tree yielding fruit, whose seed is in itself, after its kind.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen Against Celsus 8.34
Celsus would also have us to offer first-fruits to demons. But we would offer them to Him who said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 10.19
… nor the air apart from tillage, but rather He who by His providence has enacted that the things which spring up from the earth could not spring up apart from tillage; for this He has done once for all in the law, “Let the earth put forth grass sowing seed after its kind and after its likeness;”
St Peter of Alexandria † AD 311 Fragments from the Writings of Peter 5.1
… For then, as they say, our eternal God also, the Maker and Creator of all things, framed all things, and said to them, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth.” Then he adds, “And it was so; and God saw that it was good.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 5.1
1. “ And God said Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 5.6
6. “ Let the earth ,” the Creator adds, “ bring forth the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself .”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on First Thessalonians 7
… What takes place is neither from the earth, nor from the grape-stone, but from Him who is Lord both of the earth and of its seeds. For this reason He has caused the same thing to be made both without them, and with them. In the first place, showing His own power, when he said, “Let the earth bring forth the herb of grass.” (From
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on 1 Timothy 15
… 8 , Sept.), saith God of Himself. And He hath given to men a similar power; as a painter, being an affectionate father, teaches his own art to his son. I formed thy body beautiful, he says, but I give thee the power of forming something better. Make thy soul beautiful. I said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, and every fruitful tree.” (
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.17
21. But as for the souls that thirst after Thee, and that appear before Thee (being by other bounds divided from the society of the sea), them Thou waterest by a secret and sweet spring, that the earth may bring forth her fruit,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.19
24. But first, “Wash you, make you clean;” put away iniquity from your souls, and from before mine eyes, that the dry land may appear. “Learn to do well; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow,” that the earth may bring forth the green herb for meat, and the tree bearing fruit;
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 72.18
… but grass bearing fruit, as is that of wheat: for even this is called grass in Holy Scripture; as in Genesis
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.13
… if God the Word of His own will became man and the pure and undefiled blood of the holy and ever-virginal One made His flesh without the aid of seed , can He not then make the bread His body and the wine and water His blood? He said in the beginning, Let the earth bring forth grass
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St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch 7.3
3. What then is this introduction? “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth, and the earth was invisible, and unformed, and darkness was upon the face of the abyss.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.18
… Let us clothe the naked, and despise not those of our own flesh. The which fruits having sprung forth from the earth, behold, because it is good;
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Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 2.3
… When, however, an initial act had been once done by it, the scheme of temporal seasons began, for distinguishing and noting which, the stars and luminaries of heaven were arranged in their order. “Let them be,” says God, “for seasons, and for days, and years.”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 5.6
… For because ages consist of times, and times are made up of days, and months, and years; since also days, and months, and years are measured by suns, and moons, and stars, which He ordained for this purpose (for “they shall be,” says He, “for signs of the months and the years”),
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 12
… From that moment God willed creation to be effected in the Word, Christ being present and ministering unto Him: and so God created. And God said, “Let there be a firmament,…and God made the firmament;” and God also said, “Let there be lights (in the firmament); and so God made a greater and a lesser light.”
St Methodius † AD 311 The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity 8.15
If the sun and the moon and the other stars were made for the division and protection of the members of the time,
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 12.34
… For if they had a beginning, the Apostle is a liar for declaring them to be eternal. For you all are accustomed to reckon the times from the creation of the sun and the moon, since it is written of them, And let them be for signs and for times and for years
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 2.17
… and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years.’ And then he says, ‘And God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: He made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 6.2
2. “ And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to divide the day from the night .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 6.4
4. “ And let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 6.8
8. Let us return to the words which follow. “Let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years.”
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 9.8
… and how some mark the season for sowing, and others shew the commencement of navigation . And a man sitting in his ship, and sailing amid the boundless waves, steers his ship by looking at the stars. For of these matters the Scripture says well, And let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for years
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 11.23
… Or should there in our words be some syllables long, others short, but because those sounded in a longer time, these in a shorter? God grant to men to see in a small thing ideas common to things great and small. Both the stars and luminaries of heaven are “for signs and for seasons, and for days and years.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.18
22. Thus, O Lord, thus, I beseech Thee, let there arise, as Thou makest, as Thou givest joy and ability,—let “truth spring out of the earth, and righteousness look down from heaven,” and let there be “lights in the firmament.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Letters of St. Augustin 55.13
… saturated with the showers of autumn;” and so on, in regard to any other natural effects of the motion and moisture of the atmosphere which have been observed in connection with that consummately ordered revolution of the heavenly bodies concerning which it was said when they were made, “Let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 11.19
… the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 12.15
… And if time was even before the heavenly bodies, not indeed marked by hours, days, months, and years,—for these measures of time’s periods which are commonly and properly called times, did manifestly begin with the motion of the heavenly bodies, and so God said, when He appointed them, “Let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 110.10
… The morning star is put for the stars, as if the Scripture signified the whole from a part, and from one conspicuous star all the stars. But how were those stars created? “That they may be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years.”
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St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.19
… “Learn to do well; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow,” that the earth may bring forth the green herb for meat, and the tree bearing fruit; and come let us reason together, saith the Lord, that there may be lights in the firmament of heaven, and that they may shine upon the earth.
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Bardesanes † AD 222 Bardesan. The Book of the Laws of Divers Countries 1
… to be set aside as fallacious, because the wisdom of God is too profound for them—that wisdom which founded the world, and created man, and ordained Governors, and gave to all things the degree of pre-eminence which is suited to every one of them. What I mean is, that this power is possessed by God, and the Angels, and the Potentates, and the Governors,
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 1.7.4
4. And now we have to ascertain whether those beings which in the course of the discussion we have discovered to possess life and reason, were endowed with a soul along with their bodies at the time mentioned in Scripture, when “God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night, and the stars also,”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 13.6
… heed to the very letter of the passage, and first let us inquire, how he who has been cast into darkness and repressed by an impure and deaf and dumb spirit is said to be a “lunatic,” and for what reason the expression to be a “lunatic” derives its name from the great light in heaven which is next to the sun, which God appointed “to rule over the night.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 6.9
… It does not even preserve the form of objects, and thinks that all square towers are round. Thus all proves that at a great distance sight only presents to us obscure and confused objects. The luminary is then great, according to the witness of Scripture, and infinitely greater than it appears.
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 18.42
… What grievance can we find in being transferred hence to the true life? In being freed from the vicissitudes, the agitation, the disgust, and all the vile tribute we must pay to this life, to find ourselves, amid stable things, which know no flux, while as lesser lights, we circle round the great light?
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount 1.23
… But He does not say, “who maketh the sun to rise on the evil and on the good;” but He has added the word “His,” i.e. which He Himself made and established, and for the making of which He took nothing from any one, as it is written in Genesis respecting all the luminaries;
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St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 12.2
2. The weakness of my tongue confesseth unto Thy Highness, seeing that Thou madest heaven and earth. This heaven which I see, and this earth upon which I tread (from which is this earth that I carry about me), Thou hast made. But where is that heaven of heavens,
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Theodotus † fl. AD 160 Excerpts of Theodotus 1
… But some as head, some as eyes, some as ears, some as hands, some as breasts, some as feet, shall be set, resplendent, in the sun. “Shine forth as the sun,” or in the sun; since an angel high in command is in the sun. For he is appointed for rule over days; as the moon is for ruling over night.
St Methodius † AD 311 The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity 3.8
… and is conceived and formed by the Church, as by a woman. so as to give birth and nourishment to virtue. For in this way, too, the command, “Increase and multiply,”
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Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 22
… “And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creatures that have life, and fowl that may fly above the earth through the firmament of heaven. And it was so. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 10.11
… or otherwise blame could not rightly attach to those of the kinds that were such by nature, nor praise to those of a better kind. For the reason why fishes are good or bad lies not in the souls of the fishes, but is based on that which the Word said with knowledge, “Let the waters bring forth creeping things with living souls,”
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Heathen (Contra Gentes) 46
… 4. Wherefore He also persuades us and says , “He spake and they were made, He commanded and they were created;” as the illustrious Moses also at the beginning of his account of Creation confirms what we say by his narrative
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 3.8
… We often find the visible region called heaven, on account of the density and continuity of the air within our ken, and deriving its name “heaven” from the word which means to see. It is of it that Scripture says, “The fowl of the air,” “Fowl that may fly…in the open firmament of heaven;”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 7.1
1. “ And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life ” after their kind, “ and fowl that may fly above the earth ” after their kind .
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Letters 188
… Yet I must not carelessly pass by the question started by an enquiring mind. At the creation of the world, birds of the air and the fishes of the sea had the same origin; for both kinds were produced from the water.
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John 26
… henceforth all the fabric of our nature is framed above, of the Holy Ghost and water. The water is employed, being made the Birth to him who is born; what the womb is to the embryo, the water is to the believer; for in the water he is fashioned and formed. At first it was said, “Let the waters bring forth the creeping things that have life” (
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.20
26. Let the sea also conceive and bring forth your works, and let the waters bring forth the moving creatures that have life.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.21
29. And hereby, in Thy Word, not the depth of the sea, but the earth parted from the bitterness of the waters, bringeth forth not the creeping and flying creature that hath life,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 3.8
… For those seeds that are visible now to our eyes from fruits and living things, are quite distinct from the hidden seeds of those former seeds; from which, at the bidding of the Creator, the water produced the first swimming creatures and fowl, and the earth the first buds after their kind, and the first living creatures after their kind.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise on the Soul and its Origin 4.37
… Owing to this it is, no doubt, that we are placed above brute animals, since these are unendowed with reason. These animals therefore have not spirit ,—that is to say, intellect and a sense of reason and wisdom,—but only soul . For it is of these that it was spoken, “Let the waters bring forth the creeping creatures that have a living soul;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 50.18
… What is that knowledge? O man, thou beginnest to see, after that thou hadst been formed, after that thou hadst received sense of seeing. These fowls sprung of the water at the word of God, saying, “Let the waters bring forth fowls.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 81.2
… See ye therefore to whom this Psalm speaketh. For it seems to me that it speaketh to the baptized. For on the fifth day God from the waters created animals: on the fifth day, that is, on the “fifth of the sabbath,” God said, “Let the waters bring forth creeping things of living souls.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 81.8
… when Joseph went out from the land of Egypt, that is, the people multiplied through Joseph, he was caused to pass through the Red Sea. Therefore then also the waters brought forth creeping things of living souls.
Socrates Scholasticus † AD 440 The Ecclesiastical History of Socrates Scholasticus 5.22
… One can see also a disagreement about the manner of abstinence from food, as well as about the number of days. Some wholly abstain from things that have life: others feed on fish only of all living creatures: many together with fish, eat fowl also, saying that according to Moses,
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Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 12
… Well, then, I will adopt this definite opinion of his, and by means thereof refute him. I blame Matter with a like censure, because out of it, evil though it be—nay, very evil—good things have been created, nay, “very good” ones: “And God saw that they were good, and God blessed them”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 2.8.1
… For the general opinion of all men maintains this; and confirmation from the authority of holy Scripture is added, when it is said that “God made great whales, and every living creature that moveth which the waters brought forth after their kind.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 10.11
… For the reason why fishes are good or bad lies not in the souls of the fishes, but is based on that which the Word said with knowledge, “Let the waters bring forth creeping things with living souls,” when, also, “God made great sea-monsters and every soul of creeping creatures which the waters brought forth according to their kinds.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 7.6
“ Let the waters bring forth .” What necessary object was there that did not immediately appear? What object of luxury was not given to man? Some to supply his needs, some to make him contemplate the marvels of creation. Some are terrible, so as to take our idleness to school. “God created great whales.”
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Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 5.11
If, owing to the fault of human error, the word God has become a common name (since in the world there are said and believed to be “gods many” ), yet “the blessed God,” (who is “the Father) of our Lord Jesus Christ,” will be understood to be no other God than the Creator, who both blessed all things (that He had made), as you find in Genesis,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 128.7
7. “The Lord from out of Sion bless thee: and mayest thou see thee good things that are of Jerusalem” ( ver. 5 ). Even to the birds was it said, “Be fruitful and multiply.”
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.10
That this is the case is made worthy of belief from the fact that their endurance is secured by the word of the Lord, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth
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Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 22
… And it was so. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind.” Again afterwards: “And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beasts of the earth after their kind.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 29
… “Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, after their kind.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 2.8.1
… That beasts of burden or cattle of smaller size are endowed with souls, there is, by general assent, no doubt whatever. The opinion of holy Scripture, however, is manifest, when God says, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind, four-footed beasts, and creeping things, and beasts of the earth after their kind.”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 8.1
1. And God said “ Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and creeping things, and beast of the earth after his kind; and it was so .”
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Hexæmeron 9.2
2. “ Let the earth bring forth the living creature .”
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 9.13
13. Who among men knows even the names of all wild beasts? Or who can accurately discern the physiology of each? But if of the wild beasts we know not even the mere names, how shall we comprehend the Maker of them? God’s command was but one, which said, Let the earth bring forth wild beasts, and cattle, and creeping things, after their kinds
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 13.24
… What is this but to fight strenuously for their own conjectures, while they carelessly neglect the teaching of Scripture? Without troubling themselves much, they might have found in a preceding page of this very book of Genesis the words, “Let the earth bring forth the living soul,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 16.7
… At the same time, it cannot be denied that by the intervention of angels they might be transferred by God’s order or permission. If, however, they were produced out of the earth as at their first creation, when God said, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 3.5
… Yet, when the rod of Aaron the priest blossomed, the Godhead in some way conversed with doubting humanity. Again, the earthy matter certainly serves in common to the production and formation both of all kinds of wood and of the flesh of all animals: and who makes these things, but He who said, Let the earth bring them forth;
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise on the Soul and its Origin 4.37
… These animals therefore have not spirit ,—that is to say, intellect and a sense of reason and wisdom,—but only soul . For it is of these that it was spoken, “Let the waters bring forth the creeping creatures that have a living soul;” and again, “Let the earth bring forth the living soul.”
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St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 5.15.4
… For it were incompatible that the eyes should indeed be formed from one source and the rest of the body from another; as neither would it be compatible that one [being] fashioned the body, and another the eyes. But He, the very same who formed Adam at the beginning, with whom also the Father spake, [saying], “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness,”
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St Barnabas † AD 61 The Epistle of Barnabas 5
… And further, my brethren: if the Lord endured to suffer for our soul, He being Lord of all the world, to whom God said at the foundation of the world, “Let us make man after our image, and after our likeness,”
St Barnabas † AD 61 The Epistle of Barnabas 6
… For the Scripture says concerning us, while He speaks to the Son, “Let Us make man after Our image, and after Our likeness; and let them have dominion over the beasts of the earth, and the fowls of heaven, and the fishes of the sea.”
Pope St Clement I † AD 99 The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 33
… Above all, with His holy and undefiled hands He formed man, the most excellent [of His creatures], and truly great through the understanding given him— the express likeness of His own image. For thus says God: “Let us make man in Our image, and after Our likeness. So God made man; male and female He created them.”
St Ignatius of Antioch † AD 108 Epistle to the Antiochians 2
… and so God made man, after the image of God made He him.”
St Justin Martyr † AD 165 Dialogue with Trypho 62
… And God created man: after the image of God did He create him; male and female created He them. And God blessed them, and said, Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and have power over it.’
St Justin Martyr † AD 165 On the Resurrection, Fragments 7
… and besides, because it is full of all wickedness, so that it forces the soul to sin along with it. But these persons seem to be ignorant of the whole work of God, both of the genesis and formation of man at the first, and why the things in the world were made. For does not the word say, “Let Us make man in our image, and after our likeness?”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 1.24.1
… Man, too, was the workmanship of angels, a shining image bursting forth below from the presence of the supreme power; and when they could not, he says, keep hold of this, because it immediately darted upwards again, they exhorted each other, saying, “Let us make man after our image and likeness.”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 1.30.6
… and so is Anthropos the son of Anthropos.” Then, as all were disturbed by this new voice, and by the unexpected proclamation, and as they were inquiring whence the noise proceeded, in order to lead them away and attract them to himself, they affirm that Ialdabaoth exclaimed, “Come, let us make man after our image.”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 3.23.2
2. But this is Adam, if the truth should be told, the first formed man, of whom the Scripture says that the Lord spake, “Let Us make man after Our own image and likeness;”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 4.pref.4
… Now man is a mixed organization of soul and flesh, who was formed after the likeness of God, and moulded by His hands, that is, by the Son and Holy Spirit, to whom also He said, “Let Us make man.”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 4.20.1
… For with Him were always present the Word and Wisdom, the Son and the Spirit, by whom and in whom, freely and spontaneously, He made all things, to whom also He speaks, saying, “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness;”
Tertullian † AD 220 On Idolatry 15
… Therefore, too, the Lord demanded that the money should be shown Him, and inquired about the image, whose it was; and when He had heard it was Cæsar’s, said, “Render to Cæsar what are Cæsar’s, and what are God’s to God;” that is, the image of Cæsar, which is on the coin, to Cæsar, and the image of God, which is on man,
Tertullian † AD 220 A Treatise on the Soul 27
… Accordingly from the one (primeval) man comes the entire outflow and redundance of men’s souls—nature proving herself true to the commandment of God, “Be fruitful, and multiply.” For in the very preamble of this one production, “Let us make man,”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 2.4
… Who indeed was so worthy of dwelling amongst the works of God, as he who was His own image and likeness? That image was wrought out by a goodness even more operative than its wont, with no imperious word, but with friendly hand preceded by an almost affable utterance: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 5.8
… Surely of him concerning whom he adds soon afterwards: “The man ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image of God.” Since then he is the image of the Creator (for He , when looking on Christ His Word, who was to become man, said, “Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness”
Tertullian † AD 220 On the Resurrection of the Flesh 5
… But we maintain that there is a difference. In the first place, because all things were made by the Word of God, and without Him was nothing made. Now the flesh, too, had its existence from the Word of God, because of the principle, that here should be nothing without that Word. “Let us make man,”
Tertullian † AD 220 On the Resurrection of the Flesh 6
… For, whatever was the form and expression which was then given to the clay (by the Creator) Christ was in His thoughts as one day to become man, because the Word, too, was to be both clay and flesh, even as the earth was then. For so did the Father previously say to the Son: “Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 5
… Now, whilst He was thus planning and arranging with His own Reason, He was actually causing that to become Word which He was dealing with in the way of Word or Discourse . And that you may the more readily understand this, consider first of all, from your own self, who are made “in the image and likeness of God,”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 12
If the number of the Trinity also offends you, as if it were not connected in the simple Unity, I ask you how it is possible for a Being who is merely and absolutely One and Singular, to speak in plural phrase, saying, “Let us make man in our own image, and after our own likeness;”
Tertullian † AD 220 On Modesty 16
… “Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: God maketh a full end both of the one and of the others; but the body (is) not for fornication, but for God:” for “Let Us make man,” said God, “(conformable) to Our image and likeness.” “And God made man; (conformable) to the image and likeness of God made He him.”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 7.16
… And (Saturnilus affirms) that man was a work of angels. There had appeared above from (the Being of) absolute sway, a brilliant image; and when (the angels) were not able to detain this, on account of its immediately, he says, returning with rapidity upwards, they exhorted one another, saying, “Let us make man in our likeness and image.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 3.6.1
… But this definition I regard not so much as a discovery of theirs, as a view derived from holy Scripture. For this is pointed out by Moses, before all other philosophers, when he describes the first creation of man in these words: “And God said, Let Us make man in Our own image, and after Our likeness;”
Origen † AD 254 Origen Against Celsus 4.30
It appears to me that Celsus has also misunderstood this statement, “Let Us make man in Our image and likeness;”
Origen † AD 254 Origen Against Celsus 5.37
… For the Son of God, “the First-born of all creation,” although He seemed recently to have become incarnate, is not by any means on that account recent. For the holy Scriptures know Him to be the most ancient of all the works of creation; for it was to Him that God said regarding the creation of man, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen Against Celsus 6.49
… and so on with the other subjects that follow. Celsus has also expressed his opinion that the narrative of the creation of man is “exceedingly silly,” without stating any proofs, or endeavouring to answer our arguments; for he had no evidence, in my judgment, which was fitted to overthrow the statement that “man has been made in the image of God.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John 2.17
Another, again, appeals to the text, “Let us make man according to our image and likeness,
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 12.2
… But to bring back a soul which had gone out, so that it came out of the grave when already stinking and passing the fourth day, was the work of no other than Him who heard the word of the Father, “Let us make man after our image and likeness.”
St Cyprian of Carthage † AD 258 On the Dress of Virgins 15
… God says, “Let us make man in our image and likeness;”
Novatian † AD 258 A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity 17
… What if the same Moses introduces God saying, “Let us make man after our image and likeness;”
Novatian † AD 258 A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity 26
… And since these things are easily answered, few words shall be said. For who does not acknowledge that the person of the Son is second after the Father, when he reads that it was said by the Father, consequently to the Son, “Let us make man in our image and our likeness;”
St Peter of Alexandria † AD 311 Fragments from the Writings of Peter 6
… For if, according to the Word of salvation, He who made what is without, made also that which is within, He certainly, by one operation, and at the same time, made both, on that day, indeed, on which God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness;”
St Alexander of Alexandria † AD 326 Epistles on the Arian Heresy and the Deposition of Arius 5.2
… Besides, we were not created, like the rest of the world, by word alone, but also by deed. For God made the world to exist by the power of a single word, but us He produced by the efficacy alike of His word and working. For it was not enough for God to say, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,”
Eusebius of Caesarea † AD 339 The Church History of Eusebius 1.2.4
… He declares that the maker of the world and the creator of all things yielded to Christ himself, and to none other than his own clearly divine and first-born Word, the making of inferior things, and communed with him respecting the creation of man. “For,” says he, “God said, Let us make man in our image and in our likeness.”
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 3.23
… Now nothing can be like God unless it have its source in Him; a perfect likeness can be reflected only from that which it represents; an accurate resemblance forbids the assumption of any element of difference. Disturb not this likeness; make no separation where truth shews no variance, for He Who said, Let us make man after our image and likeness
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 4.17
17. When the world was complete and its inhabitant was to be created, the words spoken concerning him were, Let Us make man after Our image and likeness
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Heathen (Contra Gentes) 34
… For the soul is made after the image and likeness of God, as divine Scripture also shews, when it says in the person of God
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 2.21
… for he says not first ‘He begat,’ lest that term should be taken as indiscriminate with ‘He made,’ and these men should have a pretence for saying, ‘Moses tells us indeed that God said from the beginning, “Let Us make man
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 History of Arian Opinions 1
… being and abiding with His Father before ages, and that not in foreknowledge only , and ministering to Him for the whole framing whether of things visible or invisible. For He it is, to whom the Father said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness ’ (
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 10.6
6. Christ the Lord is He who was born in the city of David . And wouldest thou know that Christ is Lord with the Father even before His Incarnation , that thou mayest not only accept the statement by faith, but mayest also receive proof from the Old Testament? Go to the first book, Genesis: God saith, Let us make man , not ‘in My image,’ but, in Our image
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 11.23
… And again, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work , there being no opposition in those who work. For all Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine , saith the Lord in the Gospels . And this we may certainly know from the Old and New Testaments. For He who said, Let us make man in our image and after our likeness
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 12.5
… herbs and trees were created for our enjoyment. All the works of creation were good, but none of these was an image of God, save man only. The sun was formed by a mere command, but man by God’s hands: Let us make man after our image, and after our likeness
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 14
At that time God said, let us make man after our image and after our likeness
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 2.22
… But the scope of our art is to provide the soul with wings, to rescue it from the world and give it to God, and to watch over that which is in His image,
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 16.8
… us, or that upon the mountains and hills, of which we have heard, or whatever and whenever it may be, when He will reason with us, and oppose us, and set before us those bitter accusers, our sins, comparing our wrongdoings with our benefits, and striking thought with thought, and scrutinising action with action, and calling us to account for the image
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 Against Eunomius 2.12
… Can it possibly be such a form of “likeness” as this, that he is continually attributing to the Son? Nay, surely he cannot be so infatuated as to discover deceptive similarity in Him Who is the Truth. Again, in the inspired Scriptures, we are told of another kind of resemblance by Him Who said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 Answer to Eunomius' Second Book 1
… Whereas, to attribute the invention of vocal sound to those who are naturally endowed with the faculty of speech, this involves no impiety towards Him Who gave them their voice. Nor indeed do we hold it to be a great thing to invent words significative of things. For the being to whom Holy Scripture in the history of the creation gave the name of “man
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 3
… for it says, “God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the beasts of the earth, and the fowls of the heaven, and the cattle, and all the earth
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 6.2
… for “He that made the eye,” as the prophet says, and “that planted the ear ,” stamped on human nature these operations to be as it were significant characters, with reference to their models in Himself: for He says, “Let us make man in our image
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 11.3
3. But I find the solution of these difficulties by recourse to the very utterance of God; for He says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 16.1
1. Let us now resume our consideration of the Divine word, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 22.3
3. Well, whether our answer is near the truth of the matter, the Truth Itself may clearly know; but at all events what occurs to our intelligence is as follows. I take up then once more in my argument our first text:—God says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and God created man, in the image of God created He him
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Duties of the Clergy 1.28
133. But whence have they got such ideas but out of the holy Scriptures? For Moses wrote that God said: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Holy Spirit 2.9
… and that all things are through Him through Whom all are; and that we must understand that all things are through Him or of Him in Whom all are. For every creature exists both of the will, and through the operation and in the power of the Trinity, as it is written: “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness;”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 On the Holy Spirit 3.11
85. Learn also that the Father was with Him, and He with the Father, when all things were being made. Wisdom says: “When He was preparing the heavens I was with Him, when He was making the fountains of waters.” And in the Old Testament the Father, by saying, “Let Us make,”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.3
… “Serve not two lords.” And the Law saith: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord thy God is one God;” moreover, in the same Testament it is written: “The Lord rained from the Lord.” The Lord, it is said, sent rain “from the Lord.” So also you may read in Genesis: “And God said,—and God made,” and, lower down, “And God made man in the image of God;”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.7
51. More might I set down from the Son’s testimony; howbeit, lest He perchance appear to have asserted Himself overmuch, let us enquire of the Father. For the Father said, “Let us make man in Our image and likeness.”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.17
111. But if the Arians acknowledge not the Son’s nature, if they believe not the Scriptures, let them at least believe the mighty works. To whom doth the Father say, “Let us make man?”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Exposition of the Christian Faith 2.14
124. If the sentence please you not, appeal to the Father, cancel the judgment that the Father hath given. Say that He hath a Son Who is unlike Him. He will reply: “Then have I lied, I, Who said to the Son, ‘Let us make man in Our image and likeness.’”
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Selections from the Letters of St. Ambrose sermon-against-auxentius-on-th.32
32. But in the church I only know of one Image, that is the Image of the unseen God, of Which God has said: “Let us make man in Our image and Our likeness;”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch 3.18
… For when thou throttlest a debtor, when thou strippest him, when thou draggest him away, thou tramplest under foot God’s image. Hear for a certainty Paul saying, that “a man ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God.” And again, hear God Himself saying, “Let us make man in Our Image, after Our likeness.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch 7.3
… And this is, indeed, the most marvellous thing, that He gave us not such a world as this in payment for services done; or as a recompense for good works; but at the very time He formed us, He honoured our race with this kingdom. For He said, “Let us make man after our image, and after our likeness.”
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Paul's Epistle to the Romans 23
… If thou love My beloved, then will I also reckon Myself to be greatly beloved of thee. For He vehemently desireth our salvation, and this He showed from of old. Now hear what He saith when He was forming the man, “Let Us make man in Our Image:” and again, “Let Us make an help meet for him. It is not good for him to be alone.” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Colossians 5
Christ is above, ruling over all things: it was necessary this should be believed. The same takes place in the earth with respect to man. “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Colossians 6
… He is formed in the water, he receiveth spirit instead of a soul. And after he is formed, He bringeth to him, not beasts, but demons, and their prince, and saith, “Tread upon serpents and scorpions.” ( Luke x. 19 .) He saith not, “Let Us make man in our image, and after our likeness” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on 1 Timothy 16
… our Maker, as faithfully as our fellow-creatures serve us, from whom they have received no such gift. For they too are free by nature. To them also it was said, “Let them have dominion over the fishes.” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John 33
And whence came the Samaritans to expect the coming of Christ, seeing that they received Moses only? From the writings of Moses themselves. For even in the beginning He revealed the Son. “Let Us make man in Our Image, after Our Likeness” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John 64
… Now, if His Name had such great power, how could He have needed prayer? Had He needed prayer, His Name would not have availed. When He wholly made man, what manner of prayer did He need? was there not then great equality of honor? “Let Us make,” It saith, “man.” (
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 43.2
… If we hear of household losses—such as often occur—our looks become dejected and gloomy. The gain of a penny fills us with joy; the loss of a half-penny plunges us into sorrow. One man is of so many minds that the prophet’s prayer is: “Lord, in thy city scatter their image.” For created as we are in the image of God and after His likeness,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 6.3
… and I heard him, indeed, every Lord’s day, “rightly dividing the word of truth” among the people; and I was all the more convinced that all those knots of crafty calumnies, which those deceivers of ours had knit against the divine books, could be unravelled. But so soon as I understood, withal, that man made “after the image of Him that created him”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.22
… also follows that which Thou presently subjoinedst, saying, “But be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,” —not now after your kind, as if following your neighbour who went before you, nor as if living after the example of a better man (for Thou hast not said, “Let man be made after his kind,” but, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”),
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 16.6
… And yet this Trinity, being one God, even after saying “Let us make,” goes on to say, “And God made man in His image,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 19.15
This is prescribed by the order of nature: it is thus that God has created man. For “let them,” He says, “have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every creeping thing which creepeth on the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 1.7
… in the form of a servant He was made man. For if the Father alone had made man without the Son, it would not have been written, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 7.6
… Sometimes the meaning is altogether latent, as in Genesis: “Let us make man after our image and likeness.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 12.6
… but because divine Scripture evidently shows it to be false. For God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness;” and a little after it is said, “So God created man in the image of God.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 14.19
25. But in respect to that image indeed, of which it is said, “Let us make man after our image and likeness,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 2.18
… if thou find it not in thyself, admit it not. Look inward then; but first let us see what had escaped me, whether man be not the image, not of the Son only, or of the Father only, but of the Father and the Son, and so consequently of course of the Holy Ghost also. The words in Genesis are, “Let Us make man after Our own image and likeness.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 76.11
… For because of the Plurality of Persons it was said, “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness.” He did not say, “I will make man, and do Thou attend when I am making him, that Thou too mayest be able to make another.” “Let Us make,” He saith; I hear the Plurality; “after Our image;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Ten Homilies on the First Epistle of John 8.6
… did he fall by grasping? What more grasping, than he whom God could not suffice? In fact, my brethren, we read how man was made after the image and likeness of God: and what said God of him? “And let him have power over the fishes of the sea, and over the fowl of the heaven, and over all cattle which move upon the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 4.8
… But he says, “stamped on us,” as a penny is stamped with the king’s image. For man was made after the image and likeness of God,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 39.11
11. “Albeit man walketh in the Image” ( ver. 6 ). In what “Image,” save that of Him who said, “Let Us make man in Our Image, after Our Likeness.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 49.2.9
But wherefore this? What he hath written in the middle of the Psalm, the same also he hath writ at the end: “Man, though he was in honour, understood not, was compared to the beasts without sense, and was made like to them” ( ver. 20 ). But ye, brethren, consider that ye be men made after the image and likeness of God. The image
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 55.3
… He lamenteth not with it, who hath not understanding. But furthermore, dearly beloved, we ought to remember, that after the image of God we have been made, and that not in any other part than in the understanding itself. For in many things by beasts we are surpassed: but when a man knoweth himself to have been made after the image of God,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 58.1
… Come, if thou art not willing to suffer these things, art thou by any means the only man? dost thou not live in the fellowship of mankind? He that together with thee hath been made, is thy fellow; and all men have been made after the image of God,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 67.4
… Or else surely it is, “Thy image lighten upon us:” so that he said this, in “lighten Thy countenance upon us:” Thou hast imprinted Thy countenance upon us; Thou hast made us after Thine image and Thy likeness,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 102.11
… but, “abideth upon him:” because that wrath in which he was born is not taken away.…Man set in honour, is made in the image of God: raised up to this honour, lifted up from the dust, from the earth, he hath received a reasonable soul; by the vivacity of that very reason, he is placed before all beasts, cattle, birds that fly, and fishes.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 102.29
… for He hath not distinct bodily members, who said, “I Am That I Am.” And perhaps His Word is His hand, assuredly His hand is His power. For inasmuch as it is said, “Let there be a firmament,” and there was a firmament; He is understood to have created it by His Word; but when He said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 103.2
… For what good things? First, because thou art: but a stone also is. Next, because thou livest: but a brute also liveth. What reward wilt thou give the Lord, for His having created thee above all the cattle; and above all the fowls of the air, in His image and likeness?
John Cassian † AD 435 The Conferences of John Cassian 10.3
… the blessed Paphnutius received with the warmest welcome, and in order to confirm the faith which had been stated in the letters of the aforesaid Bishop, placed him in the midst and asked him before all the brethren how the Catholic Churches throughout the East interpreted the passage in Genesis where it says “Let us make man after our image and likeness.”
John Cassian † AD 435 The Conferences of John Cassian 10.5
… Which error although by this its origin, of which we have spoken, it is engrained in the notions of some, yet none the less is it contracted in the hearts also of those who have never been stained with the superstition of the heathen world, under the colour of this passage where it is said “Let us make man after our image and our likeness,”
Socrates Scholasticus † AD 440 The Ecclesiastical History of Socrates Scholasticus 2.18
… If any one hearing that the only-begotten Son of God was crucified, should say that his divinity underwent any corruption, or suffering, or change, or diminution, or destruction, let him be anathema. If any one should affirm that the Father said not to the Son, “Let us make man,”
Theodoret of Cyrus † AD 458 The Ecclesiastical History of Theodoret 4.9
The illustrious emperor thus took heed of the apostolic decrees, but Audæus, a Syrian alike in race and in speech, appeared at that time as an inventor of new decrees. He had long ago begun to incubate iniquities and now appeared in his true character. At first he understood in an absurd sense the passage “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 3.14
… By the transgression we were driven from the natural to the unnatural . But the Lord led us back from the unnatural into the natural . For this is what is the meaning of in our image, after our likeness
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.16
But since some find fault with us for worshipping and honouring the image of our Saviour and that of our Lady, and those, too, of the rest of the saints and servants of Christ, let them remember that in the beginning God created man after His own image
Pseudo-Clement The Recognitions of Clement 2.39
… and after they have tasted of the tree, God Himself testifies, saying to the rest of the gods, ‘Behold, Adam is become as one of us;’ thus, therefore, it is manifest that there were many gods engaged in the making of man. Also, whereas at the first God said to the other gods, ‘Let us make man after our image and likeness;’
Pseudo-Clement The Clementine Homilies 16.11
And Simon said: “Since I see that you frequently speak of the God who created you, learn from me how you are impious even to him. For there are evidently two who created, as the Scripture says:
1:27
Pope St Clement I † AD 99 The Second Epistle of Clement 14
… but if we shall not do the will of the Lord, we shall come under the Scripture which saith, “My house became a den of robbers.” So, then, let us elect to belong to the church of life, that we may be saved. I think not that ye are ignorant that the living church is the body of Christ (for the Scripture, saith, “God created man male and female;”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 26
… 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.”
Tertullian † AD 220 On the Resurrection of the Flesh 5
… Now the flesh, too, had its existence from the Word of God, because of the principle, that here should be nothing without that Word. “Let us make man,” said He, before He created him, and added, “with our hand,” for the sake of his pre-eminence, that so he might not be compared with the rest of creation. And “God,” says (the Scripture), “formed man.”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Praxeas 12
… and the Spirit on the other, who was to sanctify man. With these did He then speak, in the Unity of the Trinity, as with His ministers and witnesses. In the following text also He distinguishes among the Persons: “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God created He him.”
Bardesanes † AD 222 Bardesan. The Book of the Laws of Divers Countries 1
… In that case , too, there would not be one thing diverse from another: yet that which is one, and in which there is no diversity of parts , is a being which up to this time has not been fashioned. But those things which are destined for ministering have been fixed in the power of man: because in the image of Elohim
Origen † AD 254 Origen De Principiis 3.6.1
… For this is pointed out by Moses, before all other philosophers, when he describes the first creation of man in these words: “And God said, Let Us make man in Our own image, and after Our likeness;” and then he adds the words: “So God created man in His own image: in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them, and He blessed them.”
Origen † AD 254 Origen Against Celsus 4.30
… If, however, he had known the difference between man being created “in the image of God” and “after His likeness,” and that God is recorded to have said, “Let Us make man after Our image and likeness,” but that He made man “after the image” of God, but not then also “after His likeness,”
Origen † AD 254 Origen's Commentary on Matthew 14.16
… and I think that it is not even said about the same persons, namely, of those who were formed after the image of God, and of those who were formed from the dust of the ground and from one of the ribs of Adam. For where it is said, “Male and female made He them,”
Novatian † AD 258 A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity 17
… What if the same Moses introduces God saying, “Let us make man after our image and likeness;” and below, “And God made man; in the image of God made He him, male and female made He them?”
St Hilary of Poitiers † AD 367 De Trinitate or On the Trinity 4.18
… For the words our image —not our images —prove that there is one nature possessed by Both. But an argument from words is an insufficient proof, unless its result be confirmed by the evidence of facts; and accordingly it is written, And God made man; after the image of God made He him
St Cyril of Jerusalem † AD 386 The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril 10.6
… Go to the first book, Genesis: God saith, Let us make man , not ‘in My image,’ but, in Our image . And after Adam was made, the sacred writer says, And God created man; in the image of God created He him
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 3
… ye are my witnesses, ye, and they who have placed in our hands this—shall I say Authority , or Service ? And if to him that loveth most is due, how shall I measure the love, for which I have made you my debtors by my own love? Rather, shew respect for yourselves, and the Image committed to your care,
St Gregory of Nazianzus † AD 389 Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen 43.70
70. Come then, there have been many men of old days illustrious for piety, as lawgivers, generals, prophets, teachers, and men brave to the shedding of blood. Let us compare our prelate with them, and thus recognize his merit. Adam was honoured by the hand of God,
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On Virginity 12
This reasoning and intelligent creature, man, at once the work and the likeness of the Divine and Imperishable Mind (for so in the Creation it is written of him that “God made man in His image
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On Infants' Early Deaths 1
… It would be better however to quote the very words: “And God created man, in the image of God created He him
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 16.5
5. We must, then, take up once more the Holy Scripture itself, if we may perhaps find some guidance in the question by means of what is written. After saying, “Let us make man in our image,” and for what purposes it was said “Let us make him,” it adds this saying:—“and God created man; in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 16.7
7. We must, then, examine the words carefully: for we find, if we do so, that that which was made “in the image” is one thing, and that which is now manifested in wretchedness is another. “God created man,” it says; “in the image of God created He him
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 16.8
8. Thus the creation of our nature is in a sense twofold: one made like to God, one divided according to this distinction: for something like this the passage darkly conveys by its arrangement, where it first says, “God created man, in the image of God created He him
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 16.9
… and we learn also that his community and kindred with the irrational is for man a provision for reproduction. For he says first that “God created man in the image of God” (showing by these words, as the Apostle says, that in such a being there is no male or female): then he adds the peculiar attributes of human nature, “male and female created He them
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Ephesians 20
… xxv. 1 .) And elsewhere again he sets it down among blessings, that a woman should dwell in harmony with her husband. ( Ecclus. xl. 23 .) And indeed from the beginning, God appears to have made special provision for this union; and discoursing of the twain as one, He said thus, “Male and female created He them” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Colossians 12
… Seest thou the mystery of marriage? He made of one, one; and again, having made these two, one, He so maketh one, so that now also man is produced of one. For man and wife are not two men, but one Man. And this may be confirmed from many sources; for instance, from James, from Mary the Mother of Christ, from the words, “He made them male and female.” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Titus 3
… And the fornicator is not unclean on account of the intercourse, but on account of the manner of it, because it injures the woman, and they injure one another, making the woman common, and subverting the laws of nature. For she ought to be the wife of one man, since it is said, “Male and female created He them.” (
Rufinus of Aquileia † AD 411 The Apology of Rufinus. Addressed to Apronianus, in Reply to Jerome's Letter to Pammachius 1.24
… for there is a natural bond which unites the sexes in mutual dependence, so that, if one does not exist, there is no need of the other. And further, if it is man alone who is to receive at the resurrection the form of clay which was originally given in paradise, what becomes of that which is written,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 3.7
… for every bulk is less in a part than in the whole, and, if it be infinite, it must be less in such part as is limited by a certain space than in its infinity; and cannot be wholly everywhere, as Spirit, as God is. And what that should be in us, by which we were like unto God, and might rightly in Scripture be said to be after “the image of God,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.22
… And Thou teachest him, now made capable, to perceive the Trinity of the Unity, and the Unity of the Trinity. And therefore this being said in the plural, “Let us make man,” it is yet subjoined in the singular, “and God made man;” and this being said in the plural, “after our likeness,” is subjoined in the singular, “after the image of God.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.23
… In Thy Church, therefore, O our God, according to Thy grace which Thou hast accorded unto it, since we are Thy workmanship created in good works, there are not only those who are spiritually set over, but those also who are spiritually subjected to those placed over them; for in this manner hast Thou made man, male and female,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 14.22
… And it was this work of God on which His blessing was pronounced. For no sooner had Scripture said, “Male and female created He them,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 4.4
… The sixth part of it, then, is one; the third part, two; the half, three. But one and two and three complete the same six. And Holy Scripture commends to us the perfection of this number, especially in this, that God finished His works in six days, and on the sixth day man was made in the image of God.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 12.6
… Why then, when Scripture had said, “God made man after the image of God,” did it go on to say, “God created him; male and female created He them: and God blessed them”?
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 14.3
But far be it from us to think, that while the nature of the soul is immortal, and from the first beginning of its creation thenceforth never ceases to be, yet that that which is the best thing it has should not endure for ever with its own immortality. Yet what is there in its nature as created, better than that it is made after the image of its Creator?
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 14.16
… For that image cannot form itself again, as it could deform itself. He says again elsewhere: “Be ye renewed in the spirit of your mind; and put ye on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” That which is meant by “created after God,” is expressed in another place by “after the image of God.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 15.3
… that which is granted him by God’s gift in the partaking of that very God Himself, which is distinct from knowledge; and the discussion reached this point, that a trinity is discovered in the image of God, which is man in respect to his mind, which mind is “renewed in the knowledge” of God, “after the image of Him that created” man; “after His own image;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Holy Trinity 15.6
… But because that ineffable light beat back our gaze, and it became in some degree plain that the weakness of our mind could not as yet be tempered to it, we turned back in the midst of the course we had begun, and planned according to the (as it were) more familiar consideration of our own mind, according to which man is made after the image of God,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Catechising of the Uninstructed 22
… in order that in this sixth age the mind of man may be renewed after the image of God, even as on the sixth day man was made after the image of God.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter 47
Nor ought it to disturb us that the apostle described them as doing that which is contained in the law “ by nature, ”—not by the Spirit of God, not by faith, not by grace. For it is the Spirit of grace that does it, in order to restore in us the image of God, in which we were naturally created.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.12
… and He said accordingly, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’” Now, who amongst ourselves denies that the woman was provided for the work of child-bearing by the Lord God, the beneficent Creator of all good? See further what he goes on to say: “God, therefore, who created them male and female,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.53
… a custom, indeed, which is followed by all other heretics. Now who could make such an assertion, as that it was possible for marriages to be “without bodily motion, without necessity for sexual organs”? For God made the sexes; because, as it is written, “He created them male and female.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 10.2
… Of our toil that is to be, the infant’s very cry is witness. From this cup of sorrow no one may be excused. The cup that Adam hath pledged, must be drunk. We were made, it is true, by the hands of Truth, but because of sin we were cast forth upon days of vanity. “We were made after the image of God,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 75.4
… the fourth from David unto the carrying away into Babylon; the fifth from the carrying away into Babylon unto the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now the sixth day is in passing. We are in the sixth age, in the sixth day. Let us then be reformed after the image of God, because that on the sixth day man was made after the image of God.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 76.11
… I hear the Plurality; “after Our image;” again I hear the Plurality. Where then is the Singularity of the Divinity? Read what follows, “And God made man.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 69.5
… what the Father is called in reference to Himself and the Son in reference to Himself, the same is Father and Son, that is, God. What is then, “there is no substance”? After this interpretation of substance, how shall we be able to understand this passage of the Psalm, “Fixed I am in the clay of the deep, and there is no substance”? God made man,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 71.25
25. “How great troubles hast Thou shown to me, many and evil!” ( ver. 20 ). Deservedly, proud servant. For thou hast willed perversely to be like thy God, who hadst been made after the image of thy Lord.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 78.38
… but they have the will to do them, if they could with impunity. Such men may seem to have innocence of hands, but yet not that of heart. And what, I pray, or of what sort is that innocence, if of heart it is not, where man was made after the image of God?
Theodoret of Cyrus † AD 458 Dialogues. The “Eranistes” or “Polymorphus” of the Blessed Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus 2
Eran. —Man is not an image of God, but was made in the image of God.
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.24
But they will perhaps ask, what then is the meaning of “male and female
1:28
St Barnabas † AD 61 The Epistle of Barnabas 6
… For the Scripture says concerning us, while He speaks to the Son, “Let Us make man after Our image, and after Our likeness; and let them have dominion over the beasts of the earth, and the fowls of heaven, and the fishes of the sea.” And the Lord said, on beholding the fair creature man, “Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
Pope St Clement I † AD 99 The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 33
… For thus says God: “Let us make man in Our image, and after Our likeness. So God made man; male and female He created them.” Having thus finished all these things, He approved them, and blessed them, and said, “Increase and multiply.”
St Irenaeus of Lyons † AD 202 Against Heresies 4.11.1
… at one time, again, reproving, at another exhorting, and then setting free His servant, and adopting him as a son ( in filium ); and, at the proper time, bestowing an incorruptible inheritance, for the purpose of bringing man to perfection? For He formed him for growth and increase, as the Scripture says: “Increase and multiply.”
Tertullian † AD 220 A Treatise on the Soul 27
… Nature should be to us an object of reverence, not of blushes. It is lust, not natural usage, which has brought shame on the intercourse of the sexes. It is the excess, not the normal state, which is immodest and unchaste: the normal condition has received a blessing from God, and is blest by Him: “Be fruitful, and multiply, (and replenish the earth.)”
Tertullian † AD 220 The Five Books Against Marcion 1.29
… There is a great difference between a cause and a fault, between a state and its excess. Consequently it is not an institution of this nature that is to be blamed, but the extravagant use of it; according to the judgment of its founder Himself, who not only said, “Be fruitful, and multiply,”
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 1
… by his very nature a heretic, and turbulent withal, who mistakes loquacity for eloquence, and supposes impudence to be firmness, and judges it to be the duty of a good conscience to speak ill of individuals. Moreover, he despises God’s law in his painting, maintaining repeated marriages, alleges the law of God in defence of lust,
Tertullian † AD 220 On the Resurrection of the Flesh 45
… Much more is that prior, without which preceding things could have no existence. If the flesh be the old man, when did it become so? From the beginning? But Adam was wholly a new man, and of that new man there could be no part an old man. And from that time, ever since the blessing which was pronounced upon man’s generation,
Tertullian † AD 220 On Repentance 2
… where there is no amendment, repentance is of necessity vain, for it lacks the fruit for which God sowed it; that is, man’s salvation. For God—after so many and so great sins of human temerity, begun by the first of the race, Adam, after the condemnation of man, together with the dowry of the world
Tertullian † AD 220 To His Wife i.2
We do not indeed forbid the union of man and woman, blest by God as the seminary of the human race, and devised for the replenishment of the earth
Tertullian † AD 220 On Exhortation to Chastity 6
… I grant that it will, if there still remain types—sacraments of something future—for your nuptials to figure; or if even now there is room for that command, “Grow and multiply;”
Tertullian † AD 220 On Monogamy 7
… and thus they will come to know that that reason, now ceasing, is among those parts of the law which have been cancelled. Necessary it was that there should be a succession to the marriage of a brother if he died childless: first, because that ancient benediction, “Grow and multiply,”
St Hippolytus † AD 235 The Refutation of All Heresies 5.21
… And in like manner also Eve was produced, he says, as Moses has described, an image and emblem (as well as) a seal, to be preserved for ever, of Edem. And in like manner also a soul was deposited in Eve,—an image—from Edem, but a spirit from Elohim. And there were given to them commandments, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth,”
St Methodius † AD 311 The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity 2.1
Let us begin with Genesis, that we may give its place of antiquity and supremacy to this scripture. Now the sentence and ordinance of God respecting the begetting of children
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Festal and Personal Letters of Athanasius 48
… But since we must grapple with the objections of evil persons, as they may say, ‘If the organs have been severally fashioned by the Creator, then there is no sin in their genuine use,’ let us stop them by asking this question: What do you mean by use? That lawful use which God permitted when He said, ‘Increase and multiply, and replenish the earth
St Basil the Great † AD 379 The Letters 160.4
… But, for my part, to every one who is thinking about marriage I testify that, “the fashion of this world passeth away,” and the time is short: “it remaineth that both they that have wives be as though they had none.” If he improperly quotes the charge “Increase and multiply,”
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 Against Eunomius 3.3
… In order, however, that our account of these matters may be cleared up as far as possible, let us once more discuss the point in the following way. He Who framed the universe made the nature of man with all things in the beginning, and after Adam was made, He then appointed for men the law of generation one from another, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On the Making of Man 22.4
… for it was not when He made that which was in His own image that He bestowed on man the power of increasing and multiplying; but when He divided it by sexual distinctions, then He said, “Increase and multiply, and replenish the earth
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 22.19
19. Some one may say, “Do you dare detract from wedlock, which is a state blessed by God?” I do not detract from wedlock when I set virginity before it. No one compares a bad thing with a good. Wedded women may congratulate themselves that they come next to virgins. “Be fruitful,” God says, “and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 48.2
… We know, too, that on the foundation of Christ which Paul the master builder has laid, some build up gold, silver, and precious stones; others, on the contrary, hay, wood, and stubble. We are not ignorant that ‘marriage is honorable…and the bed undefiled.’ We have read the first decree of God: ‘Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.’
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 51.4
… If this doctrine is true what becomes of our faith? Where is the preaching of the resurrection? Where is the teaching of the apostles, which lasts on to this day in the churches of Christ? Where is the blessing to Adam, and to his seed, and to Noah and his sons? “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 52.10
… Let the bishops of Christ be bound to marry wives, who must be virgins. Let the best-intentioned priest be deprived of his office if he bear a scar and be disfigured. Let bodily leprosy be counted worse than spots upon the soul. Let us be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth,
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 66.3
… I have learned on good authority that her wish in submitting herself to her husband was not to take advantage of God’s primitive command “Be faithful and multiply and replenish the earth”
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 69.4
… He took a wife that he might have children by her; you by taking a harlot have lost the hope of children. He withdrew into the privacy of his own chamber when he sought to obey nature and to win God’s blessing: “Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.”
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 107.13
… Yes, Laeta: were it possible for you with your own eyes to see your mother-in-law and your sister, and to realize the mighty souls which animate their small bodies; such is your innate thirst for chastity that I cannot doubt but that you would go to them even before your daughter, and would emancipate yourself from God’s first decree of the Law
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 123.13
… like the people of Sodom and Gomorrah let us be found by the last day buying and selling, marrying and giving in marriage; and let us only end our marrying with the close of our lives. And if both before and after the deluge the maxim held good: “be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth:”
St Jerome † AD 420 The Perpetual Virginity of Blessed Mary 22
… I rather think that in accordance with the difference in time and circumstance one rule applied to the former, another to us upon whom the ends of the world have come. So long as that law remained,
St Jerome † AD 420 Against Jovinianus 1.3
… And that upon the foundation, Christ, which Paul the master-builder laid, some build gold, silver, precious stones: others, on the contrary, hay, wood, straw. We are not ignorant of the words, “Marriage is honourable among all, and the bed undefiled.” We have read God’s first command,
St Jerome † AD 420 Against Jovinianus 1.5
… and they shall be one flesh.” And lest we should say that this is a quotation from the Old Testament, he asserts that it has been confirmed by the Lord in the Gospel—“What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder”: and he immediately adds,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.24
35. But what is this, and what kind of mystery is it? Behold, Thou blessest men, O Lord, that they may “be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 14.10
… but this original blessedness continuing until, in virtue of that benediction which said, “Increase and multiply,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 14.21
Far be it, then, from us to suppose that our first parents in Paradise felt that lust which caused them afterwards to blush and hide their nakedness, or that by its means they should have fulfilled the benediction of God, “Increase and multiply and replenish the earth;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 22.24
But we must now contemplate the rich and countless blessings with which the goodness of God, who cares for all He has created, has filled this very misery of the human race, which reflects His retributive justice. That first blessing which He pronounced before the fall, when He said, “Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Good of Marriage 2
2. Nor is it now necessary that we enquire, and put forth a definite opinion on that question, whence could exist the progeny of the first men, whom God had blessed, saying, “Increase, and be ye multiplied, and fill the earth;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise on the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin 2.40
There was, however, undoubtedly marriage, even when sin had no prior existence; and for no other reason was it that woman, and not a second man, was created as a help for the man. Moreover, those words of God, “Be fruitful and multiply,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 1.6
Now, this being the real state of the question, they undoubtedly err who suppose that, when fleshly lust is censured, marriage is condemned; as if the malady of concupiscence was the outcome of marriage and not of sin. Were not those first spouses, whose nuptials God blessed with the words, “Be fruitful and multiply,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.12
… and the reason, no doubt, is, that God declared through the man what the man, in fact, uttered as a prophecy. Now, observe what follows in the paper of extracts: “By that primitive name,” says he, “He showed for what labour the woman had been provided; and He said accordingly, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.13
… Is it their union? But this union is justified in the privilege of the primeval blessing no less than institution. For it is the voice of God that says, ‘A man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they two shall be one flesh.’ It is again the voice of God which says, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.42
… just as if we said that marriage is the cause of sin, though it is true that the human being which is born in wedlock is not born without sin. Marriage was instituted not for the purpose of sinning, but of producing children. Accordingly the Lord’s blessing on the married state ran thus: “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
John Cassian † AD 435 The Conferences of John Cassian 17.19
… For up to the coming of Christ it was well that the blessing of the original sentence should be in full vigour, whereby it was said: “Increase and multiply, and fill the earth.”
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.24
But they will perhaps ask, what then is the meaning of “male and female ,” and “Be fruitful and multiply?” In answer we shall say that “Be fruitful and multiply
Pseudo-Clement The First Epistle of the Blessed Clement, the Disciple of Peter the Apostle 3
… God will give thee understanding.” For whosoever engages before God to preserve sanctity must be girded with all the holy power of God. And, if with true fear he crucify his body, he for the sake of the fear of God excuses himself from that word in which the Scripture has said: “Be fruitful, and multiply,”
1:29
Tertullian † AD 220 On Fasting 4
… nay, rather, why did He withal enlarge His permission? For, at the beginning indeed, it had only been the food of herbs and trees which He had assigned to man: ‘Behold, I have given you all grass fit for sowing, seeding seed, which is upon the earth; and every tree which hath in itself the fruit of seed fit for sowing shall be to you for food.’
St Ambrose of Milan † AD 397 Concerning Widows 1.5
… But we turning aside the warnings of a general utterance to our private advantage, God says: “Every tree which has in it the fruit of a tree yielding seed shall be to you for meat, and to every beast, and to every bird, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.25
… And therefore he that “speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own;” therefore that I may speak the truth, I will speak of Thine. Behold, Thou hast given unto us for food “every herb bearing seed,” which is upon the face of all the earth, “and every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On Marriage and Concupiscence 1.23
… “My happiness would in paradise have been greater if sin had not been committed. For to me belongs that blessing of almighty God: ‘Be fruitful, and multiply.’
1:30
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.25
… Behold, Thou hast given unto us for food “every herb bearing seed,” which is upon the face of all the earth, “and every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed.” Nor to us only, but to all the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the earth, and to all creeping things;
1:31
Tertullian † AD 220 Against Hermogenes 25
… How great a change indeed from the condition of that earth, which is Matter, has come over this earth of ours, is plain even from the fact that the latter has received this testimony to its goodness in Genesis, “And God saw that it was good;”
Novatian † AD 258 A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity 4
Him alone the Lord rightly declares good, of whose goodness the whole world is witness; which world He would not have ordained if He had not been good. For if “everything was very good,”
Novatian † AD 258 On the Jewish Meats 2
… to say which is certainly characteristic of extreme and excessive folly: it is to accuse God as having created unclean things, and to charge upon the divine majesty the guilt of having made things which are abomination, especially when they were both pronounced “very good,”
St Dionysius of Alexandria † AD 265 Containing Various Sections of the Works 2.2
… those objects, I mean, of which each taken by itself as it is made, and the whole system collectively, were seen to be good by Him by whose command they came into existence. For, as it is said, “God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good.”
St Athanasius of Alexandria † AD 373 Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) 2.22
… It beseemed not that God should counsel concerning us afterwards, lest He should appear ignorant of our fate. The God of all then,—creating us by His own Word, and knowing our destinies better than we, and foreseeing that, being made ‘good
St Gregory of Nyssa † AD 395 On Virginity 12
… For, be it observed, there is no such thing in the world as evil irrespective of a will, and discoverable in a substance apart from that. Every creature of God is good, and nothing of His “to be rejected”; all that God made was “very good
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on Ephesians 12
… If they are God’s works, how are they vain? And great is the dispute concerning these things. But hearken, beloved: it is not the works of God which he calls vain; God forbid! The Heaven is not vain, the earth is not vain,—God forbid!—nor the sun, nor the moon and stars, nor our own body. No, all these are “very good.” (
St John Chrysostom † AD 407 Homilies on 1 Timothy 12
If it be the creature of God, it is good. For “all things,” it is said, “were very good.” (
St Jerome † AD 420 The Letters of St. Jerome 48.14
“Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher, “all is vanity.” But if all created things are good,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 7.12
… I perceived, therefore, and it was made clear to me, that Thou didst make all things good, nor is there any substance at all that was not made by Thee; and because all that Thou hast made are not equal, therefore all things are; because individually they are good, and altogether very good, because our God made all things very good.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 10.34
… and so to conclude the temptations of “the lust of the flesh” which still assail me, groaning and desiring to be clothed upon with my house from heaven. The eyes delight in fair and varied forms, and bright and pleasing colours. Suffer not these to take possession of my soul; let God rather possess it, He who made these things “very good”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.28
43. And Thou, O God, sawest everything that Thou hadst made, and behold it was very good.
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 The Confessions 13.34
49. We have also examined what Thou willedst to be shadowed forth, whether by the creation, or the description of things in such an order. And we have seen that things severally are good, and all things very good,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Letters of St. Augustin 55.19
… for this reason it is said of God Himself, that when He had made all things “very good,” He rested “on the seventh day from all His works which He had made.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 City of God 11.23
… in ecclesiastical literature, should not have observed, in the first place, how opposed this is to the meaning of this authoritative Scripture, which, in recounting all the works of God, regularly adds, “And God saw that it was good;” and, when all were completed, inserts the words, “And God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Catechising of the Uninstructed 6
… At this point the narration ought now to be commenced, which should start with the fact that God made all things very good,
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 On the Good of Widowhood 9
… The eyes have great honor in the body, but they would have less, if they were alone, and there were not other members of less honor. In heaven itself the sun by its light surpasses, not chides, the moon; and star from star differs in glory, not is at variance through pride. Therefore, “God made all things, and, lo, very good;”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Reply to Faustus the Manichæan 31.4
4. Augustin replied: When the apostle says, "To the pure all things are pure," he refers to the natures which God had created,—as it is written by Moses in Genesis, "And God made all things; and behold they were very good,"
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants 2.35
… And it was not possible more suitably to intimate the inherent importance of obedience, or its sole sufficiency securely to keep the rational creature under the Creator, than by forbidding a tree which was not in itself evil. For God forbid that the Creator of good things, who made all things, “and behold they were very good,”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 54.3
The things which were made, are many, He who made them is One. The heaven, the earth, the sea, and all things that in them are, how many are they! Who could enumerate them? who conceive their vast number? Who made all these? God made them all. Behold, “they are very good.”
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 135.3
3. What reason shall I give why you should praise Him? “Because the Lord is good” ( ver. 3 ). Briefly in one word is here explained the praise of the Lord our God. “The Lord is good;” good, not in the same manner as the things which He here made are good. For God made all things very good;
St Augustine of Hippo † AD 430 Expositions on the Book of Psalms 136.4
… but not that we should believe that He makes sky, earth, and luminaries, of His Mercy; since they are marks of His Goodness, who created all things very good.
John Cassian † AD 435 The Conferences of John Cassian 8.6
God forbid that we should admit that God has created anything which is substantially evil, as Scripture says “everything that God had made was very good.”
John Cassian † AD 435 The Conferences of John Cassian 23.3
… And to support this illustration by the authority of Scripture, does not Scripture declare of all things in general which were created by God, and say: “And behold everything that God had made was very good;” and again: “And things that God hath made are all good in their season”?
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 2.4
… For evil is nothing else than absence of goodness, just as darkness also is absence of light. For goodness is the light of the mind, and, similarly, evil is the darkness of the mind. Light, therefore, being the work of the Creator and being made good (for God saw all that He made, and behold they were exceeding good
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 3.15
… And so all created things must be bad, and he must have spoken falsely who said, And God saw every thing that He had made, and, behold, it was very good
St John of Damascus † AD 749 An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.20
But if this is so, they say, whence comes evil ? For it is quite impossible that evil should originate from goodness. We answer then, that evil is nothing else than absence of goodness and a lapsing from what is natural into what is unnatural: for nothing evil is natural. For all things, whatsoever God made, are very good
Pseudo-Clement The Clementine Homilies 19.18
And Peter said: “What you state is impossible; for if he came into existence by degrees, He could have cut him off as a foe by His own free choice. And knowing beforehand that he was coming into existence, He would not have allowed him as a good, had He not known that by reason of him what was useful was being brought into existence.
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In Hebrew it is, the earth was תהו ובהו tohu vevohu, that is the earth was a solitude, or empty and void: because the earth was empty of men and beasts, as Jonathan the Chaldean translated it; again it was empty of plants, animals, seeds, grass, light, beauty, rivers, fountains, mountains, valleys, plains, hills, metals and minerals, to which it has a natural inclination as it were. Hence in Wisdom XI, it is said that God "created the world from invisible matter," in Greek ἀμόρφῳ, that is formless, unadorned, uncomposed. Whence the LXX here translate, the earth was invisible and uncomposed; Aquila, the earth was vanity and nothing; Symmachus, the earth was idle and undigested; Theodotion, the earth was empty and nothing; Onkelos, the earth was desolate and void. For the earth was indeed with the abyss of waters poured over it as a certain empty chaos, rude and undigested, of which Ovid says: One was the whole face of nature in the world, Which they called chaos, a rude and undigested mass; Nor anything but inert weight, and gathered together Discordant seeds of things not well joined. Wherefore it is improbable what Gabriel in II, dist. 12, q. 1, and Marsilius in the same place think, that this chaos, or, as the Wise Man speaks, formless matter, was primary matter, or alone; or certainly informed only by some rude, obscure, general and common form of corporeality. For from this place of Moses it is established that the earth and heaven were created first; therefore primary matter when created was not devoid of form, but was clothed and imbued with the particular form of heaven and earth. Why not adorned at the same time? You will ask: Why did God, creating heaven and earth on the first day, not at the same time fully and perfectly adorn them? I answer: The first cause is His holy will: it is fitting that nature (whose creator is God) proceed from imperfect things to perfect things. The second is, that we may learn that all things depend on God both as to their beginning and as to their adornment and perfection, and that nothing in created things is so imperfect, sin excepted, of which God is not the author. The third is, lest, if all things were read as perfect from the beginning, they should be thought uncreated. Which spirit is understood here? The Spirit of the Lord,—that is an angel, says Cajetan; better the Hebrews, Theodoret, and Tertullian Against Hermogenes, cap. xxxii: The Spirit of the Lord, they say, is a wind stirred up by God. Thirdly, most excellently and most fully, the Spirit of the Lord is the Holy Spirit proceeding from God the Father and the Son, and by His power, presence and might breathing wind and warm air upon the waters. Thus St. Jerome, Basil, Theodoret, Athanasius, and almost all other Fathers, who from this prove the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Was borne, explained from the Hebrew WAS BORNE.—For was borne, in Hebrew it is מרחפת merachephet, which according to St. Basil, Diodorus and Jerome in Questions on Hebrew in Genesis, is of birds, when over eggs and chicks, as if suspended they gently move themselves with the motion of wings, flutter and fly, and then brood over them, breathe warmth, cherish and animate them. In like manner the Holy Spirit was borne over, or, as Tertullian reads it, was carried over the waters, not by place or motion, but by power surpassing and excelling all things, as the will and idea of the artificer is borne over things to be made, says St. Augustine lib. I On Genesis according to the letter cap. vii. By this therefore will and power of His, with the warm air which He scattered from Himself, the Holy Spirit as it were brooded over the waters, and gave them prolific power, so that reptiles, flying creatures, fishes and plants, indeed all things of heaven might be produced from the waters. Hence the Church in the blessing of fonts sings to the Holy Spirit: "Thou wast borne over the waters to cherish them;" and Marius Victor: And the sacred Spirit hanging over the extended waters Animated the nourishing waters, giving the seeds of things. This spirit animating the waters and all things, Plato said was the soul of the world. Whence Virgil, lib. VI of the Aeneid: Spirit within nourishes, and mind infused through all the limbs Moves the mass, and mingles itself with the great body. Allegorically Allegorically, here is signified the Holy Spirit as it were brooding over the waters of baptism, and bringing us forth and regenerating us in them, says St. Jerome epistle 83 to Oceanus.
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3. AND GOD SAID — by a word, not of the mouth, but of the mind, and by that not rational, but essential, and common to the three persons. "Said" therefore, that is, he conceived in his mind, willed, decreed, commanded efficaciously, and by commanding actually made and produced God, namely the most holy Trinity itself, light: for God's willing is doing, says St. Athanasius, sermon 3 Against the Arians. Yet the word "said" is appropriated to the Son. Whence elsewhere Scripture often says that all things were created through the Son, namely as the Word and idea, because truly the Son himself is the Word notionally and properly so called, and consequently to him are appropriated wisdom, art, idea; just as to the Father power, and to the Holy Spirit goodness is attributed. Finally, God said these things after creating heaven, earth and the abyss, but still during that same first day of the world. Let there be light LET THERE BE LIGHT. — Note, that in Genesis and in the creation of the world, light was formed before all things, because light is the noblest, most joyful, most convenient, most efficacious and most powerful quality, without which all created and creatable things would have remained invisible. "From his treasures," says Esdras, book IV, chapter vi, 40, "he brought forth a luminous light, by which his work might appear." See St. Dionysius On the Divine Names, part I, chapter iv, where he enumerates thirty-four properties of light and fire, wonderfully suited to God and divine things. And among other things he teaches that light is a living image of God, and therefore was first created by God, so that in it as in an image he might depict himself and exhibit himself visible to the world. "From that very good," says St. Dionysius, "light is, and the image of goodness." For God is uncreated, eternal and immense light, which, though it dwells in inaccessible light, nevertheless illuminates all things. St. Basil gives a beautiful similitude, homily 2 of the Hexaemeron: "Just as," he says, "those who pour oil into a deep chasm of water, thereby bring to that place and infuse clarity, so also the creator of all things, having uttered the word of light, brought into the world an amiable and most pleasant beauty." St. Ambrose gives another, book I of the Hexaemeron, chapter ix: "Whence," he says, "would the ornament of the world begin except from light: for it would be useless if it were not seen, etc. Whoever desires to build some edifice worthy of a dwelling for the father of a family, before he lays the foundations, explores whence he might bring in and infuse light; and that is the first grace, which if it be lacking, the whole house stands deformed in uncouth neglect. Light is that which commends the other ornaments of the house." What was this light? You will ask, what was this light? Catharinus answers first that it was the most luminous sun; but the sun was not produced on the first day, as light was, but only on the fourth day. Second, St. Basil, homily 6 of the Hexaemeron; Theodoret and Gregory of Nazianzus think that only the quality of light was created here without a subject: for which reason Gregory of Nazianzus calls this light spiritual, which is a note against heretics denying that in the Eucharist accidents can exist without a subject. Third and best, Bede, Hugh, the Master, St. Thomas, St. Bonaventure, Lyra, Abulensis, and St. Dionysius above favors it, think that this light was a luminous body; either of the sky, or rather a luminous part of the abyss, which, shaped into the form of a circle or column, shone forth upon the orb, and which was like matter from which afterwards, divided and separated into parts, increased and as it were fabricated into fiery globes, the sun, moon and stars were made. Whence St. Thomas says this light was the sun itself still unformed and imperfect. Pererius and others assert the same. Note here first, that this light was not properly created, because God on the first day created all primary matter, and subjected it to the form of the waters of the abyss; and from it then he drew forth this light and other forms, both essential and accidental. God therefore properly on the first day only created all things to be created; but on the remaining five days he did not create, but formed and adorned what was created. Thus it appears that God, about to produce light, condensed from the waters of the abyss some sort of spherical body like crystal, and infused this light into it. Note second, that this luminous body in the first three days of the world, namely before the sun was created on the fourth day, was moved by an angel from East to West, and in the same manner and time as the sun, namely in twenty-four hours, and circled around both hemispheres of the sky, and illuminated uniformly and non-uniformly, as the sun now does. Tropologically Tropologically, the Apostle in II Corinthians iv, 6: "God, he says, who commanded light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts," that is to say, Just as God of old in Genesis brought forth light from darkness, so now he made us faithful from among the unfaithful, and illuminated us with the light of faith. Again, light first of all created signifies the right intention of the mind, which ought to precede and direct all our works, says Hugh of St. Victor. Moreover, light is knowledge and wisdom. Whence St. Augustine says: Light was created first, that is, "wisdom was created before all things," Ecclesiasticus i, 4. "The light of thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us." Finally, light is law and doctrine, especially the Gospel, according to that passage in Proverbs vi, 23: "The commandment is a lamp, and the law is light." Hence concerning the Gospel Isaiah sings in chapter ix, 2: "The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light." Symbolically and Allegorically Symbolically, "let there be light," that is, let there be an Angel, says St. Augustine. But this cannot be the literal sense, because the Angels were created before light, together with heaven and earth. Secondly, the same St. Augustine understands these words of the generation of the Word of God from eternity: God the Father said: "Let there be light," that is, let there be the Word, as it were light from light. But this too is symbolic, not literal. Allegorically, Christ incarnate is the light of the world, John viii, 12: "He was the true light that enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world." Hence the Apostles, Doctors and Preachers share this same name from Christ, to whom he himself says in Matthew v: "You are the light of the world." On which account St. Basil most excellently, in his homily On Penance: "Jesus, he says, bestows his attributes upon others. Light is: You are the light of the world, he says. He is a Priest, and he makes priests. He is a Sheep, and he says: Behold I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves. He is a Rock, and he makes a rock (St. Peter). He bestows his own things upon his servants. For he is (Christ) like a fountain flowing perpetually." Anagogically, light signifies the light of glory and the brightness of the beatific vision, according to that passage in Psalm xxxv, 10: "In thy light we shall see light." Hence Christ represented heavenly glory in his transfiguration through light: "For his face shone as the sun," Matthew xvii, 2.
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4. AND GOD SAW THE LIGHT THAT IT WAS GOOD. — "Saw," that is, made us to see and know, says St. Jerome in epistle 15. Secondly, more plainly and simply, by a figure of speech Moses here introduces God in human fashion as it were a craftsman, who after completing his work contemplates it, and saw that it was beautiful and elegant: and this for this purpose, that against the Manichaeans we might know that nothing evil, but all things good were produced by God. St. Augustine teaches learnedly in his Sentences, n. 144: "Three things, he says, we ought especially to be taught concerning the condition of creation: who made it, by what means he made it, why he made it? God said, he says, Let there be light, and light was made. And God saw the light that it was good. Nor is there an author more excellent than God; nor is there an art more efficacious than the word of God; nor is there a cause better than that good should be created by the good." GOOD. — The Hebrew טוב tob signifies all good, beautiful, pleasant, useful and fitting: for light is most pleasant to the world, and equally most useful. How did he divide the light from the darkness? AND HE DIVIDED THE LIGHT FROM THE DARKNESS. — The Hebrew and the Septuagint have: He divided between the light and the darkness. He divided first, in place: for while here is light and day, among the antipodes is night and darkness. Secondly, in time: for in the same hemisphere alternately, and at different times light and darkness, night and day succeed one another. Thirdly, in cause: for the cause of light is one, namely a luminous body; the cause of darkness is another, namely an opaque body. The third especially is what Moses intends here, that is to say, God made it so that after light was created by him, darkness and night would follow. Whence it follows: "And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night." When was hell created? You will ask, when was hell created? Ludovicus Molina thinks it was created on the third day. But it is more true that hell was created at this point, namely on the first day; for since the Angels are most swift, and have instantaneous acts, it is altogether probable that they sinned on the first day, not long after their creation, and therefore were immediately cast out of heaven into hell, which God immediately after their sin, as it were a prison and torture chamber with its fire and sulphur, prepared for them in the center of the earth. On the first day therefore, just as God divided light from darkness, so he divided the Angels from demons, grace from sin, glory from punishment, heaven from hell. Allegorically, Hugh, book I On the Sacraments, part I, chapter x, and others note that on the first day when light was made and divided from darkness, the good Angels were confirmed in good and in grace, but the evil ones in evil and were separated from the good; and thus what was being done in the sensible world was an image of those things which were being done in the intelligible world.
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5. AND GOD CALLED THE LIGHT DAY, AND THE DARKNESS NIGHT. — In the word "called" there is a metonymy; for the sign is put for the thing signified, as if to say: God made it so that light, for the whole time in which it illuminates the hemisphere, would make day, and darkness would make night. Thus St. Augustine, book I On Genesis Against the Manichaeans, chapters ix and x. AND THE EVENING AND MORNING WERE MADE ONE DAY. — I think it more certain that heaven and earth were created not before, but on the very first day itself. Now I say it is more probable that the world was created as it were in the morning, and then there were darkness over the globe and the abyss — at which time the Spirit of the Lord was borne over the waters, as is evident from verse 2. Then a little later, at verse 3, after about six hours around midday, light was created in the midst of heaven, which, having completed its motion of six hours, by which it declined from the midst of heaven to the West, produced evening as it were its own terminus; so that both darkness and light together lasted no more than twelve hours. Then followed night likewise of twelve hours, whose terminus is morning. For Moses here names day and night by their terminus, Evening and Morning, as if to say: When the course of the day through the succeeding evening was completed, and the space of night through the succeeding morning was likewise completed, the first day of twenty-four hours was finished. The first day of the world was a Sunday "One" signifies first, as is evident from verses 8 and 13. This first day of the world was a Sunday; for the seventh day from it was the Sabbath. See thirteen prerogatives of Sunday at Pererius at the end of the treatment of the first day. Not all things were created in one day Note: St. Augustine, book IV On Genesis Literally, and book XI On the City of God, chapter vii, wishes these days to be understood mystically; for he seems to hold that all things were created by God simultaneously on the first day, and that Moses through the six days of creation signifies various cognitions of the angels. Philo teaches the same. But all the other Fathers teach the contrary, and the simple and historical narrative of Moses proves it entirely. Wherefore it is now erroneous to say that all things were produced in one day. St. Augustine speaks doubtfully and disputatively about a question which, as he himself says, was then most difficult. You will object: In Ecclesiasticus xviii, 1 it is said: "He that liveth for ever created all things together." I answer: The word together is to be referred not to "created" but to "all things," as if to say: God created all things equally, with none excepted. Whence for together, in the Greek is κοινῇ, that is "commonly." Morally, St. Chrysostom, in the homily That Man Presides Over All Creation, from the day, light and other creatures applies sharp incentives to man to serve God. "For you heaven is clothed in the splendor of day and adorned with the rays of the sun: at night the very summit of heaven is illuminated by the most brilliant mirror of the moon and the varied light of the stars. For you the seasons are varied in turn by alternating change, forests grow green, fields are beautified, meadows become verdant, living creatures bring forth offspring, fountains gush forth, rivers flow." And: "What if all nature were to say to you continually: I am commanded by the Lord of all things to obey you: I obey, I comply, I serve, and although he changes, I do not change. I obey the rebellious; I comply with the insolent; I serve the contemptuous. Who are you, who persist in this contempt? You command creatures, and do not serve the Creator? Fear the patient Lord, lest you experience the severe judge. Even if you were to spend your whole life's time in giving thanks, you could not repay what you owe. The sin of the sinner is twofold: both that he does not render to the Lord the obedience and service owed, and that he strives to repay his innumerable benefits with insult."
On the Work of the Second Day On the first day in the fabric of the world God created and made the earth as a foundation, and imposed upon it heaven empyrean as it were a roof; the remainder between these intermediate was chaos, or that abyss of waters, which on this second day he unfolds, orders and forms.
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6. LET THERE BE A FIRMAMENT IN THE MIDST OF THE WATERS, AND LET IT DIVIDE THE WATERS FROM THE WATERS. — "Firmament" is called in Hebrew רקיע rakia, whose root, רקע raka, according to St. Jerome and other most learned Hebrews, signifies to expand, to stretch out, and by stretching out to make firm and solid something which was previously fluid and rare. Just as therefore molten brass is stretched out and condensed by casting, so here water made dense into the heavens is called in Greek στερέωμα, in Latin firmament: for the firmament is as it were a wall in the midst of the waters, that is, placed between two waters, namely the upper and the lower, separating them from one another and restraining them. You will ask, what is this firmament, and what are the waters above the firmament? First opinion First, Origen understood by the upper waters angels, and by the lower waters demons; but this is an Origenistic and allegorical dream. Second opinion Second, Bonaventure, Lyra, Abulensis, Cajetan, Catharinus and others, by the upper waters understand the crystalline heaven. But this is called water too equivocally. Third opinion Third, Rupertus, Eugubinus, Pererius, Gregory of Valencia hold that the firmament is the middle region of the air, which on this second day was made a firmament, that is, an interspace dividing the upper waters, that is, the clouds, from the lower waters of rivers and fountains. Fourth opinion and the true one But I say the firmament is the starry heaven and all the celestial orbs adjacent to it, both the lower and the upper ones up to the empyrean. And so above all the heavens, next below the empyrean heaven, there are true and natural waters. Calvin laughs at this; but foolishly, for this opinion is proved from the simplest and historical narrative of Moses. For the firmament, and the Hebrew rakia, signifies not the air, not clouds, but properly the starry heaven and the celestial orbs. These waters were placed there both for the ornament of the universe, and perhaps also for the pleasure of the Saints existing in the empyrean heaven. And "the authority of this Scripture is greater," says St. Augustine, "than the capacity of all human understanding." Why did Moses not say on this day: And God saw that it was good? Catharinus and Molina answer: The reason is that the firmament was still unfinished. Perhaps it could be said very well here that Moses embraced three works of divine separation, namely the first of light from darkness, the second of the upper waters from the lower, the third of waters from the earth, in a single and final clause, when after these three things in verse 10, he says: "And he saw that it was good." Finally, the Septuagint here, as in other places, has "and God saw that it was good"; in the Hebrew, however, and in the Chaldean, Theodotion, Aquila, Symmachus and the Vulgate it is lacking. Morally, the firmament is the firmness and constancy of the soul fixed in God and the heavens, which constantly sustains the upper waters, that is, prosperities; and the lower waters, that is, adversities. Man is the image of heaven: first, he has a round head, like heaven; second, he has two eyes, as it were the sun and moon; third, because he received a soul from the heaven of God and similar to angels; fourth, because heaven is said from concealing, says St. Bernard, because in heaven many things are concealed and hidden from us: so in man the mind, thought and secrets of the heart are concealed; fifth, just as Christ is the heaven of divinity and virtues: so also is the Christian, in whom the moon is faith, the evening star hope, the sun charity, the remaining stars the other virtues, says St. Bernard, sermon 27 in the Canticles.
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8. AND GOD CALLED THE FIRMAMENT HEAVEN. — Heaven is said in Latin from concealing, that is, hiding, because it conceals and covers all things: thus St. Augustine; or, as St. Ambrose says, it is called heaven as if decorated, that is, depicted with various stars. But Moses wrote in Hebrew, not in Latin; and God spoke in Hebrew, and called the firmament schamaim, for the reason which I gave above. AND THERE WAS EVENING AND MORNING THE SECOND DAY. — Do not think that God, like a craftsman, was occupied the whole day in this work of the firmament; but that he made it suddenly, in an instant, and preserved it throughout the rest of the day.
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9. LET THE WATERS THAT ARE UNDER HEAVEN BE GATHERED TOGETHER INTO ONE PLACE, AND LET THE DRY LAND APPEAR. Into what place were the waters gathered together? You will ask, how was this done? First, some think that the sea was collected into another part of the earth, and another hemisphere, so that that part of the earth was entirely covered with waters and uninhabitable, and therefore there are no antipodes. Thus Procopius, and St. Augustine did not deny it. But the contrary is established from the daily navigations of the Portuguese and Spanish to the Indies. Second, Basil, Burgensis, Catharinus, and St. Thomas think that the sea was here separated from the earth, so that it became higher. From this opinion it is easy to give a reason why springs and rivers burst forth even in high places: because namely they arise through subterranean veins from the sea, which is higher than the earth. Earth and water make one globe I say first: Earth and water make one globe; and therefore water is not higher than earth. This is the common opinion of mathematicians, Molina, Pererius, Cajetan, St. Jerome, Chrysostom and Damascene. And it is evident first, from the eclipse of the moon, which is caused by the earth interposed between the sun and the moon. For this eclipse casts the shadow of only one globe, not of two: therefore earth and sea are one globe. Second, because every drop of water, and every part of the earth everywhere descends to the same center. Third, because shores and islands project above the waters. Fourth, the same is evident from Scripture: "He hath founded it upon the seas" (Psalm 23:2); "Who established the earth upon the waters" (Psalm 135:6). Why are the waters said to be gathered together? I say second: The waters were gathered together on this third day, first, because God made it so that much of the fresh water became denser, with terrestrial exhalations collected together in it, by which the sea became salt, both so that it would not putrefy, and so that it would have nourishment for the fishes, and so that it would more easily support ships. Thus therefore by God's operation the water became denser, it contracted itself, and occupied a smaller part of the earth than before, and left part of the earth dry. On this third day the mountains were made Second, not after the flood, as some wish, but on this third day of the world God made the earth partly subside, partly rise up. Whence mountains and valleys were made: and also various chasms and cavities in the earth, into which as into channels the sea withdrew itself. Cavities under the earth Third, God made on this third day very great cavities under the earth itself, and filled them with a very great quantity of waters, which by many is called the abyss or the deep; and it is connected with the sea through various passages, and is thought to be the matrix and origin of all springs and rivers. What therefore the liver is in man, this abyss of waters in the caverns of the earth is. How the water was gathered together in one place I say third: The waters are said to be gathered together in one place, that is in a place separated from the earth, so that it became dry and habitable. For God wished to mix the waters through various channels and bays of the earth, both so that the earth would be irrigated and made fertile by them; and so that it would be blown upon by sea winds for health and fertility. Theodoret notes that the raging sea is restrained not so much by shores, as by God's command, as if by a bridle: otherwise it would often break through and overwhelm everything. Hence God is said to have set a boundary for the sea, which it cannot transgress. St. Basil asks: "What would prevent the Red Sea from breaking through with its overflowing flood into all of Egypt, which is so much lower than the Red Sea itself in its depression, unless it were restrained by the command of the Creator?" Pliny relates that Sesostris, king of Egypt, first devised to lead a navigable canal from the Red Sea, but was deterred by fear of inundation, having discovered the Red Sea to be higher by three cubits than the land of Egypt. LET THE DRY LAND APPEAR,—which before was muddy and covered with waters: whence for dry land, in Hebrew it is יבשה iabesa, that is, dried out so that it could be inhabited, sown, bear fruit; dry land therefore is not the same as sandy, but dry land is the same as dry. For there remained in the earth some sweet moisture, so that it would make it fruitful.
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10. AND GOD CALLED THE DRY LAND EARTH; AND THE GATHERING TOGETHER OF THE WATERS HE CALLED SEAS. It is a prolepsis. For not on this third day, but on the sixth day, namely when He formed Adam, and gave him the Hebrew tongue, then God called the dry land in Hebrew ארץ erets, that is, earth; and the gatherings of the waters He called ימים iammim, that is, seas. Etymologies of the word erets (earth) Note: Earth in Hebrew is called ארץ erets, either from the root ratsats, that is, to tread, because it is trodden and inhabited by men and beasts (just as earth is called from treading); or from the root רצה ratsa, that is, it wished, it desired, because it always seeks to bear fruit; or from the root רוץ ruts, that is, it ran, because men and animals dwell in it and run upon it, and because all heavy things as it were descend and run to it, and all elements circle around it, and all the celestial orbs. From the Hebrew erets some derive the German erde. Furthermore, seas in Hebrew are called ימים iammim from the abundance and multitude of waters: for iammim by anastrophe of the letter yod, is the same as maim, that is, waters. Again iammim alludes to the root המה hama, that is, to sound, to roar, as the sea roars.
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11. LET THE EARTH BRING FORTH GRASS. — "Let it bring forth," not by actively producing, as Cajetan and Burgensis wish, but by furnishing matter only: for in the first creation of things, God by Himself alone actively and efficaciously, and that suddenly, produced all sprouts and plants; and these of just and perfect magnitude, as St. Thomas teaches, I part., Quest. LXX, art. 1. Indeed the Psalmist, Psalm. CIII, 14: "Bringing forth grass for cattle, and herb for the service of men." Now indeed the earth also concurs effectively toward sprouts, especially if it be imbued with seed. Furthermore, St. Basil marvels, and deservedly, at God's providence in sprouts, which shoot forth in stalks equal in number to the roots and raise themselves up. "See how the stalks of grain are girded with joints, so that, strengthened by these as by certain bonds, they easily bear and sustain the weight of the ears. But in a sheath He has enclosed the grain, lest it be exposed as prey to grain-eating birds: moreover, with a rampart of awns, as if with darts set against it, He wards off harm from small creatures." Then applying it symbolically to man: "He has raised our senses on high, nor permitted us to be cast down to the ground. He also wishes us, as it were with tendrils, to cling to and adhere to our neighbors in the embraces of charity, so that with constant affection we may be borne upward." And making seed, — that is to say, let the earth produce grass, which may be able to make seed for the propagation of its own kind, that is, to sow. AND THE FRUIT TREE, — that is, a fruit-bearing tree, as the Hebrew has it. Whose seed is in itself, — which has the power of generating something like itself, through the seed which it has in itself. For many plants do not have seed properly so called, as is evident in the willow, grass, mint, saffron, garlic, reed, elms, poplars, etc.; but these have something in place of seed, namely in the roots themselves a certain propagative power. And this for this end, that, when individual plants perish, they may nevertheless remain in the seed and fruit which they propagate from themselves; and thus they attain a certain quasi-immortality and eternity.
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12. THE EARTH BROUGHT FORTH. — From this it is clear that on this third day the earth received not merely the power of producing plants, as St. Augustine seems to wish; but in that very moment in which God commanded, the earth actually brought forth all species of plants, and those mature, many also with ripe fruit: for the works of God are perfect. Thus St. Basil and Ambrose. I say the same of the animals and man, created on the sixth day, namely that all were created in perfect magnitude, vigor and strength, as the Doctors commonly teach. From what has been said it follows that on this third day also the paradise was planted and adorned with a wonderful variety and beauty of trees, concerning which see chapter II. Poisonous Herbs and Thorns Note that on this third day the earth also brought forth poisonous herbs, and likewise the rose with thorns: for these are as it were connatural to the rose, and congenital to it. Some deny this and think that before man's fall the earth brought forth nothing harmful. But the contrary is taught by St. Basil and St. Ambrose, and this is the truer view: both so that their beauty should not be lacking to the universe, and because those things which are poisonous to man are beneficial to other things, and useful to other animals. "Hemlock," says Basil, "is eaten by starlings, and yet they are not affected by the poison. But hellebore is food for quails, and they suffer no harm from it." Moreover because the same things are useful to man: "For through mandrake physicians bring on sleep: and by the juice of the poppy they allay violent bodily pains." Moreover because God before the sin of Adam during the six days of creation brought forth all species of things absolutely, and made the universe perfect: nor after these six days did He create any new species. Wherefore I say the same of wolves, scorpions and other harmful animals. Yet none of these could have harmed man, if he had remained in innocence; which innocence had conjoined with it and required prudence, namely that he should carefully handle roses lest he strike against the thorns. Minerals and Winds Note secondly: since this third day is that on which God perfectly formed and adorned the earth, for this reason it is altogether probable that on this day likewise were produced marbles, metals, minerals and all fossils, and again winds. For without winds neither plants nor men could live or be nourished. Finally Molina thinks that on this day hell was produced in the center of the earth. But I have already said that it is truer that it was produced on the first day, immediately after the fall of Lucifer. The World Was Created Not in Autumn, But in Spring You will ask, in what season of the year was the world created by God? Many think the world was created at the autumnal equinox, because then fruits are ripe. But I answer: It is truer that the world was created at the vernal equinox. First, because all the Fathers teach this everywhere. Indeed even the Poets, such as Virgil in book II of the Georgics, speaking of the first origin of the nascent world: "Spring, he says, that was: spring the great world was experiencing, and the Euri spared the wintry blasts." Secondly, because spring is the most beautiful season of the year; and such was fitting for the happiness of the state of innocence, and in spring the world was redeemed and recreated through Christ. Thirdly, because the Council of Palestine, held under Pope Victor, in the year of Christ 198, defines this very thing. Indeed this Council approves its opinion from the word "let it bring forth": for in spring the earth begins to bring forth. The same Council teaches that the world was created at the vernal equinox, and proves this from the fact that God then divided the light from the darkness into equal parts: which division occurs at the equinox. It adds that the first day of the world was the 8th of the Kalends of April, that is the 25th of March, on which also the Blessed Virgin was announced to, and at the same time Christ was incarnate, and on which after 34 years He either suffered, or rose from the dead. It is certain that this day was a Sunday. To the argument of the Hebrews I answer that at the beginning of the world not all fruits, nor everywhere, were produced ripe on this third day; but God brought forth in plants and trees, in these indeed leaves, in those truly most pleasant flowers: in others fruits ripening, in others ripe fruits, according to the nature, quality and condition both of the plant and tree, and of each region.
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14. LET THERE BE LIGHTS IN THE FIRMAMENT. — You will ask, how was this done? Note first, that firmament here signifies not only the eighth starry heaven, but is taken for the expansion of all the celestial orbs. For the Hebrew word רקיע rakia signifies all these; and Moses speaks to unlearned Hebrews, who did not know how to distinguish these orbs. The stars are not animate. Note secondly, although Plato asserts, and St. Augustine, Enchiridion cap. LVIII, doubts whether the sun, moon and stars are animate, and use reason, and consequently whether they are ever to be blessed with men and angels: yet it is now certain that neither the heavens are rational, nor the stars; for neither the heavens nor the stars have an organic body. Again, their circular, perpetual and natural motion argues that the principle of that motion is not free, nor rational, but inanimate and wholly determined: thus St. Jerome in Isaiah xxv, and throughout the Fathers and Philosophers. Philo therefore errs in his usual manner platonizing, teaching that the stars are intelligent animals. Again Philastrius errs, when he says: It is a heresy asserting that the stars are fixed in the heaven, when it is certain that they are moved in the heaven, as birds are moved in the air, and as fish swim in water. For all Astronomers teach the contrary, namely that the stars are fixed to their orb, and move and rotate with it, namely with the eighth or sidereal heaven. The stars are distinguished in species from the orbs and planets. I suppose thirdly, that it is more true that the stars and all planets are distinguished in species from their orbs or heavens; again the stars from the planets, finally the planets from each other in species. This is proved first, because the stars and planets shine with a wonderful light which the orbs lack. Again, the stars are luminous from themselves and by their own nature. Albert denies this, Avicenna, Bede, and Pliny lib. II, cap. vi, but others assert it throughout, and experience makes it plain; for no increase or decrease of light is ever observed in them, even through a telescope, whether they approach the sun or recede from it. Secondly and rather, because they are at a very great distance from the sun, namely 76 million miles: but the power and light of the sun cannot extend that far. I speak of the stars: for it is clear that the moon does not shine from itself, but borrows its light from the sun. The same is likely true of the other planets. For I myself have clearly observed through a telescope that Venus, equally as the Moon, at fixed times of the seasons, becomes crescent-shaped, grows and wanes. Thirdly, the same is evident from the fact that the stars have wonderful influences and wonderful power over these lower things, which the orbs themselves do not have: thus Molina and others. I said that the stars differ from the planets in species: for it is likely that many stars are of the same species, namely those which have the same mode of influencing these lower things: but those which have a different mode are of a different species. This different mode is gathered from the diversity of the effect of dryness, moisture, heat, coldness, which they produce on the earth. Whence were the stars made? I say: God on this fourth day rarefied one part of the heavens, so that he might condense another, namely that luminous one which was created on the first day, and was called light, verse 3; and into that thus condensed, the form of the heavens being expelled, he introduced the new form of the sun, moon and stars: in a similar manner from the waters on the second day he made the firmament. The ancients therefore err, who thought the stars were produced from fire, and were fiery. Whence the Poet: You eternal fires, and inviolable divinity, I call to witness. And those also err, who think that the stars according to substance were produced on the first day; but on this fourth day only endowed with accidents, namely light, proper motion, and power of influencing these lower things. Will God make a new sun in the resurrection? In a similar manner Molina and others probably think, that in the resurrection God will produce another sun, which will have another form, not merely accidental, but substantial, namely one which will naturally have seven times more light than our sun has, as Isaiah says cap. xxx, 26. Again, on this fourth day God divided the orbs of the planets into their parts, or eccentric circles, concentric circles, epicycles, if there are any such things; for Aristotle denies all these, while he teaches that the planets are moved only by the motion of their orb. But the Astrologers, and Scotus with his followers, establish them, because they teach that the planets move in their orb by themselves, according to eccentrics and epicycles. In what part of the heavens was the Sun produced? Note. From what has been said in the work of the third day, it follows that the sun was produced at the beginning of Aries. Thus Bede: for then spring begins. But the Moon was produced in the opposite position of the sun, namely at the beginning of Libra. Therefore it was then a full moon, as the Council of Palestine defines above; so that the sun illuminated one hemisphere and the moon the other. Thus Molina and others. Luminaries. — In Hebrew מאורות meorot, from the root or, that is light. The sun therefore is or. From this the Egyptians called the sun and the year which is described by the course of the sun, Horum. From this the year was called by the Greeks ὥρα, from this ὥρα any primary part of the year is called, namely Spring, Autumn, Summer, Winter. From this by synecdoche they named the day, and finally a notable part of the day, which we commonly call an hour, ὥραν. See how the etymology of hour flowed from the Hebrews to the Egyptians, from these to the Greeks and Latins. Thus from Father Clavius our Voellus, book I On Horology, chapter 1. For from the Hebrews to the Egyptians and Greeks flowed all knowledge, especially Mathematics, and the reckoning of hours, and the making of clocks. Whence the first clock which we find in histories both sacred and profane, was that of Achaz, father of Ezechias king of Juda, Isaiah XXXVIII, 8. Thus Father Clavius, book I Gnomon., page 7. LET THEM DIVIDE THE DAY AND THE NIGHT, that is to say, Let them distinguish the day and the night, and thus let them indicate to men and animals soon to be produced the alternation of labor and rest. Again let them divide the day and the night, as to position and as to hemisphere, so that while in one the sun and day are, in the other may be night and the moon which presides over the night. From this place it appears that the moon was created in the opposite position of the sun, as I have said. Symbolically, Innocent III the Pontiff writing to the Emperor of Constantinople, book I of the Decretals, title XXXIII, chapter Solitae: "To the firmament of heaven, that is the universal Church, God made two great luminaries, that is He instituted two dignities, which are Pontifical authority and royal power. But that which presides over the days, that is spiritual things, is greater; but that which presides over carnal things, is lesser: so that as great as is the difference between the sun and the moon, so great may be understood the difference between Pontiffs and kings." What are the signs of these things? AND LET THEM BE FOR SIGNS, AND FOR SEASONS, AND FOR DAYS, AND FOR YEARS. — "For signs," not for the prognostications of judicial astrology, for Scripture condemns these, Isaiah XLVII, 25; Jeremiah x, 2. For although the stars by their influence change the disposition and complexion of bodies, and from this incline the soul in the same direction, they do not however necessitate it. For although the soul often imitates the complexion of the body, whence we find choleric persons to be irascible; sanguine persons to be benign; melancholic persons to be suspicious, timid, pusillanimous and envious; and phlegmatic persons to be sluggish: nevertheless the will, especially aided by grace, dominates both the body and these passions; whence we see many choleric persons to be meek, and melancholic persons to be benign and magnanimous. Therefore the wise man shall rule the stars. And so the sun and moon "shall be for signs," namely prognostications of rain, fair weather, frost, winds, etc. for example, "If on the third day from the new moon it be thin and shine with pure brightness, it foretells constant fair weather: but if it be seen thick at the horns and somewhat reddish, it threatens either impetuous and immoderate water from the clouds, or the dreadful stirring up of the South wind," says St. Basil homily 6 on the Hexaemeron; and further below: The moon moistens, as is evident both in those who sleep under the open sky and the moon, whose heads are filled beyond measure with moisture; and in the brains of animals and the marrows of trees, which grow and increase with the moon. Again the moon causes and marks the tides of the sea and their reciprocations. Secondly, let them be for signs of sowing, planting, reaping, sailing, vintage, etc. Thirdly and properly, let them be for signs of days, months and years, so that it is a hendiadys, or for signs and seasons: that is for seasonal signs, or for signs of seasons: for signs and days, that is for signs of days: for signs and years, that is for signs of years; for the year is described by one course of the sun, and one revolution through the Zodiac, but by twelve lunations. Note, by seasons here are understood spring, summer, winter and autumn. Likewise dry, hot, humid, stormy, healthful, sickly seasons: for the sun and moon are the signs and cause of these. Symbolically and anagogically, St. Augustine in book XIII of On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter XIII, in the Unfinished Work: "Let them be for signs and seasons," that is, let them distinguish seasons, which by the distinction of intervals signify that immutable eternity remains above them. For this time of ours seems to be a sign and as it were a vestige of eternity, so that from here we may learn from the sign to the thing signified, namely to ascend from time to eternity, and to say with St. Ignatius: "How does the earth seem vile to me, when I behold heaven!" Truly St. Augustine in the Sentences, Sentence 270: "Between temporal and eternal things this is the difference, that temporal things are loved more before they are possessed, but become worthless when they arrive: for the soul is not satisfied except by the true and certain eternity of incorruptible joy; but eternal things are loved more ardently when possessed than when desired, because there charity will obtain more than faith believed or hope desired." See St. Augustine's conversation on this matter with his mother Monica, book IX of the Confessions, chapter x. AND DAYS AND YEARS, that is to say, so that the sun, moon and stars may be indices of all natural days, artificial days, feast days, critical days, court days, and market days, and also of lunar years, solar years, great years, critical years, etc., concerning which Censorinus and Macrobius. Thus Basil and Theodoret.
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16. AND HE MADE TWO GREAT LIGHTS, — the sun and the moon. For although the moon is smaller than all the stars, except Mercury, yet because it is nearest and very close to the earth, hence it appears to all others to be greater, equally as the sun. Again, the moon possesses greater efficacy and power of acting upon these lower things than the other stars. Thus St. Chrysostom here, homily 6, Pererius, and P. Clavius in Sphaera cap. 1, where he teaches that the earth contains within itself the magnitude of the moon thirty-nine times. Acutely the philosopher Secundus, when asked by the Emperor Adrian: "What is the sun?" answered: "The eye of heaven, splendor without setting, the ornament of day, the distributor of hours. What is the moon? The purple of heaven, the rival of the sun, the enemy of misdeeds, the solace of travelers, the presage of storms." But Epictetus to the same Adrian: "The moon is the helper of day, the eye of night; the stars are the fates of men." But this last is the error of the Genethliacists. More excellently Ecclesiastes XLIII, 2 and seq.: "The sun," he says, "a vessel," that is an organ, an instrument, "wonderful of the Most High, burning mountains, shooting forth fiery rays. The moon, a showing of time and a sign of the age. From the moon the sign of the festival day. A vessel of the camps on high, shining gloriously in the firmament of heaven," that is to say, The stars which shine in the firmament are as it were vessels, that is the warlike arms of God. "The beauty of heaven the glory of the stars, the Lord illuminating the world on high. In the words of the holy they shall stand for judgment," that is to say, The stars of God by His precept stand for judgment, that is, to execute His sentence and command, "and they shall not fail in their watches." For the stars, as it were soldiers and watchmen of God, perpetually keep watch intent upon every nod of His. Symbolically St. Basil, homily 6 of the Hexaemeron: The moon, he says, which perpetually either waxes or wanes, is the symbol of inconstancy, and marks all human things to be in perpetual change: but the sun, always like itself, is the symbol of a constant mind. Hence the Wise man: "A holy man remains in wisdom like the sun; for a fool is changed like the moon," Ecclesiastes XXVII, 12. The wonderful vastness of the heavens, but the smallness of the earth. And the stars, — namely so that together with the moon they may preside over the night and illuminate it, Psalm CXXXV, 7. Astronomers teach that there is a wonderful height, and consequently magnitude of the celestial orbs and stars, so that the earth, which is the center of the world, in comparison with them is like a point: just as all riches, goods and earthly joys are as it were a point in comparison with heavenly things, and bear themselves as a drop to the whole sea. The sun is distant from the earth four million miles. For first, astronomers teach that the sun contains within itself the whole quantity of the earth one hundred and sixty times, and that it is distant from the earth four million miles, or leagues and more: whence it follows that the circumference and vastness of the solar orb is so great, that the sun traversing its circle in 24 hours, in one hour traverses 1,140,000 miles: which is as much as if it were to run around the circumference of the earth fifty times. For the circumference of the convex heaven of the sun contains 27 million and three hundred sixty thousand miles. Infer from these things how great God is. "For the sun and moon compared to the Creator hold the proportion of a gnat and an ant," says St. Basil, homily 6 of the Hexaemeron. The firmament is distant from the earth eighty million miles. Secondly, astronomers teach that the earth is distant from the concave of the firmament, or the eighth and starry heaven, by eighty million and a half miles: but the thickness of the firmament is the same, namely eighty million; how great therefore must be the distance, thickness and vastness of the ninth heaven, the tenth, and especially of the empyrean heaven? Each star accomplishes 42 million miles in single hours. Whence thirdly, they teach that any point of the equinoctial, and any star whatever, accomplishes in single hours 42 million miles, and moreover a third part of a million: which is as much as a horseman accomplishing 40 miles daily could accomplish in 2,904 years: again as much as if someone in one hour twice a thousand times went around and traversed the circumference of the earth. The ninth heaven accomplishes far more space, and the tenth more, which they think to be the first mobile; consider therefore how swift time is. How great is the swiftness of time? For time is as swift as the motion itself of the first mobile, of which it is the measure; time therefore is borne far more swiftly than an arrow, or than a cannonball shot from a bronze cannon: for this cannonball would need 40 days to traverse the whole circumference of the earth, which a star traverses in one hour twice a thousand times; like lightning therefore flies irrevocable time: like lightning with time we are borne and snatched away to eternity. "You sleep," says St. Ambrose in Psalm 1, "and your time" does not sleep, but "walks;" nay it flies. A millstone from the firmament to the earth in 90 years. From this fourth point, they deduce that if a millstone should begin to fall from the convex surface of the firmament toward the earth, it would require ninety years to fall and reach the earth, even if it fell two hundred miles each hour. For divide 460 million into days and years, giving each hour 200 miles, and you will find the matter to be thus. The difference of six magnitudes of stars. Fifth, they teach that there is no star in the firmament which is not eighteen times greater than the whole globe of the earth: indeed, according to the opinion of Ptolemy and Alfraganus, they divide all stars into six differences of magnitude. Stars of the first and highest magnitude are in number 17, each of which is greater than the whole earth 117 times; of the second magnitude are 45, each of which is greater than the earth 90 times; of the third magnitude are 208, each of which is greater than the earth 72 times; of the fourth magnitude are 264, each of which is greater than the earth 54 times; of the fifth magnitude are 217, each of which is greater than the earth 35 times. Of the sixth and lowest magnitude are 249, each of which is greater than the earth 18 times. The vast amplitude of the empyrean heaven. Sixth, they teach that the proportion of the whole world, contained within the concave of the firmament, to the expanse of the empyrean heaven is much smaller than the proportion of the globe of the earth to the firmament itself. Eight thousand years one would not ascend to the empyrean heaven. Seventh, from the aforesaid they deduce that if you were to live two thousand years, and each day you were to ascend directly upward at one hundred miles, and this continuously, after two thousand years you would not yet arrive at the concave of the firmament: again, after another two thousand years ascending the same distance each day, you would not arrive from the concave to the convex of the firmament: finally, after four and more thousands of years, ascending the same distance each day, you would not arrive from the convex of the firmament to the empyrean heaven. These and more things Father Christopher Clavius teaches in the Sphere, chapter 1. If therefore we were to stand on some star, and much more if in the empyrean heaven, and were to look down upon this little globe of earth, would we not exclaim: This is the point which the sons of Adam covet, like ants: this is the point which among mortals is divided by iron and fire. O how narrow are the bounds of mortals, O how narrow are the minds of mortals! "O Israel, how great is the house of God, and how vast the place of His possession!" Despise therefore this point, and look up to the vault of heaven: whatever you see here is small and brief: think of what is immense and eternal. Who, thinking on these things, would be so mad and foolish as to wish to unjustly snatch from his neighbor some small part of this point, such as a field, a house, or something else by force or fraud, and thus deprive and exclude himself from the immense spaces of the heavenly spheres? Who would prefer a point of earth to the immensity of the heavens? Who would sell a particle of earth, red or white (for gold and silver are nothing else), for the vast and radiant palaces of the stars? Are you poor? Think of heaven; are you infirm? Endure, thus one goes to the stars; are you despised, mocked, persecuted? Bear it, thus one goes to the stars; groan, strive, labor, sweat a little, thus one goes to the empyrean. Thus St. Symphorianus, a youth, when he was seized for martyrdom under the Emperor Aurelian, was encouraged by his mother with these words: "My son, my son, remember eternal life, look up to heaven, and behold Him reigning there: for your life is not taken away, but changed for the better." Inflamed by these words, he boldly offered his neck to the executioner and flew as a martyr to heaven. Thus in our age that noble matron, condemned to death in England for the sake of faith, in a horrible manner, namely lying under a sharp stone with a heavy weight imposed from above pressing her down, while her life and soul were being squeezed out, while others were horrified, she herself sang joyfully like a swan: "So brief," she said, "is the way that leads to heaven: after six hours above the sun and moon I shall be borne, I shall tread the stars beneath my feet, I shall enter the empyrean." Thus St. Vincent, lifting his mind to heaven, conquered, indeed mocked all the torments of Dacian; and when he was lifted up by him on the rack and asked in mockery where he was: "In the sublime," he said, "from which I look down upon you, swollen with earthly power, from on high;" when he threatened worse things: "You do not seem to threaten me," he replied, "but to offer what I have desired with all my prayers." Therefore, when he endured with constancy the raking of his whole body with claws, torches, and burning coals, and death itself, he said: "You labor in vain, Dacian: you cannot devise torments so horrible as I am prepared to endure. Prison, claws, burning plates, and death itself are play and jest to Christians, not torment:" for they think of heaven. Thus St. Menas, an Egyptian Martyr, when afflicted with atrocious torments, would say: "There is nothing that can be compared with the kingdom of heaven; for the whole world, weighed in an equal balance, cannot be compared to a single soul." Thus St. Apronianus, when he heard a voice sent from heaven to the Martyr Sisinnius: "Come, ye blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you from the constitution of the world;" sought baptism, and on that same day became both a Christian and a Martyr. Saints as stars. Symbolically and tropologically, the Firmament is the Holy Church, which is the firmament and pillar of truth, as the Apostle says, I Timothy III, 15, in which the sun is Christ, the moon the Blessed Virgin, the fixed stars the other Saints, who participate in their light from Christ as from the sun. Whence they are not like the planets, which sometimes hide the sun from us; but like the stars which always revere, show forth and proclaim the sun, that is Christ, and testify and glory that they have all their light from him, and with Paul, forgetting the things that are behind, always press forward in a direct course towards those that are before. Therefore, first, as the stars are in heaven, so the Saints dwell in heaven in mind and life, pray frequently and converse with God and the angels. Hence they love solitude and flee the vain conversations of men. Second, the stars, although they are greater than the whole earth, yet appear small on account of their distance and height: so the Saints are humble, and the holier they are, the more humble. Hence the stars teach us patience, as St. Augustine says in Psalm XCIV. For citing that passage of the Apostle, Philippians II: "In the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom you shine as lights in the world:" "How much," he says, "do men invent concerning these very lights and the moon? and they bear it patiently. Reproaches are made to the stars: what do they do? Are they moved, or do they not perform their courses? How much do some say concerning these very lights? and they bear it, and endure it, and are not moved. Why? because they are in heaven. So also a man who in a perverse and crooked nation has the word of God, is as a light shining in heaven." As therefore the stars do not abandon their course appointed to them by God on account of the reproaches of men: so neither should the just abandon the way of virtue on account of the revilings of men. Wherefore a pious man will not regard the mockeries of scoffers more than the moon regards the jeers of children, or the barking of dogs that bark at her. Third, the stars teach the loftiness and immobility of mind amid so many adversities, so that as it were the stars despise all things that happen in the world. For, as Augustine says in the same place: "Such great evils are committed, and yet the fixed stars in heaven do not deviate, performing their courses through the celestial tracts which their Creator established and appointed for them: so should the Saints, but if their hearts are fixed in heaven, if they imitate him who says: Our conversation is in heaven. Those therefore who are in the heavenly places, and think of heavenly things, from these very thoughts of heavenly things become patient. And whatever is committed on earth they do not care about thus, until they complete their journeys; and as they bear what happens to others, so they bear what happens to themselves, as the lights do. For he who has lost patience has fallen from heaven." Fourth, the stars shine, and illuminate the whole orb at night, and do so always with equal light: so also the Saints shine forth in the night of this age, and show the way of virtue and the path to heaven to all by word and example, and do so always with equal serenity of mind and constancy. Moreover, the light of the stars is not like the light of a candle, lamp, or torch, which is nourished by tallow, oil, or wax, and is consumed by it, and when consumed dies out. Those are similar to this who strive for virtue on account of carnal and human respects. For as soon as these cease, their virtue and devotion cease also; the Saints shine forth always as stars, because they shine from God, and for God himself: for they are intent only on pleasing God alone, and on promoting the honor of God. Fifth, the light of the stars is most pure, as are the stars themselves: so the Saints pursue chastity and angelic purity. Hence as in the stars there is nothing cloudy, dark or murky, so in the Saints there is no melancholy, no anger, no disturbance, no suspicion; because they regard all things with clear and benign eyes like the stars. They know not what simulation, fraud, or malice is: for charity thinks no evil. Wherefore they appear to be as it were sinless. Sixth, the light of the sun and stars is most swift; for in an instant it spreads and propagates itself through the whole orb: so the Saints are swift to the works of God, especially apostolic men, who run through provinces evangelizing, to whom that passage of Isaiah XVIII, 2 rightly applies: "Go, ye swift angels, to a nation rent and torn in pieces, to a people terrible, after whom there is no other." Seventh, the light of the stars is spiritual: thus spiritual is the discourse of the Saints, equally as their thought and conversation. Eighth, the light of the sun and stars, even if it illuminates sewers, dung-heaps, corpses and dungheaps, is yet not defiled or corrupted by them in the least: thus Saints conversing with sinners are not polluted by their sins, but rather illuminate them, and make them like themselves, that is, bright and holy. Ninth, the light of the sun and stars shines in such a way that it also warms: thus Saints inflame others with charity and so shine that they burn; they do not, however, burn so that they may shine, as Christ says of St. John the Baptist: "He was a burning and shining lamp," not, shining and burning, as St. Bernard rightly observes, serm. On St. John the Baptist: "For it is vain merely to shine, merely to burn is little, to burn and to shine is perfect." Finally, in heavenly glory they will shine forth as stars, as the Apostle teaches in I Corinthians xv, 41, and Daniel cap. XII, 3: "They that are learned shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that instruct many to justice, as stars for all eternity." It is added that stars hide their own substance and vast magnitude, and show only a small light like a spark. Thus Saints hide themselves and their virtues, grace and glory from men and desire to be hidden. Wherefore their works indeed shine, so that from them men may glorify God; but in such a way that they themselves show the light of their works, but conceal their own person: for they wish not to be seen, so that men, seeing the work but not seeing the author, may refer it to God, who is the Father of all lights, and may celebrate Him.
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20. LET THE WATERS BRING FORTH THE CREEPING THING AND THE FOWL. LET THEM BRING FORTH. — In Hebrew ישרצו isretsu, that is, let them bubble forth and gush out in great abundance. This word is proper to fishes and frogs, and signifies their wonderful fruitfulness, propagation and prolification. Hence on account of the abundance of moisture, fishes are unteachable and stupid, nor can they be tamed or domesticated by man, as St. Basil says in homily 7 on the Hexaemeron. Again, he says, nothing in the fish kind is armed with teeth for half its length, as the ox or sheep: for no fish ruminates except the parrotfish alone; but all are furnished with the sharpest edge of frequent teeth, lest, if delay were drawn out in grinding, the food would flow away through moisture. Some feed on slime, some on seaweed: one devours another, and the smaller is the food of the larger, and often each becomes the prey of a third. So among men the more powerful despoils the weaker, and he in turn becomes the prey of the more powerful. The crab, in order to devour the flesh of the oyster, when it opens its shell to the sun, throws a pebble into it, so that it cannot close, and thus invades and feeds upon it. Crabs are cunning thieves and robbers. The octopus adheres to any rock, takes on its color; and thus fishes swimming toward it as toward a rock, it seizes and devours. Octopuses are hypocrites, who when with the chaste pretend to be chaste, when with the impure impure, when with the gluttonous gluttonous, etc., and therefore Christ calls them rapacious wolves. Fishes say: "Let us go to the Northern sea. For indeed the water there is sweeter than in other seas, because the sun, drawing only a brief stay in it, does not exhaust with its rays all that which is drinkable. For aquatic creatures delight in sweet humors: whence it comes that they often swim to rivers, and depart far from the sea. For this reason they themselves prefer the Pontus to other seas, as more suitable for pouring forth and nourishing their offspring." Learn, O man, from the fishes providence, that you may provide for yourself concerning those things which conduce to salvation. "The sea urchin, when it has sensed a disturbance of the winds, takes up a stone not small, stabilizing itself under it as under an anchor. When sailors observe this, they presage a coming tempest. The viper seeks the nuptials of the sea-moray, and signifies its presence by hissing; and she hastens and couples with the venomous one. What does this reasoning of mine portend? Whether the husband is harsh or drunken, let the wife bear with him. But let the husband also hear: the viper vomits forth its venom out of reverence for the nuptials; do you not put aside the hardness of mind, the savagery, the cruelty out of reverence for the union? Or does the example of the viper profit us in another way? The coupling of the viper and sea-moray is a kind of adultery of nature; let those therefore learn, who lay snares for the nuptials of others, to what reptile they are similar." And from what matter were birds made? You will ask, whether birds were made from water. Cajetan and Catharinus deny it, and think that birds were made from the earth: for this seems to be asserted in chapter II, 19, and the Hebrew in this verse insinuates that only fishes were produced from water; for thus they have it word for word, "Let the waters bring forth the creeping thing (namely fishes), and let the fowl fly over the earth." But the common opinion of St. Jerome, Augustine, Cyril, Damascene and other Fathers (except Rupert), whom Pererius cites, is that both birds and fishes were produced from water, as from matter; for this is clearly taught both by our version and by the Septuagint and the Chaldean, who all understand in the Hebrew the relative pronoun אשר ascer, that is, which (for this is familiar to the Hebrews), as if it were said: "Let the waters bring forth the creeping thing and the fowl, which shall fly over the earth." To the passage Genesis II, 19, I shall respond there. Hence Philo calls birds cognate to fishes. In what way do birds and fishes agree? You will say, birds and fishes are altogether unlike and dissimilar: therefore birds do not seem to have been made from water, but only fishes. I answer, by denying the antecedent: for there is great kinship between birds and fishes, as St. Ambrose rightly teaches, book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter XIV. First, because water, which is the place of fishes, and air, which is the place of birds, are neighboring and cognate elements: for both are transparent, moist, soft, subtle, movable. Hence air easily turns into water, and conversely water is turned either into vapor and cloud: for birds are of a more airy than aqueous temperament. Second, because both birds and fishes possess lightness and agility. For what wings are to birds, fins and scales are to fishes. Hence neither birds nor fishes have a bladder, nor milk, nor breasts, lest they impede flight or swimming. Thirdly, the motion is similar in both: for what swimming is to fishes, flying is to birds, so that fishes appear to be aquatic birds, and conversely birds appear to be aerial fishes. Again, both birds and fishes direct their course and path by their tail, so that from them, and especially from the kite, men appear to have learned the art of navigation, as Pliny says in book X, chapter X. Fourthly, many birds are aquatic, such as swans, geese, ducks, coots, divers, kingfishers. Finally, St. Augustine responds, in book III of On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter III, and St. Thomas in the First Part, Question LXXI, article 1, that fishes were made from denser water; but birds truly from more subtle water, which approaches air. St. Basil then marvels how sea water is turned into salt, how coral in the sea is a plant, but when it is brought into air it is transformed into stone; how nature has impressed precious pearls in the vilest oysters; how from the blood of the vile purple fish a purple color is made, with which the garments of kings are dyed; how the remora fish, if it adheres to the keels of ships, stops them and renders them immobile even when driven by strong wind. All these things St. Basil relates in homily 7. Pliny, Plutarch, and Aldrovandus relate the same about the remora, who attribute the cause to an arcane quality imparted to the remora by nature, such as is in the magnet for attracting iron and indicating the pole. Furthermore, to all these things St. Basil teaches first, to admire the power, wisdom and munificence of God in this theater of the sea, and to render thanks to Him perpetually for so many benefits, as many as there are fishes, indeed as many as drops in the sea. Secondly, he shows how we ought to draw fitting lessons for life from fishes and other animals and individual creatures, and accommodate all their gifts and actions to the formation of morals: for they have been given to man by God equally as a mirror and as an aid. Thus the Wise Man in Proverbs VI, 6, sends the idle man to the ants: "Go, he says, to the ant, O sluggard, and consider her ways, and learn wisdom, which though she have no guide, nor master, nor prince, prepareth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest." REPTILE HAVING A LIVING SOUL, — that is, a reptile having a living soul, or the soul of a sentient animal. He calls fishes reptiles, because fishes do not have feet, but lie on their belly in the waters, as if creeping and swimming. Amphibians are to be referred to fishes. Refer amphibians to fishes, such as beavers, otters, hippopotamuses; which although they have feet, they do not walk with them when they are in waters, but use them swimming as oars.
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21. AND GOD CREATED GREAT WHALES. "Whales" in Hebrew are called תנינים tanninim, which signifies dragons, and all huge animals, both terrestrial and aquatic, such as whales, which are as it were aquatic dragons. Thus the name whales is common to all great and cetacean fishes, as Gesner teaches. The Jews by tanninim understand the greatest whales, of which they say only two were created (lest if there were more, they would devour all the fishes and absorb all the ships), namely the female, which God killed and reserves for the just to feast upon at the time of the Messiah; and the male, which He reserves, so that with him He may play at certain hours each day, according to that Psalm CIV: This dragon which Thou hast formed to play with him, in Hebrew, that Thou mayest play with him. They took this fable from book IV of Esdras, chapter VI, as Lyra and Abulensis relate. These are the ravings of those wise men. Note on great whales: for when they raise their back above the waters, they exhibit the appearance of a huge island, says St. Basil and Theodoret. AND EVERY LIVING AND MOVING SOUL. — "And" here signifies, that is, as if he were to say: God created every living animal in waters, which namely has in itself a principle of motion, namely a soul, by which it can move itself by its own will, and therefore is called moving.
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22. AND HE BLESSED THEM, SAYING: INCREASE AND MULTIPLY. To bless in God's manner is to do good; and God did good to the fishes and birds, precisely by granting them appetite, power and ability to generate their like, so that since they themselves as individuals cannot remain forever but die, they may at least remain in their offspring, and thus have a kind of eternity: for all things desire their own preservation and eternity; whence, explaining this, he adds: "Increase," not in magnitude (for they received this in due measure at their first creation), but, as it is in Hebrew, פרו, that is, be fruitful, or proliferate, so that you may multiply in number; and you, O fishes, fill the waters. Why is the fertility of fishes greater than that of birds? For the fertility of fishes is greater than that of birds; and that of birds is greater than that of terrestrial animals; because, as Aristotle says, in book III of the Generation of Animals, chapter XI, the moisture in which fishes abound has a nature more suited to forming and shaping, than earth. Add to this, that fishes and birds generate through eggs, which multiply more easily in the womb than the offspring which terrestrial animals carry in the uterus. Whence God is read to have blessed birds and fishes, but not terrestrial animals: although, as St. Augustine rightly observes, in book III of Genesis according to the Letter, chapter XIII, what is expressed in one should equally be understood in the other. But God is read to have blessed man, both because man is lord of all animals, and because man was to be disseminated through all provinces of the earth, since other animals, each in their own lands, do not naturally sustain themselves elsewhere. Is the phoenix a unique bird? You will say: The phoenix is a unique bird in the world: therefore in it the saying "increase and multiply" is not true. I answer to the premise: Many of the ancients asserted that the phoenix exists, not so much from certain knowledge as from common report. But later philosophers and natural scientists, who have written exactly about birds, among whom the last and most exact is Ulysses Aldrovandus, hold the phoenix to be a fable, and demonstrate by many arguments that it does not exist, nor ever did exist. The phoenix, therefore, is a bird not real but symbolic, as I shall show in chapter VII, verse 2. St. Basil, in homily 8 of the Hexaemeron, and from him St. Ambrose, in book V of the Hexaemeron, describes and marvels at, first, the industry of bees in constructing honeycombs, gathering honey, arranging it, guarding it, etc. Second, the watches of cranes, which they keep by night in turn, so that they may relieve the others sleeping and guard them. For when the appointed time is completed, the one which has kept watch, emitting a cry, composes itself to sleep; another succeeds, and renders to the rest the security of watch which it has received. They fly in a certain order as if arrayed in battle: one as it were leads as commander, which, when the appointed time has completed its duty, turns itself to the rear of the whole column, and resigns the duty of leading to the one which follows next. Third, the customs of storks, which at a fixed time fly to and fly away; ravens lead them; and they protect themselves against other birds. The sign of protection afforded is that ravens return with wounds. Again, storks, when their parents grow old, warm them wrapped in their own wings, supply them with food abundantly, and lift them up on both sides with their wings. "This is the conveyance of piety," says St. Ambrose. Fourth, let no one bewail his own poverty, if he considers the swallow, which for building its nest picks up straw in its mouth and carries it: but since it cannot carry mud with its feet (for it has them so short and small that it seems to have none; and therefore it scarcely stands but almost always flies), it wets the extremities of its wings with water, then rolling itself in dust, in this way forms mud for itself, with which it constructs its nest, and there, having laid eggs, it hatches chicks; if any of these has its eyes injured, it knows how to restore them with the herb celandine. Fifth, the halcyon near the seashore in the middle of winter, when winds and storms rage, lays eggs, and then immediately the winds and storms are silenced and lulled to sleep, and the seas are calmed for seven whole days, during which the halcyon incubates the eggs and hatches the chicks, and then seven other serene days follow, during which it nourishes the chicks. Whence sailors navigate safely at that time. Hence also poets call tranquil and serene days halcyon days. The halcyon teaches us to hope in God: for if he himself grants such serenity to one little bird, what will he not grant to man who calls upon him? Fifth, the turtledove, when its mate dies, joining itself to no other, teaches widows to remain chaste, and not to aspire to the marriage of another man. Sixth, the eagle is harsh toward her young, soon abandoning them, indeed sometimes casting them out of the nest: hence it is a symbol of parents cruel toward their children. On the contrary, those kind toward their children are like quails, which accompany their young already flying and supply them with nourishment for some time. Seventh, vultures are long-lived (for they generally live a hundred years), and they give birth without copulation. You may object these to the Gentiles, who say: How could the Blessed Virgin, remaining a virgin, give birth to Christ? St. Ambrose has the same thing, book V of the Hexameron, chapter XX. Indeed, Aelianus, book II of On Animals, chapter XL; Horus, book I, Hieroglyphics; Isidorus, book XII; Origen, chapter VII, and others whom Aldrovandus cites in his work on the vulture, relate that all vultures are females, and that they conceive and generate without a male from the wind. But that all these things are fabulous is taught by Albert the Great, and from him by Aldrovandus, book III of Ornithology, page 244. For vultures are perfect animals, which all enjoy both sexes by the common law of nature, and by this they generate and propagate themselves, as do other birds. Moreover, vultures are strong in smell, and they scent carcasses situated a hundred miles away, indeed across the sea, and fly to them: indeed they even seem to presage slaughter; whence in great flocks they follow armies and camps. Eighth, the bat is a quadruped, and yet winged, as it were a bird: whence it gives birth to an animal, as a quadruped does; and it has wings, not distinct in feathers, but continuous like a leathery membrane. Those who are like these and owls are those who are wise in vain things, not true and solid ones; for just as owls, their sight is dulled when the sun shines; but it is sharpened by darkness and gloom itself. Ninth, the rooster, a sentinel, awakens you in the morning so that you may rise to accomplish your works, calling out with a sharp voice, and by his song proclaiming the sun still coming from afar, and awakening travelers in the morning, and leading his own to their labors and the harvest to farmers from their homes. Tenth, the goose is ever-watchful and most acute in perceiving things that escape others. Whence once at Rome the geese guarded the Capitol against the Gauls, enemies creeping in, by their cries awakening the sleeping guards. For this reason St. Ambrose, book V of the Hexameron, chapter XIII: "Deservedly, he says, Rome, you owe to them that you reign. Your gods slept, and the geese kept watch. Therefore in those days you sacrifice to the goose, not to Jupiter. Let your gods yield to the geese, by whom they know themselves to be defended, lest they themselves be captured by the enemy." Eleventh, an army of locusts under one command, all lifted up together into the heights, with camps spread wide over the field, does not consume the fruits before this has been granted by God, and as it were commanded. God suggests the remedy, which is the seleucis bird, which flying in formation devours the locusts. Moreover, what and of what kind is the manner of the cicada's singing? At midday it applies itself more to singing, by the drawing of air, which happens when the breast expands, producing sound. Twelfth, insects (such as bees, wasps), so called because they show everywhere certain fissures, or incisions, lack a lung, and therefore do not breathe, but are nourished by air in all parts of their body. For which reason if they have been soaked in olive oil, that is oil pressed from olives, with their passages closed they perish: if you immediately sprinkle them with vinegar, with their openings unclosed they revive. Thirteenth, ducks, geese and other birds that swim have feet not split, but continuous, and spread like a membrane, so that they may swim and float more easily. The swan, immersing its long neck into deep water, practicing fishing, hunts fish. A type of the Resurrection in silkworms. Fourteenth, silkworms are an argument and type of the Resurrection. For in these first from seed is born a worm, from this comes a caterpillar, from the caterpillar a silkworm, which fills itself with mulberry leaves, and being full spins threads of silk, which it draws from its own entrails, and enclosing itself in the ball made dies, and when it emerges revives, and having conceived wings becomes a butterfly, and leaving the seed in the ball flies away. This is from Basil. Add birds wonderfully melodious, the parrot, the blackbird, the wren, and especially the nightingale, which being small seems to be nothing other than a voice, indeed music, concerning which St. Ambrose, book V of the Hexameron, chapter XX: "Whence for me, he says, the voice of the parrot, and the sweetness of blackbirds? Would that at least the nightingale sing, which awakens the sleeper from sleep. For that bird is accustomed to signify the rising of the coming day, and to bring forth more abundant joy at dawn;"; the same, chapter V: "How, he says, do coots, who delight in the deep sea, fleeing what you have sensed of the sea's commotion, play in the shallows? The very heron, which is accustomed to cling to marshes, abandons its known seats, and fearing rains, flies above the clouds, so that it cannot feel the storms of the clouds."
Concerning the Work of the Sixth Day The sixth day gave inhabitants to the earth, just as the fifth gave inhabitants to the water and air. But to fire no inhabitants were given: for neither the salamander nor any other animal can live or endure in fire, as Galen teaches in book III of On Temperaments, and Dioscorides in book II, chapter LVI, where Mattioli says he himself experienced this, and threw many salamanders into fire, which were quickly consumed. Thus the pyraustae or lampyrides, which are somewhat larger than flies, live in fire only for a brief time; for they are born in the copper furnaces in Cyprus, and in them they leap and walk through the fire, and soon flying away from the flame they die, as Aristotle testifies in book V of the History of Animals, chapter XIX.
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24. LET THE EARTH BRING FORTH A LIVING SOUL,—living animals; this is a synecdoche. Again, "let the earth bring forth," not as if it were the efficient cause: for that was God alone, but as the material cause, as if to say: Let animals arise, emanate, emerge, come forth from the earth. Were all species of all animals created on the sixth day? You may ask whether all terrestrial animal species whatsoever were created by God on this sixth day? I answer first, that all terrestrial animal species whatsoever that are perfect and homogeneous, that is, which can be born through the union of male and female from one species only, were created on this day: thus the Interpreters and Scholastics teach everywhere. And it is proved, because the perfection of the universe required this. For God in these six days perfectly created and adorned this entire universe; whence it follows that in these six days he created all things, that is, the species of all things. And hence it is said that on the seventh day he ceased, namely from the production of new species. Venomous beasts also were created. I say secondly, that consequently on this sixth day all venomous beasts, such as serpents, and those hostile and carnivorous to one another, such as the wolf and the sheep, were created, and thus were created with this enmity and antipathy: for this antipathy is natural to them. And so before the sin of Adam the nature of the wolf was hostile to the sheep, and would have brought it death: yet God's providence would have prevented this from happening before the species was sufficiently propagated, so that it would not perish. Thus St. Thomas, I part., Question LXIX, article 1, to 2, and St. Augustine, book III of Genesis Interpreted Literally, chapter XVI, although he himself seems to retract this in book I of Retractions, chapter X, and to assert that it pertains to the natural order that all beasts feed on herbs, according to what is said in Genesis 1:30; but that from man's disobedience it came to pass that some feed on others. Pererius holds the same view, and Abulensis, in chapter XIII, where he treats this at length. Gregory of Nyssa seems to hold the same opinion, oration 2 On the Procreation of Man. Junilius teaches this expressly: "From the fact," he says, "that God said: Behold I have given you every herb, it is clear that the earth brought forth nothing harmful, and no poisonous herb, and no barren tree. Second, that neither did the birds of prey live by preying on weaker birds, nor did the wolf scout out ambushes around the sheepfolds, nor was dust bread to the serpent; but all things fed together concordantly on herbs and the fruits of trees." But what I said before is more true. The reasons why God created venomous things are: first, so that the universe would be complete in all kinds of things; second, so that from them the goodness of others might shine forth: for good shines forth when opposed to evil; third, because they themselves are useful for medicines and other uses. Thus from the viper is made theriac. Thus Damascene, book II of the Faith, chapter XXV. See St. Augustine, book I of Genesis Against the Manichaeans, XVI. Why also they are born from putrefaction. I say thirdly, that tiny animals which are born from sweat, exhalation or putrefaction, such as fleas, mice and other small worms, were not created formally on this sixth day, but potentially, and as it were in seminal form; because namely those animals were created on this day, from whose certain condition these were naturally going to arise: thus St. Augustine, book III of Genesis Interpreted Literally, chapter XIV, although St. Basil seems to teach the contrary here in homily 7. Certainly fleas and similar worms, which are now in men, would then have been created contrary to the most blessed state of innocence. Note, that in small animals equally, and sometimes even more, the magnificence of God shines forth, as in large ones. Hear Tertullian, book I Against Marcion, chapter XIV: "But when you also mock the smaller animals, which the greatest artificer has purposely enlarged in ingenuity or strength, thus teaching to prove greatness in mediocrity, as he proves virtue in weakness, according to the Apostle; imitate, if you can, the buildings of bees, the dwellings of ants, the nets of spiders, the threads of silkworms; endure, if you can, those very beasts of your bed and mat, the poisons of beetles, the stings of flies, the trumpet and lance of the gnat: what will be greater, when you are helped or harmed by such small things, that you should not despise the creator even in small things?" Thus Chrysippus, as Plutarch testifies in book V of Nature, said that bugs and mice are very useful to man; for by bugs we are roused from sleep, and by mice we are reminded to take care in placing things. St. Augustine expounds upon Psalm CXLVIII: "Let your charity attend," he says, "to this: who arranged the members of a flea and a gnat, so that they have their order, have their life, have their motion? Consider one small creature, the briefest and most minute you wish: if you consider the order of its members, and the animation of the life by which it moves, it flees death for its own sake, loves life; it desires pleasures, avoids troubles, exerts diverse senses, thrives in motion suited to itself. Who gave the gnat its sting, by which it sucks blood? How thin is the tube by which it draws it? Who arranged these things? Who made these things? You shudder at the smallest things, praise the great." Nor hybrids. I say fourth, hybrids, namely animals which are generated from the intercourse of diverse species, such as a mule from a mare and an ass, a lynx from a wolf and a doe, a tityrus from a he-goat and a sheep, a leopard from a lioness and a leopard—these, I say, it is not necessary to say were created on this sixth day: and in fact it is certain that not all of these were created then. Thus Rupertus, Molina and others, although Pererius here holds the contrary opinion. This is proved first, because in Africa new species of monsters are daily arising, and more will arise hereafter, and can arise from new mixtures of other and other species, whether of animals. Second, because this mixture is contrary to nature and adulterous, whence it was forbidden to the Jews, Leviticus XIX, 19. Third, because these animals are sufficiently reckoned as created when the other species were created, from whose mixture these were afterwards to be born. Fourth, because the Hebrews teach concerning mules in Genesis XXXVI, 24, that they were discovered by Anan in the desert far after this sixth day of the world, from the intercourse of mares with asses. ACCORDING TO THEIR KIND,—according to their kind, namely according to their species, as follows, that is to say, Let the earth bring forth living creatures, according to each single species of them: or, let the earth bring forth each single species of terrestrial animals. St. Basil enumerates and contemplates these species, homily 9 of the Hexaemeron, and St. Ambrose following him, book VI of the Hexaemeron, chapter IV, where among other things he says: "The bear lying in wait, although, as Scripture says, it is full of fraud, nevertheless is said to bring forth shapeless offspring in the womb, but to shape the newborns with its tongue, and to form them into its own likeness and image: can you not form your sons to be like yourself?" Affected by the same grievous calamity, and wounded with wounds, it knows how to heal itself, with an herb, which is called phlomos, placing its wounds beneath it, so that they may be healed by touch alone. The serpent also by eating fennel repels blindness except. The tortoise, having fed on the entrails of a serpent, when it perceives the poison creeping in itself, exercises oregano as the medicine of its salvation. You would see also the fox healing itself with a tear of pine. The Lord cries out in Jeremiah VIII: The turtle dove and the swallow and the sparrows of the field have kept the time of their coming; but my people have not known the judgments of the Lord. The ant also knows how to explore the times of fair weather: for foreseeing moist fruits, it carries them out, so that they may be dried by the constant sun. Oxen when rain is impending know to keep themselves at the manger, otherwise they look out, and stretch their necks beyond the manger, so that they may testify that they wish to go out, because a clearer breeze is about to come. "The sheep at the approach of endless winter insatiably snatches grass for food, because it foresees the harshness and sterility of the coming winter. The hedgehog, if it has sensed any snares, closes itself with its spines, and gathers itself into its own weapons, so that whoever thinks to touch it may be wounded. The same, foreseeing the future, fortifies itself with two breathing passages, so that when it knows Boreas is about to blow, it may block the Northern one: when it knows the clouds are to be driven away by the South wind, it may betake itself to the Northern one, so that it may decline the blasts that are contrary, and harmful from the opposite direction. How magnified are thy works, O Lord! thou hast made all things in wisdom." He adds concerning the tigress, which pursues the robber of her cubs, and when she sees herself near, he casts a glass sphere. But she is deceived by the image of herself (which she sees reflected in the glass, and thinks to be her cub), and as if about to nurse her offspring, she sits down: thus deceived by the study of piety, she both loses her vengeance and her offspring. The savage tigress therefore teaches how much parents ought to love their children, and not provoke them to wrath. He proceeds then to dogs, which by wonderful sagacity scent out the hare from its tracks, and pursue it. He brings examples of dogs, who have detected and avenged the murderers of their masters, and adds: "What worthy return do we make to our creator, whose food we eat, and we dissemble injuries, and often to the enemies of God we exhibit the feasts which we have received from God?" A lamb calls its absent mother with frequent bleating, so as to stir forth her answering voice; although it wanders among many thousands of sheep, it recognizes the voice of its parent, and hastens to its mother; she also, among many thousands of lambs, recognizes her only son by a silent testimony of affection. The shepherd errs in distinguishing sheep, but the lamb cannot err in recognizing its mother. Not yet does the puppy have teeth, and yet as if it had them, it seeks to avenge itself with its own mouth. Not yet does the stag have horns, and yet it does not accept the forehead and gait of the others, but leads the way, and from that which it has not yet experienced, it disdains; for it neither approaches yesterday's fodder, nor ever returns to the remnants of its hunting. The panther is violent, impetuous and swift, and therefore flexible and agile. The bear is very sluggish, solitary and cunning. BEASTS OF BURDEN,—domestic and tame animals: for these are called in Hebrew בהמות behemot, and are opposed to beasts, that is to wild beasts of the earth, which the Greeks here translate as θηρία. What the work of six days signifies tropologically. Tropologically, the work of creation of six days signifies the work of justification of man. Therefore on the first day light is created, that is, illumination is infused into the sinner, by which he may see the foulness of sin, and the danger of his state and eternity; on the second day the firmament is made, that is, fear of God and judgment is given to the sinner, which divides the waters above, that is the rational appetite, from those below, that is from the sensitive appetite, so that although he may desire earthly things by sense, he may nevertheless be borne by spirit toward heavenly things; on the third day the earth, that is, man covered with water, that is concupiscence, is uncovered, so that, although he may have it, he is not nevertheless overwhelmed by it, and he may feel it, but not consent to it: thence it brings forth the shoots of virtues; on the fourth day the sun is made, that is, charity is given to man; and the moon, that is illustrious faith; and Hesperus, that is hope; and Saturn, that is temperance; and Jupiter, that is justice; and Mars, that is fortitude; and Mercury, that is prudence: with other stars, that is virtues; on the fifth and sixth days living creatures are made, first, fishes, that is good men, but most imperfect, because immersed in worldly cares; second, beasts of burden, that is more perfect men, who live spiritually on the earth; third, birds, that is most perfect men, who, despising all things, fly with their whole affection like birds toward heaven: thus according to Eucherius, Origen and Hugh, Pererius. See St. Bernard, sermon 3 On Pentecost. Symbolically, Junilius adapts these six days to six ages of the world. There follows the creation of man, namely: A creature holier than these was lacking, and one capable of a lofty mind, and which could have dominion over the rest: Man was born. Therefore God says:
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LET US MAKE MAN TO OUR IMAGE AND LIKENESS. Here the mystery of the Holy Trinity is understood. Note here the mystery of the Holy Trinity: for by these words God the Father speaks, not to the angels, as if He were commanding them to fabricate the human body and the sensitive soul for themselves, and reserving to Himself alone the fabrication of the rational soul, as Plato wished in the Timaeus, and Philo, in the book On the Work of Six Days, and the Jews; for the holy Fathers detest this as impious: St. Basil, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Cyril in book I Against Julian, and Augustine in book XVI of The City of God, chapter VI; for God created not through angels, but through Himself both the body and the soul of man, as is evident from chapter II, verse 7 and 21; hence He does not say here, make, but let us make to the image, not yours, O angels, but ours. Therefore God the Father here addresses His Son and the Holy Spirit, as it were His colleagues, of the same nature, power and operation with Himself. Thus St. Basil, Rupert and others above; indeed the Council of Sirmium in Hilary, in the book On Synods, pronounces anathema on those who explain this passage otherwise. Twelve excellences of man. Note secondly the excellence of man: for God deliberates and takes counsel concerning the creation of man, as of a great thing, saying: Let us make man; thus Rupert. For man is the first image of the uncreated world, that is of the Holy Trinity, and a testimony of its infinite art and wisdom, and the most perfect work; of the created world, however, man is the end, the compendium, the bond and nexus: for man has in himself and binds together all the grades of spiritual and corporeal things, and therefore he is and is called the Microcosm, and by Plato is called the Horizon of the universe, because he determines and joins together in himself the upper hemisphere, namely heaven and angels, and the lower, namely earth and brutes; for man is in part similar to angels, in part to brutes. Thus life, and this our time is the horizon of eternity: because it determines blessed eternity, which is in the heavens, from miserable eternity, which is in hell, and participates in something from both. Beautifully St. Clement, book VII of the Apostolic Constitutions, chapter XXXV: "The end," he says, "of creation, a living being partaking of reason, a citizen of the world, you made with the moderation of your wisdom, when you said: Let us make man to our image and likeness; you made, I say, that man should be κοσμου κοσμος, that is, the ornament of the ornament, whose body you formed from the four first elements, but the soul from nothing, and you gave five senses for the contest of virtue; and you set the mind itself of the soul, as it were a charioteer, over the senses." Secondly, because through Christ man all creatures alike, which in man as in a microcosm, as I have already said, are contained, were to be deified: see therefore how great is the dignity of man. Thirdly, because on account of man, and with man, as the world was created, so also in the resurrection it will be renewed. Fourthly, the supreme mystery of faith, namely the Holy Trinity and indivisible unity, was first revealed in the generation of man, which afterwards in the regeneration of the same man, namely in baptism, was to be openly declared and professed; for those words, let us make and ours, signify the Trinity; but those words indicate unity: God said, God made, etc. Fifthly, animals and plants are said to be generated from earth and water: but God alone fashioned and formed the body of man, and gave to it the rational soul created by Himself from nothing. Sixthly, man was made by God the ruler and prince of all animals, even the greatest, and as it were the king of the whole world. Seventhly, God assigned to man for dwelling and recreation a paradise, furnished with delights and every abundance of things. Eighthly, God created man endowed with such integrity of mind and innocence, that the mind was subject to God, and the senses to reason, and the body to the soul, and all living creatures were subject to the dominion of man: hence it came about that he did not blush when naked. Ninthly, Adam imposed fitting names on all living creatures; whence shines forth his supreme knowledge and wisdom, so that the living creatures themselves, as it were, recognized and professed that they had man as their king and lord. Tenthly, he had an immortal body, so that if he obeyed God, after living a very long age on earth, he would be transferred from earthly life to the heavenly and eternal life, free from death and all evils. Eleventhly, God distinguished man with the gift of prophecy, when He said: "This now is bone of my bones." Twelfthly, God often appeared to man under human form, and addressed him familiarly. Note thirdly, God furnished this palace of the world, as it were a certain banquet, says Nyssenus, or rather as a splendid triclinium, with all things which were suitable for use, enjoyment and knowledge; and then finally He brought into it thus adorned and created man, as it were who would be the apex, end and lord of all things. See St. Ambrose, epistle 38 to Horont., and Nazianzenus, oration 43, and Nyssenus, book On the Making of Man. Rightly therefore St. Bernard, sermon 1 On the Annunciation: "What," says he, "was lacking to man at first, whom mercy guarded, truth taught, justice ruled, peace cherished?" Moreover Diogenes, as witness Plutarch, book On Tranquility of Soul, and Philo, book I On Monarchy, teach that the world is as it were a sacred and beautiful temple of God, into which man was brought, that he might be its priest, and perform the priesthood for all creatures, and give thanks to God for all and each of the benefits bestowed upon them, and render Him propitious to them, that He might add good things and repel evils. Hence "in the robe of judgment, which he had," Aaron the high priest of the Old Testament, "the whole world was," Wisdom XVIII, 24. Hear Lactantius, book On the Wrath of God, chapter XIV: "It follows that I show why God made man. As He contrived the world on account of man, so He made man on account of Himself, as the priest of His divine temple, the spectator of the works and things of heaven. For He alone is one who, being sentient and capable of reason, can understand God, who can admire His works, perceive His virtue and power, etc. Therefore He alone received speech, and language the interpreter of thought, that he might be able to declare the majesty of his Lord." Furthermore St. Ambrose, epistle 38 already cited, teaches that man was created last, that he might have subject to him all the riches of the world, all flying things, terrestrial things, even fishes, etc., and might be as it were king of the elements, and through these as through steps might ascend to the royal palace of heaven. And finally he concludes elegantly: "Rightly therefore the last, as it were the sum of the whole work, as it were the cause of the world, for which all things were made, as it were the inhabitant of all elements: he lives among beasts, swims with fishes, flies above birds, converses with angels; he inhabits the earth, and serves in heaven; he ploughs the sea, feeds on air; tiller of the soil, traveller of the deep, fisher in the waves, fowler in the air, heir in heaven, co-heir with Christ." "Man." — Man here is not the idea of man abstract and universal, which might be the cause and exemplar of all singular men, as Philo wished from Plato. Nor is man here the soul of man, that is to say, Let us adorn the soul of man with our image, namely grace, as St. Basil and Ambrose explain. But man is Adam himself, the first man, and parent of all others, as is evident from what has been said: for in Adam, and through Adam God made and created other men. "In His image and likeness" — The image of God in man. IN HIS IMAGE AND LIKENESS. — You will ask, in what does this image of God, expressed in man, consist? The Anthropomorphites, whose author was Audaeus; whence they are also called Audaeans, thought that man is the image of God according to the body, and therefore that God is corporeal; but this is heresy. Secondly, Oleaster and Eugubinus in the Cosmopoeia think that God here assumed human form, that He might create man in its likeness; but this is equally frigid and novel. Note first, that image here is taken for exemplar, that is to say, Let us make man according to our exemplar, so that as an image of us, as of its exemplar, he might reflect and represent it. This image is not the divine Word, or the Son, who is the image of the Father, as some explain; but it is the divine essence itself, and God Himself one and triune: for to the image of this man was created. Wherefore what Rupertus takes image to mean the Son, and likeness the Holy Spirit, is mystical. It can however secondly be taken properly, that image here is a Hebraism, that is to say, Let us make man in the image, that is, that he might be the image of us, as of his exemplar. Are image and likeness distinguished here? Note secondly, many distinguish image here from likeness, namely so that image pertains to nature, likeness to virtues. Thus St. Basil, homily 10 of the Hexaemeron: "By the image impressed upon my soul," he says, "I obtained the use of reason; but having become a Christian, I am surely made like unto God;" St. Jerome, on that passage of Ezechiel chapter XXVIII: Thou art the seal of likeness, thus says: "And it should be noted that the image was made then (in creation) only, the likeness is completed in baptism;" and St. Chrysostom, homily 9 on Genesis: "He said image, on account of the reason of dominion; likeness, so that according to human strength we might become like unto God in meekness, gentleness, etc., which Christ also says: Be ye therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect." The same doctrine is taught by St. Augustine, book Against Adimantus, chapter V; Eucherius, book I on Genesis; Damascene, book II On the Faith, XII; St. Bernard, sermon 1 On the Annunciation, where he also adds: "The image indeed can be burned in hell, not consumed, it burns but is not erased. Likeness is not so; but either it remains in good, or, if the soul has sinned, it is miserably changed, made like unto senseless beasts." Thus therefore through sin the likeness of God perishes in man, not the image. But I say they are not distinguished, and that it is a hendiadys, as if to say: To the image and likeness, that is, to the image of likeness, as is found in Wisdom chapter II, verse 24, that is, to an image that is like, or most like. Hence Scripture uses these names promiscuously, now one, now the other, now both. Man is the shadow of God. Note thirdly, for image in Hebrew is צלם tselem, which signifies shadow, or an adumbration of a thing. For the root צלל tsalal signifies to overshadow, hence צל tsel signifies shadow, and tselem, an image that adumbrates. Just as the shadow of a body, so the image of its prototype is a certain adumbration. Therefore tselem hints that man with respect to God is merely a shadow, or a shadowy image. For God has a solid and constant essence; man truly has a shadowy and evanescent one: and this is what is said in Psalm XXXVIII: "All vanity is every man living, yet in the image (Hebrew בצלם betselem, in shadow, that is like a shadow) man passes away." Note fourthly, man is not the image of God as God is, that is as to the proper attributes of God (for man is not omnipotent, immense, eternal, omniscient, as God is), but only as to the common attributes, which he himself communicates to an intellectual creature. Note fifthly, this image of God is not in man alone, as Theodoret wishes, but also in the angel, and in woman, as St. Augustine teaches at length, book XII On the Trinity VII, and Basil here homily 10, explaining those words of Genesis I: "Male and female he created them." The image of God is situated in the mind of man. I say first: this image of God is situated in the mind of man, or in that by which man is in the highest degree of things, in which God and angel are, namely in that man is of an intelligent nature, and is a rational animal: for through reason, mind and intellect man most of all reflects God, and is most like to him before other creatures. From this rational nature six eminent gifts and properties of man follow, in which now one, now another the Fathers sometimes place this image of God, namely partially and incompletely. Six eminent gifts of man in which man is the image of God. The first is that the soul of man is incorporeal and individual, as God himself is: in this St. Augustine places the image of God. The second is that it is eternal and immortal: in this Origen places it. The third is that it is endowed with intellect, will and memory: in this Damascene places it. The fourth is that it is of free will: in this St. Ambrose places it. The fifth is that it is capable of wisdom, virtue, grace, blessedness, the vision of God and all good: hence in this capacity Nyssenus places the image of God. The sixth is that it presides over and has dominion over all animals by its power: in this St. Basil places it. Add seventhly, just as in God all things are and are contained eminently, so also all things are in man eminently, as I said at the beginning of this verse. Again, man by understanding becomes as it were all things, as Aristotle says, because he forms for himself the images and likenesses of all things in imagination and mind. Four other properties and excellences of man. Eighth, man is in a certain way almighty like God; because he can form and comprehend many things by art, and all things by his mind. Again, man is the end of all creatures, just as God is their end. Ninth, just as the soul rules the body, and is wholly in the whole, and wholly in each of its parts: so also God is wholly in the whole world, and wholly in each part of the world. Tenth and most perfectly, just as God the Father, knowing himself through the intellect, produces the Word, namely the Son, and loving him produces the Holy Spirit: so man, understanding himself, produces in his mind an intelligible word, expressive of himself, and like unto himself, and thence proceeds in his will the love of the same: for thus man clearly represents the Holy Trinity. Thus St. Augustine, book X On the Trinity, chapter X, and book XIV, chapter XI. The natural image of God cannot be lost through sin. This image of God in man is therefore natural, which cannot be lost through sin; for it is impressed upon his nature intimately and indelibly, so that it cannot be lost unless the nature itself be lost. Thus against Origen teaches St. Augustine, book II of the Retractations, chapter XXIV. Impious therefore and foolish is the opinion of Matthias Illyricus the Lutheran, saying that the image of God in man through sin is so corrupted that man is substantially transformed into a living and substantial image of the devil: this very thing he maintains to be original sin itself, he and his followers stubbornly defend in the book On Original Sin. Concerning the supernatural image of God in man. I say secondly: there is also another image of God in man, namely the supernatural, which is situated in the grace and justification of man, by which he becomes a partaker of the divine nature, and which shall be confirmed and perfected in glory and eternal life. "For grace is the soul of the soul," says St. Augustine; that Adam was created in this grace, and that this also is to be understood literally here as the image of God, is evident from Colossians III, 10; Ephesians IV, 24. Thus the Fathers everywhere. This image depends upon the will of man, and is lost when it sins, but is repaired and reformed through grace and justification. Whence the Apostle in Ephesians chapter IV, 23: "Be renewed," he says, "in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth." The original justice of Adam. Note here, that Adam at the first instant of his creation, together with infused grace, had all the theological and moral virtues infused at the same time: likewise there was given to him original justice, which besides the habits of virtues already mentioned, was the constant assistance and maintenance of God; by which it came to pass that all movements of disordered appetite, or of concupiscence, preceding reason, were prevented; and that appetite was subject to reason, and reason to God in all things; and thus man enjoyed in all things internal peace, rectitude and holiness; whence he would have conceived no disordered sadness, anger, concupiscence, or other turbulent passion from anything, and this justice and integrity Adam, had he not sinned, would have transmitted to his posterity. Concerning original justice see Molina, Pererius, Aretinus and others. I say thirdly, in the body of man properly there is not an image of God, but nevertheless in it there shines forth in a certain way and gleams, because namely the body of man is an image of the mind: for the upright stature, and the face raised toward heaven, indicates a mind that is the ruler of the body, sown from a heavenly origin, and similar to God, capable of eternity and divinity, and ought to look toward and aspire to things above. "For if glass is worth so much, how much is a pearl worth?" if such is the body, what sort ought the soul to be? thus St. Augustine, book VI On Genesis according to the letter, chapter XII, and Bernard, sermon 24 on the Canticles. By the upright stature therefore man is admonished that he ought not to pursue earthly things, as beasts do, whose whole pleasure is from the earth: whence all beasts are prone and prostrate toward the belly; hence the Poet: And whereas other animals look down upon the earth, He gave to man a lofty face, and commanded him to gaze upon heaven And to raise his upright countenance toward the stars. To heaven therefore we are born, to heaven we are created: this is our end, this is our aim: if we wander from this, we are men in vain, we have looked up to heaven and the sun in vain; it would have been better to have been beasts or stones: but if we attain it, we are blessed thrice and four times over. Let this therefore be for us, as equally for St. Bernard, a perpetual stimulus to a pure and holy life: Bernard, tell why are you here? why do you gaze upon heaven? why have you received a rational and immortal soul? In other creatures there is a certain vestige of God. I say fourth, in other creatures there is not an image, but a certain as it were vestige of God, representing God, just as an effect represents its cause. For to one considering their nature, action, disposition, determination, and the wonderful association and order of all things among themselves, it is plain that they were created and are preserved by divine reason and wisdom. Moral: The reason is given why man bears the image of God. Morally, God willed that all things be man's, but man to be God's, as it were His peculiar possession, and therefore He sealed him with the seal of His image, and with that most tenacious and indelible seal, so that man beholding himself, as in an image might know God his creator, and might know by how great a debt and how close a bond he is bound to Him. For man bears the image of God: first, as a son of his father, to whom he owes love and piety; second, as a slave of his lord, whom he ought to fear and revere; third, as a soldier of his leader and commander, to whom he ought to render faith and obedience; fourth, finally, as a minister and steward of the goods of his lord and master, to whom he ought to exhibit the right use of creatures, which have been committed to his stewardship, unto the eternal praise and glory of the Lord and his God. Finally, if it is a crime of lèse-majesté to violate the image of a king, what crime will it be to defile and pollute the image of God implanted in oneself with sin? "And let him have dominion" — The dominion of man. AND LET HIM HAVE DOMINION. — In Hebrew וירדו veiirdu, that is, and let them have dominion, or let them rule, namely both Adam and Eve and their posterity. Man therefore is an animal born for rule. Hear St. Basil, homily 10 of the Hexaemeron: "You are therefore an animal, O man, born for rule. Why this wretched servitude to the passions! why have you given yourself over to sin as a vile slave? why do you of your own accord make yourself a slave and captive of the devil? God commanded you to hold the principal place among creatures; and behold you cast off and reject the dignity of so great a principality." What dominion man had over creatures in the state of innocence. Note first: Man in the state of innocence had perfect dominion over all animals, and this partly from natural knowledge and prudence, by which he knew how each was to be tamed, made gentle and handled; partly from the special providence of God. For it was fitting that, as long as the flesh of man obeyed the spirit, and the spirit obeyed God, so also animals should obey man, as their lord. Moreover this dominion is an index of the great dignity of man. Hear St. Ambrose, at the beginning of book VI of the Hexaemeron: "It seemed that nothing in nature was more lofty and robust than the elephant, nothing more terrible than the lion, nothing more savage than the tiger: yet these serve man, and put off their nature by human instruction; they forget what they were born to be; they take on what they are commanded. Why say more? they are taught like children, they serve like servants, they are helped like the weak, they are beaten like the timid, they are corrected like subjects: they pass into our customs, because they have lost their own movements." Note: In the state of innocence, the obedience of animals would have been as it were political: for they ought to have perceived the rule of man in some sense, so as to obey him. Finally, then man would also have ruled over man, with a dominion not servile, but civil, such as is among angels. Thus St. Augustine, book XIX of the City of God, chapter XIV. How then dominion over nature? Note second: This dominion remained in man after sin, as is plain from Genesis IX, 1; hence by natural right, it is lawful for each man to hunt wild animals, as well as to fish for fish. But by sin this dominion was greatly diminished, and this especially concerning extreme animals, namely the greatest, such as lions, and the smallest and most vile, such as gnats, fleas, etc. Yet certain most holy men recovered it, who approached most nearly to primeval innocence; such as Noah over all the animals of the ark, Elisha over bears, Daniel over lions, Paul over a viper, St. Francis over fish and birds, to whom he preached, obtained dominion. Tropologically, man rules over fish when he dominates gluttony and lust: over birds, when he dominates ambition: over reptiles, when he dominates avarice: over beasts, when he dominates anger; thus Origen, Chrysostom, Eucherius.
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IN THE IMAGE OF GOD HE CREATED HIM. — "Of God," that is, of Christ, who is God: for man was created specially in the image of Christ; for this is what is said in Rom. VIII: "Whom he foreknew and predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his Son." But the image of Christ is supernatural grace and glory: here, however, the matter concerns primarily the natural image. There is therefore here an enallage of person, frequent among the Hebrews. For God speaks of himself as if of some other, in the third person. 27. MALE AND FEMALE HE CREATED THEM. — Hence a certain innovator in France recently asserted foolishly that Adam was created a hermaphrodite, and was both female and male. Thus also Plato in the Symposium held that the first men were androgynous. But this is said absurdly: for Scripture does not say he created him, but them, namely Adam and Eve: that is, Adam he created male, Eve truly female. Whence it is clear that this is said by anticipation. For Moses had not yet described the creation of Eve, although she herself was made on this same sixth day; for he reserves this for cap. II, 22. Equally absurd is what some Hebrews hand down, and Francis George tom. I, prob. 29, namely, that Adam and Eve were created by God in such a way that they were joined to each other on their sides, and were as it were one, but afterwards God separated them from each other; for this is contrary to cap. II, 18, as I shall show there.
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28. INCREASE AND MULTIPLY. — From these words it is clear that Adam and Eve were created in perfect age and stature, and apt for generation, namely in youthful or virile condition. Heretics wish that here generation and the use of matrimony be commanded to individual men by God. But if it is so, then Christ the Lord (to say nothing of other most holy men) must be made the first guilty of this law violated. And indeed, if what is here a precept is given not to individual men, but to the whole species, that is to all men in common, lest they allow the human species to die out: thus St. Thomas. But I say there is no precept here. For God said the same thing to the fishes vers. 22, to which certainly he gave no law. God therefore only blesses man here, as is evident from his very words; that is, he approves the use of matrimony among men, and gives them the power and fruitfulness, so that through the conjunction of male and female, like other animals, they may procreate one like themselves, and thus preserve and propagate themselves and their species. Thus St. Chrysostom, Rupert, and Augustine, lib. XXI De Civit. cap. XXII, Pererius, Oleaster, Vatablus and others. The name Adam contains the four regions of the world. AND FILL THE EARTH. — As a symbol of this matter, says St. Augustine tract. 9 in Joan., the four regions of the world, by their initial letters, are contained in the name Adam in Greek. For Adam, if you expound the initials, is the same as ἀνατολή, δύσις, ἄρκτος, μεσημβρία, that is East, West, North, South; so that it might be signified that from Adam would be born men who would inhabit and fill the four parts of the world. Subdue it, — with all wild beasts expelled or tamed, inhabit and cultivate it, and feed yourselves and enjoy its beauty and fruits. Have dominion. — The Hebrew רדו redu is ambiguous. For if you derive it from רדה rada, it signifies have dominion; but if from ירד iarad, it signifies descend, as if to say: If you obey my command, you shall have dominion over all animals: if not, you shall fall from your dominion, as the Psalmist laments Ps. XLVIII, 15. Thus Delrio. But this sense is more subtle than solid; for it is evident here that the matter concerns only the blessing and dominion of man, and redu signifies only this when it is constructed with bet, as it is here. Redu therefore here is the same as have dominion.
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29. BEHOLD I HAVE GIVEN YOU EVERY HERB FOR FOOD. — I have given, that is, I give: for the Hebrews use the past tense for the present, which they lack. Hence the more common opinion of the Fathers and Doctors is that men until the flood were so frugal in food that they fed on herbs and fruits, but abstained from flesh, equally as from wine, and this not on account of any precept of God, but on account of a certain piety born from this, because God had not yet expressly and clearly granted the use of flesh and wine, as is evident Gen. IX, vers. 3 and 21. Behold this simple frugality of the fathers did not diminish their life, but increased it, for they lived then to 900 years. Boethius speaks beautifully of this ancient frugality, lib. II de Consolatione, metro 5: O happy age too much before, Content with faithful fields, Nor lost in idle luxury, Which was accustomed to settle Late fasts with an easy acorn. And Ovid, lib. I Metamorph., thus sings of the ancient fathers: They gathered strawberries, And cornels, and berries clinging to rough brambles, And acorns that had fallen from the spreading tree of Jupiter. I shall say more on this matter cap. IX, 3, 2.
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Why is it not said of man, and God saw that it was good. You will ask why, when after each work of creation it is said: "And God saw that it was good," this is omitted after the creation of man? I answer: The first reason is that in man the creation of things is completed, which being completed and perfect, Moses embraces all things in a single statement: "And God saw all the things that he had made, and they were very good;" which statement pertains especially to man, both because he had described his creation more fully than the others immediately before, and because man is the end, the completion, the knot and center of all creatures: for all things were created on account of man, and man is the lord, participant, nexus and bond of all creation. Wherefore, lest Moses should repeat the same thing twice immediately, he omitted it at first, and understood it in the latter statement, to signify that all things, as they were created on account of man and in man, are likewise good from the good creator of man. Thus Pererius. Who also adds that the word "very" is added here, which is omitted in the others, because the goodness of man surpasses the goods of other things, especially because through man, namely Jesus Christ, all creatures were to be deified: for with Christ's humanity deified, all creatures likewise, which are contained in it, were marvelously deified. St. Augustine brings forward two other reasons, in book III of Genesis according to the letter, chapter XXIV, namely the second: Because, he says, man was not yet perfect: for he was not yet established in paradise; or because, after he was established there, that same statement was likewise omitted from that point; he adds the third, because God foreknew that man would sin, and would not remain in the perfection of his image, as if to say: He did not wish to call him good by nature, whom he foreknew would be evil through his fault. St. Ambrose gives a fourth reason, in the book On Paradise, chapter X: God, he says, did not wish to say to Adam alone before the formation of Eve, "that it was good," lest he should seem contrary to himself; for in chapter II, 18, he says: "It is not good for man to be alone, let us make him a helper like unto him." Therefore, because the good of the human race, namely fecundity and propagation, depended on Eve, God did not wish to say of Adam alone before her formation, "that it was good." "For he preferred," he says, "that there be many whom he could save, and to whom he could give sin, rather than one Adam alone who would be free from fault." The fifth reason is moral, namely to signify that man possesses free will, which other creatures lack: hence he has only the goodness of being, or natural goodness; but man, because he is free, has the greater goodness of virtue, or moral goodness. Therefore, to indicate that the moral goodness of man, which is principal, depends on the use of his free will, he did not wish to say of him before that he was good. This reason is assigned by St. Augustine, St. Ambrose and others. 31. AND GOD SAW ALL THE THINGS THAT HE HAD MADE, AND THEY WERE VERY GOOD. — St. Augustine, book I Against the Manichees on Genesis, chapter XXI: "When he dealt with individual things," he says, "he said only: God saw that it was good; but when it was said of all things, it was not enough to say, Good, unless there were added also very. For if individual works of God, when considered by the prudent, are found to have praiseworthy measures, and numbers, and orders, each constituted in its own kind, how much more all things together, that is the universe itself, which is completed by these individual things brought together into one. For all beauty which consists of parts is much more praiseworthy in the whole than in the part." And soon after: "So great is the force and power of integrity and unity, that things which are good then please much also, when they come together and concur into some universe. But the universe received its name from unity." Nine reasons for the beauty of the world. Note: Marvelous is the beauty of the world and of created things. First, from the variety of things. On account of the variety of things; for some are incorporeal, as angels, and these are distributed into various species, hierarchies and choirs, and are very many, and almost innumerable; others are corporeal: again of these, some are incorruptible, as the heavens and stars; others corruptible, and these are twofold, namely inanimate and animate; again the animate, some are plants, others animals, and finally some are partly corporeal, partly incorporeal, as men. Now what variety there is in men in form and face, in gait, voice, talent, language, studies, crafts, morals, laws, institutions, religions. Second, from the order of things. On account of the order of all things and their most apt disposition: for the nobler things hold the highest place in the world, the ignoble the lowest, the middle things the middle, and these are moved, preserved and governed by the superior. Thirdly, from the universality of things. On account of the fullness and universality of things: for in the world all things exist in a threefold manner: first, according to the general grades of things, which are four: being, living, sensing and understanding; secondly, according to all the genera of each of these grades, and their subordinate species; thirdly, that nothing anywhere exists, and nothing has been made by God which is not contained in the world and does not pertain to it. Fourthly, from the connection of things. On account of the close and wonderful connection of all parts among themselves, not only according to quantity, so that nothing anywhere is empty and void; but also in the series and context of natural species, namely so that there is no interruption, and so that each part is bound and linked most aptly and most amicably to other neighboring parts on all sides. Fifthly, from the antipathy and sympathy of things. On account of the discordant concord of things among themselves, and on account of their sympathy and antipathy. Such antipathy exists between the vine and cabbage, between the sheep and the wolf, the cat and the mouse, and innumerable other things: sympathy exists between the magnet and iron, between male and female herbs, between various metals, between liquors, between animals. Sixthly, from the proportion of things. On account of the wonderful proportion of all things both among themselves and with the whole world: for this is similar to the proportion and beauty of the human body, which arises from the fitting composition of all its members, so that just as man is a small world, so the world is a certain great man. Seventhly, from the most excellent administration of the world. On account of the divine and most excellent administration of the world: first, because God has most wisely and most liberally provided for each thing, even the vilest, whatever was either necessary or opportune for the preservation of the life of each and the attainment of its end; secondly, because He directs each, even those lacking reason and sense, toward its end, and by His guidance they attain their end, just as if they knew and intended their actions and ends, as is clearly evident in birds when they build nests, in the motion of the sun, the heavens, the winds, etc.; thirdly, because He so tempers each equally that their forces, breaking one another in turn and corrupting themselves, are not a destruction to the world and to themselves, but a salvation and ornament; fourthly, because each prefers the public good to the private, as when a heavy body ascends upward, so that it may prevent a vacuum. Wherefore St. Augustine, epistle 28, citing that passage from Isaiah XL, according to the Septuagint: "Who brings forth the age by number," or in measured fashion, "the age," teaches that the world is the most sweet music of God the modulator, which, being composed from various and contrary things, as if from opposite sounds and tones, produces a wonderful harmony and concert. The same, book XI of the City of God, chapter XVIII, says that in this world God made things so diverse, "that He might honor the order," he says, "of the ages like a most beautiful song, by means of certain antitheses as it were." Eighthly, because all things serve man. That all things of the world are composed for the utility of man: for some pertain to the necessities and conveniences of human life; others to various delights of men: some are remedies for diseases and safeguards of health: many are set forth as examples and for imitation: all conduce to the knowledge of things, and especially to the conception of the knowledge, love and religion of God. Ninthly, because evils are ordered toward good. That God orders all evils in the world toward good: for He orders the evils of punishment to chastise the evils of guilt; the evils of guilt are absolutely evils and sins: yet so great is the goodness, wisdom and power of God, that He orders them toward good either of His clemency and mercy, by forgiving them, or of His justice and vengeance, by punishing them with present and eternal punishments: thus Pererius. Aptly therefore St. Bernard, sermon 3 On Pentecost: "Three things, he says, we ought to consider in the great work of this world, namely what it is, how it is, and for what purpose it has been established. And indeed in the being of things, an inestimable power is commended, in that so many things, so great, so manifold, so magnificently have been created. Certainly in the very manner singular wisdom shines forth, in that these things are placed above, those below, these in the middle most orderly. But if you meditate on the purpose for which it was made, there occurs so useful a benignity, so benign a utility, which could even overwhelm the most ungrateful with the multitude and magnitude of benefits. Most powerfully indeed from nothing all things, most wisely beautiful, most benignly useful have been created." And St. Augustine in Sentences, Sentence 141: "Three things, he says, it was necessary that we should be taught especially concerning the condition of creatures: who made it, by what means he made it, why he made it. God said, he says: Let there be light, and light was made, and God saw the light that it was good. Neither is there an author more excellent than God, nor an art more efficacious than God's word, nor a cause better than that good should be created by the good." And Sentence 440: "God would create none, he says, either of angels or of men, whom he foreknew would be evil, unless he likewise knew in what uses of goods he would commend them, and in the order of ages, as it were a most beautiful song, he would also honor them even from certain most beautiful antitheses." This is a song, this is the book of the world. Wherefore St. Antony, when someone asked him how he could live in the desert without books, answered: "My book, O Philosopher, is the nature of things established by God, which whenever it pleases me, furnishes me the very books of God to read." Thus Socrates relates it, book IV of History, chapter XVIII. Finally Philo, in the book On the Planting of Noah, near the end, teaches that nothing is lacking in God's works except a just appreciator and eulogist of them. "It is said, he says, a fable handed down by wise men to posterity through the generations: and it is of this kind. Once when the maker was completing the whole world, he asked one of the prophets whether he desired anything not yet created, either on earth and water, or in air or heaven. He answered that indeed all things were perfect and full, yet he required one thing, a praiser of these works, who in all things, or what appears least obscure, would not so much praise as expound them. For the very exposition of God's works, he said, is sufficiently the highest praise, needing no additional support." Finally St. Basil, homily 4 of the Hexaemeron: "This entire mass of the world, he says, is just as a book written with letters, plainly testifying and proclaiming the glory of God, and abundantly setting forth to you the intellectual creature his most august majesty, otherwise hidden and invisible. For the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth forth the work of his hands," Psalm XVIII, verse 1.
Machine translation from the Latin, not reviewed.
1:1
v. 1. « In principio creavit Deus coelum et terram. ». I principio i. e. énitio, is enim indubie sensus est expressionis n'v&*3 ler. 26,1 ; 27,1; 28,1; 49,34, quibus omnibus locis de initio regni alicuius scribitur: ita intellexit Kimchi substituens nonn; ita vocem, quae apud Syr. eadem est , explicabat EpAr.; ita unice intelligi h. 1. potest graecum £v ágyy intellexitque Jos., qui vocem non mutatam transsumpsit suaeque narrationi historicae praefixit. Cf. etiam FF. H. Patritii de Interpr. Script. SS. II. 2 sqq., Romae 1844. Post Theophil. Antioch. (M. 6. 1065) et Or. (M. 12. 145) auctores plures defendere, in principio idem Sopare quod ín Filio atque hinc, cum illico spiritus Dei commemoretur, initio Geneseos deprehendi vestigium SS. Trinitatis. Sententia haec vix quemquam nostro tempore nacta est patronum. Io. 8, 25, aiunt (sed cf. textum graecum), Christus se ipsum appellat « principium, quod et loquor vobis »; de eo ait Io. 1, 3 « omnia per ipsum facta sunt », et S. Paulus Col. 1, 16 « in ipso condita sunt universa ». Tamen haec ad exegesin Gen. 1, 1 nihil conferunt. Targ. Hier. « in sapientia », paraphrasis est, non versio. « Quod dicit Wellh. Prol. 411 , vocis IYUN"* ad designandum initium alicuius temporis usum esse hebraismum recentiorem et aramaismum, id falso asseri intelliges, si conferas Os. 9, 10; Mich. 1, 13; Prov. 17; 14; Iob 8, 7; 42, 12; Deut. 11, 12. Ipsi vero Iudaei aramaizantes, nisi velint ad factum creationis alludere, uti Targum. Is. 40, 21; 41, 4, nunquam scribunt TY'ÜN"23, sed Y'TpIa, yopoa, Now3 qo, 5vi2. et similia » (Dilim.). Cum ergo reapse mundus creatus scribatur 2n principio , disquirunt porro auctores, in cuius rei principio seu initio creatus sit. Vox per se indeterminata contextu determinatur : intelligas igitur principium non indeterminate et absolute, quasi nihil omnino Deus ante coelum terramque creaverit, non angelos, non mundos alios a nostro penitus diversos; sed principium eorum, quae modo narranda veniunt , hexaemeri operum. Recte Ephr. « in principio creationis visibilium », Sa « ante omnia, primum omnium ». Ante effectam lucem, a qua primus hexaemeri dies orditur, iam creaverat Deus coelum et terram. Hinc voci competit sensus mere negativus seu exclusivus, ex oppositione ad ea quae sequuntur. enim vocem de se ideoque etiam vi punctationis esse indeterminatam, determinari autem contextu sequentium. Parum refert, vertasne substantive im principio, an adverbialiter initio; vertasne adverbialiter primum an primo, dummodo haec adverbia secundum modo. dicta explices, ut non aliud quid sonent, nisi ante modo narranda. — Commemoranda hic interpretatio, quae post Bas. placuit plurimis, ut idem sit ín principio atque in principio? temporis. Si ergo tempus intelligas illud, quo modo nárranda.-fuere effecta, lempus hexaemeri, bona est interpretatio. Si tempus intelligas indeterminate, ut exprimafur principium cuiusvis. temporis seu momentum illud, quod primum omnium fuit et quo ipsum tempus esse coepit, minus tuto tramite ince- . dis, uti ex iis patet, quae supra explicavimus.. : "Creavit.. Radicis xi significationem primitivam statuunt cecidi; secutt , sécando - effinzit; unde tamen: perperam inferebat Fürst, eadem creationem 'ex nihilo non exprimi. Nonne ipsa vox creare ad , radicem s&ar, quae eandem illam secandi seu findendi significationem habet, revocatur (4. Fick : Vergleichendes Wórterbuch der indogermanischen Sprachen, Góttingen 1871, p: 203 sq.)? Nonne germ. schaffen ab eadem aique ox&xxev excavare radice derivatur? Radicum sc. significationes$ primitivae a rebus vel actionibus sensibilibus peti consuevere, etiam eae quae inde ad res vel actiones. pure spirituales. designandas derivantur. Vocissignificatio non ex solo eT sed magis etiam ex üsü lequendi ést definienda. Tam verum est, quod affirmat Malv. ; Vocem (conjugatiorie kal) proprie tantum: Deo, not homini convenire, neque de homine in scriptura unquam usurpari. Adhibetur ea sc. Gen. 1,1; 2,3. 4; Is. 40,98; Ps. 148,5 de prima productione terrae, et Is. 40,26 et 45,18 coeli, — Geh. 1,97; 5,1.2; 6,7; Deut. 4,32; Is. 45,19; Eccle. 12,1; Ps. 88 (89), 48; 101 (102), 19 de prima hominis productione (cf. Is. 43,1. 7.15; 55,16; Ez. 21,80 — hebr. 35; Mal.'2,10), Ez. 28,13 de illo cherub, cuius imagine rex Tyri designatur. Quae omnia nonnisi veri nominis creatione effecta sunt. Adhibetur Gen. 1,21 de prima vitae animalis productione, quae creationis utique fuit perquam affinis; tandem de quibusdam portentis, quae nonnisi immediato Dei interventu effici potuere Ex. 34,10; Num. 16,30; Is. p ,55,541,90 ; 48,7; 57,19; 65,18; Ier. 31,22; Ps. 50 (51), 12; 103 (104) , 30. Uno verbo, adhibetur A de actionibus exclusive divinis: ergo aut creationis conceptu carebant Iudaei, aut illum ea voce ME ES Fatetur Ges. eam, « magis de nova rei productione, quam de conformatione et elaboratione materiae usurpatam esse»; et Wel/h. Prol. 391 : « Liber Genesis », inquit, « propria utitur voce ad solam actionem Dei creairicem designandam atque ab humana actione et formatione distinguendam; : neque habent Graeci aut Latini aut Germani vocem, qua aeque exelusive creationem exprirhant ». Ex eo, quod N?2 actionem quidem divinam, sed non necessario semper creatricem indicet (quod intér alios concedunt Cai., Bonfr., Per.), explicatur, quomodo indeterminatius verterit LY X émolnocew, accuratius Aq., Symm., Theod. Éxvtotv, quae vox proprie creationem designat. — Ros. sensum creandi a N13 exsulare iubet, idque ob hano inter alias rationem, quod aliis locis indifferenter ea vox cum iYUy vel *3* adhibeatur. Hominis productio Gen. 1, 26. per Wy, 1, 27 per "3 exprimitur; animalium 1, 21 per N*32, 2, 19 per 1Y*; Is. 43, 7 tría illa verba de hominis productione praedicantur : « creavi eum, formavi eum, feci eum ». Verum nonne ex ipso facto horum trium in unicam sententiam coactorum verborum evidens fit, aliquam significationis esse diversitatem? Igitur wy facere omnem efficientiae modum indeterminate complectitur; est veluti genus, cuius duae species sunt N?2, et ?y*, Hoc alterum est formare, utique ex praeexsistente materia; illud praeexsistentem materiam certe non exigit, mirandum quid, instantaneum, minimeque operosum denotat. Tandem x"3 nunquam adnexum habet nomen materiam designans, ex qua aliquid factum sit. At, urget Cler., dato voce N13 exprimi posse creationem, erediderim Hebraeos Gen. 1, 1 legentes de creatione non cogitasse, sed id fere intellexisse, quod latinum condere, graecum xzl5ev sonet. Concesserim, non ommes lectores Hebraeos vim vocis N"3 h. l. adhibitae satis perpendisse, sicut non omnes christiani dogmata sua satis norunt. At creationem intelligebat Machabaea mater 2 Mach. 7, 28 : « Peto, nate, ut adspicias ad coelum et terram et ad omnia, quae in eis sunt et intelligas, quia ex nihilo fecit illa Deus et hominum genus ». Quae mulier non est censenda praeclariori prae popularibus floruisse rerum divinarum notitia, aut revelationes ipsa quasdam a Deo accepisse, sed quem sensum Geneseos verbis tribuebant omnes, eum pia et religiosa expressisse. Hinc Ios., cuius tempore verbum z:t'etv iam esset consecratum creationi exprimendae, voci ixolqcsv, quam apud LXX ipse legebat, substituit vocem £zztoev. Hinc Ephr. : « planum fit », inquit, « coelum et terram e nihilo esse ». Hinc Kimchi : « Vox na" creatio remip novat et producit ex nihilo, et sic dixit in versu (Is. 43, 7) : Ad gloriam meam creavi eum, formavi eum, feci eum. Primum ereavi eum , produxi eum de nihilo ad esse; deinde formavi eum;, constitui eum in forma; postremo feci eum, disposui i ordinavi eum ». Consentiunt Rabbini, exinde, quod operator Deus, opus coelum et terra enuntientur, materia vero, ex qua operator produxerit opus, reticeatur, infert nullam operi adhibitam esse materiam : sane sequentium operum materia intelliguntur coelum et terra primordio creata, origo tam corporis quam animae Adami accurate cap. 2 describitur : ergo si aliqua coeli et terrae praeexsistebat materia, ea füerat commemoranda. — Putabat Zup., ideo non scribi Deum produxisse coelum et terram alloquio « Fiat coelum et terra », « ne nihilo praeceptum dedisse diceretur Deus, quod incongrue esset ». Infirmior tamen haec ratio ad creationem ex nihilo stabiliendam. Deus — bene hac voce huic contextui inserta innui affirmat TAeodoret. Dei aeternitatem : « Illorum », i. e. creatorum, « declaravit originem , huius reperire nequivit initium ». Coelum et terram. Terrae conditio ante ereatam lucem illico v. 9 describitur; unde perperam Aug. 35.178 : « Informis illa. materia, quam de nihilo Deus fecit, appellata est primo coelum et terra, non quia iam hoc erat, sed quia hoc esse poterat... Quia certum erat, inde futurum esse coelum et terram, iam et ipse materia coelum et terra appellata est ». Textus certe nobis exhibet terram solidam a coelo plane distinctam, licet coelum eo quadamtenus indistinctum exhibeatur et confusum, quod aquae superiores ab inferioribus nondum fuerint separatae. lam coelum certe non intelliguntur angeli, qui nunquam coelum appellantur, sed ad summum ornatui coeli attribuuntur, unde Deo: nomen Tahve Sabaoth : cf. quae diximus ad 1 Reg. 1,3 ; ornatus autem coeli v. 1 certissime non affirmatur esse creatus. 'Sed intelligitur coelum materiale. Quod probatur primum contextu : illud quippe coelum 1,1 creatum scribitur, quod sequentibus discretum et exornatum ostenditur : sed stabilito firmamento dispositisque astris discernitur et ornatur coelum materiale. Rursum illud coelum 1,1 creatum, quod 2,1 perfectum dicitur : sed hoc ex praecedentibus est coelum materiale. Tandem ita his textibus coelum et terra narrantur ereata et perfecta, uti aliis textibus (Ps. 101,26; Is. 65,17; 66,22; Matth. 24,35; 2 Petr. 3,7. 10. 12. 13; Ap. 21,1) coelum et terra praenuntiantur aliquando destruenda : destruentur autem coelum et terra materialia. Hinc locutio « coelum et terra : » vel « coelum et terra et (mare et) omnia , quae in eis sunt » Hebraeis idem exprimit, quod mundus materialis : non enim propria ad designandum mundum voce utuntur. Sed dispiciendum nobis est, utrum ea locutio h. 1., dum creaturam corporalem explicite designat, implicite praeterea designet creaturam angelicam. Ubi perperam appellant quidam ad Gen. 14,19. 22 ; 4 Reg. 19,15; 2 Par. 2,12; Iudith 13,24; Ps. 123,8; Ier. 32,17, qui textus verbotenus fere iidem sunt cum. Gen. 1,1 vel 2,1 neque creaturam angelicam subintelligi exigunt. Lubentes quidem permittimus, posteriores Iudaeos, quando coelum et terram i. e. mundum adspectabilem cogitabant, angelos, quos toties in scripturis eidem admixtos, e coelo visibiliter descendentes aut in coelum ascendentes nossent, non exclusisse, imo quandoque inclusisse. At eaedem locutiones sensu quandoque arctiore, quandoque latiore accipiuntur, neque, sufficientem noster contextus rationem offert, ut angelos vere, licet implicite designari affirmemus : coelum et terra 1,1 creata eadem sunt, quae 2,1 perfecta dicuntur, et ornatus coelorum 2,1 ille idem intelligatur oportet, qui 1,6 et 14 'providebatur, i. e. firmamentum et astra, non vero angeli. Sed alia nobis eaque gravior h. 1l. discutienda objectio. Construebat quippe JarcAi : In principio, cum Deus crearet coelum et terram (terra autem erat tum inanis et vacua etc.), dixit Deus : Fiat lux. Similiter Abenesra : in principio, cum crearet Deus coelum et terram, erat terra inanis et vacua etc. ; sed haec altera constructio ut admitti queat, pro nma yox deberet scribi vhnNA *^m. Manet ergo constructio Iarchi, in qua non est opus ut cum F. Bottcher (Neue exegetisch kritische Aehrenlese zum À. T., Leipzig 1863) pro praeterito x?3 punctes infi-- nitivum 8*3 (ef. 5,1), cum similes constructiones adhibito praeterito et supresso pronomine legantur : Os. 1,2 (kethib) ^23 r5nn, initium quo locutus est, Deut. 4,15 333 Dv2, in die quo locutus est; similiter Ps. 89 (90), 15 nv» sicut diebus quibus, nv annis quibus; Iob 6,17 et 2 Par. 94,11 ny2 tempore quo; imo Is. 29,1 n'»p civitas quae. In quibus exemplis omnibus sequitur praeteritum , non infinitivus. Ergo etiam x33 n'vx?2 verti. potest : In principio, cum crearet vel creasset etc. Si hoc, constructione mutata sensus manet substantialiter idem, creatio praecessit hexaemeron. Si illud, tum utique sensus textus non parum mutatur : principium non iam est hexaemero anterius, sed tempore idem cum lucis productione; w"3 non exclusive creandi significationem induit, sed quolibet modo efficiendi, formandi, omnia hexaemeri opera complectitur. Creandi significatio necessario neque excluditur neque includitur, neque excluditur necessario praeexsistens materia. Constructio redditur intricatior et parenthetica , sed eo similior inscriptionibus 2,4 et 5,1. — Manet tamen, quod demonstravimus, nullam hebraicam vocem esse aptiorem voce x73 creationi exprimendae. Manet ex 2 Mach. 7,28, reapse Hebraeos creationem ex nihilo professos esse, hon in genere tantum, sed speciatim dum Gen. 4,1 in mente habebant. Qui textus erat sane e numero eorum, quos Hebraeus quisque et mature addisceret, et frequenter repeteret : an. fingi potest, eius textus constructionem ita apud omnes oblivioni traditam esse, ut sensim alteram toto coelo diversam professi sint? v. 1 « coelum et terram » unam retineat « terram », nexumque cum v. $1 exprimat voce V^N3 initio sententiae collocata. Gressum igitur facit s. auctor ad de- Scribendam rerum conditionem, quae post primam creationem et immediate ante primae diei opus obtinuit. Dico immediate ante primae diei opus : nam efferuntur tenebre et aquae primis illico diebus coercendae, terrae vastitas plantis operienda ; simul sequentium. operum effector spiritus Dei demonstratur. Intime igitur haec sequentibus copulantur, non tamen ideo haec cum Ke. et Del. a& v. 1 separanda et.cum primae diei opere iungenda : singula quippe hexaemeri opera a Dei iubentis edicto ordiuntur, ergo h. l. a verbis « Fiat lux ». Dico eandem illam rerum conditionem post, non tamen necessario immediate post primam creationem obtinuisse : illae sc., quas Restitutionistae adstruunt, inter primam ereationem et inter hexaemeron naturales evolutiones textu hoc nequaquam proscribuntur. 1121 Yn recte vertit Vulg. inanis et vacua, et consentiunt versiones. Leves, quae in textibus graecis leguntur, divergentiae inde ortum habuere , quod scriptor expressionem interpretatus sit non tam ex etymo, quam potius ex effectu secuto. Ita LXX scripsit &$pavog xoi &xav&oxeUaotog, destitutam sc. terram luce et ornatu; sed Is. 45,18 recte vertit 133 xsv5v. Symm. vertit &pyov xoi à8wxpurov , iners et indistincta, sc. postea variae mundi partes ab invicem distinguebantur. Sensus vocis indubie colligitur ex Is. 45, 18 : « Non in vanum (153) creavit eam : ut habitaretur, formavit eam », sc. terram. ler. 4,93 sqq. : « Aspexi-terram, et ecce vacua erat et nihili (1321 3n), et coelos , et non erat lux in eis. Vidi montes, et ecce movebantur, et omnes colles conturbati sunt. Intuitus sum, et non erat homo et omne volatile coeli recessit. Aspexi, et ecce Carmelus desertus, et omnes urbes eius destructae sunt a facie Domini et a facie irae furoris eius. Haec enim dicit Dominus : Deserta erit omnis terra ». Habes hic 1321 *n effectum divini decreti, quo terra deserta esse iubebatur. Expressio sonu confusionem chaoticam imitatur; est $£» .àix :$uotv, euius duo membra assonantiam, quam dicunt, efficiunt. Cf. Gen. 4,19 21 Y3, et alia in Hebraeorum nostratumque linguis exempla. Quo autem sensu vacua dicatur terra, ex ipso hexaemero intellige : ergo non solum vacua ab hominibus et iumentis (Ps. Ion. et Targ. Hier.), sed ab animalibus quibusvis et potissimum etiam a plantis. . Vox qun deneórae alias quoque de tenebris maxime spissis et vix non omnis lucis expertibus scribitur, ut de tenebris aegyptiacis Ex. 10,21, de inferorum tenebris Ps. 87 (88), 13; Iob 10,21; Eccle. 11, 8'etc. Tehebfae autem nostrae describuntur fuisse super faciem abyssi : ergo sicut ante primam hexaemeri diem aderat iam terra, licet aquis submersa et omnino vacua, ita tum iam exhibetur fuisse atmosphaera aliqua : aquae totam quidem terram obvolvebant, at non totum coelum implebant. Máre illud, cui nullum litus, circumplectebatur atmosphaera lucis expers, spiritu tamen Dei foecunda: Sed in coelo idem tum desiderabatur, quod in terra : distinctio et ornatus. man a oq aquarum sonitum exprimit, hinc aquas designat abundantes, copiosas, v. g. Deut. 8,7 rivorum terrae promissae, at vix non semper maris, Ex. 15,5..8; Ps. 32 (33), 7; 35 (36), 1 ; Iob. 28,1* etc. Dicitur etiam de mari ex diluvio nato Gen. 7,11 et est vox poetica magis, dum m potius prosam sapit. Eadem prorsus vox in cosmogonia chaldaica cuneiformi legitur /i-amat, estque Assyriis usitata ad designandum mare. pnbw m de se vel; ventum Dei designare potest vel spiritum Dei, i. e. S. Spiritum. Unde Ephr., Theodoret. interpretati sunt ventum : et hic quidem, quod post aquas et terram necessariam hoc versu existimaverit aeris mentionem; ille, quod, si Dei virtus initio hexaemeri describatur aquis incubans, debuisset prima die aliquid in ipsis aquis effici, cum tamen ante secundam quintamve diem nihil in illis effectum legamus. Infirmior argumentatio : quodsi enim coeli v. 2 omittebatur mentio, cur non et aeris, qui ad coelum potius quam ad terram spectabat? Effecit autem omnino aliquid vel prima die spiritus Dei, cum ab ipso processerit vox « Fiat lux ». Ventum quominus intelligamus, prohibet vox n2n*D, « quod nos appellare possumus zncubabat sive confovebat, in similitudinem volucris ova calore animantis » (Hier.). Idipsum iam notaverant Jacob. Edess. et Bas. (29.43). Porro ex modo loquendi Hebraeorum ventus Dei necessario esset ventus validus : qui sensus discordat a voce namo, quae motum aut nullum aut certe lenem exprimit.
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v. 9 « Terra autem erat inanis et vacua, et tenebrae erant super faciem. abyssi, et spiritus, Dei ferebatur super. aquas ». "Tria haec membra intime inter se connectuntur, cum ad unum nn'1 tria subiecta 1521 *n, qvn et m referantur; intime quoque cum v. 1 connectuntur, cum auctor e termino complexo
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v. 5 « Appellavitque lucem diem et tenebras. noctem » , lucem sc. et tenebras ut divisas alternantesque, secus enim variis ominibus. VOCAT] possunt. Recte S. Thom. 1. q. 67 a. & àd 9 : « Scriptura », inquit, « in. principio Genesis commemorat institutionem naturae , quae postmodum perseverat. Unde non debet dici, quod aliquid tunc factum fuerit, quod postmodum esse desierit ». Consentiunt auctores inspirati celebrantes: hexaemeron tamquam: institutionem. rerum. usque perdurantium : ef. Ps.-103 (105); 32,6. sqq. ; 148,5 sq.; Iob 38,11. Speciatim primiae diei opus respiciebat ler. 38,20:sq..:.« Haec. dicit Dominus : Si irritum potest fieri pactum meum.cum die et pactum meum cum nocte, ut/non sit dies et nox in tempore suo : et pactum meum irritum esse poterit'cum David servo meo ». Ergo diei noctisque nominibus ipsissima illa lucis et tenebrarum vicissitudo designatur, quae hodiedum viginti quatuor horarum intervallo completur atque terrarurh orbe circa se ipsum revolvente efficitur. Confirmant istud vel ipsa nomina, quae eandem s. scriptoris tempore.&ignificationem retinuisse supponuntur, quam eis creator indiderat. Ceterum appellavit non est idem atque appellari fecit (4ug. M. 35. 180), sicut eum dicimus aedificare domum , qui aedificari facit : agitur enim de aliquo effectu, qui durante hexaemero obtinuerit : si ergo tum Deus appellari fecit, per quem:tandem fecit appellari? Praeferenda explanatio, quam ad Gen. 2,19 tradit Chrys. (M. 53.116), nomina imponi in signum domeniz. Id praestitit Adam sua animalibus nomina et postea duplex Evae nomen imponens. Semper parentes natis indidere nomina. Imponebant nova nomina, qui servos vel tributarios alios effecerant : & Reg. 24,17; 2 Par. 36,4; Gen. 41,45; Dan. 1,7. Idipsum saepenumero fecerat Deus nomen imponens iis personis, quas speciali ratione suo servitio devinciebat : Gen. 17,5.15.19; 35,10; 1 Par. 292,9, quibus addas nomina Servatori, Praecursori, S. Petro imposita. Deus luci ac tenebris et postea aliis effectibus naturalibus nomina imponens heri in subditos personam agit supremumque et permanens omnium rerum profitetur dominium.
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v. 6 « Dixit quoque Deus : Fiat firmamentum in medio aquarum ». y'p» habet Hebr. retinueruntque vocem Sam. Chald. Syr. Radici non quidem in solo piel et in formis a piel derivatis (cf. Ex. 39,3; Ier. 10,9; Num. 16,39 — apud Hebr. Num. 17,^) competit significatio percussit, hinc de metallis maxime percutiendo extendit; sed bis etiam (Ez. 6,11; 25,6) in kal; tamen in kal significatio firmav:t utique praevalet (cf. Iob. 37,18; Ps. 103,2; 135,6; Is. 40,92; 42,5; 44,914), maxime cum et illis textibus ea aptissime conveniat, ubi aliqui vertunt eztendit. Quam significationem tribuit radici etiam Syr. et, nti ex Iob ciendi significatio penes Arab. et Chald. Quare, licet We/l/h. (Prol. p. ^12) nonassentiamursignificationem percutiendi velextendendi penitus a kal eliminanti, omnino tamen cum eodem tenemus, longe praeferendam esse nominis y»p* versionem traditione consecratam , quam exhibent Ag. Symm. Theod. LXX (csspéoyo) et Vulg. (firmamentum), asignificatione non extendendi sed firmandi petitam. — Quo posito illico patet, quid firmamenti nomine h. l. veniat, utrum coelum nubium tantum, an etiam, imo polissimum coelum nubibus vacuum atque azureum. Hoc alterum interpretatus est lac. Edess., « quod propter profunditatem et distantiam apparet ad instar corporis caerulei ». Interpretatus est Jos. describens Deum coelo secunda die xpóccza?3cv «epu fjsac. Huc illud quoque placet trahere , quod de vocibus chaldaicis habet Levy, e septem coelis illud, quod infimum sit terraeque proximum, vocari v5 seu velum; illud, quod proxime sequatur, Ny'p^; velo illo recedente cerni lucem firmamenti, i. e. Ny'p3. Idipsum enuntiat Iob 37,18, qui textus nostrum opus respicit : « Tune cum eo firmasti aethera, qui firmus est sicut speculum fusum? » Quae imago sane non respicit coelum nubium. Reapse nubes non satis respondent conceptui firmitatis , huc illuc feruntur, saepissime omnino absunt, nam in Palaestina à mense Maio ad Octobrem coelum nubibus est fere semper vacuum, item saepissime mense Novembri : at firmamentum azureum immobile concipitur, vel ipsis nubibus alte supereminet. Porro illud h. l. coelum intelligitur, cui mox nomen inditur à*Ov, a nov aitus fuit, quod nomen certissime non ad coelum nubium restringitur ; illud item coelum, quod quarta die sideribus ornatur : uti enim die quinta et sexta. illa terra eaque maria viventibus replentur, quae die tertia ab invicem fuerant divisa, ita die quarta 11 coeli perficiuntur, qui die secunda ab aquis inferioribus fuerant secreti. sententia evaserat manca, quid erat magis obvium, quam ad instar aliorum operum inserere voculam »? Et factum est ita, quo symmetriae simul et perspicuitati textus consuleretur?
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v. "1 « Et fecit Deus firmamentum , divisitque » — LXX supplet subiectum Deus; ceterum etiamsi, uti v. 6, verbo dividendi assignes subiectum firmamentum , kamen sensus manet idem : ope firmamenti divisit Deus « aquas, quae erant sub firmamento, ab his, quae erant super firmamentum. Et factum est ita ». Quamvis impletio non assueto post mandatum legatur loco, nequaquam tamen (DlÍm.) sensu caret : sc. vox ?fa non refertur ad impletionem (« Et fecit Deus etc. »), quae esset tautologia, sed ad praecedens mandatum : Et ita, effecto firmamento, adamussim impletum est divinum v. 6 mandatum. Fecit utique solo suo verbo, quod patet collato v. 3, et ex Ps. 32 (33), 6 : « Verbo Domini coeli firmati sunt », cf. Ps. 148,& sq. Quid autem effecerit Deus, ex modo explicata voce firmamentum collige. Fuerint igitur in opere secundae diei nubes, tonitrua, imbres : illud quod tandem effectum est, quod ex elementorum fortasse tumultu prodiit, fuit firmamentum serenum, pellucidum, sideribus utique vacuum. LXX supplevere laudationem. Cur ea omittatur varias assignant rationes. No septenarius laudationum numerus excedatur, inquit Del. : at sex sunt laudationes particulares v. 4.10.12.18.21.25 et alia universalis v. 31; etsi suam haberet secunda dies laudationem, essent tamen septem laudationes particulares et numero sacro factum esset satis. Melius Rup. : quia Deus non laudat ea, quae ad 'Thohu va Bohu spectaverant : non laudat tenebras prima die, non laudat opus secundae diei, quod sola divisione aquarum constat nondum intra iustos limites relegatarum; e contra subactis prima die tenebris laudat lucem, subactis die tertia aquis laudat aridam, sublata aridae nuditate laudat plantas. In opere dein ornatus singula laudat Deus; homini specialem laudem non tribuit, quod universalis v. 31 illico sequatur laus.
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« Factumque est vespere et mane, dies unus » , i. e. primus, ut recte interpretati sunt Jos. et Targ. Hier., patetque sequentium serie numeralium, Ceterum haec numeralia, sexto excepto, articulo carent, quem v. g. legis 2,11 sqq. in recensendis paradisi fluminibus. Efferuntur sc. tamquam totidem membra seriei primum indefinitae, ga//. « un premier jour, un second jour etc. », adiecto tandem sexto die definiendae et limitandae, ga//. « le sixi&me jour ». Illud autem dies unus non est appositio ad vespere et mane (Dillm.), cum haec, etiamsi interiectam noctem computes, minime efficiant diemi unum; sed exprimit summam totius durationis, quae inde a primo Dei mandato elabebatur : « Dixitque Deus : Fiat lux... factumque est vespere et mane, dies unus ». Intelliges porro, vocem d?es v. 5 bis usurpari sensu non plane eodem, cuius autem diversitas ex ipso textu neminem fugere possit. Ubi dicitur Deus appellasse lucem diem, dies intelligitur naturalis, a mane durans ad vesperam atque noctem excludens; ubi dicitur dies unus, intelligitur dies civilis viginti quatuor horarum, diem naturalem cum nocte complectens. Hic autem dies civilis computatur a mane ad mane (CArys.), non a vespera ad vesperam (EpAr.), est 4spovóxztov, non vero vuyOfjuspov. Etenim dies hic civilis terminatur mane, protenditur itaque a mane ad mane. Factum esse vespere finem exprimit diei, factum esse mane finem noctis : ergo prior fuit dies, quam secuta est DOoX. scripserat ante : De Hexaemero secundum caput primum Geneseos ad litteram, Brugis 1889) vertit : « et constitutum est vox8nu£gov (cf. Dan. 8,14.56), dies primus ». Ergo, in memoriam singulorum operum constitutus est unus aliquis hebdomadae dies. « Non est », inquit, « textus historiam enarrans, sed legem latam commemorans ». Textus Danielis falso appellari demonstrat Knabenbauer. Praeterea, si vertas et facta est lux, vertas quoque necesse est et factum est vespere.
Arg. — Eius tridui opus intime cum conditione rerum v. 2 descripta connectitur. Divinum creationis consilium optime expressit Is. 45.18 affirmans, non in thohu creasse Deum terram, sed ut habitaretur. At thohu adhuc illa erat, aquis submersa et tenebris involuta. Ergo primum haec removenda, hoc opus distinctionis : dein exornanda variisque creaturis veluti habitatoribus implenda, hoc opus ornatus. Removentur igitur primum tenebrae : lux quippe viventibus universis necessaria magis, quam vel separatio aquarum, cum viventium infra recensendorum aliqua possint quidem vivere in aquis, nulla vero queant omni omnino luce carere. Praeterea in narratione, in qua Deus producitur anthropomorphice loquens et agens, qui poferat is adstrui vidisse opera esse bona, nisi prius exsisteret lux, qua videret? Ac tandem recte ait S. Thom. I. q. 67 .a. &. Sed c. : « id, sine quo non potest esse dies, oportuit fieri in prima die ». Post creatam lucem tenebrasque in certos fines relegatas sui quoque aquis assignandi sunt termini, quod duplici efficitur opere. Secunda sc. die dividuntur aquae superiores ab inferioribus, tertia arida ab aquis inferioribus. Quibus perfectis illico Thohu va Bohu in paradisum convertitur, terra ex arida et vacua in floridam mutatur. - v. 8 « Dixitque Deus :.Fiat lux. Et facta est lux ». Versus post divinum mandatum impletionem brevi sed nervosa formula complectitur : Et facta est lux. Cum mandatum duabus solis vocibus constet (Fiat lux), languesceret oratio, si primum impletio referretur, dein subiiceretur descriptio : Et factum est ita, et fecit Deus lucem. E contra, quam legimus, formula vividius, quam quae ceteris operibus prolixiores adscriptae sunt formulae, instantaneum atque completum. divini mandati depingit effectum. — Mandatum hic, ut in aliis operibus, expressio est divinae auctoritatis; impletio illico consequens divinae omnipotentiae. Quem nexum iam perspioiebat Ps. 32 (33), 6. 9 : « Verbo Domini coeli firmati sunt, et spiritu oris eius omnis virtus eorum... quoniam ipse dixit et facta sunt, ipse mandavit et creata sunt » (cf. Ps. 148,5); Eccli. 42,15 : « In sermonibus Domini omnia opera eius », i.e. sermonibus eius opera effecta suní; Iudith 16,17 : « dixisti et facta sunt, misisti spiritum tuum et creata sunt, et non est qui resistat voci tuae »; Greg. Nyss. : « Verbum in Deo effectus est ». — Quae /uz h. 1. intelligatur, evidens omnino est : eadem sc., quae v. 4 a tenebris dividitur nobisque discrimine dierum noctiumque affulget , quae vespere recedit, mane oritur. v. lk « Et vidit Deus lucem, quod esset bona ». Bonum a Deo praedicatur illud, quod ideae divinae perfecte respondet. Unde 2,18 : « non est bonum. », inquit, « esse hominem solum », quod sc. unico sexu creato divina de homine idea plenum nondum nacta sit effectum. Hinc Thohu va Bohu laudationem non habet, imo quae illud obvolverant v. 9 tenebrae et aquae ne in opere quidem primae et secundae diei laudantur; nam primae diei laus soli luci tribuitur, secundae diei remotius maria attingit. Sed quod ideae divinae, idipsum perfecte etiam suae ideae respondet, estque in suo genere perfectum. Igitur mente agnosci eumque hac agnitione delectari. Hinc inculcatur obligatio bonitatis rerum creatarum perpendendae atque ex ea ad: laudem creatoris assurgendi. « Et divisit lucem a. tenebris », non physica actione, quasi lux et tenebrae tum simul fuissent eodem loco, quod est absurdum : sed morali atque legifera actione sanciens, ut porro certis interyallis: tenebrae succederent luci et lux tenebris; quem sensum confirmant sequentia. Crediderim autem nostrum incisum cum praecedente intimius connecti : Et vidit Deus lucem, quod esset bona; et zdeo divisit. Cum lux ob insitam et insignem bonitatem esset conservanda, neque eorum quidquam, quaein prineipio fuissent creata, penitus esset eliminandum, non tenebrae, non aquae, hinc dividi oportuit lucem et tenebras singulisque suam attribui provinciam. Ita prima dies unicum quidem . habet opus. lucem, sed in .hoc unico .opere Pupucem effectum , lucis primum produetae ac inde divisae. |
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v. 9 « Dixit vero Deus : Congregentur aquae, quae sub coelo sunt, in locum unum ». Aquis superioribus super firmamentum coactis, jam suum in locum aquae inferiores coercentur. Dicitur autem is loeus unus, non tam quod maria omnia invicem communicent (TAeodoret.), id enim licet verum sit h. l. non exprimitur, sed quod in visione, qua cosmogonia revelabatur, reapse unicus se oceanus videntis oculis obtulerit. « Et appareat arida » , quo nomine etiam Ion. 1,9.13; 2,11 designatur terra firma opposita mari, Ex. 4,9 eadem Nilo flumini opposita. Sensus obvius est, ut refluentibus aquis terra patuerit obtutui. Eo fine congregantur aquae, ut appareat arida : hoc principalius, illud secundarium. Ideo vero emergere iubetur terra, quo fiat « utilis fovendis seminibus, progignendis herbis et stirpibus, hospitalisque hominibus et reliquis animantibus » (Iac. Edess.). « Et factum est 4a ». LXX addit descriptionem.
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v. 10 « Et vocavit Deus aridam terram , congregalionesque aquarum appellavit maria ». Singularem congregationem habent praeter Vu/g. LXX reliqui, unde placet cum Keil pluralem mara interpretari intensivum potius quam numericum, designantem vastum oceanum ; notatque Dz//m. eundem pluralem Ps. A5 (46), 3 sq. ad instar singularis construi. Uli tenebrae luce distinctae appellantur nox, ita aquae continentibus limitatae vocantur maria. De fluviis, lacubus silet textus, « quippe quae non sunt nisi continentis terrae interstitia » (Cor/uy), et in visione probabilius non obiiciebantur oculis. « Et vidit Deus, quod esset bonum ».
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v. 11 « Et ait : Germinet terra herbam virentem et facientem semen », — sola LXX 2uxta genus et similitudinem , cum tamen secus in scriptura similitudo solorum sit viventium .— « et fignum pomiferum faciens fructum 1ux(a genus suum , cuius semen in semetipso sit super terram ». Intime, utpote quae ab una derivantur radice, copulandae Voces wv xvn, germinet (terra) germen, quae semper ad plantam teneram nascentem referuntur, unde h. l. plantarum origo a tenuissimis germinibus profecta describi perspicitur. Cum iis vero vocibus minus apte LXX Vulg. Ag. Theod. sequentem etiam vocem 3v7 connexuere , Aerbam virentem , Qozávr» 45p-co : cur enim vox germen solis herbis adiiciatur, quae suapte natura teneriores germinumque affines sunt, non vero /ignis? si &utem ea vox ad utrumque referatur, tum vertendum erat 5óXov pro 5$0Aov. Obest praeterea accentus Masor., cui adhaesere CAha/d. Syr. Unde verius suggerit Vat., sequentia inde ab avY « per oppositionem dici », et Caz. easdem plantas, quae modo voce germen exprimebantur, explicat in duas discerni classes, quarum discrimen ex CAa/d. Syr. perspicies ratione seminis consistere. Priorem sc. classem efficiunt herbae, quarum semen seminatur, alteram ligna fructifera facientia fructum, in quo semen est. Prior classis, quam praeprimis efficiunt herbae, olera, fruges, semen producit propatulum ; altera, quae arborum est fructiferarum , semen gerit fructu inclusum. Cum verbi y»; hiphil praeter h. 1l. et v. 29 solummodo Lev. 12,2 legatur, non ex eo unico loco tuto significatio stabiliri potest, sed consulantur oportet versiones, quae h. l. significationem suggerunt semznare, 1. e. semen proiicere. Ita etiam LXX ozsipev ozéppa, et Ág. oxetpópsvov. Hinc colliges, nequaquam omne plantarum genus recenseri. Non so- Ium omittuntur, quae in mari nascuntur, plantae, sed eae etiam arbores, quae aut fructu omnino carent, aut in quibus non semen intra fructum reconditur, sed idem est semen quod fructus, cuiusmodi sunt quercus et nux. Agit textus de solis plantis a/zmentarzis, de iis quae illico v. 29 homini et animalibus traduntur, « ut sint vobis in escam ». Eae primum indiseriminatim omnes describuntur ut tenue germen, dein generaliori quodam modo ratione seminis discernuntur. — Ambigunt recentiores, quo trahendum sit illud super terram. Ad solum lignum &rahit Kn., quod arbores alte immineant terrae; ad semen vero Dilím. ( « in quo fructu sit semen ad propagationem super terram »); ad germinet tandem De/. Vox sola constructione fortasse ad ultimum incisum, sensu certe ad totam sententiam refertur, tatn ad herbas quam ad ligna. | . Contra reliquos omnes h. l1. Vulg. omittit vocem Deus : « Et ait Deus ». Item v. 17 « et posuit eas Deus »; v. 22 « Benedixitque eis Deus »; v. 26 « ait illis Deus »; 2, 3 « et benedixit Deus ». Quam vocem etiam retinent Aq. Symm. Theod., ubicunque eorum ad nos textus devenerunt. 1,28 « Et ait illis Deus » duas supremas voces cum Vulg. sola ignorat LXX. Sed hoc textu, uti 2,3, reapse vox Deus intra eundem contextum et brevissimo interiecto spatio repetitur, ideoque facilius omittebatur; reliquis etiam textibus laudatis subiectum Deus facile ex contextu suppleri, ideoque facile in aliqua versione omitti poterat; critice solius Vulgatae auctoritas reliquis omnibus hac in re minime praevalet. Dicas igitur, eam vocem primitus in textibus laudatis fuisse, Vulgatam alium & reliquis textum hebr. nequaquam legisse, sed S. Hier. suarum partium minime illud esse existimasse, ut voculam-quamque serviliter exprimeret. — Id semel monuisse sufficiat.
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v. 14 « Dixit autem. Deus : Fiant luminaria in firmamento coeli » — addit LXX Sam. ad élluminandam terram — « et dividant diem ac noctem ». Perperam Cai., quod Hebr. non habeat e/ devidant sed ad dividendum , putabat non ipsam luminarium primam productionem narrari, sed solum officium productis attribui. Infinitivus cum 5 non cogit nos hunc sensum admittere ; aliunde autem parallelismus cum v. 3. 6 omnino cogit vocem *', uti iis versibus, interpretari. Quodsi igitur ibi lux et firmamentum non apparuisse tantum, sed vere producta esse narrantur, referuntur h. l. etiam luminaria non tantum terricolis visibilia facta, sed primum producta esse. In quem sensum cum Vulg. (Fiant et dividant) conspirat LXX «evrüfzocav. « Et sint in signa et tempora et dies et annos ». Non est cum Ges. adstruenda hendiadys « in signa temporum »; neque cum Z'uch et Kurtz « in signa tam temporum quam dierum et annorum » : quatuor nomina sunt coordinata. A duobus postremis d?es et annos ordiamur, quae explicat Chald. ut numerentur per ea dies et annz , circumscribitque Ps. Ion. « ad sanctificandum initia mensium et anütorum, intercalationes mensium et annorum, solstitia lunaeque mutationes et cyclos ». Quae descriptio videtur sat conveniens. Ubi d?esintelligere placet civiles potius quam naturales, cum hi luce prima die creata a noctibus abunde secernantur, dum dierum civilium limites et horae astris definiantur. 1712 tempus significat, et quidem tempus determinatum , unde merito Ios. e& Theodoret. quatuor anni tempora huc revocavere; neque tamen ad haec unice restringenda est expressio, neque cum Lamy ad solos menses, nullibi quippe Ty"2 mensis vertitur, et alio ordine nomina scribenda essent (dies et menses et annos); sed ad tempora quaeque extendenda est expressio sive natura sive lege aliqua certis eventibus attributa (v. g. Ps. Ion. recenset « tempora festorum ») : haec omnia ope corporum coelestium computantur. Quid tandem signa? Merito Theodoret. ad astrologiam alludi negat. Sed neque de eclipsibus, cometis et similibus (lac. Edess., Theodoret.) agitur, cum Cosmogonia non portentorum originem describat. Dicendum ergo cum eodem TAÀeodoret., signa intelligi ea, quae ex astris petere consuevere agricolae, viatores, nautae. Quodsi tandem quatuor voces simul contempleris, perspicies Cosmogoriiae auctorem uti in recensendis plantis nequaquam botanistam, ita in recensendis astris nequaquam astronomum agere. Astrorum meminit, quatenus temporis sunt indices maxime pro agrorum gregumque cultura : huic quippe suppetunt signa temporaque definiunt. Idem mox astra in duas veluti classes dividit, maiora et minora, secundum id quod oculis apparet; nam.stellas plerasque luna esse maiores, quis iam ignoret?
Arg. — Priori triduo praeparabantur coelum et terra ad instar domus, quae recipiendis incolis instruitur : incolarum autem loco hic veniunt, quaecumque in coelo terraque moventur, motu sive reali sive apparenti : hinc astra et animantia. Secundi tridui opera prioris tridui operibus quadamtenus correspondent, non tamen accuratissime. Ita luminaria quartae diei utique correspondent luci prima die productae; sed quinta die non solius firmamenti, sed etiam aquarum incolae producuntur, dum sexta die solius terrae animantia creantur, duplici tamen opere, quod duplex tertiae diei opus in memoriam revocet.
1:15
« Et factum est ita ». V. 19 « Et protulit terra herbam virentem et facientem semen iuxta genus suum, lignumque faciens fructum et habens unumquodque sementem secundum speciem suam ». Eadem in. Hebr. vox speciem et genus exprimit. Recole quod diximus, in singulis operibus impletionis verba illud exprimere, quam adamussim effectus divinae iussioni responderit. Ergo totum illud intra alteram * tertiae diei partem in effectum prodiit, quod Deus v. 11 effici praeceperat. Sane ea die plantas non in germinibus substitisse, sed reapse in herbas et fructus maturuisse, colligas ex creatis sequentibus diebus animantibus, quae non meris germinibus, sed insuper herbis , seminibus, fructibus ad vietum indigent. Quando Deus sexta die dicebat : « Ecce dedi vobis omnem hérbam et universa ligna, ut sint vobis in escam », sane non mera germina demonstrabat triduo ante nata. Tandem reliqui dies sua ad perfectionem perducunt opera : ergo etiam tertius. Ita quinta et sexta die animalia et homo adulta sane aetate producuntur; corpora coelestia quarta die eo illico ordine prodeunt, quo tempora et dies et annos ita demonstrent, uti nunc quoque fit. Ergo recte omnino Ephr. alterum tertiae diei opus ita describit : « Et herbae quidem, etsi creatione effectae sint instantanea, eam praeferebant speciem, acsi mensibus ante natae fuissent; itemque arbores, quarum productio nonnisi diem habuisset, in perfectione sua ramorumque fructibus, quasi annis crevissent, apparebant ». Id indubie verum est : planíae unico die ad perfectam maturitatem perductae describuntur. Obiicies, stupendum ita portentum affirmari. Non magis stupendum concedam , quam hominem sexta die adulta aetate esse creatum ; respondebo, interpretis non esse portenta eliminare, sed textum s. fideliter explicare; tandem evanescit portentum, si Cosmogonia narrari defendas rerum productionem, qualis Adamo in visione exhibita fuit. v. 15 « Ut luceant in firmamento coeli et illumznent terram ». Tres conditorum astrorum fines textus recenset, sed duos posteriores tantum constructione coordinatos. Primus : Sint luminaria ad divisionem diei et noctis, ut quae divisio v. ^ alternantibus luce et tenebris effecta fuerat, constitutis luminaribus evidentior evadat. Additur porro repetita voce Y duplex alius finis : Luminaria sint in signa etoe., i. e. praeter dierum noctiumque discrimina alias etiam temporis divisiones demonstrent ; dein : Luminaria luminarium officio fungantur in firmamento ad illuminandam terram, quod non est omnino idem atque dividere diem et noctem. Quorum divisio v. ^ nullam nocti lucem concesserat, at nune vel ipsi nocti luna et stellae suam affundunt lucem. Regnum igitur lucis quarta die magis etiam quam prima praevalet regno tenebrarum, tam ordine quam ambitu, cum universi temporis tam nocturni quam diurni primatus luminaribus attribuatur.
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V. 16 « Fecitque Deus duo lumznaria magna : luminare maus, ut praeesset diet, et luminare minus, ut praeesset noctt , et stellas ». Cum haec omnino ad oculum, non scientifice describantur, non est subtilius indagandum, quo sensu astra praeesse scribantur. Sane sol regio quodam splendore diei praefulget, luna nocti : id omnes sensere gentes, cecinere poetae, isque sensus textui abunde satisfacit. v. 16 stellae à praesidio noctis excludi videntur, v. 18 includi et Ps. 135 (136), 7 sqq. habet « Fecit... lunam et stellas in potestatem noctis ». Utrumque vere dicitur : si lunam stellis compares, sane illam praeesse, has aulicorum instar subesse fatebere; si lunam cum stellis subjectae nocti opponas, noctem subesse, illas praeesse haud dubitabis.
1:17
V. 17 « E: posuit eas ?n firmamento coeli, At lucerent super terram » ,
1:18
v. 18 « et praeessent diei ac nocti, et dividerent lucem ac tenebras ». Tres hic quoque fines enuntiantur, quorum primus et tertius cum iis, quos v. 1^ sq. legebamus, iidem sunt. Num ideo praeesse diei ac nocti idem est atque esse 2n signa etc.? Non necessario : praeesse h. 1. eundem atque v. 16 sensum habet, ubi de signis etc. non agebatur; s. auctor non est exspectandus serviliter in descriptione ea repetere, quae divino mandato enuntiabantur ; praeesse latius patet quam esse 2n signa. « Et vidit Deus quod esset bonum ».
1:19
« Et factum est ita ». V. 19 « Et factum est vespere et mane, dies quartus ».
1:20
v. 90 « Dixit etiam Deus : Producant aquae veptile antmae vtven- (is ». Expressio vv "x"v" similis est alteri v. 11 xv7 Nv3n. Verbum , intransitivum yv significat pullulare , ve? non est hiphil (pullulare faciant, i. e. producant) sed kal, ergo : pullulet aqua pullulatione animae viventis, seu anima vivente. Sive mm v23 genitivum consítruas (Vulg. LXX), sive appositionem, sensus est idem : illa pullulatio eo definitur, ut viventium consistat motu. Nomen y^v de se ad. omnis generis animalia refertur, sc. Lev. 11,10. 20. 29 ad animalia aquatilia, volatilia et terrestria : certe h. 1. non sola reptilia designat, sed maxime pisces, quod v. 16 docet. — « et volatile super terram sub firmamento coeli ». Similiter Chald. LXX Aq. Symm. Theod. : ct volatilia (quae) volant super terram sub firmamento coeli. Hi videntur zD5'7' construxisse, quasi omissum sit ante illud relativum (Ca/m.), quod ad 1,1 quandoque fieri concessimus, constructione utique minus usitata. Perperam autem Lamy has versiones putat e textu profectas & textu Hebr. Sam. Syr. diverso. Diversus nullo argumento probatur textus, receptus vero omnino vertatur oportet: e£ aves volent super terram etc. Ergo textus non adstruit, quod iam putabat Ephr., aves productas esse ex aqua. Ne ipsi quidem pisces dicuntur formati ex aqua, sed pullulantes in aqua : quomodo autem dicet quis, volatilia pullulare in aqua? Praeterea 2,19 volatilia diserte affirmantur producta esse de terra. Adverte tandem, ex Lev. 11,20 *'v non solas aves, sed volatilia quaelibet etiam quadrupedia designare. Perperam autem ex duobus successive adscriptis verbis 1?w" et 7p inferre videtur Del., volatilia post aquatilia esse creata : potuere omnino simul creari. — LXX in fine versus adiicit impletionem E/ factum est 1ta.
1:21
v. 91 « Creavitque Deus cete grandia » — van bestiam vastae molis significat (h. 1. et Iob. 7,19; Ps. 73,13 sq.; Ez. 29,4), piscem (cum Ier. 51,35 cf. Ton. 2,11; Ps. 103,25), cete (ad Thren. 4,3 cf. Bochart " Hieroz. t. I lib. I cap. 7), crocodilum (Ez. 29,3), serpentem (Is: 27,1 etc.), ergo omne genus immanium piscium vel amphibiorum. Nominatim h. l. effertur ob molem, uti v. 16 « luminaria magna » — « et omnem animam viventem atque motabilem, quam produxerant aquae in species suas », Hebr. quibus pullulant aquae etc., « et omne volatile secundum genus suum. Et vidit Deus, quod esset bonum ».
1:22
v. 92 « Benedixitque ets dicens : Crescite et multiplicamini et replete aquas maris », — ergo de solis animalibus marinis per se v. 21 agit, non autem explicite de iis, quae in fluminibus etc. reperiuntur — « avesque multiplicentur super terram ». Recte infert Calm. (itemque Cai.), haec animalia » in eo statim perfectionis statu constituta fuisse, quo divinis iussionibus praestandis essent comparata », ergo in statu adulto; falso infert Theodore(. unicum singularum specierum par esse creatum, id enim textus non habet. Quid benedictione intelligatur, recte Vat. ait adiectis verbis Cresc?te et multzplicamini exprimi. Quorum prius /[ans. putat posteriore explicari et limitari : Crescite non quantitate sed numero, hinc multiplieamini. Sed planius locutionem hendiadin explicabis, ut utriusque verbi idem sit sensus. lis igitur verbis Deus collatam in ipsa creatione virtutem prolificam pronuntiat, eiusque effectum se velle suaque providentia esse promoturum. Ita Dei dominium, quod iussione et appellatione praesentia attingebat, benedictione in ipsa futura extenditur. Hic autem oritur quaestio, cur non etiam plantis benedixerit Deus : ideo sane, quia praeposterum erat plantas alloqui, quae ne sonum quidem vocis audire valebant; quia verbis incitantur ii, qui aliquo appetitu moventur. Ceterum divina plantarum propagandarum voluntas v. 11 sq. commemoratis seminibus et fructibus sufficienter inculcatur.
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v. 23 « Et factum est vespere et mane, dies quintus ». | $ nere suo iumenta et reptilia et bestias terrae secundum spectes suas. Factumque est 1a ». xxn prodire faciat, eadem vox quae v. 12 de plantis adhibebatur, quaeque productionis modum ad oculum depingit, non eius internam pandit rationem : cf. Ps. 103 (105), 14 « ut educas panem de terra », ubi tamen non de prima tantum, sed de productione frugum universim agitur, quae utique fit de terra, attamen ex seminibus. Eadem animalia 9,19 producta a Deo scribuntur de humo : audiebatur Dei verbum 1,94 produci jubens, cernebantur de humo, de terra argillosa (Ps. Ion.) et humida (cf. 2,6) prodeuntia. Ad Dei vocem oriuntur, merito igitur Dei quoque virtute effecta creduntur; at eorumdem de humo conspectus ortus nequaquam terrae virtute producta evincit, non terrae vim quasi maternam (Del.) in illis gignendis assignat, generationem aequivocam neque adstruit neque refutat. Exhibetur utique humus tamquam materia, unde sint animalia et plantae, cum ita locutio « formari de humo » 2,7 et 3,19 de homine accipiatur, neque ulla sit ratio eiusdem locutionis in eodem contextu repetitae diversum adstruere sensum; atque ita rem intellexere auctores inspirati posteriores, qui de animalibus « in pulverem suum », inquiunt, « revertentur » (Ps. 103,29), et « de terra facta sunt et in lerram pariter revertuntur » (Eccle. 3,90). . Animalia autem producta cernebantur secundum species suas, quae eaedem intelliguntur, quae inde a creato homine exstiterunt : quippe rerum, quae sunt, non quae forte in aevis homine antiquioribus fuere , describitur origo. Hinc Deus specierum quoque auctor exhibetur, licet ratio, qua illas effecerit et distinxerit, non exprimatur. Dividuntur autem animalia in classes tres, quae, similiter ac quartae et quintae diei opera, non ex alia ratione quam ex mole hominumque usu distinguuntur. galia maiora et minora; semper de pecoribus intelligitur, quando cum ;1'n copulatur, uti Gen. 1 et similiter 2,19 sq.; 7,14.21. Ergo minus recte hoc versu LXX tetpamoó«, melius v. 25 etc. xv jv. — U'12? ex etymo designat animalia, quae repunt , alque hinc etiam de minoribus animalibus aquaticis adhibetur (Ps. 103,25 et cf. Gen. 1, 21). H. 1. de solis terrestribus intelligitur, non tamen de iis solis, quae pedes habent aut breviusculos aut nullos (Dilim.), sed de iis quibusque, quae quadrupedes aliquantae molis non sunt (Bochart. Hieroz. lib. I cap. IV p. 23, Francof. ad M. 1675) : inter quae numerantur mures, talpae, vermes, locustae, serpentes (cf. Lev. 11). — "IND zm vel mTw9n Irvin sunt ferae. Hic pro consueta forma stat. const. habetur altera VN "IY (non tamen in Sam.) quam archaismum declarant (cf. Ps. 49,10; 78, 2; 103,11. 20; Sophon, 2, 14; Is. 56, 9) h. 1l. ad maiestatem divino sermoni addendam adhibitum. v. 25 adhibetur forma consueta. — "Vario ordine hae tres classes enumerantur Gen. 1,25 sq.; 7,14.21 aliisque locis, quin eius divergentiae specialem rationem assignari oporteat.
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v. 25 « Et fecit Deus bestias terrae iuxta species suas, et sumenta, et omne reptile terrae in genere suo. Et vidit Deus, quod esset bonum ». Creatum esse in singulis speciebus utrumque sexum inde concludas, quod ad perfectionem speciei etiam distinctio sexuum requiratur, et quod 2,19 homo, comparatione instituta cum animalibus, dicatur caruisse adiutorio simili sui. Arg. — Merito Greg. (cf. Pater. M. 19.687) : « Quamvis per coaeternum Patris Verbum cuncta creata sint, in ipsa tamen relatione creationis ostenditur, quantum cunctis animalibus, quantum rebus vel coelestibus sed tamen insensibilibus homo praeferatur ». Id autem primum inculcatur eo, quod in rerum productione, quae ab imperfectioribus ad perfectiora ascendit, hominis productio ultimo eoque potissimo loco narretur. Secundo eo, quod homo ab animalium « speciebus » exemptus iisque superior tractetur. Tertio eo, quod eius productio speciali divino consilio (« Faciamus ») adscribatur. Quarto eo, quod eidem divina adscribatur imago et similitudo. Quinto eo, quod ei praesidium super animalia et plantas conferatur. Sexto eo, quod creato homine Deus ab universo tandem opere quieverit. Adde ex sequenti pericope creationem animae a Deo immediate profectam.
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v. 96 « Et ait : Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostram ». « 0 rem admirandam! Sol creatur nulla deliberatione praecedente, eodemque pacto coelum, quibus duobus nihil esse par creatis in rebus potest : ... solius ad hominis fabricationem creator ille universitatis rerum quadam cum consideratione accedit » (Greg. Nyss.). Antiqua est de plurali faciamus disputatio, ubi per se patet, subiectum intelligi aut solum Deum aut alium quemdam praeter Deum. Si hoc alterum defendas, habes sententiam PAzlon. (De mundi opificio 2^; De profug. 13) et Ps. Ion., Deum hic loqui ad angelos, quam refutabat Bas. monens, non ad ingenua imaginem factum esse hominem. Insuper ei faciamus correspondet
1:27
v. 27 creavit Deus, qua ratione secus in hexaemero descriptio mandato respondet. Ergo subiectum solus Deus. Ubi rursum duplex se offert pluralis explanatio : aut enim verba dicemus esse soliloquium Dei ad se ipsum, aut unius divinae personae ad aliam vel alias alloquium, vel accuratius omnium ad omnes, cum decretum creandi hominis omnibus tribus divinis personis sit commune. Id in controversiis de divinis personis maxime contra Arianos inslitutis non paucis visum est Patribus. Patrem loquentem ad Filium statuere Barnab. in epist. (M. 9.735.141), Theophil. Antioch. (ad Autol. II. 18; M. 6.1081). Epiphan. (Haer. 93; M. 41.304), Cyr. Heros. (Catech. X. 6, XI. 23; M. 33.668.721), Chrys. (M. 53.12), Ambr. (Hex. M. 14.957). Accedunt Conc. Antioch. I anno 26* in epist. ad Paulum Samosat. (Labb. I. 1036) et Conciliabulum Syrm. n. 13 anno 35' (ib. III. 258) definiens : « Si quis hoc dictum faciamus hominem non Patrem ad Filium, sed Deum secum loqui affirmet, anathema sit ». Ceterum, cum hi auctores vix censeri queant voluisse 3 Spiritum excludere, Audi Rup. : « Magnum plane consilium in illo sapientiae consilio, in illo talium . personarum, Patris et T'ilii et Spiritus S., non tam senatu quam soliloquio venerando de nobis peccatoribus habitum est. An putas eorum quidquam, quae circa nos acta vel agenda sunt, illic defuisse? Plane ibi omnis nostra in medio causa posita est, mors vel perditio nostra, quae futura erat, illic perspecta est et inde totum consilium habitum, ut unaquaeque persona suam operis partem susciperet, ut sc., sicut iam dictum est, tunc quidem Pater conderet, postea in plenitudine temporis Filius perditum redimeret, Spiritus S. remissionem peccatorum et carnis resurrectionem perficeret, atque ità communi Trinitatis consilio reacdificarentur in homine deserta saeculorum, et fundamenta generationis et generationis suscitarentur ». Alteram supra innuebamus opinionem, qua verba sint Dei soliloquium. Ubi nonnihil severius Bas. : « Quis faber ferrarius aut lignarius aut quis sutor, solus inter artis instrumenta sedens nulloque adiuvante, dicat ipse sibi: Faciamus gladium, aut aratrum coniungamus, aut conficiamus calceamentum? An non potius quod sibi convenit opus cum silentio absolvit? » Eiusmodi soliloquia et in vita communi et in - scriptura occurrunt (cf. Gen. 6,7), neque plus admirationis facit Deus se ipsum ad ereandum hominem exhortans, quam res intellectu carentes, ut fierent, iubens : utrumque sc. factum est, ut rerum per Deum productionem intelligeret homo. Verum quod in hoc soliloquio difficultatem habet, est pluralis verbi : disputatur enim , adhibuerintne Hebraei pluralem maiestatis. Aliquod vestigium pluralis dignitatem rei exprimentis habes in nominibus quibusdam venerandae antiquitatis, quae, cum unam rem sanctam exprimant, nonnisi plurali numero construuntur : ita man5N, quam vocem cum Hebraeis norant Aramaei et Arabes, ignorant Assyrii et Aethiopes (Schrader KAT) , et arzon (cf. Gen. 31,35; 1 Reg. 19,13.16). Iam si plurali nominis quandoque dignifas rei exprimatur, non est cur negemus, quandoque etiam plurali verbi et suffixorum, qui proprie dictus est pluralis maiestatis, expressisse dignitatem loquentis Hebraeos. Eiusmodi mos, inquies, nonnisi serius a Persis Graecisque invectus est : 1 Esdr. 4,18; 1 Mach. 10,19; 11,31; 15,9. Repono, eius nos exempla invocare posse nostrum textum, itemque Gen. 11,7; Is. 6,8; 41,99 et fortasse alios quosdam textus. Quominus tamen cum Knobel, Umbreit (Theol. Studien u. Kritiken, 1839 I. 200), Reinke (Beitráge V. 77 sq.) pluralem maiestatis Gen. 1,26 adstruamus, prohibet alter textus 3,22 : « Ecce Adam quasi unus ex nobis factus est », qui ad pluralem maiestatis nequaquam revocari potest; quod sensere Chald.. Symm. «225 interpretati non ez noó:s, sed ex 1pso (cf. Field), at minus feliciter. Verum, si 3,92 agnoscendum sit vestigium Trinitatis, nulla suppetit ratio eiusmodi non etiam 1,26 admittendi. Aliunde tamen illud Reinkio concedere debemus, tenuiora esse vestigia illa omnia, quam quae ad agnoscendam SS. Trinitatem manuducerent lectorem aevi mosaici, quód totum unice erat in unitate Dei affirmanda; certissime non erant adiutura ad agnoscendas (res in Deo personas, neque plures neque pauciores, multoque minus personarum inter se et ad naturam divinam relationem. Non ergo ad praeparandam apud lectores aevi mosaici SS. Trinitatis fidem illa vestigia & Deoprovisafuere. Sed meminerimus, hebraicam nostram Cosmogoniam non esse tandem aliud, nisi ipsam traditionem initiis temporum et diu &nte Moysen hominibus divinitus concessam. Quibus temporibus distinctius Deus credi potest mysterium SS. Trinitatis revelasse. Cuius mysterii cognitio postmodum ex hominum memoria evanuit, remanentibus in creati atque prolapsi hominis, et fortasse item in destructae turris Babelicae narratione, pristinae fidei vestigiis quibusdam, quibus christiani in suspicionem adducerentur revelati primitus illius mysterii. Cf. etiam Rom. 15,4. Hominem articulo caret, uti nomina v. 24 zwmnenta etc. ; ergo non est nomen proprium Adam sed collectivum : unde v. 27 transitus fit a pronomine singulari 2//uÓ, quod ab hoc nomine regitur, ad pronomen plurale eos. — «inwo35 22552 est hendiadys ad emphasim adhibita (Corluy) : ad tmagtnem similltmam. Eae, quibus discutiendis auctores aliqui h. 1. indulgent, derivationes nominis Adam (ab QN ruber fuit, 11271N terra), e commentariis in lexica sunt amandandae. Nomen Adam scriptura protoparenti attribuit non ob aliam rationem, nisi quia QN est appellatio generica hominis, et quia primus homo appellatione generica pro nomine proprio appellandus erat. Cf. alia primorum hominum nomina, quae item generica sunt : 2,23 Issah i. e. mulier; 3,21 Heva i. e. vita, mater; 4,1 Cain i. c. productio, proles; 4,2 Abel(ass. habal)i. e. filius; 4,25 Seth i. e. positus, germen; 4,26 Enos i. e. homo. Quibus nominum formis videmur revocari ad eam ferc aetatem, qua variae gentes semiticae nondum ab invicem penitius essent separatao , saltem voce habal uterentur communi, quae apud solos postea Assyrios est praeservata. Hinc tandem patet, haec eadem nomina in lingua, qua protoparentes utebantur, potuisse esse significatione quidem eadem, at sono toto coelo diversa. — Vulg. LXX Sam. copulam inserunt : ad imaginem et similitudinem : ita reapse textus ne mutatis quidem consonantibus legi potest. Gen. 5,3 legimus voy» 3272, unde patet utrumque nomen indifferenter cum alterutra praepositione construi posse. Gen 1,27 dieitur homo creatus Woby2, 5,1 rwW2723 (nota praepositionem); unde colligitur expressio complexa esse hendiadys. Praepositio 2 etiam Ex. 25,40; 30,32.37 normam exprimit , secundum quam aliquid fit. Licet Epzphan. (Haer. 70; M. 42. 341) statuat, ecclesiasticam tra- . ditionem omnes quidem homines ad imaginem Dei creatos esse defendere, in quo tamen ea imago consistat nullatenus definire, tamen antiquissimi iam Patres et scriptores ecclesiastici eius imaginis indolem indagati sunt. Ubi illud primum certo constat, eam in s. textu homini assignari imaginem, quae in inferioris ordinis creaturis, v. g. bestiis, nequaquam inveniatur; alterum, unicam hominem praedicari Dei imaginem in mundo visibili. Quare perperam D/odor. Tars. et Theod. Mopsv. (ap. Theodoret.) illos risui habent, quiideo hominem ad Dei imaginem factum esse praetendant, quod intelligentia praeditus sit aut rebus aliis dominetur; nonne haec eadem, inquiunt, in angelis obtinent? nonne et ipsi dicendi erunt ad imaginem Dei esse creati? At peccat obiectio, cum de angelis textus Geneseos minime agat, eos ad Dei imaginem creatos esse neque affirmet neque neget. Imaginem autem divinam Patres modo in corpore hominis reperiunt, uti Tert. (de Resurr. carnis 6, et contra Prax. 12; M. 2. 802. 167 sq.), Aug. (de Gen. c. Manich. I. 17; M. 35. 186 sq.), modo in anima; et quidem vel in immortalitate eiusdem (Aug. de Trin. XII. 2; M. 42. 1038) , vel in intelligentia (Aug. in Ps. 54; M. 36. 629), vel in libero arbitrio (Macar. Hom. 15.23; M. 35. 591), vel verius in intellectu et libertate simul sumptis (Jo. Damasc. de Fide XI. 2; M. 94. 920; Ambr. Hex. VI. 8; M. 14. 259). Imo praestabit his omnibus simul sumptis eum Greg. Nyss. (M. &&. 136 sq.) superaddere hominis 1n res visibiles dominium; cui etiam consentit CArys. (M. 53. 72. 8 et passim), licet 1s longius contra anthropomorphistas abripiatur imaginem divinam in solo illo dominio collocans. Ceterum dominium illud ad rationem imaginis spectare, clare docet apostolus 1 Cor. 11,6 sqq. Dicamus igitur cum Pef£avio (de sex dierum Opificio II. 4), qui hanc funditus tractavit quaestionem, Dei imaginem inveniri in toto homine; potissimum quidem in anima spirituali et immortali, intelligente atque libera virtutibusque, quae mores divinos imitentur, exornata ; secundarie sed vere in corpore, tum ob eius habitum erectum Dei imitantem maiestatem, tum ob loquelam mentis et voluntatis interpretem , tum ob externos mores interiorum virtutum indices. | Quae omnia efficiunt imaginem naturalem Dei in homine. Homo vero, quod factus est ad imaginem Dei, eo ipso etiam est imago Dei, cf. 1 Cor. 11,7 : « Vir... imago et gloria Dei est ». Videndum autem, utrum Gen. 1,26 exprimatur praeterea imago Dei in homine supernaturalis per gratiam. Ubi non illud quaeritur, ditatusne sit Adam gratia sanetificante, quod est de fide; neque illud, aptene gratia dicatur homo formari ad Dei imaginem, quod patet cum per se tum ex 2 Cor. 3,18; Col. 3,10; sed id unice, cogamurne contextu Gen. 1,26 admittere, voce ad zmaginem exprimi imaginem non naturalem tantum, sed supernaturalem. Quod videtur negandum. Etenim Hexaemeron est in explicanda origine mundi vésibzlis, imago autem illa supernaturalis sensus omnino fugit. Vi divinae imaginis, secundum quam homo creatus est, tribuitur eidem illico praesidium creaturarum inferiorum : verum hoc ei competit intuitu divinae imaginis naturalis. — Tandem, licet in vocibus faciamus ad tmaginem nostram agnoscamus vestigium SS. Trinitatis, tamen non inde effici censemus, factum referri hominem ad imaginem non Dei solummodo, sed trium divinarum personarum : licet enim in quibusdam homo proprietates divinarum personarum imitetur, at non potest dici esse earumdem imago secundum ea, quibus distinguuntur, sed secundum ea, quae illis communia sunít, i. e. naturam divinam. Quo sensu etiam optime explicatur vox nostram, ut sc. eatenus una illa imago sit trium personarum communis, quatenus id exprimat, in quo illae conveniunt. « Et praesit. piscibus maris et volatilibus coeli et bestits universaeque terrae omnique reptili, quod movetur zn terra ». Reliqui praesint, quia vox Adam est nomen collectivum. Dicebantur v. 16. 18 luminaria praeesse (cf. quae ib. diximus), ibi tamen verbo 5v, dum hic verbum 737» adhibetur, i. e. proprie pedibus culcare, cf. Ps. 8,8 sq.: « Omnia subiecisti sub pedibus eius, oves etc. ». Praesidium utrobique pro subiecta materia explicandum est, hicque cf. Gen. 9,2 : « Terror vester ac tremor sit super cuncta animalia terrae etc. »; et Eccli. 17,4 « Posuit timorem illius super omnem carnem, et dominatus est bestiarum et volatilium ». Homo praeest animalibus, quod iis ad suos fines libere utatur, quod dominium moribus humanis expressum illa terrore agnoscant. Copula e£ sane aliquem cum praecedentibus nexum exprimit, ut illud praesidium aut sit aliquid divinam imaginem mere consequens, aut sit ipsa integra imago, aut aliqua eiusdem pars : quem ultimum sensum esse praeferendum supra monuimus. Illud certe ea copula enuntiat, principatum super animantia uni inter visibilia homini competere vi divinae, quae ipsi naturaliter inest, imaginis : illius tantum est in mundo visibili praeesse, qui divinam reflectit imaginem. Syr. contra omnes et iumentis cunctisque bestiis terrae, inserens vocem IY atque ita conformans enumerationem v. 26 enumerationibus v. 24. 25 et alibi. Haee lectio, utpote facilior, secundum regulas critices tanto magis est repudianda, quod vel ipse Ephr. Syrus eam ignoret. Fuit igitur correctoris cuiusdam manu in textum Syrum introducta et aliquando omnes, quantum novimus, textus hebraici ea voce caruere; non tamen primitus. Etenim sunt,rationes, cur primitus et ante antiquissimas concinnatas versiones ea vox textui infuisse defendatur. Nulla penitus deprehenditur ratio enumerationis v. 26 diversae à v. 24 sq. scribendae, cum v. 26 illud utique pronuntiare intendat, eas omnes animalium classes homini subiici, quae v. 20-25 creatae narrabantur : cf. 9, 2 textum omnino parallelum, qui bestias terrae minime omittit; et alterum textum 1, 28, ubi hominis in terram imperium non sub eodem cum animalibus verbo ;11^ subsumitur, sed speciali verbo 22 exprimitur. Praeterea si textus reapse praeter animalium principatum dominium quoque universae terrae homini attribuebat, at nequaquam illud mediis animalium classibus interserebat, sed lis ad calcem adnectebat. Ergo non de universa terra primitus agebat textus, sed de universis bestiis terrae, vocemque IY'r1 antiquitus deperditam Syrus postmodum sapienti coniectura restituit. — Ceterum aliquod in v. 26 irrepsisse mendum, , eo etiam fit probabilius, quod in v. 28 eidem affini varia apud varios menda deprehendantur. Quippe consentientibus ibi Hebr. Vulg. Chald. Aq. Theod., legit mmi pro mmm Sam., omittit 52 Symm., videtur pro i'n legisse vYa LXX. Et haec quidem minora. At praeterea addita videtur legisse LXX vNn 53231 nona 5221, Syr. vero solummodo aanamt Hlud voNnD 5323 utique ex corrupto v. 26 apud LXX huc delapsum est. v. 297 « Et creavit Deus hominem ad imaginem suam, ad imaginem Dei creavit illum , masculum et feminam creavit eos ». Ubi Symm. suam divinae imaginis interpretationem hac paraphrasi proponit : E creavit. Deus hominem in imagine excellenti, rectum Deus creavit illum. Auctor inspiratus consideratione dignitatis homini collatae in trium membrorum iubilum abripitur. Et primum quidem , quam verbo nvy expresserat, iam repetito verbo x33 tamquam immediate divinam exhibet productionem. Quam suffixis tantum (nostram, suam) divinam pronuntiaverat imaginem, eam adiecta voce De? explicitius scribit divinam, forma insuper orationis, quam chiasmum vocant, illustrat. Unico antea plurali 1711 indicatum individuorum numerum jam sexuum discrimine explicat atque ita simul viam sternit benedictioni « Crescite etc. ». Non ergo ideo h. 1. illud discrimen commemorat, ut hominem sicut imagine Deo, ita sexibus bestiis assimilari doceat (Greg. Nyss.); quin etiam in sexuum differentia et consequente foecunditate aliqua cum aeterna numinis foecunditate affinitas consistit : sed ut beneficium v. 26 enuntiatum pluribus celebret. Clarius etiam, quam solo plurali *11(^, docemur sexuum in hominibus discrimen a primaeva Dei ordinatione ortum ducere (Cor/uy). Recte tandem ex hoc versu concluditur creationem mulieris, quae cap. 2 narratur, die Contra nugas Wellh. cf. Dilim. — Pluralis QnN utique excludit errorem, creatum esse primitus unum individuum androgynum. Num vero napa 125 ita cogimur interpretari, ut necessario praeter differentiam sexuum statuat, unicum par esse primitus creatum? Ita Del., Dillm. At, licet unicum par esse creatum ex narratione sequenti indubie pateat, non id laudata h.l. expressione enuntiari crediderim, sed solam differentiam sexuum. Cf. 5, 1: « Masculum et fipminam creavit eos... et vocavit nomen eorum Adam »; ubi Adam est nomen speciei in duos sexus discretae, est etiam nomen unius individui, primi sc. viri, sed non est nomen eorum, si hac voce exprimi praetendas et primum virum et primam mulierem : primae quippe mulieris nomen proprium non fuit Adam.
1:28
v. 98 « Benedixitque illis Deus et att » : — alii et dixit illis Deus, unde affirmat De/., auctore uti v. 27 parallelismo indulgente, simplex Y2N5 (cf. v. 22) in longiorem formulam excrevisse : at merum *2N5 etiam LXX legunt, unde incerta lectio — « Crescite et multiplicamini et replete terram, et subiticite eam, et dominamini piscibus maris et volatilibus coeli et universis animantibus, quae moventur super terram ». Non replere terram solummodo iubetur homo, sed eandem subiicere totamque in suos usus convertere. Animalia eo ordine, quo creata sunt, recensentur : pisces, volatilia, animalia terrestria; benedictio vi verborum soli utique homini confertur, merito tamen censet Proc. animalia sexta die creata ita venire in partem benedictionis, uti v. 99 animalia quinta die creata benedictionem nanciscebantur.
1:29
v. 99 « Dixitque Deus : Ecce dedi vobis omnem herbam afferentem semen super terram et universa ligna , quae habent in. semetipsis sementem generis sui, ut sznt vobis 2n escam » ,
1:30
v. 30 « et cunctis antmantibus terrae » , quo nomine rm h. l. etiam 5232 includi censenda sunt, « omnique volucri coeli et universis, quae moventur in » — reliqui addunt universa — « terra et in quibus est anima vivens » , dedi omnem herbam viridem , — quae verba omnes praeter Vulg. habent, sola LX X erronee praefigente copulam — « w4 habeant ad vescendum ». Explicata v. 28 mutua hominis ad bestias relatione, v. 29 sq. quorsum ad has et ad illum plantae spectent explicatur : assignantur autem eae in escam, adscripta extremo utroque versu eadem voce n52x5. Et homini quidem assignantur v. 29 eaedem duae plantarum classes, quas v. 11 sq. distinguebant, fruges et fructus; animalium esca ea utique voce 3vY exprimitur, qua v. 11 sq. item exprimebatur; dum vero ibi et v. 29 eae herbae describebantur a/ferentes semen, hic legimus véirox herbae, ut earumdem plantarum homini potius grana et fructus, aniz malibus herbae et folia cibus attribuantur. Hinc cum Ca. perspicies, auctorem s. tantummodo « describere provisionem cominunem », i. e. plantarum ad animantia rationem generalissime spectatam. Non ciborum leges fert, quales postea in V. T. sancitae fuere : sane gra- : nis et fructibus auimalia quoque, puta aves, vescuntur; neque homo . herba viridi, cuiusmodi sunt non pauca legunt, abstinet; animalia 'carnivora ante peccatum carnibus abstinuisse, gratuito aliqui (Rup., Proc. etc.) et absurde affirmavere; homo esu carnium nostro textu nequaquam interdicitur, neque omnis eius cibus enumeratur, cum inter alia mel et lac desiderentur, quibus sane hominibus uti licuit. Non ciborum leges fert auctor, sed creatorum ordinem absolvit ; qui in eo est, ut homini subsint bruta, animantibus plantae, homini frumenía potius fructusque, animalibus herbae et folia cibus attribuantur. Facile utique assentimur Lap. statuenti, « homines usque ad diluvium (?) in cibo ita frugales fuisse, ut herbis et fructibus vescerentur, carnibus vero aeque ac vino abstinerent; idque non ob aliquod Dei praeceptum, sed ob religionem quamdam inde natam, quod necdum Deus carnium et vini usum expresse et diserte concessisset ». Dillm.), quasi affirmetur, profecto nulla primitus exstitisse animalia carnivora, neque ad solum v. 26, secus enim post illum scribenda erant, sed ad totum alterum sextae diei opus, quo creatus homo brutisque antepositus plantaeque in cibum assignatae narrantur. Singulorum naturae huic divino consilio adamussim adaptabantur.
1:31
V. 31 « V2ditque Deus cuncta, quae fecerat, et » ecce « erant valde bona ». Laudatio haec proxime utique alterum sextae diei opus respicit, cum ante verba « Et factum est ete. dies sextus » inseratur, neque excluso homine mundus visibilis dici possit valde bonus. Sed laudationem non solum illud opus respicere, docent verba cuncta, quae fecerat. Quomodo fit, quae seorsim spectata dicebantur bona, ea simul considerata praedicari valde bona? « Si singula opera Dei, cum considerantur a prudentibus , inveniuntur habere laudabiles mensuras et numeros et ordines in suo quaeque genere constituta, quanto magis omnia simul, i. e. ipsa universitas, quae istis singulis in unum collectis impletur » (Aug.)! Aliam praeterea responsionem suggerit Bonf7. : « Necdum creato homine, propter quem cetera, et necdum ultima manu addita universo, neque mundus neque quidquam ceterorum poterat dici undequaque perfectum ». Secundum haec et homo propter naturae excellentiam, divinam sc. imaginem, dicitur valde bonus, quem altiorem bonitatis gradum reliqua, homini subordinata atque ita eius bonitatis affinia effecta, partieipant. Pulchre etiam Cai. « Apponitur adverbium ecce ad demonstrandum non futuram, non exspectandam , sed praesentem haberi bonitatem summam ipsius universi. Et significatur per hoc, quod universum est ita bonum, quod nihil ei deficit, quod nihil habet superflui, quod nullam desiderat additionem ». Bene tandem Vulg. vertit non optima , sed vaíde bona : | perfectum sc. est universum hoc in suo gradu et ordine; Cosmogonia, dd | quae de aliis, quae fortasse creata erant universis silet, multo minus (— "^" censeri potest affirmare, hoc nostrum universum omnium, quae fieri ': potuerint, esse perfectissimum. — « Et factum est vespere et mane, dies sextus ». Notabat iam Malv., hoc tandem numerale articulum habere (cf. quae diximus ad v. 5), ut sexto die seriem concludi significetur. Quo confirmatur, quod aliunde evidens est, Hexaemeron suam habere structuram, a qua septimus dies excludatur : quodsi enim auctor continuo veluti calamo septem dierum acta describere voluisset, articulum non sexto, sed soli septimo diei praefixisset, quo solo die septiduum concludebatur; at ipsi primo loco non septiduum, sed hexaemeron describere in: animo erat. Arg. — MHexaemero absoluto neque Hexaemeri iam structurae adstringitur oratio; non consecratis formulis mandatum, impletionem, laudationem exprimit, non diem vespera et mane distinguit, sed latiori alveo fluit faciliorique sermone. v. 1 Hexaemeri opera resumit, v. 9 eorumdem auctorem et durationem repetit, v. 2 sq. septimam diem sanctificatam narrat. | Cap. II.
1:1
… which the Torāh is written; the alphabetic acrostic in Lamentations would indicate that the people had failed to fulfill all the precepts of the Law; "from alef to tau" is equivalent to "from alpha (v.) to omega," whence the value attributed to 'eth in Gen. 1, 1.
… Genes.), p. 3, ed. Lagarde, and Commentarii in Ep. Pauli ad Gal. 3, 13: PL 26, 387 b). It is seen from these citations that for A. the bereich (the "beginning") of Gen. 1, 1, was the Son (for this exegesis in patristic literature, cf. A. Harnack, in Texte und Untersuchungen, I, III, Leipzig 1883, p. 130 ff.), and that A. knew the text of Deut. 21, …
BIBLE - Polyglot of Antwerp (1558). Gen. 1:1-20. Hebrew text and Vulgate, with the Targum text below. - Rome, copy in the Pontifical Biblical Institute.
… With the rise of the natural sciences, especially geology and paleontology, the effort to find in the Bible the new data for scientific hypotheses led to the elaboration of a new system of interpretation of the Hexaemeron (Gen. 1:1-2:3) and related passages. …
… "In principio creavit Deus caelum et terram" (Gen. 1, 1). To read in this text that God produced all things, drawing them from nothing, one must not consider the word "created" alone (in Hebrew bāra), which can be understood and is in …
GENESIS. - Gen. 1, 1 in the rabbinic Bible, ed. J. Buxtorf, Basel 1620. Hebrew text and Targum of 'Chuséba. …
… God, with the world and with men. Here are its salient features: in v. 1 the term λόγος occurs three times: "In the beginning was the L., and the L. was with God, and the L. was God," that is: the L. is eternal (he already existed before creation, cf. Gen. 1:1), is a person distinct from God the Father, of whom he will be called the Only-Begotten (John 1:14, 18), is God (θεός ἦν ὁ λόγος). …
… As parallels that remained distinct are indicated the accounts of creation (Gen. 1, 1-2, 4a and 2, 4b-24), of God's covenant with Abraham (Gen. 15 and 17), of the manna and the quail (Ex. 16 and Num. 11), etc. From the fusion of duplicates result the accounts of the Flood …
1:2
… According to the haggadic legends, A. was created from the beginning formless (golēm) and, according to some, did not receive the human soul until the end of the creative work, while according to others the soul was created from the beginning because «the spirit of God was hovering» (Gen. 1:2). The letters of his name sum up the four cardinal points: ἀνατολή (east), θύσις (west), ἄρχτος (north), μεσπυβρία (south). …
Mary, reassured by the Angel ("the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you"; cf. Gen. 1, 2), gives her assent, declaring herself "the handmaid (ἀνδός) of the Lord." And in that instant, according to the unanimous sentiment of theologians, "the Word became flesh and dwelt …
This disk rests on the primordial waters of the great abyss or tĕhōm (Gen. 1:2; cf. the Akkadian tāmtu) and is consolidated by columns (Ps. 18:16). From the great abyss the waters rise up to feed the springs and rivers. …
… the soul over the body; in the second the term ἄμαρρος ὕλη is not to be interpreted in the sense of unformed, uncreated matter, from which the world would have originated according to the Greek philosophers, but in that of chaos, which is presented in Gen. 1:2 as the first effect of God's will.
I. THE REVELATION. - In the Old Testament there are numerous texts that seem to refer to the Holy Spirit (Spirit of Yahweh, Spirit of God): for example, in Gen. 1:2; 41:38; Ex. 31:3; Num. 27:18, and more often in the prophetic books; Isaiah announces the outpouring of the Spirit upon the Messiah (Is. 41:1; 42:1 ff.; principally 11:1-2, a text …
… The idea of an attack of the initial darkness was perhaps suggested to Mani by a Jewish or Christian tradition that attributed to the Pneuma of Gen. 1, 2 the function of separating the region of light from that of darkness (Gen. 1, 4; cf. Theophilus of Antioch, Ad Autolyc., II, 13: PG 6, 1072-73). The Father of "greatness" (majesty) …
… with the cosmological problem, develop according to the style and movements of ancient pagan Germanic poetry (notable indeed are the analogies of this song with a stanza of the Old Norse Voluspá, which is the first song of the Edda) the theme of Gen. 1:2 and Ps. 89:2. The remaining four verses, fragmentary, probably allude to the episode of the fall of the Angels, as a premise to the narration of the origin of the world and of man, …
1:4
… The day (jōm) was reckoned from one evening to the next (evening-morning: Gen. 1:4; Dan. 8:14; νυχθήμερον, 2 Cor. 11:25) and comprised evening, morning, and noon (Ps. 54 [55]:18). …
… until he becomes aware of the light of him who is truly God (Irenaeus, I, 29, 4, p. 263; St., 30, 6, p. 267; Hippolytus, Refut., VII, 25, 3, 26, 1). At the basis of the concept that the demiurge saw the light of the higher god lies an interpretation of Gen. 1:4 "et vidit deus lucem" (v. the already cited book: Shand-Gunanik Vicar, p. 185, 52; v. also the Manichaeans in St. Augustine, De genesi contra manich., I, 13 and Contra Faustum, XXII, …
II. SECOND NARRATIVE. - As for the second narrative (Gen. 1:4-10), the strongly anthropomorphic character of this passage, the way it begins: "When the Lord God made the earth..." so similar to the Babylonian account. …
… The idea of an attack of the initial darkness was perhaps suggested to Mani by a Jewish or Christian tradition that attributed to the Pneuma of Gen. 1, 2 the function of separating the region of light from that of darkness (Gen. 1, 4; cf. Theophilus of Antioch, Ad Autolyc., II, 13: PG 6, 1072-73). The Father of "greatness" (majesty) faced the attack by sending to meet it "the Primal
1:6
… In the depths of the earth is found the śĕ'ōl (Job 10:21 ff.; cf. the Akkadian arallû) destined as the dwelling of the departed souls, who appear as shadows, rĕphā'îm (Ps. 88:11). Above, the solid celestial vault ("firmamentum") has the task of dividing the upper waters from the lower (Gen. 1:6 ff.) and holding these back in their reservoirs (Job 38:22). When God wishes to send rain he opens the floodgates (Gen. 7:11; 8:2) and lets the waters flow. …
1:14
… The heaven of the stars would be the highest (according to G. Schiaparelli) and as thin as a curtain or skin (Vulgate, cf. Ps. 104:2); according to others, the stars, with the sun and the moon, would instead be attached to the solid firmament (cf. Gen. 1:14, 15, 17), with the consequent difficulty of explaining the motion of the stars, recog-
of light, the reference to Gen. 1:14-19 is full of meaning, where, on the fourth day, the creation of the «luminaria magna» is placed: the sun, the moon, the stars that give life and light to creation. …
1:20
plants were the food of men and of domestic animals (Gen. 1:20). Such an indication is of a general nature: only the primary sustenance is meant to be presented; it is evident that carnivorous animals existed from that time.
On the fourth day of creation God filled the sea with fish and the air with birds (Gen. 1:20-21). The poet sees in this the destiny of souls: in the birds that free themselves on high he represents those that ascend to heaven; in the fish, which are immersed in the waters, those …
1:21
The tannin (from tnn "to stretch out lengthwise") was a sea monster or cetacean (Gen. 1:21 is translated κῆτος; but Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion: δράκων; Ps. 148:7; cf. Job 7:12; Is. 27:1), or a fearsome serpent (Ex. 7:9-12; Deut. 32:33; Ps. 91 [90]:13). …
1:22
In Sacred Scripture we have the blessings of God (Gen. 1:22, 28), of kings (ibid. 14:19), of patriarchs, of parents (ibid. 9:26). In the Gospel we read of Jesus' blessings upon foods, upon his own, and upon children (Mt. 14:19; Lk. 24:50; …
1:24
… righteousness in order to be able to enter the Kingdom of God (11, 5; 7) awaiting its arrival from hour to hour (12, 1). Doing so we shall be members of the first church that was built before the sun and the moon (14, 1) and if God created according to Gen. 1, 24 man male and female, we must think of Christ and the primitive church (14, 2), which were spiritual. …
The poet draws his inspiration from the account of the sixth day of Creation (Gen. 1:24-28), which culminates in the appearance of man, who came to rule over all creation. …
1:26
… The name ádhám means "man"; it indicates both the human species (Gen. 1:26) and the first man, progenitor of the human family.
… Apart from this, the only doctrine to be reproached in A. would be his anthropomorphism, that is, the thesis that the image of God in man is the human body (Gen. 1, 26) and that therefore God too has a body (Epiphanius, 70, 2, 3; 70, 6, 1; cf. Theodore bar Kōnaj, op. cit., p. 195). This indulgent judgment of Epiphanius is explained by his struggle against Origen. …
The plural form, preferred in the Bible (about 2,500 times), indicates the fullness of the power of the one God: pluralis virium = virtutum: cumulus potentiarum (W. Gesenius - E. Kautzsch, § 124 g); cf. the plural of Gen. 1:26: "God has such fullness of being that he can deliberate with himself, as several persons deliberate among themselves" (M.-J. …
… Hence the denial, or rather the allegorical interpretation, of the creation of man (Gen 1:26-27) in the image and likeness of God. Furthermore, the Mikaelites maintained the impossibility of representing the formless Trinity in three distinct Persons and therefore recognized …
III. PURPOSES OF MARRIAGE. — 1. The data of Revelation. — It has already been mentioned how God himself establishes the natural foundations of marriage, promulgating its laws and determining its purposes in procreation and mutual help (Gen. 1:26-31; 2:7-25).
… The first, in Gen. 1, 26-31, of the pre-Adamites, carried out together with that of the plants and animals. …
2. Man was also immune from pain. - Sacred Scripture partly lets it be understood that in the earthly paradise man had whatever he could reasonably desire, worked without tiring, and the animals and lower beings were subject to him (Gen. 1:26; 2:8, 15; Sir. 17:3-4). Pain appears in Genesis as a consequence of sin (Gen. 3:19). Moreover, immunity from death presupposes immunity from the pains and illnesses that lead to death. …
6. Man's superiority over the animals in the Old Testament is not derived from the possession of a spiritual and immortal soul, but is expressed through the idea of likeness to God (Gen. 1:26; 5:1-3; 9:6; Ps. 8:6 ff.; Eccli. 17:3; Wis. 2:23). Nevertheless, since this likeness consists in man's being endowed with intelligence and free will, implicitly resembling God coincides …
Supernatural Gifts and Original Justice
… This doctrine has become common, because it is more conformable to Scripture as interpreted by tradition; Gen. 1, 26: "Let us make man in our image"; Eccl. 7, 28-30: "God made man upright"; Eph. 4, 24: "We must put on the new man, created according to God in true justice and holiness."
… means of sensible things, the knowledge of intelligible realities (St. Thomas, loc. cit.), but also that creatures bear impressed upon them the sign and the vestige of the creator, and that man, in particular, was created "in his image and likeness" (Gen. 1:26). Therefore human realities are naturally suited to signify divine realities. …
1:27
… Full of wonder, the inspired author exclaims: "God created man in his image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them" (Gen. 1:27). The formation of man is expressed with the verb bārā used in the Hebrew forms qal and nif'al to indicate an action or direct intervention of God (v. CREATION).
1. Scripture. - In the first pages of the Bible the structure of M. is outlined as a natural institution (Gen. 1:27-28; 2:18-24), whose constitutive elements
This sublime equality is taught us in Sacred Scripture: "God created man in his own image: in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them" (Gen. 1:27); and in the New Testament: "For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. …
1:28
Birth control, setting aside the reasons that may motivate it, is not in itself reprehensible, as though it were a shirking of the divine precept: Crescite et multiplicamini (Gen. 1:28); for this precept, even if it was a true precept of natural law or of positive divine law at the origin of humanity and as long as the human race did not have adequate propagation …
… The Gnostic demiurge has his collaborators: either the seven planets or the twelve constellations of the zodiac, according to astrological language, or the angels according to a Jewish tradition (the plural: "faciamus hominem" in Gen. 1:28 explained by the collaboration of the angels in creation). …
… USE OF MARRIAGE. - 1. Principles. - The use of marriage, even after original sin, notwithstanding the fervor of the concupiscence that accompanies it, is entirely honorable (cf. Gen. 1:28; cann. …
… The second discourse defends marriage (Gen. 1, 28), although virginity surpasses it as the moon surpasses the stars. …
Noe (Heb. Nōah; Septuagint Nōe; cf. Old Babylonian Nuḫīja)
… N. and his descendants a "covenant" (ibid. 9:8-17; cf. Is. 54:9), which he set as a divine seal upon N.'s condition as the new progenitor of the human race; in it he renewed and expanded certain dispositions already given to the first head, Adam (cf. Gen. 1:28 with 9:1-7: development of hunting and a carnivorous regime in the new historical phase of civilization). …
… The t. cannot in fact claim in its own favor any argument from Sacred Scripture: the few passages cited (e.g., Gen. 1:28; 5:3; 46:26) prove nothing. …
1:29
the herbs, the fruits and the animals as sustenance for them and for their descendants (Gen. 1, 29-30; 9, 2-3). Not only that; but he gave man full and absolute dominion over nature: « God, who have created all things by your word and by your wisdom have formed man so that he may dominate …
1:31
… alliteration, in Greek, with the greeting], with a possession not transitory but permanent) indicates the Virgin's moral perfection and her sublime greatness, as it were a new creation of the supernatural order (cf. Hugon, p. 72) in which, as in the first (Gen. 1:31), the divine Artificer takes delight (cf. Song 4:1, 7 and Mt. 3:17).
Christian thought, while affirming the intrinsic goodness of every being (cf. Gen. 1, 31) and the immense positive values of creation in the cosmic-natural order and in the human-spiritual one (perfection, dignity, beauty and happiness of the world and of life), cannot …
Douay-Rheims (Challoner) · Vulgata Clementina · original Douay-Rheims (Douay 1609-10), transcription by EEBO-TCP (CC0) · La Sacra Bibbia, tradotta dalla Volgata da Antonio Martini (1769-1781) (LaParola (laparola.net), Martini OSIS text, Public domain (LaParola's electronic edition marks it 'Dominio pubblico')). Public domain.