Chapter XVII.—He Mentions Five Explanations of the Words of Genesis I. I.

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.’1010    Gen. i. 1. Under the name of heaven he did not indicate that spiritual or intellectual creature which always beholds the face of God; nor under the name of earth, that shapeless matter.” “What then?” “That man,” say they, “meant as we say; this it is that he declared by those words.” “What is that?” “By the name of heaven and earth,” say they, “did he first wish to set forth, universally and briefly, all this visible world, that afterwards by the enumeration of the days he might distribute, as if in detail, all those things which it pleased the Holy Spirit thus to reveal. For such men were that rude and carnal people to which he spoke, that he judged it prudent that only those works of God as were visible should be entrusted to them.” They agree, however, that the earth invisible and formless, and the darksome deep (out of which it is subsequently pointed out that all these visible things, which are known to all, were made and set in order during those “days”), may not unsuitably be understood of this formless matter.

25. What, now, if another should say “That this same formlessness and confusion of matter was first introduced under the name of heaven and earth, because out of it this visible world, with all those natures which most manifestly appear in it, and which is wont to be called by the name of heaven and earth, was created and perfected”? But what if another should say, that “That invisible and visible nature is not inaptly called heaven and earth; and that consequently the universal creation, which God in His wisdom hath made,—that is, ‘in the begining,’—was comprehended under these two words. Yet, since all things have been made, not of the substance of God, but out of nothing1011    See p. 165, note 4, above. (because they are not that same thing that God is, and there is in them all a certain mutability, whether they remain, as doth the eternal house of God, or be changed, as are the soul and body of man), therefore, that the common matter of all things invisible and visible,—as yet shapeless, but still capable of form,—out of which was to be created heaven and earth (that is, the invisible and visible creature already formed), was spoken of by the same names by which the earth invisible and formless and the darkness upon the deep would be called; with this difference, however, that the earth invisible and formless is understood as corporeal matter, before it had any manner of form, but the darkness upon the deep as spiritual matter, before it was restrained at all of its unlimited fluidity, and before the enlightening of wisdom.”

26. Should any man wish, he may still say, “That the already perfected and formed natures, invisible and visible, are not signified under the name of heaven and earth when it is read, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;’ but that the yet same formless beginning of things, the matter capable of being formed and made, was called by these names, because contained in it there were these confused things not as yet distinguished by their qualities and forms, the which now being digested in their own orders, are called heaven and earth, the former being the spiritual, the latter the corporeal creature.”

CAPUT XVII. Ut coeli et terrae nominibus aliud et aliud intelligi potest.

24. Dicunt enim: Quamvis vera sint haec, non ea tamen duo Moyses intuebatur, cum spiritu revelante diceret: In principio fecit Deus coelum et terram (Gen. I, 1). Non coeli nomine spiritualem vel intellectualem illam creaturam, semper faciem Dei contemplantem significavit; nec terrae nomine informem materiam. Quid igitur? Quod nos dicimus, inquiunt, hoc ille vir sensit, hoc verbis istis elocutus est. Quid est illud? 0835 Nomine, aiunt, coeli et terrae, totum istum visibilem mundum prius universaliter et breviter significare voluit, ut postea digereret dierum enumeratione, quasi articulatim, universa quae sancto Spiritui placuit sic enuntiare. Tales quippe homines erant rudis ille atque carnalis populus cui loquebatur, ut eis opera Dei non nisi sola visibilia commendanda judicaret. Terram vero invisibilem et incompositam, tenebrosamque abyssum, unde consequenter ostenditur per illos dies facta atque disposita esse cuncta ista visibilia quae nota sunt omnibus, non incongruenter informem istam materiam intelligendam esse consentiunt.

25. Quid si dicat alius, eamdem informitatem, confusionemque materiae, coeli et terrae nomine prius insinuatam, quod ex ea mundus iste visibilis cum omnibus naturis quae in eo manifestissime apparent, qui coeli et terrae nomine saepe appellari solet, conditus atque perfectus est? Quid si dicat et alius, coelum et terram quidem invisibilem visibilemque naturam non indecenter appellatam; ac per hoc universam creaturam quam fecit in Sapientia, id est in Principio, Deus, hujuscemodi duobus vocabulis esse comprehensam: verumtamen quia non de ipsa substantia Dei, sed ex nihilo cuncta facta sunt, quia non sunt idipsum quod Deus, et inest quaedam mutabilitas omnibus, sive maneant, sicut aeterna domus Dei; sive mutentur, sicut anima hominis et corpus; communem omnium rerum invisibilium visibiliumque materiem adhuc informem, sed certe formabilem, unde fieret coelum et terra, id est invisibilis atque visibilis jam utraque formata creatura, his nominibus enuntiatam, quibus appellaretur Terra invisibilis et incomposita, et, Tenebrae super abyssum: ea distinctione, ut terra invisibilis et incomposita intelligatur materies corporalis ante qualitatem formae; tenebrae autem super abyssum, spiritualis materies ante cohibitionem quasi fluentis immoderationis et ante illuminationem Sapientiae?

26. Est adhuc quod dicat si quis alius velit, non scilicet jam perfectas atque formatas invisibiles visibilesque naturas, coeli et terrae nomine significari cum legitur, In principio fecit Deus coelum et terram; sed ipsam adhuc informem inchoationem rerum formabilem creabilemque materiam his nominibus appellatam, quod in ea jam essent ista confusa, nondum qualitatibus formisque distincta, quae nunc jam digesta suis ordinibus vocantur coelum et terra; illa spiritualis, haec corporalis creatura.