Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Introduction
This book is entitled in Hebrew, according to custom, from the first word of the book, bereshit, that is, "in the beginning"; in Greek and Latin it is called Genesis. For it narrates the generation, that is, the creation or birth of the world and of man, his fall, propagation, and deeds, especially of the Patriarchs Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. Genesis encompasses the deeds of 2,310 years. For that many years elapsed from Adam and from the creation of the world up to the death of Joseph, at which Genesis ends, as is evident if you add up the years of the Patriarchs in this chronology:
Chronology of Genesis
From Adam to the flood there elapsed 1,656 years. From the flood to Abraham, 292 years. In the 100th year of Abraham, Isaac was born, Gen. ch. 21, v. 4. In the 60th year of Isaac, Jacob was born, Gen. 25:26. In the 91st year of Jacob, Joseph was born, as I shall show at Gen. 30:25. Joseph lived 110 years, Gen. 50:25. Add these years together and you will find from Adam to the death of Joseph, 2,310 years.
Genesis can be divided into four parts, which Pererius divided and treated in as many volumes. The first encompasses the deeds from Adam up to the flood, Gen. 7. The second contains the deeds from Noah and the flood up to Abraham, namely those things which are narrated from chapter 7 up to chapter 12. The third contains the deeds of Abraham from chapter 12 up to Abraham's death, Gen. 25. The fourth, from chapter 25 to the end of Genesis, encompasses the deeds of Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, and ends with the death of Joseph.
Writers on Genesis
Origen, St. Jerome, Augustine, Theodoret, Procopius, Chrysostom, Eucherius, Rupert, and others wrote on Genesis. St. Ambrose, after St. Basil, wrote his book Hexameron, also books on Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc. Blessed Cyril wrote five books, to which add his Glaphyra, that is, "polished gems," as if to say, a few things selected from many, in which he pursues not the literal but mostly the mystical sense. These exist in manuscript, which I myself used, and afterwards our Father Andreas Schottus published them together with other works. Albinus Flaccus also wrote Questions on Genesis. Junilius, an African bishop, also wrote on the earlier chapters of Genesis; he is found in tome VI of the Library of the Holy Fathers. Furthermore, Anastasius of Sinai, a monk and later Bishop of Antioch and Martyr, in the year of our Lord 600, wrote eleven books of Hexameron on Genesis, in which he allegorically expounds the first chapters of Genesis concerning Christ and the Church. They are found in the appendix of the Library of the Holy Fathers.
Thomas the Doctor also wrote -- not the holy Angelic Doctor, but the English one, namely the Doctor of York, around the year of Christ 1400. That these works are by the English, not the Angelic Doctor, is attested by St. Antoninus and Sixtus of Siena, in book IV of the Bibliotheca Sancta; although Antonius of Siena, who first published them, tries to ascribe them to St. Thomas Aquinas. And because these are commonly cited under the name of St. Thomas, we too shall speak thus, lest anyone think we are citing someone else. Many more recent authors also wrote on Genesis after Lyra, Hugo, and Denis the Carthusian, among whom Pererius excels in the variety of his learning. In former times, Alphonsus Tostatus, Bishop of Avila, wrote at greater length than all others, with great examination and judgment of each point, and to him this eulogy is rightly given:
"Here is the wonder of the world, who examines every knowable thing."
For he died in his fortieth year. Finally, Ascanius Martinengus of Brescia recently wrote two enormous volumes on chapter 1 of Genesis, which he entitles the Great Gloss on Genesis, in which he weaves a chain from the Fathers and Doctors, and discusses at length all incidental questions.
But because regarding Sacred Scripture that saying is most true: "Art is long, life is short," for this reason I shall compress into a few words what others have said at length, and I shall earnestly strive for brevity, as well as solidity and method. Therefore I shall weave in only the more outstanding moral lessons, and from time to time I shall refer readers to authors who treat these matters more fully. And here, once and for all, I would like to advise preachers and all who eagerly seek moral teachings to read St. Chrysostom, Ambrose, Origen, Rupert, Rabanus, Jerome de Oleastro, Pererius, Hamerus, Caponius, and Johann Ferus -- who however must be read with a grain of salt, for he greatly extols faith, which on account of Luther and Calvin is dangerous in these times. Finally, let them read Denis the Carthusian, who applies and explains nearly everything morally, and Antonio Honcala, Canon of Avila, who comments on Genesis with equal piety and learning.
Finally, when I cite those authors just mentioned, I shall not note the specific passage; for I take it as understood -- what is obvious to anyone to think -- that they say this about the passage I am treating. Otherwise I shall ordinarily note the passage. In the work on the Hexameron, Gen. 1, I shall not note the passages, because everyone knows that the commentators treat that subject in the same place, and the Scholastics in book II of the Sentences, distinction 12 and following, or Part I, question 66 and following. Now because some Fathers and Doctors are wordy and prolix, while I am brief, lest the work grow too large and the reader become weary, for this reason I occasionally cut their redundant and repeated words; and with some intervening matter omitted, I select and connect those things which have greater force and weight. Thus I extract all their substance and compress it into a few of their very own words, so as to serve the readers' time, taste, and convenience.
Chapter One
Synopsis of the Chapter
The creation of the world and the work of the six days is described: namely, on the first day heaven, earth, and light were made. On the second day, v. 6, the firmament was made. On the third day, v. 9, the sea and dry land were made, with herbs and plants. On the fourth day, v. 14, the sun, moon, and stars were made. On the fifth day, v. 20, fish and birds were produced. On the sixth day, v. 24, cattle, creeping things, and beasts were produced, and God blesses them and assigns them food, and sets man over the rest as their lord.
Vulgate Text: Genesis 1:1-31
1. In the beginning God created heaven and earth. 2. And the earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God moved over the waters. 3. And God said: Let there be light, and light was made. 4. And God saw the light that it was good; and He divided the light from the darkness. 5. And He called the light Day, and the darkness Night: and there was evening and morning, one day. 6. And God said: Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 7. And God made a firmament, and divided the waters that were under the firmament from those that were above the firmament. And it was so. 8. And God called the firmament Heaven: and the evening and the morning were the second day. 9. And God 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. 10. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters He called Seas. And God saw that it was good. 11. And He said: Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth. And it was so. 12. And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each according to its species. And God saw that it was good. 13. And the evening and the morning were the third day. 14. And 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: 15. to shine in the firmament of heaven, and to give light upon the earth. And it was so. 16. And God made two great lights: a greater light to rule the day, and a lesser light to rule the night; and the stars. 17. And He set them in the firmament of heaven to shine upon the earth, 18. and to rule the day and the night, and to divide the light and the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. 20. God 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. 21. And God created 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. 22. And He blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the waters of the sea; and let the birds be multiplied upon the earth. 23. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day. 24. And 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. 25. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and cattle, and every thing that creeps on the earth after its kind. And God saw that it was good. 26. And He said: Let Us make man to Our image and likeness; and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the fowl of the air, and the beasts, and the whole earth, and every creeping creature that moves upon the earth. 27. And God created man to His own image; to the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28. And God blessed them, and said: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea, and the fowl of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth. 29. And 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 food; 30. and 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. 31. And God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Verse 1: In the beginning God created heaven and earth
In the Beginning: Nine Interpretations
First interpretation: "In the beginning of time"
1. IN THE BEGINNING. -- First, St. Augustine, book I of On the Literal Interpretation of Genesis, ch. 1; Ambrose and Basil, homily 1 on the Hexameron: "In the beginning," they say, that is, in the first origin or start, not of eternity, not of aeviternity, but of time and of the world, when indeed the world's duration, namely time, began together with the world. For although at the beginning of the world there was not such time as now exists -- for our time now is the measure of the motion of the first movable sphere, of the sun and the heavens -- yet at that time the first movable sphere, the sun, and the heavens did not yet exist, and consequently neither did their motion, which could be measured by time. Nevertheless, there was then the duration of a corporeal thing, namely of heaven and earth, which was similar to and commensurate with our time, and therefore in reality was time. For a corporeal thing is measured by time, whether it moves or is at rest: for time is the measure of bodies, just as aeviternity is of angels, and eternity is of God. Yet speaking in Aristotelian terms, time is at least by nature posterior to motion and to a movable body.
What kind of time before the world?
Whence St. Augustine in his Sentences, number 280: "Once creatures were made," he says, "times began to run in their motions. Hence before creation, times are sought in vain, as if they could be found before time itself. For if there were no motion, whether spiritual or corporeal, by which through the present, the future would succeed the past -- there would be no time at all. But a created thing could not possibly be moved if it did not exist. Therefore time began from the creature, rather than the creature from time; but both began from God. 'For from Him, and through Him, and in Him are all things.'"
When were heaven and earth created?
Note that God created heaven and earth not in time, but in the beginning of time, that is, in the first moment of time, namely in the first instant of the world. St. Basil and Bede think that heaven and earth were created not on the first day, but shortly before the first day, namely before light. But that they were created not before, but on the very first day, that is, at the beginning of the first day, before light was produced, is clear from Ex. 20:1.
Second interpretation: "In the Son"
Secondly, and better according to the letter, the same Augustine, Ambrose, and Basil in the same place, and the Lateran Council, chapter Firmiter, on the Supreme Trinity and the Catholic Faith: "In the beginning," they say, that is, in the Son; for the Apostle teaches that all things were created through the Son as the idea and wisdom of the Father, Col. 1:16. But this interpretation is mystical and symbolic.
Third interpretation: "Before all things"
Thirdly, and most simply: "in the beginning," that is, before all things, so that God created nothing earlier or before heaven and earth. So in John ch. 1, v. 1, it is said: "In the beginning was the Word," as if to say: Before all things, that is, from eternity the Word existed. St. Augustine also brings forth this meaning above.
Both of these meanings are genuine and literal, and from the second it is clear against Plato, Aristotle, and others that the world is not eternal. From the third it is clear that the angels were not created before the corporeal world, but simultaneously with it by God, as the Lateran Council teaches, which will be cited below.
To these three, the ancients add other explanations.
Fourth interpretation: "In sovereignty"
Fourthly, therefore, "in the beginning," that is, in sovereignty, or in royal power (for the Greek arche also signifies this, whence rulers and magistrates are called archontes), God made heaven and earth, says Tertullian, in the book Against Hermogenes. So also Procopius: "God," he says, "who is the King of kings, and most entirely His own master, not depending on anything else, and administering all things according to His own will, called forth this universe together with its species and forms; indeed He Himself brought forth the matter, and did not borrow it from elsewhere."
Fifth interpretation: "In summary"
Fifthly, Aquila translates 'in the beginning' as 'in the heading,' that is, in summary, all things at once comprehensively, or in a mass. For God, in creating heaven and earth, at the same time as it were created everything else in summary; for from them He afterwards fashioned the rest. For the Hebrew reshit, that is 'beginning,' is derived from rosh, that is, 'head.'
Sixth interpretation: "In a moment"
Sixthly, St. Ambrose and St. Basil, homily 1 on the Hexameron: "In the beginning," they say, that is, in a moment, without any delay of time, even the smallest, for the beginning is indivisible. For just as the beginning of a road is not the road, so the beginning of time is not time, but an instant.
Seventh interpretation: "As principal things"
Seventhly, "in the beginning," that is, as principal, more excellent, and primordial things. So St. Ambrose, Procopius, and Bede.
Eighth interpretation: "As foundations"
Eighthly, "in the beginning," that is, as the first things, as the foundations and bases of the universe, say St. Basil and Procopius. So it is said: "The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord;" for fear is the foundation of wisdom and the first step toward it.
Ninth interpretation: God's eternity and omnipotence
Finally, Junilius here says: the phrase 'in the beginning' denotes God's eternity and omnipotence. "For He whom it declares to have created the world in the beginning of time is certainly designated as having existed eternally before all time; and He whom it narrates to have created heaven and earth at the very beginning of creation is declared to be omnipotent by the great swiftness of His operation."
He Created
From what?
HE CREATED -- properly, that is, from nothing, from no pre-existing matter. So that holy mother of the Maccabees, 2 Macc. ch. 7, says to her son: "I beg you, my child, to look at the heaven and the earth, and at all that is in them, and understand that God made them from nothing." Secondly, "He created," namely alone, as Isaiah says, ch. 44, v. 24, by Himself and His own omnipotence, not through angels -- who did not yet exist, and even if they had existed, they still cannot be the ministers of creation. Thirdly, "He created" according to the idea and exemplar which He had conceived in His mind from eternity. For God was then
"Bearing the beautiful world in His mind, most beautiful Himself," as Boethius sings, book III of the Consolation of Philosophy, metre 9.
Why?
Fourthly, He created the heaven, not because He needed it, but because He is good, and because God willed by this means to communicate His goodness to the world and to mankind: for it was fitting that good works should come from a good God, says Plato, and after Plato, St. Augustine, book XI of The City of God, ch. 21. Wherefore the same Augustine beautifully says, Confessions I: "You have made us, O Lord, for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You;" and: "Heaven and earth cry out, O Lord, that we should love You."
Note: 'To create' in Cicero and among the pagans means 'to beget'; among the Greeks, creation and foundation are the same thing. But in Sacred Scripture, 'to create,' when it is said of those things which before in no way existed, means to make something from nothing. So St. Cyril, book V of the Thesaurus, ch. 4; St. Athanasius, in the epistle inscribed with the decrees of the Council of Nicaea against the Arians; St. Justin, in the Admonitory; Rupert, book I on Genesis, ch. 3; Bede and Lyra here. For, as St. Thomas teaches, Part I, question 61, art. 5, the universal emanation of all things could only have come from nothing.
Jerome de Oleastro translates the Hebrew bara as 'divided.' Whence he thus translates it: "In the beginning God divided heaven and earth." For he thinks that God first of all created waters with the earth, and these most vast and immense, and then from them produced the heavens (which Scripture here passes over in silence and presupposes), and finally separated them from the earth and the waters, and that only this is expressed here. But this invention is rejected by all the Fathers and Doctors, who translate bara as 'created.' For this is its proper meaning: for nowhere does it mean 'divided,' as those learned in Hebrew know.
Tropology on the threefold contemplation of creatures
Tropologically, creatures are to be contemplated in three ways. First, by considering what they are of themselves, namely nothing, because they were made from nothing, and of themselves they change day by day and tend toward nothingness. Second, by considering what they are from the gift of the Creator, namely good, beautiful, stable, and eternal, and thus they imitate the stability of their Maker. Third, that God uses them for the punishment and reward of human beings. Thus we hear every creature proclaiming these three things to us: Receive, return, flee; receive the benefit, return the debt, flee the punishment. The first voice is that of a servant, the second of one admonishing, the third of one threatening.
The errors of philosophers are refuted
Hence it is clear, first, the error of Strato of Lampsacus, who imagined that the world was ungenerated and had existed of its own power from eternity. Second, the error of Plato and the Stoics, who said that the world was indeed created by God, but from eternal and unbegotten matter; because this matter would be uncreated and coeternal with God, and consequently would be God Himself, as Tertullian rightly objects against Hermogenes. Third, the error of the Peripatetics, who asserted that God created the world not by will, nor freely, but from the necessity of nature from eternity. Fourth, the error of Epicurus, who taught that the world was produced by a fortuitous collision and combination of atoms.
Saint Augustine speaks admirably, in book XI of The City of God, chapter III: "The world itself, by its most orderly mutability and mobility, and by the most beautiful appearance of all visible things, proclaims in a certain silent manner both that it was made and that it could not have been made except by God, who is ineffably and invisibly great, ineffably and invisibly beautiful." Hence all the schools of philosophers that held anything more divine affirm by unanimous consent that nothing so proves both that the world was made by God and that it is administered by His care, as the very sight of the whole world and the consideration of its beauty and order. So Plato, the Stoics, Cicero, Plutarch, and Aristotle, whose argument on this subject is reported by Cicero in book II of On the Nature of the Gods.
How did He create?
Note: God created heaven and earth by commanding and saying: Let there be heaven and earth, as is expressly stated in IV Esdras, vi, 38, and Psalm xxxii, verse 6: "By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established;" from which Saint Basil infers: because God made this world by His power, art, and freedom, by the same He can create many more: and again by the same He can annihilate the world. For the world in relation to God is like a drop from a bucket, and like a drop of dew, as is said in Isaiah XL, 15, Wisdom XI, 23: hence God is also said to hang the mass of the earth by three fingers.
Objection
You will say: Why then does Moses not say here that God said: Let there be heaven, as he says He said: Let there be light? I respond that Moses used the word "created" rather than "said," lest the uneducated Jewish people, from the word "let there be," conceive of some pre-existing matter to which God had spoken, or from which He had produced heaven and earth. So Rupert, who assigns three reasons. First, he says, since the very beginning is the Word of God, it would be superfluous and inept to say: "In the beginning God said." Second, because there did not yet exist anything to which the command could be given. Third, he says "created," not "let there be," so that God would be demonstrated to be the creator of all matter.
God (Elohim): Thirteen Definitions
The errors of heretics
God. -- Therefore Simon Magus, Arius, and others err, who say that God created the Son; and the Son in turn created the Holy Spirit; and the Holy Spirit created the angels; and the angels created the world. Second, Pythagoras, the Manichaeans, and the Priscillianists err, who say that there are two principles of things, or two gods: one good, the creator of spirits; the second evil, the creator of bodies.
Explanation of the word Elohim
For "God" in Hebrew is elohim, which is derived from el, that is "strong," and ala, that is "he adjured, obligated, bound"; because God gives and preserves His power, virtue, and all good things to creatures; and through this He binds them to Himself as if by an oath, to worship, obedience, fear, faith, hope, invocation, and gratitude toward Him.
Elohim therefore is the name of God as creator, governor, judge, inspector, and avenger of all things; and Moses uses this name Elohim here, first, so that human beings might know that the same one is the founder of the world and its judge, who, just as He created the world, will also judge it, as Elohim, that is, judge. Second, so they might know that the world was established by God through His will, judgment, and wisdom. Third, so they might know that all things were arranged by Him in a just balance, and that to each thing was given what was, so to speak, owed to it, namely what its nature and the good of the universe demanded. Fourth, so they might know that, just as the world was created by God, so it is preserved and governed by the same, as Job xxxiv, 18 and following, and Wisdom xi, 23 and following teach.
Therefore Aben Ezra and the Rabbis say that God is here called Elohim to declare His majesty, and His three endowments, namely intelligence, wisdom, and prudence, by which He Himself established the world. Others think that Moses was referring to the multitude of ideas and perfections that are in God. Note: God revealed to Moses His name Jehovah. Before Moses, therefore, God was called Elohim. Hence even the serpent called God thus, saying: "Why has God commanded you?" in Hebrew, Elohim. From which it is clear that from the beginning of the world Adam and Eve called God Elohim. So Bede.
What is God? Thirteen definitions
What then is Elohim? What is God?
First. Aristotle, or whoever is the author of the book On the World, addressed to Alexander: "What the helmsman is in a ship, the charioteer in a chariot, the leader in a chorus, the law in a city, the commander in an army, the same is God in the world, except that in those cases authority is laborious, disturbed, and anxious; whereas in God it is easy, ordered, and tranquil."
Second. Saint Leo, Sermon 2 On the Passion: "God is He whose nature is goodness, whose will is power, whose work is mercy."
Third. Aristotle, or whoever is the author of the book On Wisdom According to the Egyptians, book XII, chapter xix: "God is He from whom come perpetuity, place, and time, and by whose benefit all things endure; and just as the center of a circle exists in itself, and the lines drawn from it to the circumference, and the circumference itself with its points, exist in that same center: so too all natures, both those pertaining to the intellect and those pertaining to the senses, consist and are confirmed in the first agent (in God)."
Fourth. God is providence itself over all things; for, as Saint Augustine says, book III of On the Trinity, chapter iv: "Nothing happens visibly and perceptibly that is not either commanded or permitted from the interior, invisible, and intelligible court of the supreme ruler, according to the ineffable justice of rewards and punishments, graces and retributions, in that most vast and immense commonwealth of all creation."
Fifth. The same Saint Augustine: If you see, he says, a good angel, a good human being, a good heaven; take away the angel, the human being, the heaven; and what remains is the essence of good things, that is, God.
Sixth. A certain Gentile king said that God is darkness beyond all light, and that He is known by the ignorance of the mind.
Seventh. Elohim is He who reaches from end to end mightily, and orders all things sweetly, as the Wise Man says.
Eighth. Elohim is He in whom we live, move, and have our being, Acts XVII, 28.
Ninth. "God, says Saint Augustine in his Meditations, is He whom neither the mind reaches, because He is incomprehensible; nor the intellect, because He is unsearchable; nor the senses perceive, because He is invisible; nor the tongue utters, because He is ineffable; nor writing explains, because He is inexplicable."
Tenth. "God, says Saint Gregory of Nazianzus in his Treatise On the Faith, is that which, when spoken of, cannot be expressed; when appraised, cannot be appraised; when defined, grows by the very definition; because He covers the heaven with His hand, He encloses the whole compass of the world in His fist: whom all things do not know, and yet by fearing they know: whose name and power this world serves, and the momentary succession of the elements replacing one another bears witness."
Eleventh. "God is He who hangs the mass of the earth by three fingers, who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and weighed the heavens with a span. Behold, the nations before Him are like a drop from a bucket, and are counted as a speck on a balance, the islands like fine dust. And Lebanon is not sufficient for burning, and its animals are not sufficient for a holocaust. He who sits upon the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers," Isaiah chapter XL, verses 12, 15, 22.
Twelfth. God is He of whom the Wise Man says, chapter XI, verse 23: "As a speck on a balance, so is the world before You, and as a drop of early morning dew that falls upon the earth."
Thirteenth. "Matter is more subtle than air, the soul more than air, the mind more than the soul, God Himself more than the mind," says Hermes Trismegistus.
Elohim as a plural form
Note: Elohim is of the plural number, for in the singular it is said Eloah. The reason for this is: First, because the Hebrews address great things and magnates in the plural number as a mark of honor: as the Latins also do, saying for example "We, Philip, King of Spain." Thus in Job XL, 10, the elephant is called Behemoth, that is "beasts," because on account of the greatness of its body and strength, it is the equivalent of many beasts, as the Hebrews teach.
Second, the plural Elohim signifies the very great, supreme, and immense strength and power of God in creating, governing, and judging.
Third, the plural Elohim implies in God a plurality of persons, just as the unity of essence in God is implied by the singular verb bara, that is, "he created," as Lyranus, Burgensis, Galatinus, Eugubinus, Catharinus, the Master [Peter Lombard], and the Scholastics teach against Cajetan and Abulensis, in book II of the Sentences, distinction 1.
The four causes of creation
These therefore are the four causes of creation and of creatures, namely of heaven and earth: the material cause is nothingness; the formal cause is the form of heaven and earth; the efficient cause is God; the final cause is the good, not of God, but ours. Therefore all creatures throughout all eternity lay hidden in their nothingness and in their ideas in the divine mind, but were produced in time for the sake of human beings. For God, who throughout all His eternity had been most blessed in Himself, was in no way made happier or richer; but through them He wished to pour Himself forth into creatures and into the human being, just as the overflowing sea pours itself out upon the shore.
God therefore created the world for this purpose: first, to prepare for the human being a royal house, indeed a kingdom; second, to provide for him a theater of all things and a paradise of every kind of delight; third, to offer him a book in which he might see and read his Creator.
Heaven and Earth: Four Interpretations
First opinion
First, Saint Augustine, book I of On Genesis Against the Manichaeans, chapter VII: Heaven and earth, he says, are here called prime matter, because from it heaven was to be produced on the second day, and earth on the third day; but it is not probable that matter alone without form was created, nor could such a thing be called heaven. Hear Augustine himself: "That formless matter, he says, which God made from nothing, was first called heaven and earth, not because it already was this, but because it could be this. For heaven is written to have been made afterwards: just as if, considering the seed of a tree, we were to say that roots, trunk, branches, fruits, and leaves are there -- not because they already exist, but because they will come from it." Indeed the same Augustine, book I of On Genesis Literally, chapter XIV, adds that this matter was endowed and adorned with its form in the very same instant of time. And so its creation is here merely named, because by nature, not by time, it preceded its form. Close to this is the exposition of Gregory of Nyssa, who understands by heaven and earth a chaos heaped together in one universal, common, and rough form, from which all heavenly and elemental bodies were to be drawn forth.
Second opinion
Second, the same Augustine, book XI of The City of God, chapter IX, understands by heaven the angels, and by earth the formless prime matter. But the former is mystical, and the latter is equally improbable.
Third opinion
Third, Pererius, Gregory of Valencia in his Treatise On the Work of Six Days, and others probably understand by heaven all the celestial orbs; and by earth, the earth itself with water, fire, and the neighboring air, as if on the first day of the world God created all the celestial and elemental orbs, and in the following five days only adorned them with motion, light, stars, influences, and guiding intelligences.
Fourth opinion: The author's view
Fourth, it is most probable that by heaven is here understood the first and highest, namely the empyrean, which Paul calls the third heaven, David the heaven of heavens, and which is the seat of the Blessed, as all commonly teach. Therefore on the first day God created from among the heavens only the empyrean heaven, and adorned and perfected it with all its beauty. For to inhabit this for eternity, the angels and human beings were subsequently created. And this is what the faithful in every age call heaven, so that if you ask them where they desire to go after this life, they immediately say, to heaven, namely the empyrean, so that they may be happy and blessed there. Hence Saint John Chrysostom here, homily 2: "God, contrary to human custom, in perfecting His building, first stretched out heaven, and afterward laid the earth beneath it: first the roof, and afterward the foundation;" for the roof of the fabric of the world is heaven, not the sidereal, but the empyrean. And Saint Basil, homily 1 on the Hexaemeron, says that "heaven and earth were first laid and constructed as certain foundations and supporting bases of the universe."
This opinion is proved first, because the firmament, that is, the eighth heaven and the neighboring orbs, were not merely adorned, but actually made and created on the second day, as is clear from verse 6: therefore not on the first day. The heaven, therefore, created on the first day is none other than the empyrean. This is the opinion of Blessed Clement, received from the lips of Saint Peter; of Origen, Theodoret, Alcuin, Rabanus, Lyranus, Philo, Saint Hilary, Theophilus of Antioch, Junilius, Bede, Abulensis, Catharinus, and many others; so much so that Saint Bonaventure asserts this opinion to be the more common one, and Catharinus to be the most true.
And Earth
AND EARTH. -- That is, the globe of the earth together with the abyss, that is, the mass of waters, poured into and spread over the earth, and extending all the way to the empyrean heaven. These three things therefore were created first of all, namely the empyrean heaven, the earth, and the abyss, that is, the mass of waters occupying everything from the empyrean heaven down to the earth; from which abyss, or water, partly thinned out and partly condensed and solidified, all the heavens were made, or the firmament on the second day, and all the stars on the fourth day: just as crystal is formed from frozen water. This is the opinion of Saint Peter and Clement, Saint Basil, Bede, Molina, and many others whom I shall cite at verse 6.
And from this it follows that the opinion is more true of those who hold that the matter of the heavens and of sublunary things is the same, and that it is corruptible. Furthermore, the earth created by God was placed in the middle of the universe, and there it stands firm: both because the will and power of God constantly holds and supports it like a ball suspended in mid-air, according to what eternal Wisdom says in Proverbs VIII: "When He was laying the foundations of the earth, I was with Him arranging all things;" and also for a physical reason, because the earth is the heaviest among created things, and therefore demands the lowest place.
When were the angels created?
You will ask: where and when were the angels created? Some thought they were created before the world: so held Origen, Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, Ambrose, Jerome, Hilary. Others thought they were created after the world. But I say that they were created simultaneously with the world at the beginning of time, and indeed in the empyrean heaven: for they are its citizens and inhabitants; so with Saint Augustine, Gregory, Rupert, and Bede teach the Master and the Scholastics.
Indeed the Lateran Council, under Innocent III: "It must be firmly believed that God from the beginning of time created from nothing both creatures at once: the spiritual and the corporeal, the angelic and the worldly." Although Saint Thomas and some others think these words can be taken otherwise, nevertheless they seem too clear and explicit to be twisted to another meaning. Hence it appears that our opinion is now not merely probable, but also certain as a matter of faith; for the Council itself asserts and defines this.
Why does Moses not mention the creation of the angels?
Note: Moses does not mention the creation of the angels, because he was writing for uneducated and dull Jews who were prone to idolatry, and who would easily have worshipped angels as gods: nevertheless he tacitly implies them in chapter II, 1, when he says: "Thus the heavens were finished, and all their ornament:" for the ornament of the heavens consists of stars and angels. This, then, is the vast and beautiful machine of the world, namely of heaven and earth, which that great architect of all things produced from nothing in a moment, with the beginning of time.
Admirably, the philosopher Secundus, when questioned by the emperor Hadrian: "What is the world?" He responded: "An unceasing circuit, an eternal course. What is God? An immortal mind, an inconceivable inquiry, containing all things. What is the Ocean? The world's embrace, the lodging of rivers, the source of rains. What is the Earth? The base of heaven, the center of the world, the mother of fruits, the nurse of the living." And Epictetus says: "The earth is the granary of Ceres, the storehouse of life."
Verse 2: And the earth was without form and void
In Hebrew it reads, the earth was tohu vevohu, that is, the earth was a solitude, or emptiness and void: because the earth was empty of human beings and cattle, as Jonathan the Chaldean translates; again it was empty of plants, animals, seeds, grass, light, beauty, rivers, springs, mountains, valleys, plains, hills, metals, and minerals, to which it has a natural, so to speak, inclination. Hence in Wisdom XI, it is said that God "created the world from invisible matter," in Greek amorpho, that is, formless, unadorned, unordered.
Hence the Seventy [LXX] here translate, the earth was invisible and unordered; Aquila, the earth was vanity and nothing; Symmachus, the earth was idle and unformed; Theodotion, the earth was emptiness and nothingness; Onkelos, the earth was desolate and empty. For the earth with the abyss of waters poured over it was like a kind of empty, rough, and unformed chaos, about which Ovid says:
One was the face of nature in the whole world,
Which they called chaos, a rough and unformed mass;
Nothing but inert weight, and heaped together in one
The discordant seeds of things not well joined.
Therefore it is improbable what Gabriel holds, namely that this chaos was prime matter alone, or else informed only by some rough, obscure, general form of corporeity. For from this passage of Moses it is clear that earth and heaven were created first; therefore the matter first created was not devoid of form, but clothed and imbued with the particular form of heaven and earth.
Why not adorned at the same time?
You will ask: Why did God, in creating heaven and earth on the first day, not at the same time fully and perfectly adorn them? I respond: The first reason is His holy will: the fitting explanation is that nature (whose author is God) proceeds from imperfect things to perfect things. The second is that we might learn that all things depend on God both as to their beginning and as to their adornment and perfection. The third is lest, if all things were read as perfect from the beginning, they might be thought to be uncreated.
What spirit is understood here?
The Spirit of the Lord -- that is, an angel, says Cajetan; better, the Hebrews, Theodoret, and Tertullian Against Hermogenes, ch. 32, say: The Spirit of the Lord is a wind stirred up by God. Thirdly, most fittingly and fully, the Spirit of the Lord is the Holy Spirit proceeding from God the Father and the Son, and by His own power, presence, and might breathing a warm breeze upon the waters. So say St. Jerome, Basil, Theodoret, Athanasius, and nearly all the other Fathers, who from this passage prove the divinity of the Holy Spirit.
"Was borne" explained from the Hebrew
WAS BORNE. -- For "was borne," the Hebrew is merachephet, which, as St. Basil, Diodorus, and Jerome testify in the Hebrew Questions on Genesis, refers to birds when, hovering over their eggs and chicks, they gently balance themselves with a light beating of their wings, fluttering and flitting about, and then brood over them, breathe warmth upon them, cherish and animate them. In like manner the Holy Spirit was borne over, or, as Tertullian reads, was carried over the waters -- not by place or motion, but by an all-surpassing and excelling power, just as the will and idea of a craftsman is borne over the things to be fashioned, says St. Augustine, Book I of On Genesis Literally, ch. 7. Therefore by this will and power of His, together with the warm breeze that He spread forth from Himself, the Holy Spirit brooded, as it were, over the waters, and imparted to them a generative force, so that creeping things, birds, fish, and plants -- indeed all the heavens -- might be produced from the waters.
Hence the Church, in the blessing of the fonts, sings to the Holy Spirit: "You who were to warm them were borne over the waters;" and Marius Victor says:
And the sacred Spirit, hovering over the outstretched waves,
Animated the nurturing waters, giving the seeds of things.
This spirit that gives life to the waters and to all things, Plato said was the soul of the world. Whence Virgil, in Aeneid Book VI:
A spirit within nourishes, and a mind infused through every limb
Moves the whole mass, and mingles with the great body.
Allegorically
Allegorically, the Holy Spirit is here signified as brooding, as it were, over the waters of baptism, and by them bringing us to birth and regenerating us, says St. Jerome, Epistle 83 to Oceanus.
Verse 3: And God said: Let there be light
3. AND GOD SAID -- by a word, not of the mouth, but of the mind, and that not a rational word but an essential one, common to the three Persons. "He said," therefore, means: He conceived in His mind, willed, decreed, commanded efficaciously, and by commanding actually made and produced -- God, that is, the most holy Trinity itself, produced light. For God's willing is His doing, says St. Athanasius, Sermon 3 Against the Arians. Nevertheless the word "said" is appropriated to the Son. Whence elsewhere Holy Scripture often says that through the Son, namely as the Word and idea, all things were created, because indeed the Son Himself is the notional and properly so-called Word, and consequently wisdom, art, and idea are appropriated to Him; just as power is attributed to the Father, and goodness to the Holy Spirit.
Finally, God said these things after the creation of heaven, earth, and the abyss, but while the same day still lasted, which was the first day of the world.
Let there be light
LET THERE BE LIGHT. -- Note that in Genesis and the creation of the world, light was formed before all other things, because light is the noblest, most joyful, most useful, most efficacious, and most powerful quality, without which all things created and to be created would have remained invisible. "From His treasures," says Esdras, Book IV, ch. 6, v. 40, "He brought forth a luminous light, that His work might appear." See St. Dionysius, On the Divine Names, Part I, ch. 4, where he lists thirty-four properties of light and fire, wonderfully fitting for 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 display Himself visibly to the world. "For from the Good itself," says St. Dionysius, "comes light, and it is an image of goodness."
For God is the uncreated, eternal, and immense light, who, though He dwells in inaccessible light, nevertheless illuminates all things.
St. Basil gives a beautiful comparison in Homily 2 on the Hexaemeron: "Just as those who pour oil into a deep whirlpool of water give that place clarity and transparency, so too the Creator of the universe, having uttered His word, immediately brought a lovely and most beautiful charm into the world through light." St. Ambrose gives another in Book I of the Hexaemeron, ch. 9: "From what other source should the adornment of the world take its beginning but from light? For it would be in vain if it could not be seen. He who desires to build a dwelling worthy of the master of the household, before he lays the foundations, first examines where to let in the light; and this is the first grace, without which the whole house bristles with unsightly neglect. It is light that commends the remaining ornaments of the house."
What was this light?
You will ask, what was this light? Catharinus answers first that it was the most brilliant sun; but the sun was produced not on the first day, as was the light, but finally on the fourth day. Secondly, St. Basil, Theodoret, and Nazianzen think that only the quality of light was here created without a subject -- for which reason Nazianzen calls this light "spiritual." Note this against heretics who deny that accidents can exist without a subject in the Eucharist. Thirdly, and best, Bede, Hugh, the Master, St. Thomas, St. Bonaventure, Lyra, and Abulensis hold that this light was a luminous body -- either a bright part of the heaven, or rather of the abyss, which, formed in the shape of a circle or column, shone forth upon the world, and which was like the material from which afterward, divided and separated into parts, increased and fashioned as it were 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 first that this light was not properly speaking created, because God on the first day created all primary matter, and laid it as the substrate of the form of the waters of the abyss; and from it He then drew forth this light and other forms. God, therefore, properly speaking created on the first day only all things that were to be created; on the remaining five days He did not create, but formed and adorned what had been created. And so it seems that God, about to produce light, condensed from the waters of the abyss a certain spherical body like crystal, and imparted this light to it.
Note secondly that this luminous body, during the first three days of the world -- that is, 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, it circled both hemispheres of heaven and illuminated them, as the sun now does.
Tropologically
Tropologically, the Apostle says in 2 Corinthians 4:6: "God, who said that light should shine out of darkness, has Himself shone in our hearts," as if to say: Just as God of old in Genesis produced light from darkness, so now He has made us believers out of unbelievers, and illumined us with the light of faith. Again, the light created first of all signifies the right intention of the mind, which ought to precede and direct all our works, says Hugh of St. Victor.
Furthermore, light is knowledge and wisdom. Whence St. Augustine says: "Light was created first," that is, "wisdom was created before all things" (Sirach 1:4). "The light of Your countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us." Finally, light is law and doctrine, especially the Gospel, according to Proverbs 6:23: "The commandment is a lamp, and the law is light." Hence of the Gospel Isaiah sings in chapter 9:2: "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light."
Symbolically and allegorically
Symbolically, "let there be light" means "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 takes this of the eternal generation of the Word of God: 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 8:12: "He was the true light that enlightens every man coming into this world." Hence the same name is shared by Christ with the Apostles, Doctors, and Preachers, to whom He says in Matthew 5: "You are the light of the world." On this St. Basil speaks beautifully in his Homily on Penance: "His own prerogatives Jesus bestows on others. He is the Light: '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). What is His own He bestows on His servants. For Christ is like a fountain perpetually flowing."
Anagogically, light signifies the light of glory and the brightness of the beatific vision, according to Psalm 36:10: "In Your light we shall see light." Hence Christ represented heavenly glory in His transfiguration through light: "For His face shone like the sun," Matthew 17:2.
Verse 4: And God saw the light that it was good
4. AND GOD SAW THE LIGHT THAT IT WAS GOOD. -- "He saw," that is, He caused us to see and know, says St. Jerome, Epistle 15. Secondly, more plainly and simply, God is here introduced by Moses through a kind of literary characterization, in the manner of men, as a craftsman who, having completed his work, contemplates it and sees that it is beautiful and fine -- and this to this end: that against the Manichaeans we may know that nothing evil, but all things good, were produced by God. Learnedly St. Augustine says in the Sentences, no. 144: "Three things especially about the condition of creation we needed to be told: who made it, through what He made it, and why He made it. 'God said: Let there be light, and light was made. And God saw the light that it was good.' No author is more excellent than God; no art more efficacious than the Word of God; no cause better than that good should be created by the Good."
GOOD. -- The Hebrew tob signifies everything good, beautiful, pleasant, useful, and advantageous: for light is most pleasant to the world, as well as 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, by place: for while here there is light and day, at the antipodes there is night and darkness. Secondly, by time: for in the same hemisphere, in alternation and at different times, light and darkness, night and day succeed each other. Thirdly, by cause: for the cause of light is one thing, namely a luminous body, and the cause of darkness is another, namely an opaque body. Moses here chiefly has in view the second, as if to say: God caused darkness and night to succeed after the light He had created. Whence it follows: "And He called the light Day, and the darkness Night."
When was hell created?
You may ask, when was hell created? Louis Molina thinks it was created on the third day. But it is truer 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 thrust from heaven into hell, which God immediately after their sin prepared for them in the center of the earth, as a prison and rack with its fire and brimstone.
On the first day, therefore, just as God divided light from darkness, so He divided Angels from demons, grace from sin, glory from punishment, heaven from hell.
Allegorically, Hugo 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, while the evil ones were confirmed in evil and segregated from the good; and so what was happening in the visible world was an image of what was happening in the intelligible world.
Verse 5: And He called the light Day
5. AND HE 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 caused that the light, for the whole time it illumines a hemisphere, should make day, and the darkness night. So St. Augustine, Book I of On Genesis Against the Manichaeans, ch. 9 and 10.
AND THERE WAS EVENING AND MORNING, ONE DAY. -- I take it as more certain that heaven and earth were created not before, but on the very first day itself. Now I say it is more likely that the world was created as it were at morning, and that then there was darkness over the globe and the abyss -- during which time the Spirit of the Lord was borne over the waters, as is clear from verse 2. Then a little later, at verse 3, after six hours around midday, the light was created in the middle of heaven, which, having completed its motion of 6 hours during which it declined from mid-heaven to the west, produced evening as its terminus; so that both darkness and light taken together lasted no more than twelve hours. Thence followed a night likewise of 12 hours, whose terminus is morning. For Moses here names the day and night by their terminus, Evening and Morning, as if to say: When the course of the day had been completed through the succeeding evening, and the span of the night had also been completed through the morning that succeeded it, the first day of 24 hours was complete.
The first day of the world was a Sunday
"One" means first, as is clear from verses 8 and 13. This first day of the world was a Sunday; for the seventh from it was the Sabbath. See the thirteen prerogatives of Sunday in Pererius at the end of his treatment of the first day.
Not all things were created in one day
Note that St. Augustine, Book IV of On Genesis Literally, and Book XI of The City of God, ch. 7, wants these days to be understood mystically; for he seems to hold that all things were created simultaneously by God on the first day, and that Moses, through the six days of creation, means the 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 entirely proves it. Therefore it is now erroneous to say that all things were produced in one day. St. Augustine speaks doubtfully and in a disputational manner on a question which, as he himself says, was then most difficult.
You will object: Sirach 18:1 says, "He who lives forever created all things together." I reply: The word simul (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 simul, in the Greek there is koine, that is, "in common."
Morally, St. Chrysostom, in his Homily That Man Is Set Over Every Creature, applies keen incentives to man from the day, light, and other creatures for serving God. "For you the sky is clothed in the splendor of light by day and adorned with the rays of the sun: by night the vault of heaven itself is illuminated by the most brilliant mirror of the moon and the varied brilliance of the stars. For you the seasons are changed in alternating succession, the forests grow leafy, the fields are made pleasant, the meadows turn green, living things bring forth their young, springs bubble forth, rivers flow." And: "What if all nature were to say to you constantly: 'I, by the Lord of all things, am commanded to obey: I obey, I comply, I serve, and though he changes, I do not change. I obey the rebel; I comply with the insolent; I serve the scorner.' Who are you, who persist in this contempt? You command the creature and do not serve the Creator? Fear the patient Lord, lest you feel Him as a severe judge. Even if you were to occupy the whole time of your life in thanksgiving, you could not repay what you owe. The sinner commits a twofold crime: both that he does not render to the Lord the obedience due in service, and that by sinning he strives to repay His countless benefits with insult."
On the Work of the Second Day
On the first day in the fashioning of the world, God created and made the earth as a foundation, and placed upon it the empyrean heaven as a roof; the remainder between these was a chaos, or that abyss of waters, which on this second day He unfolds, orders, and forms.
Verse 6: Let there be a firmament
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 rakia, whose root, raka, according to St. Jerome and other most learned Hebrews, means to spread out, to stretch, and by stretching to make firm and solidify something that was previously fluid and thin. Just as molten bronze is stretched out and condensed by pouring, so here the water condensed into the heavens is called in Greek stereoma, in Latin firmamentum: for the firmament is like a wall in the midst of the waters, interposed between the two waters, the upper and the lower, separating and restraining them from each other.
You will ask, what is this firmament, and what are the waters above the firmament?
First opinion
First, Origen understood by the upper waters the angels, and by the lower the demons; but this is an Origenistic and allegorical fantasy.
Second opinion
Secondly, Bonaventure, Lyra, Abulensis, Cajetan, Catharinus, and others take the upper waters as the crystalline heaven. But this is called water too equivocally.
Third opinion
Thirdly, Rupert, Eugubinus, Pererius, Gregory of Valencia hold that the firmament is the middle region of the air, which on the second day was made a firmament, that is, an intervening space dividing the upper waters, namely the clouds, from the lower waters of rivers and springs.
Fourth opinion: the true one
But I say that the firmament is the starry heaven and all the celestial orbs neighboring it, both lower and upper up to the empyrean. And so above all the heavens, immediately below the empyrean heaven, there are true and natural waters. Calvin laughs at this; but foolishly, for this opinion is proven by the simple and historical narrative of Moses. For the firmament, and the Hebrew rakia, does not signify the air or clouds, but properly the starry heaven and the celestial orbs.
These waters were placed above the heavens both for the adornment of the universe, and perhaps also for the delight of the Saints dwelling in the empyrean heaven. And "the authority of this Scripture is greater, says St. Augustine, than all the capacity of human genius."
Why did Moses not say "And God saw that it was good" on this day?
Catharinus and Molina respond: The reason is that the firmament was still unfinished. Perhaps the best answer would be that Moses encompassed the three works of divine separation -- first of light from darkness, second of the upper waters from the lower, third of the waters from the earth -- in one single final clause, when in verse 10, he says: "And He saw that it was good."
The Septuagint here, as on the other days, does have "and God saw that it was good;" yet in the Hebrew, Chaldean, Theodotion, Aquila, Symmachus, and the Vulgate, this is lacking.
Morally, the firmament is the firmness and constancy of the soul fixed upon God and the heavens, which steadfastly sustains the upper waters, that is, prosperities, and the lower, that is, adversities. Man is an image of heaven: first, he has a round head, like the heavens; second, the two eyes are like the sun and moon; third, because he received a soul from heaven like that of God and the angels; fourth, because 'coelum' (heaven) is derived from 'celare' (to conceal), as many things are concealed in heaven, 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 is hope, the sun is charity, and the remaining stars are the other virtues, says St. Bernard, sermon 27 on the Canticle.
Verse 8: And God called the firmament Heaven
8. AND GOD CALLED THE FIRMAMENT HEAVEN. -- 'Coelum' [heaven] in Latin is derived from 'celare,' that is, to hide, because it conceals and covers all things: so St. Augustine; or, as St. Ambrose says, 'coelum' is called as if 'caelatum,' that is, engraved with various stars. But Moses wrote in Hebrew, not in Latin; and God spoke in Hebrew, and called the firmament 'shamaim,' for the reason given 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 construction of the firmament; rather, He made it suddenly, in an instant, and for the entire rest of the day preserved the same.
On the Work of the Third Day
Verse 9: Let the waters be gathered together
9. LET THE WATERS THAT ARE UNDER THE HEAVEN BE GATHERED TOGETHER INTO ONE PLACE, AND LET THE DRY LAND APPEAR.
To what place were the waters gathered?
You may ask, how was this accomplished? First, some think that the sea was gathered into the other hemisphere, so that that part of the earth would be entirely covered with water and uninhabitable, and consequently there would be no antipodes. So Procopius, nor does St. Augustine deny it. But the contrary is established by the daily voyages of the Portuguese and Spaniards to the Indies.
Second, Basil, Burgensis, Catharinus, and St. Thomas think that the sea was here separated from the earth so that it was made higher. From this opinion it is easy to give the reason why springs and rivers burst forth even in high places: namely because they arise through subterranean veins from the sea, which is higher than the earth.
The earth and water form one globe
I say first: The earth and water form one globe; and consequently the water is not higher than the earth. This is the common opinion of mathematicians, Molina, Pererius, Cajetan, St. Jerome, Chrysostom, and Damascene. And it is proved first, from the eclipse of the moon, which occurs when the earth is interposed between the sun and the moon. For this eclipse casts the shadow of only one globe, not of two: therefore the earth and the sea are not two but one globe. Second, because every drop of water and every part of the earth everywhere descend to the same center. Third, because shores and islands rise above the waters. Fourth, from Scripture: "He Himself founded it upon the seas" (Ps. 23:2); "Who established the earth upon the waters" (Ps. 135:6).
Why are the waters said to be gathered?
I say second: The waters were gathered on this third day, first, because God caused the fresh water to become for the most part denser, by heaping into it terrestrial exhalations, by which the sea was made salty, both lest it putrefy, and so that it might have nourishment for fish, and so that it might more easily support ships. So therefore by God's operation the water, made denser, contracted itself, and occupied a smaller area 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 hold, but on this third day of the world God caused the earth partly to sink down and partly to rise up. Whence mountains and valleys were formed: also various chasms and cavities in the earth, into which, as into channels, the sea withdrew.
The cavities beneath the earth
Third, God on this third day made the greatest cavities beneath the earth itself, and filled them with a very great quantity of water, which is consequently called by many the abyss or the deep; and it is connected with the sea through various channels, and is thought to be the matrix and origin of all springs and rivers. What the liver is in man, therefore, is what this abyss of waters in the caverns of the earth is.
How the water was gathered into one place
I say third: The waters are said to be gathered into one place, that is, into a place separate from the earth, so that the earth might become dry and habitable. For God willed to intermingle the waters through various channels and inlets of the earth, both so that the earth might be irrigated and made fertile by them; and so that it might be ventilated by sea breezes for health and fertility.
Theodoretus notes that the raging sea is restrained not so much by its shores as by God's command, as by a bridle: otherwise it would often break through and overwhelm everything. Hence God is said to have set for the sea its boundary which it cannot transgress. St. Basil asks: "What would prevent the Red Sea from bursting with its overflowing flood into all of Egypt, which is so much lower than the sea itself, if it were not restrained by the command of the Creator?" Pliny records that Sesostris, king of Egypt, first conceived of digging a navigable channel from the Red Sea, but was deterred by the fear of flooding, the Red Sea being found to be three cubits higher than the land of Egypt.
LET THE DRY LAND APPEAR -- which previously was muddy and covered with water: whence for 'dry land,' the Hebrew is 'iabesa,' that is, dried out so that it could be inhabited, sown, and bear fruit; 'dry' therefore is not the same as 'sandy,' but means 'without standing water.' For some sweet moisture remained in the earth to make it fruitful.
Verse 10: And God called the dry land Earth
10. AND GOD CALLED THE DRY LAND EARTH, AND THE GATHERINGS OF THE WATERS HE CALLED SEAS.
This is a prolepsis [anticipation]. For not on this third day, but on the sixth day, when He formed Adam and endowed him with the Hebrew language, then God called the dry land 'erets,' that is, earth; and the gatherings of the waters He called 'iammim,' that is, seas.
Etymologies of 'erets' (earth)
Note: 'Earth' in Hebrew is called 'erets,' either from the root 'ratsats,' that is, to trample, because it is trodden upon and inhabited by men and beasts (just as 'terra' is derived from 'terere,' to tread upon); or from the root 'ratsa,' that is, to will, to desire, because it always desires to bear fruit; or from the root 'ruts,' that is, to run, because men and animals dwell and run upon it, and all heavy things descend and run to it, while all the elements and all the celestial spheres run around it. From the Hebrew 'erets' some derive the German 'Erde.'
Moreover, 'seas' in Hebrew are called '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 'hama,' that is, to sound, to roar, as the sea roars.
Verse 11: Let the earth bring forth
11. LET THE EARTH BRING FORTH GRASS. -- "Let it bring forth," not by actively producing, as Cajetan and Burgensis hold, but by only supplying the material: for in the first creation of things, God by Himself alone actively and efficaciously, and indeed suddenly, produced all plants and vegetation; and these of proper and perfect size, as St. Thomas teaches, I part, Question LXX, article 1. Indeed the Psalmist says, Psalm CIII, 14: "Bringing forth hay for cattle, and herbs for the service of men." But now the earth does also effectively contribute to the production of plants, especially if it is imbued with seed.
Moreover St. Basil marvels, and rightly so, at God's providence in germination, which sends up stalks equal in number to the roots. "The sprout, while it is continuously warmed, draws up through its rootlets that moisture which the force of heat draws forth from the earth. See how the stalks of wheat are girded with joints, so that, strengthened by these as by certain bonds, they may easily bear and sustain the weight of the ears. In the husk moreover it has hidden the grain, lest it be exposed as prey to grain-gathering birds: moreover by the rampart of the beards it wards off the harm of small creatures." Then applying this symbolically to man, he says God "raised our senses on high, and did not permit us to be cast down upon the ground. He also wills that we, as with certain tendrils, should lean upon and cling to our neighbors with embraces of charity, so that with constant affection we may be borne upward."
"And yielding seed" -- as if to say: Let the earth bring forth grass that can produce seed for the propagation of its species.
"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 what is like itself, through the seed that it has in itself. For many plants do not have seed properly so called, as is evident in the willow, grass, mint, crocus, garlic, reed, elms, poplars, etc.; but these have something in place of seed, namely in their roots a certain propagative power. And this to the end that, although individual plants perish, they may yet remain in the seed and fruit which they propagate from themselves; and thus attain a certain quasi-immortality and eternity.
Verse 12: And the earth brought forth
12. THE EARTH BROUGHT FORTH. -- Hence it is evident that on this third day the earth did not merely receive the power of producing plants, as St. Augustine seems to hold; but at that very moment when God commanded, the earth actually brought forth all species of plants, and these full-grown, many even with ripe fruit: for God's works are perfect. So St. Basil and Ambrose.
I say the same of animals and man, created on the sixth day, namely that all were created in perfect size, vigor, and strength, as the Doctors commonly teach. From what has been said it follows that on this third day paradise also was planted, and adorned with a wonderful variety and beauty of trees, about which see chapter II.
Poisonous herbs and thorns
Note that on this third day the earth also brought forth poisonous herbs, likewise the rose with its thorns: for these are as it were connatural to the rose, and innate to it. Some deny this, thinking that before the fall of man the earth brought forth nothing harmful. But the contrary is taught by St. Basil and St. Ambrose, and this is the truer view: both lest their beauty be absent from the universe, and because what is poisonous to man is beneficial to other things and useful to other animals. "Starlings," says Basil, "feed on hemlock, and yet are not affected by the poison. Hellebore moreover is food for quail, and from it they suffer no harm whatsoever." Also because the same things are useful to man: "For through mandrake physicians summon sleep: and with the juice of the poppy they calm severe bodily pains." Also because God before the sin of Adam, during the six days of creation, produced absolutely all species of things, and made the universe perfect: nor after these six days did He create any new species. Therefore I say the same of wolves, scorpions, and other harmful animals, namely that they were produced together with the non-harmful ones on the fifth day. Yet none of these things could have harmed man if he had remained in innocence; which innocence demanded prudence, namely that he should handle roses carefully lest he strike upon the thorns.
Minerals and winds
Note second: since this third day is the one on which God perfectly formed and adorned the earth, for this reason it is altogether probable that on this same day were also produced marbles, metals, minerals, and all fossils, as well as the winds. For without winds neither plants nor men could live or thrive.
Finally, Molina thinks that hell was produced on this day in the center of the earth. But I have already said above that it is truer that it was produced on the first day, immediately after the fall of Lucifer.
Not in autumn, but in spring was the world created
You may ask, at what time of year was the world created by God? Many hold it was at the autumnal equinox, since fruits are then ripe. But I respond: It is truer that the world was created at the vernal equinox. First, because all the Fathers generally teach this. Indeed even the Poets, as Virgil in book II of the Georgics, speaking of the first origin of the nascent world:
"Spring, he says, it was: great spring the world was keeping,
And the East winds were sparing their wintry blasts."
Second, because spring is the most beautiful season of the year; and such a season befitted the happiness of the state of innocence, and in spring the world was redeemed and recreated by Christ. Third, because the Council of Palestine, held under Pope Victor in the year of Christ 198, defined this very thing. This Council proves its opinion from the word "let it germinate": for in spring the earth begins to germinate. It also teaches that the world was created at the vernal equinox, proved from the fact that God then divided light from darkness into equal parts, which occurs at the equinox. It adds that the first day of the world was March 25, on which also the Blessed Virgin received the Annunciation, and Christ was incarnated in her, and on which after 34 years He either suffered or rose from death. It is certain that this day was a Sunday.
To the argument of the Hebrews I respond that at the beginning of the world not all, nor everywhere, were ripe fruits produced on this third day; but God produced in plants and trees, in some indeed leaves, in others most beautiful flowers, in some ripening fruits, in others ripe fruits, according to the nature, quality, and condition of both the plant and tree and of each region.
On the Work of the Fourth Day
Verse 14: Let There Be Lights in the Firmament
14. LET THERE BE LUMINARIES IN THE FIRMAMENT. — You will ask, how was this done? Note first, that "firmament" here does not only signify the eighth starry heaven, but is taken for the expanse of all the celestial orbs. For the Hebrew word rakia signifies all of these; and Moses speaks to the uneducated Hebrews, who did not know how to distinguish these orbs.
The stars are not animated. Note second, although Plato asserts, and St. Augustine, Enchiridion ch. 58, questions whether the sun, moon, and stars are animated and endowed with reason, and consequently whether they are someday to be blessed together 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. Moreover, their circular, perpetual, and natural motion indicates that the principle of their motion, namely their nature, is not free or rational, but inanimate and entirely determined: so St. Jerome on Isaiah 25, and the Fathers and Philosophers generally. Therefore Philo errs, Platonizing as is his custom, in his book On the Creation of Six Days, teaching that the stars are intelligent animals. Likewise Philastrius errs when he says: It is a heresy to assert that the stars are fixed in the sky, since it is certain that they move in the sky, just as birds move in the air, and just as fish swim in water. For the contrary is taught by all astronomers, namely that the stars are affixed to their orb and move and rotate with it, that is, with the eighth or sidereal heaven.
Stars are specifically distinct from the orbs, and so are the planets. I suppose third, that it is more true that all the stars and planets are specifically distinct from their orbs or heavens; likewise that the stars differ in species from the planets, and finally that the planets differ in species from one another. This is proved first, because the stars and planets shine with a marvelous light which the orbs lack. Moreover, the stars are luminous of themselves and by their own nature. Albert, Avicenna, Bede, and Pliny (book II, ch. 6) deny this, but others commonly assert it, and experience makes it clear; 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. Second and more importantly, because they are at a very great distance from the sun, namely 76 million miles, as I shall presently say: but the power and light of the sun cannot extend that far. I say this of the stars: for it is clear that the moon does not shine of itself, but borrows its light from the sun. The same is likely true of the other planets. For I myself, together with many others skilled in mathematics, have clearly observed through a telescope that Venus, just like the Moon, through the fixed alternations of times by which it approaches and recedes from the sun, shows phases, waxes, and wanes. Third, the same is evident from the fact that the stars have marvelous influences and marvelous power over these lower things, which the orbs themselves do not have. The planets also have their own motions, powers, and influences on land and sea, and these are admirable, especially those of the moon; therefore they likewise have a nature different from the others: so Molina and others.
I have said that the stars differ in species from the planets: for it is likely that many stars are of the same species, namely those which have the same mode of influencing these lower things: for those which have a different mode are of a different species. This different mode is gathered from the diversity of the effects of dryness, moisture, heat, and cold which they produce on earth.
Whence were the heavenly bodies made? I say: God on this fourth day rarefied one part of the heavens, in order to condense another, namely that luminous substance which was created on the first day and called light, verse 3; and into that thus condensed substance, having expelled the form of the heavens, He introduced the new form of the sun, moon, and stars: in a similar way He made the firmament from the waters on the second day. Therefore the ancients err who thought that the stars were produced from fire and were fiery. Whence the Poet:
You eternal fires, and inviolable divine power,
I call to witness.
Those also err who think that the stars were produced in substance on the first day; but that on this fourth day they were only endowed with accidents, namely light, proper motion, and the power of influencing these lower things.
In the resurrection will God make a new sun? In like manner Molina and others probably think that in the resurrection God will produce another sun, which will have a different form, not only accidental but substantial, inasmuch as it will naturally have seven times more light than our present sun has, as Isaiah says, ch. 30, 26.
Moreover, on this fourth day God divided the orbs of the planets into their parts, that is, into eccentric circles, concentric circles, and epicycles, if there are any such; for Aristotle denies all of these, when he teaches that the planets are moved only by the motion of their orb. But the astronomers, and Scotus with his followers, maintain them, because they teach that the planets move by themselves in their orb, according to eccentrics and epicycles.
In what part of the sky was the Sun produced? Note. From what was said concerning the work of the third day it follows that the sun was produced at the beginning of Aries. So Bede: for then spring begins. But the moon was produced in the opposite position from the sun, namely at the beginning of Libra. There was therefore a full moon at that time, as the Council of Palestine defined above; so that the sun illuminated one hemisphere and the moon the other. So Molina and others.
Luminaries. — In Hebrew meorot, from the root or, that is, "light." Therefore the sun is or. Hence the Egyptians called the sun and the year (which is described by the course of the sun) Horum. Hence the year was called by the Greeks hora, and hence hora is used for any primary part of the year, such as Spring, Autumn, Summer, Winter. Then by synecdoche it was used for the day, and finally for a noted part of the day, which we commonly call an "hour," they called hora. See how the etymology of "hour" flowed from the Hebrews to the Egyptians, from them to the Greeks and Latins. So from Fr. Clavius our Voellus, book I On Horology, ch. 1, in the Scholia. For from the Hebrews to the Egyptians and Greeks flowed all knowledge, especially mathematics, and the reckoning of hours, and the making of clocks. Hence the first clock which we find in both sacred and profane histories was that of Ahaz, father of Hezekiah king of Judah, Isaiah 38:8. So Fr. Clavius, book I Gnomon., p. 7.
LET THEM DIVIDE THE DAY AND THE NIGHT, that is, Let them distinguish day from night, and thus indicate to men and animals soon to be created the alternation of labor and rest. Again, let them divide day and night, as regards position and hemisphere, so that while in one there is the sun and day, in the other there is night and the moon which presides over the night. For from this passage it appears that the moon was created in the opposite position from the sun, as I have said.
Symbolically, Pope Innocent III, writing to the Emperor of Constantinople, book I of the Decretals, title 33, chapter Solitae: "In the firmament of heaven," he says, "that is, of the universal Church, God made two great luminaries, that is, He established two dignities, which are the Pontifical authority and the royal power. But that which presides over the days, that is, over spiritual things, is greater; while that which presides over carnal things is lesser: so that the difference between Pontiffs and kings may be known to be as great as that between the sun and the moon."
Of what are the stars signs? AND LET THEM BE FOR SIGNS, AND FOR SEASONS, AND FOR DAYS, AND YEARS. — "For signs," not the prognostications of judicial astrology, for Scripture condemns these, Isaiah 47:25; Jeremiah 10:2. For although the stars by their influence alter the disposition and temperament of bodies, and thereby incline the soul in the same direction, yet they do not necessitate it. For granted that the soul often imitates the temperament of the body, whence we find that choleric people are irascible; sanguine people are benign; melancholic people are suspicious, timid, faint-hearted, and envious; and phlegmatic people are sluggish: yet the will, especially when aided by grace, dominates both the body and these passions; whence we see many choleric people who are gentle, and melancholic people who are benign and magnanimous. The wise man therefore will rule the stars.
And so let the sun and moon "be for signs," namely, prognostications of rain, fair weather, frost, winds, etc. For example, "if on the third day from the new moon the moon is thin and shines with a pure brightness, it foretells constant fair weather: but if it appears thick-horned and somewhat ruddy, it threatens either impetuous and excessive rain from the clouds, or a terrible stirring of the south wind," says St. Basil, homily 6 on the Hexaemeron; and further on: The moon, he says, moistens, as is evident both in those who sleep in the open under the moon, whose heads are filled with excessive moisture; and in the brains of animals and the marrow of trees, which increase and grow with the moon. Again, the moon causes and marks the tides of the sea and their ebb and flow. Second, let them be for signs of sowing, planting, harvesting, sailing, grape-gathering, etc. Third 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, that is, while the moon traverses the Zodiac twelve times.
Note, by "seasons" here are understood spring, summer, winter and autumn. Likewise dry, hot, humid, stormy, healthy, and sickly seasons: for the sun and moon are the signs and cause of these.
Symbolically and anagogically, St. Augustine, book XIII On Genesis Literally, ch. 13, in the Unfinished Work: "Let them be for signs and seasons," that is, let them distinguish the seasons, which by the distinction of intervals may signify that unchangeable eternity remains above them. For our time seems to be, as it were, a sign and trace of eternity, so that from this we may learn to ascend from the sign to the thing signified, that is, from time to eternity, and to say with St. Ignatius: "How the earth seems vile to me when I look upon heaven!" Truly St. Augustine in the Sentences, Sent. 270: "Between temporal and eternal things there is this difference, that temporal things are loved more before they are possessed, but become cheap when they arrive: for nothing satisfies the soul except the true and certain eternity of incorruptible joy; but what is eternal is loved more ardently when attained than when desired, because there charity will attain more than faith believed or hope desired." See St. Augustine's conversation on this matter with his mother Monica, book IX Confessions, ch. 10.
AND DAYS AND YEARS, that is, So that the sun, moon, and stars may be indicators of all natural, artificial, festal, critical, forensic, and market days, and also of lunar, solar, great, and critical years, etc., about which Censorinus and Macrobius write. So Basil and Theodoret.
Verse 16: And God Made Two Great Lights
16. AND HE MADE TWO GREAT LUMINARIES, — the sun and the moon. For although the moon is smaller than all the stars except Mercury, nevertheless because it is nearest and closest to the earth, it appears greater than all the others, just like the sun. Moreover, the moon excels with greater efficacy and power of acting on these lower things than the other stars. So St. Chrysostom here, homily 6, Pererius, and Fr. Clavius in his Sphere, ch. 1, where he teaches that the earth contains within itself the magnitude of the moon thirty-nine times, so that the moon is only a thirty-ninth part of the earth. The philosopher Secundus, cleverly questioned by the Emperor Hadrian, "What is the sun?" replied: "The eye of heaven, a splendor without setting, the ornament of the day, the distributor of the hours. What is the moon? The purple of heaven, the rival of the sun, the enemy of witchcraft, the comfort of travelers, the presage of storms." But Epictetus said to the same Hadrian: "The moon is the helper of the day, the eye of the night; the stars are the fates of men." But this last statement is the error of the astrologers. More nobly, Sirach 43:2 and following: "The sun," he says, "is a vessel," that is, an instrument, a tool, "admirable of the Most High, burning the mountains, breathing forth fiery rays. The moon, an indicator of the season and a sign of the age. From the moon comes the sign of the feast day. A vessel of the armies on high, shining gloriously in the firmament of heaven," that is, The stars which shine in the firmament are like vessels, that is, weapons, the armaments of God. "The beauty of the sky is the glory of the stars, illuminating the world on high is the Lord. At the words of the Holy One they stand for judgment," that is, The stars at God's command stand for judgment, that is, to carry out His sentence and command, "and they will not fail in their watches." For the stars, like soldiers and watchmen of God, perpetually stand guard, attentive to His every nod.
Symbolically, St. Basil, homily 6 on the Hexaemeron: The moon, he says, which perpetually waxes or wanes, is a symbol of inconstancy, and marks that all human affairs, inasmuch as they are subject to it and it rules over them, are in perpetual change: but the sun, ever like itself, is a symbol of a constant mind. Hence the Wise Man: "The holy man," he says, "abides in wisdom like the sun; for the fool changes like the moon," Sirach 27:12.
The marvelous vastness of the heavens, and the smallness of the earth. And the stars, — namely, so that together with the moon they might preside over the night and illuminate it, Psalm 135:7. Astronomers teach that the altitude and consequently the magnitude of the celestial orbs and stars is marvelous, so that the earth, which is the center of the universe, in comparison with them is like a point: just as all earthly wealth, goods, and joys are like a point in comparison with heavenly things, and bear the same proportion as a drop to the whole sea.
The sun is distant from the earth four million miles. For first, they 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 (by a million I mean ten times a hundred thousand) and more: for I omit the fractional numbers here; whence it follows that the circumference and vastness of the solar orb is so great that the sun, completing its circle in 24 hours, traverses in one hour 1,140,000 miles, that is, one million one hundred and forty thousand miles: which is the same as if it circumnavigated the perimeter and circuit of the earth fifty times. For the circumference of the convex sphere of the sun contains 27 million and three hundred sixty thousand miles, which if you divide by 24 hours, you will find the number just stated, and a little more. Consider from these things how great God is. "For the sun and moon compared to the Creator bear the same proportion as a gnat and an ant," says St. Basil, homily 6 on the Hexaemeron.
The firmament is distant from the earth eighty million miles. Second, they teach that the earth is distant from the concavity of the firmament, or of the eighth and starry heaven, eighty million and a half miles: and that the thickness of the firmament is the same, namely eighty million; how great therefore must be the distance, thickness, and breadth of the ninth heaven, the tenth, and any others above them, and especially of the empyrean heaven?
A star traverses 42 million miles in each hour. Whence third, they teach that any point on the equinoctial, and any star positioned on the equinoctial, traverses each hour 42 million miles, and in addition a third of a million, which is as much as a horseman traveling 40 miles a day could cover in 2,904 years: again, as much as if someone in one hour two thousand times traversed and ran around the circuit of the earth. The ninth heaven covers far more space, and therefore is far swifter, and even more so the tenth, which they think to be the primum mobile; consider therefore how swift time is.
How great is the swiftness of time? For time is as swift as is the very motion of the primum mobile, of which it is the measure; time therefore is borne far more swiftly than an arrow, or than a ball shot from a bronze cannon: for this ball would need 40 days to traverse the whole circuit of the earth, which a star, as I have said, traverses in one hour two thousand times; like lightning therefore flies irrevocable time: like lightning we are borne and swept along with time toward eternity. "You sleep," says St. Ambrose on Psalm 1, "and your time" does not sleep, but "walks;" nay, it flies.
A millstone from the firmament to the earth in 90 years. Hence fourth, they deduce that if a millstone began to fall from the convex surface of the firmament toward the earth, it would need ninety years to fall down and reach the earth, even if each hour it fell and descended two hundred miles; for naturally it could not traverse more space than this. For divide 460 million (for that is the distance from the earth to the convex surface of the firmament) into days and years, giving each hour 200 miles, and you will find the matter to be so.
The six classes of magnitude of the stars. Fifth, they teach that there is no star in the firmament which is not at least eighteen times larger than the whole globe of the earth: indeed, from the opinion of Ptolemy and Alfraganus, they divide all the stars into six classes of magnitude. Stars, they say, of the first and highest magnitude are 17 in number, each of which is larger than the whole earth one hundred and seven times; of the second magnitude there are 45, each of which is larger than the earth ninety times; of the third magnitude there are 208, each of which is larger than the earth seventy-two times; of the fourth magnitude there are 264, each of which is larger than the earth fifty-four times; of the fifth magnitude there are 217, each of which is larger than the earth thirty-five times. Of the sixth and lowest magnitude there are 249, each of which is larger than the earth eighteen times.
The vast breadth of the empyrean heaven. Sixth, they teach that the proportion of the entire world contained within the concavity of the firmament, to the extent of the empyrean heaven, is much less than that of the globe of the earth to the firmament itself.
In eight thousand years one would not ascend to the empyrean heaven. Seventh, from what has been said they deduce that if you were to live two thousand years and daily ascend directly upward one hundred miles, and that continuously, after two thousand years you would not yet have arrived at the concavity of the firmament (for in two thousand years by this method you would only cover 73 million miles, but there are 80): again, after another two thousand years ascending the same distance daily, you would not have reached from the concavity to the convexity of the firmament: finally, after four thousand or more years, ascending the same distance daily, you would not have reached from the convexity of the firmament to the empyrean heaven. These and more things Fr. Christopher Clavius teaches in his Sphere, ch. 1.
If then we were standing on some star, and much more if in the empyrean heaven, and looked down upon this little globe of earth, would we not exclaim: This is the point over which the sons of Adam gape, like ants: this is the point which among mortals is divided by sword and fire. O how narrow are the boundaries 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!" Look down therefore upon this point, and look up at the circuit of heaven: whatever you see here is small and brief: think of things immense and eternal. Who, thinking these things, would be so senseless and stupid as to unjustly steal from his neighbor a point from this point, namely a field, a house, or some other thing, by force or fraud, and thereby wish to cheat 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 for a particle of red or white earth (for gold and silver are nothing else) would sell the vast and radiant palaces of the stars? Are you poor then? Think of heaven; are you ill? Endure, thus one goes to the stars; are you despised, mocked, do you suffer persecution? Bear it, thus one goes to the stars; groan, strive, labor, sweat a little, thus one goes to the empyrean.
So the young St. Symphorian, when under the Emperor Aurelian he was being dragged to martyrdom, was encouraged by his mother with these words: "My son, my son, remember eternal life, look up to heaven, and behold Him who reigns there: for life is not taken from you, but changed for the better." Kindled by these words, he bravely offered his neck to the executioner, and as a martyr flew to heaven.
Likewise in our own age that noble matron, condemned to a horrible death in England for the sake of the faith, so that lying upon a sharp stone, she would be crushed by a heavy weight placed upon her, until her life and soul were pressed out -- while others shuddered, she joyfully sang a swan song: "So short," she said, "is the way that leads to heaven: after six hours I shall be borne above the sun and moon, I shall tread the stars underfoot, I shall enter the empyrean."
So St. Vincent, raising his mind to heaven, conquered, nay laughed at all the torments of Dacian; and when, stretched upon the rack, he was mockingly asked by him where he was: "On high," he said, "whence I look down upon you from above, swollen as you are with earthly power;" when Dacian threatened worse: "You do not seem to me to be threatening," he replied, "but to be offering what I desired with all my heart." Therefore, when he steadfastly endured the claws, torches, and hot coals upon his mangled body, he said: "You tire yourself in vain, Dacian: you cannot devise torments so horrible that I am not prepared to endure them. Prison, claws, red-hot plates, and death itself are sport and play for Christians, not torment:" for they think of heaven.
So St. Menas, the Egyptian Martyr, when subjected to atrocious tortures, said: "There is nothing that can be compared with the kingdom of heaven; for neither can the whole world, weighed in an equal balance, be compared to a single soul."
So St. Apronianus, when at the side of the Martyr Sisinnius he heard a voice sent from heaven: "Come, blessed of My Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world;" he asked for baptism, and on the same day he became a Martyr as he became a Christian.
Saints as stars. Symbolically and tropologically, the firmament is the Holy Church, which is the pillar and ground of truth, as the Apostle says, 1 Timothy 3:15, in which the sun is Christ, the moon is the Blessed Virgin, the fixed stars are the other Saints, who receive their light from Christ as from the sun. Hence they are not like the planets, which from time to time, by interposing themselves in the middle, hide and cover the sun from us, and have wandering motions and go backward; but like the stars which always reverence the sun, that is, Christ, show Him forth and proclaim Him, testifying and glorying that they have all their light from Him, and with Paul, forgetting those things which are behind, always press forward in a direct course.
And so first, just 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 and the allurements of the world. Second, the stars, although they are larger than the whole earth, nevertheless appear small because of their distance and loftiness; and the higher they are, the smaller they seem: so the Saints are humble, and the holier they are, the humbler they are. Hence the stars teach us patience, says St. Augustine on Psalm 94. For citing that passage of the Apostle, Philippians 2: "In the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom you shine as luminaries in the world:" "How much," he says, "do men fabricate about the luminaries themselves and the moon? And they patiently endure it. Insults are hurled at the stars: what do they do? Are they disturbed, or do they not continue their courses? How much do certain people say about the luminaries themselves? And they bear it, and tolerate it, and are not disturbed. Why? Because they are in heaven. So too the man who in a perverse and crooked nation holds the word of God, is like a luminary shining in heaven." Just as therefore the stars do not abandon the course ordained for them by God on account of the reproaches of men: so neither should the just abandon the way of virtue, piety, and zeal shown and implanted in them by God on account of the insults of men. Wherefore a pious man will make no more of the jibes of buffoons than the moon makes of the jeers of boys, or the barking of dogs that bark at her while she shines all night long.
Third, the stars teach loftiness and immovability of mind in the midst of so many adversities and injuries, so that like stars they look down upon all things, both evil and good, that happen in the world. For, as Augustine says in the same place: "So many evils are committed, yet the stars do not deviate from above, fixed in heaven, moving through the heavenly paths which their Creator appointed and established for them: so should the Saints be, but only if their hearts are fixed in heaven, if they imitate him who says: Our citizenship is in heaven. Those therefore who are in the heights, and think of the heights, from those very thoughts of heavenly things become patient. And whatever is committed on earth they do not care about, until they complete their journeys; and just as they bear what is done to others, so they bear what is done to themselves, like the luminaries. For whoever has lost patience has fallen from heaven."
Fourth, the stars shine and illuminate the whole world at night, and always with an equal light: so too the Saints shine forth in the night of this age, and show to all by word and example the way of virtue and the road to heaven, and this always with an equal serenity of mind and countenance and constancy, both in adversity and in prosperity. Moreover, the light of the stars is not like the light of a candle, a lamp, or a torch, which is fed by tallow, oil, or wax, and consumes it, and when it is consumed, dies out. For like these are those who pursue virtue for carnal and human considerations, for profits, etc., for example, to be praised by men, or to obtain dignities or wealth. For as soon as these things cease, their virtue and devotion also cease; the Saints shine always like the stars, because they shine from God, and for God Himself: for they strive to please God alone, and to spread God's honor.
Fifth, the light of the stars is most pure, as are the stars themselves: so the Saints pursue angelic chastity and purity. Hence just as in the stars there is nothing cloudy, dark, or dusky, so in the Saints there is no melancholy, no anger, no disturbance, no suspicion; because they look upon all things with bright and benign eyes like the stars. They do not know what simulation, fraud, or malice is: for charity does not think evil. For this reason they seem to be almost sinless.
Sixth, the light of the sun and stars is most swift; for in an instant it spreads and propagates itself throughout the whole world: so the Saints are swift in the works of God, especially apostolic men, who travel through the provinces preaching the Gospel, to whom rightly applies that passage of Isaiah 18:2: "Go, swift messengers, to a nation torn and ripped apart, to a terrible people, after whom there is no other."
Seventh, the light of the stars is spiritual: so the speech of the Saints is spiritual, as are their thought and manner of life. Eighth, the light of the sun and stars, even if it illuminates sewers, dung heaps, corpses, and cesspools, is not defiled or contaminated by them in the slightest: so the Saints, living among sinners, are not polluted by their sins, but rather illuminate them and make them like themselves, that is, luminous and holy. Ninth, the light of the sun and stars shines in such a way that it also gives warmth. Whence through it all things are given life, vigor, and growth: so the Saints inflame others with charity and so shine that they burn; but they do not burn in order to 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 and explains, Sermon on St. John the Baptist: "For," he says, "merely to shine is vain, merely to burn is little, to burn and to shine is perfect."
Finally, in heavenly glory they will shine like stars, as the Apostle teaches, 1 Corinthians 15:41, and Daniel ch. 12:3: "Those who are learned," he says, "will shine like the splendor of the firmament, and those who instruct many to justice, like stars for all eternity." Furthermore, the stars hide their substance and their vast size, showing only a tiny light like a spark, through which they appear and shine. So too the Saints hide themselves and their virtues, grace, and glory from men, and desire to remain hidden. Therefore their works indeed shine, so that from them men may glorify God; but in such a way that they display the light of their works, while concealing their own person from whom the work proceeds, as far as lies in them: for they wish not to be seen, so that men seeing the work but not seeing the author may attribute it to God, who is the Father of all lights, and celebrate Him.
On the Work of the Fifth Day
Verse 20: Let the Waters Bring Forth
20. LET THE WATERS BRING FORTH CREEPING THINGS AND FLYING CREATURES.
LET BRING FORTH. — In Hebrew iisretsu, that is, let them bubble up and gush forth in great abundance. This is the proper word for fish and frogs, and signifies their marvelous fecundity, propagation, and prolific nature. Hence, because of an excess of moisture, fish are unteachable and stupid, and cannot be tamed or domesticated by man, says St. Basil, Homily 7 on the Hexaemeron. Again, he says, nothing among the fish kind is armed on only half the jaw with teeth, like an ox or sheep: for no fish ruminates except the scarus alone; but all are furnished with the sharpest row of frequent teeth, lest, if delay were involved in chewing, the food would dissolve through the moisture. Some feed on mud, some on seaweed: one devours another, and the smaller is the food of the larger, and often both become the prey of a third.
So among men the more powerful despoils the weaker, and this one in turn becomes the prey of one still more powerful. The crab, in order to devour the flesh of the oyster, when the oyster opens its shell to the sun, throws a small stone into it so that it cannot close, and so invades and feeds upon it. Crabs are cunning thieves and robbers. The octopus, clinging to whatever rock it adheres to, takes on its color; and so catches and devours fish swimming toward it as if toward a rock. Octopuses are hypocrites, who with the chaste pretend to be chaste, with the foul pretend to be foul, with the gluttonous pretend to be gluttons, etc., and therefore Christ calls them ravenous wolves.
Fish say: "Let us go to the Northern sea. For its water is sweeter than other seas, because the sun, lingering only briefly there, does not exhaust with its rays all that is drinkable. For sea creatures delight in fresh waters: hence they often swim to rivers and travel far from the sea. For this reason they prefer the Pontus to other sea-bays, as more suitable for producing and nurturing their offspring." Learn, O man, from the fish to be provident, that you may look out for those things that conduce to your salvation.
"The sea urchin, when it has sensed a disturbance of the winds, takes up a not insignificant pebble, steadying itself under it as under an anchor. When sailors observe this, they foretell a coming storm. The viper seeks the nuptials of the marine moray eel, and signals its presence with a hiss; and she runs to it and mates with the venomous creature. What does this moral point of mine portend? Whether harsh, or if a husband is a drunkard, let his wife bear with him. But let the husband also listen: the viper vomits out its poison out of reverence for the nuptials; will you not set aside the hardness of your spirit, your savagery, your cruelty out of reverence for the union? Does the example of the viper not profit us in another way also? The embrace of the viper and the moray is a kind of adultery of nature; let those who plot against others' marriages learn to what reptile they are similar."
And from what material were the birds made? You may ask whether the birds were made from water. Cajetan and Catharinus deny this, thinking that birds were made from earth: for this seems to be asserted in chapter 2, verse 19, and in this verse the Hebrew suggests that only fish were produced from water; for they have, literally, "Let the waters bring forth the creeping thing (namely fish), and let the flying creature fly over the earth." But the common opinion of St. Jerome, Augustine, Cyril, Damascene, and other Fathers (except Rupert), whom Pererius cites, is that birds as well as fish were produced from water as their material; for this is clearly taught both by our version and by the Septuagint and the Chaldean, who all understand in the Hebrew the relative ascer, that is "which" (for this is familiar to the Hebrews), as if it said: "Let the waters bring forth the creeping thing and the flying creature, which shall fly over the earth." I will respond to the passage in Genesis 2:19 when we reach that place. Hence Philo calls birds the relatives of fish.
In what way do birds and fish agree? You will object that birds and fish are entirely different and dissimilar: therefore it does not appear that birds were made from water, but only fish. I reply by denying the antecedent: for there is a great kinship between birds and fish, as St. Ambrose rightly teaches, Book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter 14.
First, because water, which is the place of fish, and air, which is the place of birds, are neighboring and kindred elements: for both are transparent, moist, soft, subtle, and mobile. Hence air easily turns into water, and conversely water is turned into vapor and cloud: for birds are of an airy temperament rather than a watery one.
Second, because in both birds and fish there is lightness and agility. For what wings are to birds, fins and scales are to fish. Hence also, both birds and fish lack a bladder, milk, and breasts, lest these impede their flight or swimming.
Third, the motion of both is similar: for what swimming is to fish, flying is to birds, so that fish seem to be aquatic birds, and conversely birds seem to be aerial fish. Again, both birds and fish steer their course and path with their tail, so that men seem to have learned the art of navigation from them, and especially from the kite, says Pliny, Book X, chapter 10.
Fourth, many birds are aquatic, such as swans, geese, ducks, coots, mergansers, and kingfishers.
Finally, St. Augustine responds, Book III On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter 3, and St. Thomas, Part I, Question 71, article 1, that fish were made from denser water; but birds from more rarefied water, which approaches the nature of air.
Then St. Basil marvels at how seawater is forced into salt, how coral is an herb in the sea but when brought out into the air freezes into stone; how nature has impressed precious pearls upon the worthless oyster; how from the blood of the worthless little purple-fish comes the purple color with which the garments of kings are dyed; how the remora, a tiny fish, if it clings to a ship's keel, stops vessels, even those driven by a strong wind, and renders them immobile. All this from St. Basil, Homily 7. Pliny, Plutarch, and Aldrovandus likewise report the same about the remora, attributing the cause to a hidden quality implanted by nature in the remora, such as exists in the magnet for attracting iron and indicating the pole.
Moreover, from all these things St. Basil teaches, first, to admire God's power, wisdom, and munificence in this theater of the sea, and to give Him perpetual thanks for as many benefits as there are fish, indeed drops in the sea. Second, he shows how we ought to draw from fish and other animals and individual creatures fitting lessons for life, and to apply all their gifts and actions to the formation of character: for they were given by God to man as a mirror equally as for assistance.
So the Wise Man in Proverbs 6:6 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 has no leader, nor instructor, nor prince, prepares food for herself in summer, and gathers at harvest what she may eat."
THE CREEPING THING OF A LIVING SOUL — that is, a creeping thing having the soul of a living being, or of a sentient animal. He calls fish "creeping things" because fish do not have feet but press their bellies upon the waters, as if creeping and rowing.
Amphibians are to be classed with fish. Class amphibians with fish, such as beavers, otters, and hippopotami; which although they have feet, nevertheless do not walk on them when in the water, but use them for rowing while swimming.
Verse 21: And God Created the Great Sea Creatures
21. AND GOD CREATED THE GREAT SEA CREATURES. "Cete" (sea creatures) are called in Hebrew tanninim, which signifies dragons and all enormous animals, both terrestrial and aquatic, such as whales, which are like aquatic dragons. Thus the name "cete" is common to all great and cetacean fish, as Gesner teaches.
The Jews understand by tanninim the greatest whales, of which they say only two were created (lest, if there were more, they would devour all fish and swallow all ships), namely a female, which God killed and preserves for the just to feast upon in the time of the Messiah; and a male, which He preserves so that He may play with it at certain hours each day, according to that passage in Psalm 104: "This dragon which You formed to play with him," in Hebrew, "that You may play with it." They took this fable from Book IV of Esdras, chapter 6, as Lyra and Abulensis report. These are the ravings of those "sages."
Note the phrase "great sea creatures": for when they raise their backs above the water, they present the appearance of a huge island, say St. Basil and Theodoret.
AND EVERY LIVING AND MOVING SOUL. — "And" here means "that is," as if to say: God created every living animal in the waters, which namely has in itself a principle of motion, that is, a soul by which it can move itself by its own impulse, and therefore is called "movable."
Verse 22: And He Blessed Them, Saying: Increase and Multiply
22. AND HE BLESSED THEM, SAYING: INCREASE AND MULTIPLY. For God to bless is to do good; and God did good to the fish and birds precisely by granting them the appetite, power, and capacity to generate their like, so that since they cannot always remain as individuals in themselves but must die, they may at least endure in their offspring, and thus possess a kind of eternity: for everything desires its own preservation and perpetuity. Hence, explaining further, He adds: "Increase," not in size (for they received their proper size in their first creation), but, as it is in Hebrew, "be fruitful," or "be prolific," so that you may multiply in number; and you, O fish, fill the waters.
Why is the fecundity of fish greater than that of birds? For the fecundity of fish is greater than that of birds; and the fecundity of birds is greater than that of land animals; because, as Aristotle says, Book III On the Generation of Animals, chapter 11, the moisture in which fish abound has a nature more suited to forming and shaping offspring than earth does.
Add to this that fish and birds reproduce through eggs, which are more easily multiplied in the womb than fetuses, which land animals carry in their uterus. Hence God is recorded to have blessed birds and fish, but not land animals: although, as St. Augustine rightly observes, Book III On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter 13, what is expressed in one case ought equally to be understood in the other similar case.
But God is recorded to have blessed man, both because man is lord of all animals, and because man was to be spread throughout all the provinces of the earth, whereas other animals naturally do not tolerate certain lands.
Whether the phoenix is a unique bird? You will object: The phoenix is the only bird of its kind in the world: therefore the command "increase and multiply" is not true in its case. I reply to the antecedent: that the phoenix exists was asserted by many of the ancients, not so much from certain knowledge as from common report. But later philosophers and naturalists, who wrote accurately about birds, among whom the latest and most exact is Ulysses Aldrovandus, consider the phoenix a fable, and demonstrate with many arguments that it does not exist and never has existed. The phoenix therefore is a bird, not real but symbolic, as I will show in chapter 7, verse 2.
St. Basil, Homily 8 on the Hexaemeron, and following him St. Ambrose, Book V of the Hexaemeron, describes and marvels at, first, the industry of bees in constructing honeycombs, in gathering honey, in arranging, protecting it, etc. Second, the sentry watches of cranes, which they take turns performing at night, to patrol and guard the others as they sleep. For when the appointed time has elapsed, the one that kept watch gives a cry, settles itself to sleep; another takes its place and repays by keeping watch the security it received from the others. They fly in a fixed order as if in battle formation: one leads the way like a general, and when its appointed time of duty is completed, it turns to the rear of the whole column, and resigns the leadership to the one following closest behind.
Third, the habits of storks, which arrive and depart at a fixed time; crows escort them and protect them against other birds. The sign of the protection rendered is that the crows return with wounds. Moreover, storks cherish their aging parents, wrapping them in their own feathers, sumptuously providing them food, and supporting them on either side with their wings. "This is the conveyance of filial piety," says St. Ambrose.
Fourth, let no one bewail his poverty, if he considers the swallow, which gathers straw in its beak and carries it for building its little nest: and since it cannot carry mud with its feet (since it has them so short and small that it seems to have none at all; and therefore can hardly stand still but appears almost always to be flying), it wets the tips of its feathers with water, then rolls itself in dust, and in this way fashions mud for itself, with which it constructs its nest, and laying eggs there, hatches its chicks; and if any of them has had its eyes injured, it knows how to restore their sight with the herb celandine.
Fifth, the kingfisher lays its eggs by the seashore in about the middle of winter, when winds and storms rage, and then immediately the winds and storms fall silent and are lulled, and the seas are calmed for seven whole days, during which the kingfisher sits on its eggs and hatches its chicks, and then seven more serene days follow, during which it nourishes its young. Hence sailors navigate safely at that time. And so the poets call calm and serene days "halcyon days." The kingfisher teaches us to hope in God: for if He provides such serenity for one little bird, what will He not provide for the person who calls upon Him?
Fifth, the turtle-dove, joining itself to no other after its mate has died, teaches widows to remain chaste and not to aspire to the marriage of another man.
Sixth, the eagle is harsh toward its young, soon abandoning them, indeed sometimes casting them from the nest: hence it is a symbol of parents who are cruel to their children. On the other hand, those who are kind to their children are like quails, which accompany their young even after they can fly, and provide them with nourishment for some time.
Seventh, vultures are long-lived (for they usually live a hundred years) and reproduce without mating. You may cite these against the pagans, who say: How could the Blessed Virgin, remaining a virgin, bear Christ? St. Ambrose says the same, Book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter 20. Indeed Aelian, Book II On Animals, chapter 40; Horus, Book I, Hieroglyphics; Isidore, Book XII; Origen, chapter 7, and others whom Aldrovandus cites under "vulture," report that all vultures are female, and that they conceive and reproduce from the wind without a male. But that all these claims are fabulous is shown by Albertus Magnus, and following him Aldrovandus, Book III of Ornithology, page 244. For vultures are perfect animals, which all enjoy, by the common law of nature, both sexes, and thereby generate and propagate themselves, like other birds. Moreover, vultures have a powerful sense of smell, and can detect carcasses from hundreds of miles away, indeed situated across the sea, and fly to them: indeed they seem to foretell slaughter; hence they follow armies and camps in great flocks.
Eighth, the bat is a four-footed creature, and yet winged, like a bird: hence it gives birth to live young, as a quadruped; and it has wings, not divided into feathers, but continuous like a leathery membrane. Those who are wise in vain matters, not in true and solid ones, are like bats and owls; for like owls, their vision is dulled when the sun shines; but it is sharpened by shadow and darkness itself.
Ninth, the rooster, that watchman, rouses you in the morning so that you may rise to complete your tasks, crying out with a sharp voice, and with his crowing foretelling the sun still approaching from afar, and waking with travelers in the morning, and leading farmers from their houses to their labors and harvest.
Tenth, the goose is ever-watchful and most keen at perceiving things that escape others. Hence at Rome, geese once protected the Capitol against the Gauls, enemies creeping in, by rousing the sleeping guards with their cries. Wherefore St. Ambrose, Book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter 13: "Rightly, he says, to them (the geese), O Rome, you owe your sovereignty. Your gods were sleeping, and the geese were keeping watch. Therefore in those days you sacrifice to the goose, not to Jupiter. For let your gods yield to the geese, from whom they know they were defended, lest they too be captured by the enemy."
Eleventh, the army of locusts under one signal rises up entirely at once into the air, and encamping across the entire breadth of the field, does not devour the crops until this has been granted by God, and as it were commanded. God provides a remedy, which is the seleucis bird, which flying in troops devours the locusts.
Furthermore, what is the manner of the cicada's singing, and what kind? It devotes itself more to singing at midday, drawing in air, which happens when the chest is expanded, producing the sound.
Twelfth, insects (such as bees, wasps), so called because they display certain cuts or incisions all over, lack lungs, and therefore do not breathe, but are nourished by air through all parts of their body. For this reason, if they are soaked with olive oil, that is, oil pressed from olives, they die when their passages are blocked: if you immediately sprinkle them with vinegar, they revive when the openings are unblocked.
Thirteenth, ducks, geese, and other swimming birds have feet that are not split but continuous and spread out like a membrane, so that they may float and swim more easily. The swan, thrusting its long neck into deep water, practices fishing, hunting for fish.
Silkworms as a type of the resurrection. Fourteenth, silkworms are a proof and type of the resurrection. For in them, first a tiny worm is born from seed, from this comes a caterpillar, from the caterpillar a silkworm, which fills itself with mulberry leaves, and when full, spins threads of silk, which it draws from its own insides, and having formed a cocoon, enclosing itself in it dies, and when the time has elapsed revives, and having developed wings becomes a butterfly, and leaving its seed in the cocoon, flies away. So says Basil.
Add the wonderfully melodious birds: the parrot, the blackbird, the kinglet, and especially the nightingale, which is so tiny that it seems to be nothing but voice -- indeed, pure music -- about which St. Ambrose says, Book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter 20: "Whence, he says, comes the voice of the parrot, and the sweetness of blackbirds? Would that at least the nightingale may sing, to rouse the sleeper from slumber. For that bird is accustomed to signal the rising of the dawning day, and to bring more abundant joy at daybreak." Again, chapter 5: "How is it, he says, that you coots, who delight in the marine depths, flee when you sense a disturbance of the sea, and play in the shallows? The heron itself, which is accustomed to cling to marshes, abandons its familiar haunts, and fearing the rains, flies above the clouds, so that it cannot feel the storms of the clouds."
On the Work of the Sixth Day
The sixth day gave inhabitants to the earth, just as the fifth gave inhabitants to water and air. But no inhabitants were given to fire: for neither the salamander nor any other animal can live or endure in fire, as Galen teaches, Book III On Temperaments, and Dioscorides, Book II, chapter 56, where Mattioli says he himself experienced this, having thrown many salamanders into fire, which were quickly consumed. Likewise the pyraustae or fireflies, which are a little larger than flies, live in fire only for a short time; for they are born in the copper furnaces of Cyprus, and in them leap and walk through fire, but soon die upon flying away from the flame, as Aristotle attests, Book V, History of Animals, chapter 19.
Verse 24: Let the Earth Bring Forth the Living Creature
24. LET THE EARTH BRING FORTH THE LIVING CREATURE, — that is, living animals; it is a synecdoche. Again, "let the earth bring forth," not as though the earth were the efficient cause: for that was God alone, but rather as the material cause, as if to say: Let the animals arise, emerge, spring up, and come forth from the earth.
Whether all species of all animals were created on the sixth day? You may ask whether absolutely all species of terrestrial animals were created by God on this sixth day. I answer first, that absolutely all species of terrestrial animals that are perfect and homogeneous, that is, which can be born through the mating of male and female from one species only, were created on this day: so the Interpreters and Scholastics commonly teach. And this is proved because the perfection of the universe required it. For God in these six days perfectly established and adorned this universe; whence it follows that in these six days He created all things, that is, all species of things. And from this it is said that on the seventh day He ceased, namely from the production of new species.
Venomous beasts were also created. I say second, that consequently on this sixth day all venomous beasts, such as serpents, and those hostile to one another and carnivorous, such as the wolf and the sheep, were created, and indeed created with this enmity and natural 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 it would have inflicted death on it: yet God's providence would have taken care that this did not happen before the species was sufficiently propagated, lest it perish. So St. Thomas, Part I, Question 69, article 1, reply 2, and St. Augustine, Book III On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter 16, although Augustine himself seems to retract this in Book I of the Retractions, chapter 10, and to assert that it pertains to the natural institution that all beasts should feed on plants, according to what is said in Genesis 1:30; but that from man's disobedience it came about that some became food for others. Pererius holds the same, as does Abulensis, in chapter 13, where he treats these matters at length. Gregory of Nyssa seems to hold the same view, Oration 2 On the Creation of Man. Junilius also expressly teaches the same: "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, no poisonous herb, and no barren tree. Second, that not even birds lived by seizing weaker birds, nor did the wolf prowl around the sheepfolds seeking victims, nor was dust the serpent's bread; but all creatures in harmony fed on herbs and the fruits of trees."
But the former opinion, which I stated, is truer. The reasons why God created venomous creatures are: first, so that the universe might be complete with all kinds of things; second, so that from them the goodness of other things might shine forth: for good shines out more clearly when set against evil; third, because they are useful for medicines and other purposes. For thus from the viper comes theriac (antidote). So Damascene, Book II On the Faith, chapter 25. See St. Augustine, Book I On Genesis Against the Manicheans, 16.
Why some animals are born from putrefaction. I say third, that tiny animals which are born from sweat, exhalation, or putrefaction, such as fleas, mice, and other little worms, were not created on this sixth day formally, but potentially, and as it were in a seminal principle; because namely those animals were created on this day from whose certain disposition these were naturally going to arise: so St. Augustine, Book III On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, chapter 14, although St. Basil here in Homily 7 seems to teach the contrary.
Certainly for fleas and similar worms, which now infest human beings, to have been created at that time would have been contrary to the most happy state of innocence.
Note that in small animals God's magnificence shines forth equally, and sometimes even more, than in large ones.
Hear Tertullian, Book I Against Marcion, chapter 14: "But when you mock even the smaller animals, which the greatest Artificer has deliberately enlarged in skill or strength, thus teaching us to appreciate greatness in smallness, just as virtue in weakness, according to the Apostle; imitate, if you can, the buildings of the bee, the stables of the ant, the webs of the spider, the threads of the silkworm; endure, if you can, those very creatures of your bed and mat, the poisons of the blister-beetle, the stings of the fly, the trumpet and lance of the mosquito: what will the greater creatures be like, when you are either helped or harmed by such small ones, so that you should not despise the Creator even in small things?"
Thus Chrysippus, as Plutarch attests in Book V On Nature, said that bedbugs and mice are very useful to man; for by bedbugs we are roused from sleep, and by mice we are warned to take care in storing our possessions.
St. Augustine, in the Exposition on Psalm 148: "Let your charity attend, he says: who arranged the limbs of the flea and the gnat, so that they have their own order, their own life, their own movement? Consider any one tiny little creature you wish, however small: if you consider the order of its limbs, and the animation of the life by which it moves, on its own behalf it flees death, loves life; it seeks pleasures, avoids annoyances, exercises diverse senses, is vigorous in movement suited to itself. Who gave the gnat its sting, with which it sucks blood? How slender is the tube through which it drinks? Who arranged these things? Who made these things? You tremble at the smallest things -- praise the Great One."
Nor hybrid animals. I say fourth, that hybrid animals, that is, animals generated from the mating of different species, such as the mule from a mare and a donkey, the lynx from a wolf and a deer, the tityrus from a he-goat and a ewe, the leopard from a lioness and a panther -- these, I say, need not be said to have been created on this sixth day: and in fact it is certain that not all of these were created then. So Rupert, Molina, and others, although Pererius here holds the contrary opinion.
This statement is proved first, because in Africa new species of monstrosities arise daily, and more will arise hereafter, and can arise from a new mixture of various species or animals. Second, because such mixture is contrary to nature and adulterous, whence it was forbidden to the Jews in Leviticus 19:19. Third, because these animals are considered to have been sufficiently created when the other species were created from whose mixture they were later to be born. Fourth, because concerning mules, the Hebrews teach from Genesis 36:24 that they were discovered long after this sixth day of the world, by Ana in the desert, from the mating of mares with donkeys.
ACCORDING TO ITS KIND — that is, according to its own kind, namely according to its own species, as follows, as if to say: Let the earth bring forth living animals according to each of their individual species: or, let the earth bring forth each individual species of terrestrial animals.
St. Basil enumerates and contemplates these species, Homily 9 on the Hexaemeron, and following him St. Ambrose, Book VI of the Hexaemeron, chapter 4, where among other things he says: "The she-bear, although crafty, as Scripture says (for she is a beast full of cunning), is nevertheless reported to bring forth formless young from the womb, but to shape the newborn with her tongue, and to mold them into the likeness and image of herself: can you not train your children to be like yourself?"
The same bear, when struck by a serious injury and wounded, knows how to heal itself, applying to its wounds the herb called phlomos, so that they may be cured by its touch alone. The serpent also by eating fennel drives off the blindness it has contracted. The tortoise, having fed on the flesh of a serpent, when it notices the poison creeping through it, employs oregano as medicine for its healing.
You may also see the fox healing itself with the sap of the pine. The Lord cries out in Jeremiah 8: "The turtle-dove and the swallow, the sparrows of the field, have kept the times of their coming; but my people has not known the judgments of the Lord."
The ant also knows how to observe the times of fair weather: for anticipating it, she carries out her moistened stores, so that they may be dried by the constant sun. Oxen, when rain impends, know how to keep to their stalls; at other times they look outside, and stretch their necks beyond the stalls, to show that they want to go out, because a fairer breeze is on the way.
"The sheep, at the approach of winter, insatiable for food, seizes the grass ravenously, because it senses the harshness and barrenness of the coming winter. The hedgehog, if it has sensed any threat, shuts itself up with its spines and gathers itself into its own weapons, so that whoever tries to touch it will be wounded. The same creature, foreseeing the future, prepares for itself two breathing passages, so that when it knows the North Wind is going to blow, it blocks the northern one: when it knows that the south wind will clear the clouds from the sky, it takes itself to the northern passage, to avoid the winds blowing toward it and harmful from that direction. How magnificent are Your works, O Lord! You have made all things in wisdom."
He adds concerning the tiger, which pursues the one who has snatched her cubs: when he sees himself about to be caught, he throws a glass sphere. And she is deceived by the image of herself (which she sees reflected in the glass and thinks is her cub), and sits down as if about to nurse the infant: thus deceived by her devotion to motherhood, she loses both her vengeance and her offspring. The tiger therefore teaches, fierce though she is, how much parents ought to love their children, and not provoke them to anger.
He then proceeds to dogs, which track the hare by its footprints with marvelous sagacity, and pursue it. He offers examples of dogs that detected and avenged the murderers of their masters, and adds: "What worthy return do we make to our Creator, whose food we eat, and yet we overlook His injuries, and often present the feasts we have received from God to God's enemies?"
The little lamb by frequent bleating summons its absent mother, to draw out the voice of her who will respond; though it moves among many thousands of sheep, it recognizes the voice of its parent and hurries to its mother; she too, among many thousands of lambs, recognizes her own son alone by a silent testimony of affection. The shepherd errs in distinguishing the sheep; the little lamb does not know how to err in recognizing its mother. The puppy does not yet have teeth, and yet, as if it did, it seeks to avenge itself with its own mouth. The deer does not yet have horns, and yet with its forehead and does not accept transgressions along with the rest, but makes a prelude, and scorns what he has not yet tried; who neither approaches yesterday's food, nor ever returns to the remains of his hunt. The panther is fierce, impetuous and swift, and therefore flexible and agile. The bear is very sluggish, solitary and crafty.
CATTLE — that is, domestic and tame animals: for in Hebrew these are called behemot, and they are contrasted with beasts, that is, the wild animals of the earth, which the Greeks here translate as theria.
What the work of the six days signifies tropologically. Tropologically, the work of creation in six days signifies the work of man's justification. On the first day, therefore, light is created, that is, illumination is poured into the sinner, by which he may see the ugliness of sin and the danger of his state and of eternity. On the second day, the firmament is made, that is, the fear of God and of judgment is placed in the sinner, which divides the upper waters, that is the rational appetite, from the lower, that is from the sensitive appetite, so that although by sense he desires earthly things, yet in spirit he may be carried toward heavenly things. On the third day, the earth, that is, man covered by water, that is by concupiscence, is uncovered, so that although he has it, he is not overwhelmed by it, and feels it but does not consent: thence he bears the seeds of virtues. On the fourth day, the sun is made, that is, charity is placed in man; and the moon, that is, illustrious faith; and the Evening Star, that is, hope; and Saturn, that is, temperance; and Jupiter, that is, justice; and Mars, that is, fortitude; and Mercury, that is, prudence -- along with other stars, that is, virtues. On the fifth and sixth days, living creatures are made: first, fish, that is, men who are good but very imperfect, because they are immersed in the cares of the world; second, cattle, that is, more perfect men who live spiritually on earth; third, birds, that is, the most perfect men, who despising all things, fly up to heaven with their whole affection like birds: so from Eucherius, Origen, and Hugh, says Pererius. See St. Bernard, Sermon 3 On Pentecost.
Symbolically, Junilius applies these six days to the six ages of the world. There follows the creation of man, namely:
"A holier creature than these, more capable of lofty mind,
Was still lacking, one that could rule over all the rest:
Man was born."
God therefore says:
Verse 26: Let Us Make Man in Our Image and Likeness
LET US MAKE MAN IN OUR IMAGE AND LIKENESS.
Here the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is understood. Note here the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity: for by these words God the Father addresses not the angels, as though He were commanding them to fashion the human body and sensitive soul, reserving to Himself alone the making of the rational soul, as Plato wished in the Timaeus, and Philo in his book On the Creation of the Six Days, and the Jews. For St. Basil, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Cyril in Book I Against Julian, and Augustine in Book XVI of The City of God, chapter 6, denounce this as impious; for God created both the body and the soul of man not through angels but by Himself, as is clear from chapter II, verses 7 and 21. Hence He does not say here "make" [facite], but "let Us make" [faciamus], in "Our" image -- not yours, O angels, but Ours. Therefore God the Father here addresses His Son, and the Holy Spirit, as His colleagues, of the same nature, power, and operation with Himself. So St. Basil, Rupert, and others cited above; indeed the Council of Sirmium, cited by Hilary in his book On the Synods, pronounces anathema on those who explain this passage otherwise.
The twelve excellences of man. Note secondly the excellence of man: for God deliberates and consults about the creation of man as a great thing, saying: "Let Us make man"; so Rupert. For man is the first image of the uncreated world, that is, of the Most Holy Trinity, and the testimony of His infinite art and wisdom, and His most perfect work. Of the created world, however, man is the end, the compendium, the bond and link: for man has and ties together in himself all degrees of spiritual and corporeal things, and therefore he is and is called a Microcosm, and by Plato he is called the Horizon of the universe, because he marks the boundary between and joins in himself the upper hemisphere, namely heaven and the angels, and the lower, namely earth and brute animals; for man is partly similar to angels, partly to brutes. Likewise, this life and time of ours is the horizon of eternity: because it marks the boundary between blessed eternity, which is in heaven, and the wretched eternity, which is in hell, and it participates in something of each. Beautifully, St. Clement, Book VII of the Apostolic Constitutions, chapter 35: "The culmination of Your work, a living being partaking of reason, a citizen of the world, You made by the governance of Your wisdom, when You said: 'Let Us make man in Our image and likeness'; You made him, I say, to be the ornament of the ornament, whose body You formed from the four elements, the primary bodies, but the soul from nothing, and You gave five senses for the contest of virtue; and the mind itself of the soul, You set over the senses as a charioteer."
Secondly, because through Christ as man, all creatures alike, which are contained in man as in a microcosm, as I have just said, were to be deified: see therefore how great is the dignity of man. Thirdly, because just as the world was created for man and with man, so too in the resurrection it will be renewed. Fourthly, the supreme mystery of faith, namely that of the Most Holy Trinity and undivided unity, was first revealed in the creation of man, which was later to be openly declared and professed in the regeneration of the same man, that is, in baptism; for those words "let Us make" and "Our" signify the Trinity; while those words "God said," "God made," etc. indicate the unity. Fifthly, animals and plants are said to have been generated from earth and water; but God alone fashioned and shaped the body of man, and placed in it a rational soul created by Himself from nothing. Sixthly, man was made by God the ruler and chief of all animals, even the greatest, and as it were the king of the whole world. Seventhly, God assigned to man for his dwelling and delight, paradise, most abundantly furnished with delights and every abundance of things. Eighthly, God created man endowed with such integrity of soul and innocence that the mind was subject to God, the senses to reason, and the body to the soul, and all living creatures were subject to man's dominion: hence it came about that he was not ashamed of his nakedness. Ninthly, Adam imposed fitting names on each of the animals; whence his supreme knowledge and wisdom shines forth, so that the animals themselves, as it were, recognized and acknowledged man as their king and lord. Tenthly, he had an immortal body, so that if he obeyed God, after spending a very long life on earth, he would be translated from his earthly life to a heavenly and everlasting one, 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 a human form, and spoke with him familiarly.
Note thirdly, God furnished this palace of the world, like a certain banquet, as Nyssen says, or rather like a splendid dining hall, with all things that were suitable for use, delight, and knowledge; and then lastly He introduced into it, thus adorned, and created man, as one who would be the crown, end, and lord of all. See St. Ambrose, Letter 38 to Horontianus, and Nazianzen, Oration 43, and Nyssen, book On the Making of Man. Rightly therefore St. Bernard, Sermon 1 On the Annunciation: "What, he says, was lacking to the first man, whom mercy guarded, truth taught, justice governed, and peace cherished?"
Moreover, Diogenes, as Plutarch attests in his book On Tranquillity of Mind, and Philo in Book I of On Monarchy, teach that the world is like a sacred and beautiful temple of God, into which man was introduced to be its high priest, and to exercise the priesthood on behalf of all creatures, and to give thanks for the benefits conferred on all and each of them, and to render God propitious to them, so that He would add good things and ward off evil. Hence, "in the full-length robe which he wore," Aaron the high priest of the Old Testament "bore the whole world," Wisdom 18:24. Hear Lactantius, book On the Wrath of God, chapter 14: "It follows that I should show why God made man. Just as He designed the world for man, so He made man for Himself, as the high priest of the divine temple, the spectator of heavenly works and things. For he alone is the one who, possessing sense and capable of reason, can understand God, admire His works, perceive His virtue and power, etc. Therefore he alone received speech, and the tongue as interpreter of thought, so that he might declare the majesty of his Lord."
Furthermore, St. Ambrose, in the letter 38 already cited, teaches that man was created last, so that he might have all the riches of the world subject to him -- all birds, land animals, even fish, etc. -- and be as it were the king of the elements, and through these ascend as by steps to the royal court of heaven. And then he concludes elegantly: "Rightly therefore he was last, as the sum of the whole work, as the cause of the world, for whom all things were made, as the inhabitant of all the elements: he lives among wild beasts, swims with fish, flies above birds, converses with angels; he dwells on earth and serves in heaven; he plows the sea, feeds on air; a tiller of the soil, a traveler of the deep, a fisherman in the waves, a fowler in the air, an heir in heaven, a co-heir of Christ."
"Man." — "Man" here is not the idea of abstract and universal man, which would be the cause and exemplar of all individual men, as Philo wished following Plato. Nor is "man" here the soul of man, as if to say: "Let Us adorn the soul of man with Our image, namely with grace," as St. Basil and Ambrose explain. Rather, "man" is Adam himself, the first man and parent of all others, as is clear from what has been said: for in Adam, and through Adam, God made and created all other men.
"Ad imaginem et similitudinem" -- Image of God in man. IN OUR IMAGE AND LIKENESS. — You will ask, in what does this image of God, expressed in man, consist? The Anthropomorphites, whose originator was Audaeus (hence they are 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 a human form so as to create man after its likeness; but this is equally feeble and novel.
Note first, that "image" here is taken as "exemplar," as if to say: Let Us make man after Our pattern, so that as an image he may reflect and represent Us, as his exemplar. 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, God Himself one and three: for man was made in the image of this. Therefore what Rupert takes by "image" as the Son, and by "likeness" as the Holy Spirit, is mystical. However, secondly, "image" can properly be taken here as a Hebraism, as if to say: Let Us make man in Our image, that is, so that he may be an 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, and "likeness" to virtues. So St. Basil, Homily 10 on the Hexameron: "Through the image impressed on my soul, I obtained the use of reason; but having become a Christian, I am made truly like God." St. Jerome, on Ezekiel chapter 28, "You are the seal of likeness," says: "And it should be noted that the image was only made at creation, while the likeness is completed in baptism." And St. Chrysostom, Homily 9 on Genesis: "He said 'image' on account of dominion; 'likeness,' so that by human powers we may become like God in gentleness, mildness, etc., which Christ also says: 'Be like your Father who is in heaven.'" The same is taught by St. Augustine, book Against Adimantus, chapter 5; Eucherius, Book I on Genesis; Damascene, Book II On the Faith, chapter 12; St. Bernard, Sermon 1 On the Annunciation, where he also adds: "The image indeed can be burned in hell, but not burned up; it can blaze, but not be destroyed. The likeness is not so; but either it remains in good, or if the soul sins, it is wretchedly changed, made like the senseless beasts." Thus therefore through sin, the likeness of God in man perishes, but not the image.
But I say they are not distinguished, and that it is a hendiadys, as if to say: "In the image and likeness," that is, "in the image of likeness," as is found in Wisdom chapter 2, verse 24, that is, "in a like image" or "a most similar image." Hence Scripture uses these terms interchangeably -- now one, now the other, now both.
Man is a shadow of God. Note thirdly, for "image" the Hebrew is tselem, which signifies a shadow, or a shadowing-forth of a thing. For the root tsalal signifies to cast a shadow, whence tsel signifies a shadow, and tselem, a shadowing image. For just as a shadow is of a body, so an image is a kind of shadowing-forth of its prototype. Therefore tselem suggests that man in relation to God is merely a shadow, or a shadowy image. For God has a solid and constant essence; but man has a shadowy and fleeting one: and this is what is said in Psalm 38: "Every living man is altogether vanity; surely man passes through as an image" (Hebrew: betselem, in a shadow, that is, like a shadow).
Note fourthly, man is not the image of God as God is, that is, with respect to the attributes proper to God (for man is not omnipotent, immense, eternal, or omniscient, as God is), but only with respect to the common attributes, which He communicates to intellectual creatures.
Note fifthly, this image of God is not in man alone, as Theodoret holds, but also in the angel and in woman, as St. Augustine teaches at length in Book XII of On the Trinity, chapter 7, and Basil here in Homily 10, explaining those words of Genesis 1: "Male and female He made 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, that is, in the fact that man occupies the highest rank of things, in which God and the angel stand, namely that man is of an intellectual nature and is a rational animal. For through reason, mind, and intellect, man most reflects God and is most similar to Him above all other creatures. From this rational nature, six outstanding endowments and properties of man follow, in one or another of which the Fathers variously place this image of God, that is, partially and incompletely.
The six outstanding endowments of man in which man is the image of God. The first is that man's soul is incorporeal and undivided, as God Himself is: St. Augustine places the image of God in this. The second is that it is eternal and immortal: Origen places it in this. The third is that it is endowed with intellect, will, and memory: Damascene places it in this. The fourth, that it possesses free will: St. Ambrose places it in this. The fifth, that it is capable of wisdom, virtue, grace, beatitude, the vision of God, and every good: hence Nyssen places the image of God in this capacity. The sixth, that it presides over and rules all animals by its power: St. Basil places it in this.
Add seventhly, just as in God all things are and are contained eminently, so likewise all things are in man eminently, as I said at the beginning of this verse. Moreover, man by understanding becomes, as it were, all things, as Aristotle says, because he forms for himself in his imagination and mind the images and likenesses of all things.
Four other properties and excellences of man. Eighthly, hence man is, as it were, omnipotent like God; because he can form and comprehend many things by art, and all things by his mind. Moreover, man is the end of all created things, just as God is the end of the same. Ninthly, just as the soul governs the body and is whole in the whole and whole in every part of it, so also God is whole in the whole world and whole in every part of the world. Tenthly and most perfectly, just as God the Father, by knowing Himself through intellect, produces the Word, that is, the Son, and by loving Him produces the Holy Spirit: so man, by understanding himself, produces in his mind an intelligible word, expressive of himself and similar to himself, and from this proceeds love in his will: for thus man clearly represents the Most Holy Trinity. So St. Augustine, Book X of On the Trinity, chapter 10, and Book XIV, chapter 11.
The natural image of God could not be lost through sin. This image of God in man is therefore natural, and could not be lost through sin; for it is impressed intimately and indelibly on nature itself, so that it cannot be lost unless nature itself is also lost. So against Origen, St. Augustine teaches in Book II of the Retractations, chapter 24. Impious therefore and foolish is the opinion of Matthias Flacius Illyricus the Lutheran, who says that the image of God in man was so corrupted by sin that man was substantially transformed into a living and substantial image of the devil -- for this, he says, is original sin itself.
On the supernatural image of God in man. I say secondly: there is also another image of God in man, namely a supernatural one, which is situated in grace and man's justification, by which he becomes a sharer in the divine nature, and which will be confirmed and perfected in glory and eternal life. "For grace is the soul of the soul," says St. Augustine. This image depends on man's will, and when he sins it is lost, but it is repaired and reformed through grace and justification. Hence the Apostle in Ephesians chapter 4, verse 23: "Be renewed, he says, in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man who was created according to God in justice and holiness of truth."
The original justice of Adam. Note here that to Adam, in the first instant of his creation, along with grace, all the theological and moral virtues were simultaneously infused; likewise, original justice was given to him, which, beyond the habits of the virtues already mentioned, was the constant assistance and sustaining help of God, by which all disordered movements of the appetite, that is, of concupiscence, which precede reason, were prevented; and the appetite was subject to reason, and reason to God in all things; and so man enjoyed in all things interior peace, rectitude, and holiness. And Adam, had he not sinned, would have passed this justice and integrity on to his descendants. On original justice, see Molina, Pererius, Aretinus, and others.
I say thirdly, in the body of man there is not properly the image of God, but nevertheless in it there shines forth in a certain way and glows, because the body of man is the image of the mind: for the upright stature and the face raised to heaven indicate a soul that rules the body, sprung from a heavenly origin, similar to God, capable of eternity and divinity, looking upon things above and ought to seek. "For if glass is of such worth, how much more the pearl?" If the body is such, what must the soul be? So St. Augustine, Book VI of On Genesis Literally, chapter 12, and Bernard, Sermon 24 on the Song of Songs. By his upright stature, therefore, man is admonished that he should not pursue earthly things, as the cattle do, whose every pleasure is from the earth: hence all cattle are bent and prostrate toward the belly; hence the Poet:
"And while other animals look downward at the earth,
He gave man a face raised high, and bade him gaze
At heaven, and lift his upturned eyes to the stars."
For heaven, therefore, we were born; for heaven we were created: this is our end, this is our goal. If we stray from this, we are men in vain, in vain have we looked up at heaven and the sun; it would have been better to have been brute beasts or stones. But if we attain it -- thrice and four times blessed! Let this therefore be for us, as for St. Bernard, a perennial spur to a pure and holy life: Bernard, say why you are here? Why do you look up at heaven? Why have you received a rational and immortal soul?
In the other creatures there is a certain trace of God. I say fourthly, in the other creatures there is not an image, but a kind of trace, as it were, of God, representing God as an effect represents its cause. For to one who considers their nature, action, disposition, determination, and the wonderful association and order of all things among themselves, it is clear 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 all things to be man's, but man to be God's, as His own special possession, and therefore He sealed him with the seal of His image -- and that a most tenacious and indelible one -- so that man, looking upon himself, may recognize God his Creator as in an image. For man bears the image of God: first, as a son of his father, to whom he owes love and devotion; secondly, as a slave of his master, whom he must fear and reverence; thirdly, as a soldier of his commander and general, to whom he must render fidelity and obedience; fourthly and finally, as a steward and administrator of the goods of his lord and master, to whom he must render a right use of the creatures committed to his stewardship, for the everlasting praise and glory of the Lord his God. Finally, if it is a crime of offended majesty to violate the image of a king, of what kind will the crime be to defile and pollute by sin the image of God implanted in oneself?
"Et praesit" -- Man's dominion. AND LET HIM RULE. — In Hebrew veiirdu, that is, "and let them rule" or "have dominion," namely both Adam and Eve and their descendants. Man is therefore an animal born to command.
Hear St. Basil in Homily 10 on the Hexameron: "You are, therefore, O man, an animal born to command. Why do you submit to this wretched slavery of passions? Why do you give yourself over to sin as a worthless slave? Why do you of your own accord make yourself a bondsman and captive of the devil? God commanded you to hold the chief place among creatures; and behold, you shake off and reject the dignity of so great a sovereignty."
What kind of dominion man had in the state of innocence over creatures. Note first: In the state of innocence, man had perfect dominion over all animals, and this partly from natural knowledge and prudence, by which he knew how each was to be tamed, domesticated, and handled; partly from the special providence of God. For it was fitting that, as long as man's flesh was subject to the spirit and the spirit to God, so long should the animals also obey man as their lord. Furthermore, this dominion is a mark of man's great dignity. Hear St. Ambrose at the beginning of Book VI of the Hexameron: "Nature seemed to have nothing taller or stronger than elephants, nothing more terrible than the lion, nothing fiercer than the tiger: yet these serve man, and by human training lay aside their nature; they forget what they were born as; they take on what they are bidden. In short, they are taught like children, they serve like servants, they are helped like the weak, beaten like the timid, corrected like subjects: they pass into our ways, since they have lost their own instincts."
Note: In the state of innocence, the obedience of animals would have been, as it were, political: for they would have needed to perceive man's command by some sense, in order to obey him. Finally, man would then have also had dominion over man, but not by servile dominion, rather by civil dominion, such as exists among the angels. So St. Augustine, Book XIX of The City of God, chapter 14.
How does nature's dominion exist now? Note secondly: This dominion remained in man after sin, as is clear from Genesis 9:1; hence by the law of nature, every man is permitted to hunt wild animals, as well as to fish. But through sin this dominion was greatly diminished, especially regarding the most remote animals, namely the greatest, such as lions, and the smallest and most vile, such as gnats, fleas, etc. Yet certain most holy men recovered that dominion, who approached as closely as possible to the original innocence; such as Noah over all the animals of the ark, Elisha over the bears, Daniel over the lions, Paul over the viper, and St. Francis over the fish and birds to which he preached -- he obtained dominion over them.
Tropologically, man rules over the fish when he masters gluttony and lust; over the birds, when he masters ambition; over the creeping things, when he masters avarice; over the wild beasts, when he masters wrath. So say Origen, Chrysostom, and Eucherius.
Verse 27: Male and Female He Created Them
IN THE IMAGE OF GOD HE CREATED HIM. — "Of God," that is, of Christ, who is God: for man was especially created in the image of Christ. For this is what is said in Romans 8: "Whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of the Son." But the image of Christ pertains to supernatural grace and glory; here, however, the discussion is primarily about the natural image. Therefore this is an enallage of person, frequent among the Hebrews. For God speaks of Himself as if of another, in the third person.
27. MALE AND FEMALE HE CREATED THEM. — From this, a certain innovator in France recently asserted ineptly that Adam was created a hermaphrodite and was both female and male. So too Plato in the Symposium held that the first humans were androgynous. But this is said foolishly: for Scripture does not say "He created him" but "them," namely Adam and Eve -- that is, He created Adam as male and Eve as female. Hence it is clear that this is said by anticipation. For Moses had not yet described the creation of Eve, although she was made on this same sixth day; for he reserves this for chapter 2, verse 22. Equally foolish is what some Hebrews and Franciscus Georgius (vol. I, prob. 29) relate, namely that Adam and Eve were created by God in such a way that they adhered to each other at the sides and were as it were one, but that God afterwards separated them from each other; for this contradicts chapter 2, verse 18, as I shall show there.
Verse 28: Increase and Multiply
28. INCREASE AND MULTIPLY. — From these words it is clear that Adam and Eve were created in a mature age and stature, and fit for generation, namely in youth or manhood. The heretics claim that here God commands each individual person to procreate and use marriage. But if that were so, then they would have to convict Christ the Lord (to say nothing of other most holy men) as the first violator of this law. And indeed, if there is any precept here, it is given not to individual persons, but to the whole species, that is, to all mankind in common, lest they allow the human species to die out. So says St. Thomas. But I say there is no precept here at all. For God said the same thing to the fish in verse 22, on whom He certainly did not impose a law. Therefore here God merely blesses man, as is clear from His very words; that is, He approves the use of marriage among humans, and bestows on them the power and fecundity so that through the union of male and female, like other animals, they may beget their like, and thus preserve and propagate themselves and their species. So say St. Chrysostom, Rupert, and Augustine (Book 21, On the City of God, ch. 22), Pererius, Oleaster, Vatablus, and others.
The name Adam contains the four regions of the world. AND FILL THE EARTH. — As a symbol of this, says St. Augustine (Tract. 9 on John), the four regions of the world are contained in the name Adam in Greek through their initial letters. For Adam, if you expand the initials, is the same as anatole, dysis, arktos, mesembria, that is, East, West, North, South; to signify that from Adam men would be born who would inhabit and fill the four parts of the world.
Subdue it — having expelled or tamed all the wild beasts, inhabit and cultivate it, and feed yourselves and enjoy its beauty and fruits.
"Have dominion." — The Hebrew redu is ambiguous. For if you derive it from rada, it means "have dominion;" but if from yarad, it means "descend," as if to say: If you obey my precept, you will have dominion over all animals; if not, you will fall from your dominion, as the Psalmist laments in Psalm 48:15. So says Delrio. But this meaning is more subtle than solid; for it is clear that here there is only a discussion of the blessing and dominion of man. Therefore redu here is the same as "have dominion."
Verse 29: Behold I Have Given You Every Herb for Food
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 up to the flood were so frugal in their food that they ate herbs and fruits, but abstained from meat and likewise from wine; and this not because of any precept of God, but because of a certain religious scruple born from the fact that God had not yet expressly and explicitly granted the use of meat and wine, as is clear from Genesis 9, verses 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. Beautifully does Boethius speak of this ancient frugality (Book 2, On the Consolation of Philosophy, meter 5):
Too happy was the former age,
Content with faithful fields,
Nor lost in idle luxury,
Which used to break its late fasts
With easily gathered acorns.
And Ovid, in Book 1 of the Metamorphoses, sings thus of the ancient fathers:
"They gathered strawberries,
And cornelian cherries, and blackberries clinging to thorny brambles,
And acorns that had fallen from the broad tree of Jupiter."
I shall say more about this matter at chapter 9, verses 3 and 2.
Verse 31: And God Saw All Things That He Had Made, and They Were Very Good
Why it is not said of man, "And God saw that it was good." One may ask: Why, when after each individual work of creation it is said, "And God saw that it was good," is this omitted after the creation of man? I answer: The first reason is that in man the creation of things is completed; once that creation was finished and perfected, Moses, in a comprehensive statement embracing all things, says: "And God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good." This comprehensive statement applies especially to man, both because Moses had described his creation more fully than the others immediately before, and because man is the end, the synthesis, the knot, and the center of all creatures: for all things were created for man, and man is the lord, participant, bond, and link of every creature. Therefore, lest Moses immediately repeat the same thing twice, he omitted the former and understood it in the latter, to signify that all things in man and for man, just as they were created, are also good from the good Creator of man. So says Pererius.
He also adds that for this reason the word "very" is added here, which is omitted for the other works, because the good of man surpasses the goods of the rest, especially because through man, namely Jesus Christ, all creatures were to be deified: for once the humanity of Christ was deified, all creatures also, which are contained in Him, were wonderfully deified.
St. Augustine brings two other reasons in Book 3 of On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, ch. 24. The second: Because, he says, man was not yet perfect, for he had not yet been placed in paradise; or because, after he was placed there, the same expression was equally omitted. 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 by his own fault.
St. Ambrose gives the fourth reason in his book On Paradise, ch. 10: God, he says, did not wish to say of Adam alone, before the formation of Eve, "that it was good," lest He seem to contradict Himself; for in chapter 2, verse 18, He says: "It is not good for man to be alone; let Us make him a helper like himself." Therefore, because the good of the human race, namely fecundity and propagation, depended on Eve, God did not wish before her formation to say of Adam alone "that it was good." "For He preferred," he says, "that there be many whom He could save and to whom He could forgive sin, rather than one Adam alone who would be free from guilt."
The fifth reason is moral, namely to signify that man possesses free will, which the other creatures lack; hence they have 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 the principal kind, depends on the use of his free will, God did not wish to say of him beforehand 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 1, On Genesis Against the Manichees, ch. 21: "When He was treating of individual things, He would only say: 'God saw that it was good'; but when it was said of all things together, it was not enough to say 'Good' unless 'very' was also added. For if the individual works of God, when considered by the wise, are found to have praiseworthy measures, numbers, and orders, each established in its own kind, how much more is this true of all things together, that is, the universe itself, which is completed by all these individual things gathered into one. For all beauty that consists of parts is much more praiseworthy in the whole than in the part." And shortly after: "Such is the force and power of integrity and unity, that those things which are good are especially pleasing when they converge and concur into some universal whole. And the word 'universe' (universum) takes its name from 'unity' (unitas)."
Nine reasons for the beauty of the world.
Note: Wondrous 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, such as the angels, who are distributed into various species, hierarchies, and choirs, and are very many and almost innumerable; others are corporeal. Again, of these latter, some are incorruptible, such as the heavens and the stars; others corruptible, and these are twofold, namely inanimate and animate. Among the animate, some are plants, others animals, and still others are partly corporeal and partly incorporeal, such as humans. And how great is the variety among humans in form and countenance, in gait, voice, talent, language, pursuits, crafts, customs, laws, institutions, and religions.
Second, from the order of things. On account of the order of all things and their most fitting arrangement: for the nobler things hold the highest place in the world, the less noble the lowest, those in between the middle, and the latter are moved, preserved, and governed by the higher ones.
Third, from the universality of things. On account of the fullness and universality of things: for in the world all things exist in a threefold way. First, according to the general degrees of things, which are four: being, living, sensing, and understanding. Second, according to all the genera of each of these degrees and their subordinate species. Third, that nothing anywhere exists, and nothing has been made by God, that is not contained in the world and belongs to it.
Fourth, from the connection of things. On account of the close and wonderful connection of all parts among themselves, not only in quantity, so that nothing anywhere is empty or void, but also in the series and texture of natural species, namely that there be no interruption, and that each part be most fittingly and most amicably bound and linked on all sides to its neighboring parts.
Fifth, from the antipathy and sympathy of things. On account of the discordant concord of things among themselves, and on account of their sympathies and antipathies. Such an antipathy exists between the vine and the 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 plants, between various metals, between liquids, and between animals.
Sixth, from the proportion of things. On account of the wonderful proportion of all things both among themselves and with the whole world: for this proportion is similar to the proportion and beauty of the human body, which arises from the harmonious composition of all its members; so that just as man is a small world, so the world is a certain great man.
Seventh, from the excellent administration of the world. On account of the divine and most excellent administration of the world. First, because God most wisely and most generously provided each thing, even the most vile, with whatever was necessary or opportune for maintaining its life and attaining its end. Second, because He directs each thing, even those lacking reason and sense, toward its end, and under His guidance they arrive at 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. Third, because He so equally tempers all individual things that, by mutually breaking each other's forces and corrupting one another, they are not destruction to the world and themselves, but salvation and ornament. Fourth, because individual things prefer the public good to the private, as when a heavy body ascends upward to prevent a vacuum. Wherefore St. Augustine, Epistle 28, citing that passage of Isaiah 40 according to the Septuagint -- "Who brings forth by number" or numerously "the world" -- teaches that the world is a most sweet music of God the Composer, which, composed of varied and contrary things like opposed sounds and tones, produces a wonderful harmony and concord. The same Augustine, Book 11 of the City of God, ch. 18, says that in this world God made such diverse things "in order," he says, "to grace the order of the ages like a most beautiful poem, with certain antitheses as it were."
Eighth, because all things serve man. Because all things in the world are ordered for the utility of man: for some pertain to the necessities and conveniences of human life; others to the various delights of men; others are remedies for diseases and safeguards of health; many are set forth as examples for imitation; all contribute to the knowledge of things, and especially to conceiving knowledge, love, and religion toward God.
Ninth, because evils are ordered toward good. Because 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 evil and sinful; yet so great is the goodness, wisdom, and power of God that He orders them toward the good either of His clemency and mercy, by pardoning them, or of His justice and vengeance, by punishing them with present and eternal punishments. So says Pererius.
Fittingly, therefore, St. Bernard, Sermon 3 on Pentecost: "Three things," he says, "we must consider in the great work of this world, namely what it is, how it is, and for what purpose it was established. And in the very being of things, inestimable power is commended, in that so many, so great, so manifold, so magnificent things have been created. Indeed in the very manner, singular wisdom shines forth, in that some things are placed above, some below, some in the middle, in most orderly fashion. But if you meditate on for what purpose it was made, there appears a benignity so useful, a utility so benign, that it could overwhelm even the most ungrateful with the multitude and magnitude of its benefits. Most powerfully indeed from nothing, most wisely beautiful, most benignly useful were all things created." And St. Augustine in the Sentences, no. 141: "Three things especially we needed to be told about the condition of creation: who made it, through what He made it, why He made it. God said: 'Let there be light,' and light was made, and God saw the light that it was good. No author is more excellent than God, no art more effective than the word of God, no cause better than that good be created by the Good." And Sentence 440: "God would create no angel or man whom He foreknew would be evil, unless He equally knew to what uses of good He would commend them, and in the order of the ages, as in a most beautiful poem, would grace it with certain most beautiful antitheses." This is the poem, this the book of the world.
Wherefore, when someone asked St. Anthony how he could live in the desert without books, he replied: "My book, O Philosopher, is the nature of things created by God, which whenever it pleases me, supplies the books of God Himself for reading." So reports Socrates, Book 4 of the History, ch. 18.
Finally, Philo, in his book On the Planting of Noah, near the end, teaches that nothing is lacking to God's works except a just evaluator and eulogist. "There is," he says, "a story handed down by wise men to posterity: it is as follows. Once, when the Creator was completing the whole world, He asked a certain prophet whether he desired anything not yet created, whether on earth, in water, in the air, or in heaven. He replied that indeed all things were perfect and fully complete, yet he required one thing: a praiser of these works, who in all things, even what seems the smallest and most obscure, would not so much praise as narrate them. For the very narration of the works of God is the most sufficient praise, needing no addition."
Finally, St. Basil, Homily 4 on the Hexaemeron: "This entire mass of the world," he says, "is like a book written with letters, openly testifying and proclaiming the glory of God, and abundantly declaring to you, the intellectual creature, His most august majesty, otherwise hidden and invisible. For the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament announces the works of His hands" (Psalm 18, verse 1).