1. Hebrew Bible, Psalms, 51.1-51.5, 51.10-51.12, 104.14, 104.17-104.18, 104.20-104.21, 104.25-104.26 (9th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 26, 29| 51.1. "לַמְנַצֵּחַ מִזְמוֹר לְדָוִד׃", 51.1. "תַּשְׁמִיעֵנִי שָׂשׂוֹן וְשִׂמְחָה תָּגֵלְנָה עֲצָמוֹת דִּכִּיתָ׃", 51.2. "הֵיטִיבָה בִרְצוֹנְךָ אֶת־צִיּוֹן תִּבְנֶה חוֹמוֹת יְרוּשָׁלִָם׃", 51.2. "בְּבוֹא־אֵלָיו נָתָן הַנָּבִיא כַּאֲשֶׁר־בָּא אֶל־בַּת־שָׁבַע׃", 51.3. "חָנֵּנִי אֱלֹהִים כְּחַסְדֶּךָ כְּרֹב רַחֲמֶיךָ מְחֵה פְשָׁעָי׃", 51.4. "הרבה [הֶרֶב] כַּבְּסֵנִי מֵעֲוֺנִי וּמֵחַטָּאתִי טַהֲרֵנִי׃", 51.5. "כִּי־פְשָׁעַי אֲנִי אֵדָע וְחַטָּאתִי נֶגְדִּי תָמִיד׃", 51.11. "הַסְתֵּר פָּנֶיךָ מֵחֲטָאָי וְכָל־עֲוֺנֹתַי מְחֵה׃", 51.12. "לֵב טָהוֹר בְּרָא־לִי אֱלֹהִים וְרוּחַ נָכוֹן חַדֵּשׁ בְּקִרְבִּי׃", 104.14. "מַצְמִיחַ חָצִיר לַבְּהֵמָה וְעֵשֶׂב לַעֲבֹדַת הָאָדָם לְהוֹצִיא לֶחֶם מִן־הָאָרֶץ׃", 104.17. "אֲשֶׁר־שָׁם צִפֳּרִים יְקַנֵּנוּ חֲסִידָה בְּרוֹשִׁים בֵּיתָהּ׃", 104.18. "הָרִים הַגְּבֹהִים לַיְּעֵלִים סְלָעִים מַחְסֶה לַשְׁפַנִּים׃", 104.21. "הַכְּפִירִים שֹׁאֲגִים לַטָּרֶף וּלְבַקֵּשׁ מֵאֵל אָכְלָם׃", 104.25. "זֶה הַיָּם גָּדוֹל וּרְחַב יָדָיִם שָׁם־רֶמֶשׂ וְאֵין מִסְפָּר חַיּוֹת קְטַנּוֹת עִם־גְּדֹלוֹת׃", 104.26. "שָׁם אֳנִיּוֹת יְהַלֵּכוּן לִוְיָתָן זֶה־יָצַרְתָּ לְשַׂחֶק־בּוֹ׃", | 51.1. "For the Leader. A Psalm of David;", 51.2. "when Nathan the prophet came unto him, after he had gone in to Bath-sheba.", 51.3. "Be gracious unto me, O God, according to Thy mercy; According to the multitude of Thy compassions blot out my transgressions.", 51.4. "Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, And cleanse me from my sin.", 51.5. "For I know my transgressions; And my sin is ever before me.", 51.10. "Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which Thou hast crushed may rejoice.", 51.11. "Hide Thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.", 51.12. "Create me a clean heart, O God; and renew a stedfast spirit within me.", 104.14. "Who causeth the grass to spring up for the cattle, And herb for the service of man; To bring forth bread out of the earth,", 104.17. "Wherein the birds make their nests; As for the stork, the fir-trees are her house.", 104.18. "The high mountains are for the wild goats; The rocks are a refuge for the conies.", 104.20. "Thou makest darkness, and it is night, Wherein all the beasts of the forest do creep forth.", 104.21. "The young lions roar after their prey, And seek their food from God.", 104.25. "Yonder sea, great and wide, Therein are creeping things innumerable, Living creatures, both small and great.", 104.26. "There go the ships; There is leviathan, whom Thou hast formed to sport therein.", |
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2. Hebrew Bible, Proverbs, 8.22-8.23, 8.31, 9.5-9.6 (9th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world •creation, of the world Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 399; Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 73| 8.22. "יְהוָה קָנָנִי רֵאשִׁית דַּרְכּוֹ קֶדֶם מִפְעָלָיו מֵאָז׃", 8.23. "מֵעוֹלָם נִסַּכְתִּי מֵרֹאשׁ מִקַּדְמֵי־אָרֶץ׃", 8.31. "מְשַׂחֶקֶת בְּתֵבֵל אַרְצוֹ וְשַׁעֲשֻׁעַי אֶת־בְּנֵי אָדָם׃", 9.5. "לְכוּ לַחֲמוּ בְלַחֲמִי וּשְׁתוּ בְּיַיִן מָסָכְתִּי׃", 9.6. "עִזְבוּ פְתָאיִם וִחְיוּ וְאִשְׁרוּ בְּדֶרֶךְ בִּינָה׃", | 8.22. "The LORD made me as the beginning of His way, The first of His works of old.", 8.23. "I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, Or ever the earth was.", 8.31. "Playing in His habitable earth, And my delights are with the sons of men.", 9.5. "'Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine which I have mingled.", 9.6. "Forsake all thoughtlessness, and live; and walk in the way of understanding.", |
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3. Hebrew Bible, Numbers, 13.22 (9th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 111| 13.22. "וַיַּעֲלוּ בַנֶּגֶב וַיָּבֹא עַד־חֶבְרוֹן וְשָׁם אֲחִימַן שֵׁשַׁי וְתַלְמַי יְלִידֵי הָעֲנָק וְחֶבְרוֹן שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים נִבְנְתָה לִפְנֵי צֹעַן מִצְרָיִם׃", | 13.22. "And they went up into the South, and came unto Hebron; and Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the children of Anak, were there.—Now Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.—", |
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4. Hebrew Bible, Deuteronomy, 30.9-30.10 (9th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 97| 30.9. "וְהוֹתִירְךָ יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בְּכֹל מַעֲשֵׂה יָדֶךָ בִּפְרִי בִטְנְךָ וּבִפְרִי בְהֶמְתְּךָ וּבִפְרִי אַדְמָתְךָ לְטוֹבָה כִּי יָשׁוּב יְהוָה לָשׂוּשׂ עָלֶיךָ לְטוֹב כַּאֲשֶׁר־שָׂשׂ עַל־אֲבֹתֶיךָ׃", | 30.9. "And the LORD thy God will make thee over-abundant in all the work of thy hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy land, for good; for the LORD will again rejoice over thee for good, as He rejoiced over thy fathers;", 30.10. "if thou shalt hearken to the voice of the LORD thy God, to keep His commandments and His statutes which are written in this book of the law; if thou turn unto the LORD thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul.", |
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5. Hebrew Bible, Genesis, None (9th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 179| 2.8. "וַיִּטַּע יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים גַּן־בְעֵדֶן מִקֶּדֶם וַיָּשֶׂם שָׁם אֶת־הָאָדָם אֲשֶׁר יָצָר׃", | 2.8. "And the LORD God planted a garden eastward, in Eden; and there He put the man whom He had formed.", |
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6. Hesiod, Theogony, 868 (8th cent. BCE - 7th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159 | 868. From all the other gods for nine years, fated |
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| 7. Hebrew Bible, Ezekiel, 37 (6th cent. BCE - 5th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of the world Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 29 |
| 8. Plato, Timaeus, None (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 106 |
| 9. Aristotle, Physics, None (4th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 114 |
| 10. Aristotle, Heavens, None (4th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 113 |
| 11. Aristotle, Metaphysics, None (4th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 114 |
| 12. Aristotle, Topics, 1.14 (4th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 113 |
13. Cicero, On The Nature of The Gods, 2.43, 2.93, 3.26 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •rationality, of the creation of the world) Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 104, 105, 121 | 2.43. moreover the substance employed as food is also believed to have some influence on mental acuteness; it is therefore likely that the stars possess surpassing intelligence, since they inhabit the ethereal region of the world and also are nourished by the moist vapours of sea and earth, rarefied in their passage through the wide intervening space. Again, the consciousness and intelligence of the stars is most clearly evinced by their order and regularity; for regular and rhythmical motion is impossible without design, which contains no trace of casual or accidental variation; now the order and eternal regularity of the constellations indicates neither a process of nature, for it is highly rational, nor chance, for chance loves variation and abhors regularity; it follows therefore that the stars move of their own free-will and because of their intelligence and divinity. 2.93. "At this point must I not marvel that there should be anyone who can persuade himself that there are certain solid and indivisible particles of matter borne along by the force of gravity, and that the fortuitous collision of those particles produces this elaborate and beautiful world? I cannot understand why he who considers it possible for this to have occurred should not all think that, if a counts number of copies of the one-and‑twenty letters of alphabet, made of gold or what you will, were thrown together into some receptacle and then shaken out on the ground, it would be possible that they should produce the Annals of Ennius, all ready for the reader. I doubt whether chance could possibly succeed in producing even a single verse! 3.26. no definition is given of the meaning of 'superior' and 'more excellent,' or of the distinction between nature and reason. Chrysippus furthermore declares that, if there be no gods, the natural universe contains nothing superior to man; but for any man to think that there is nothing superior to man he deems to be the height of arrogance. Let us grant that it is a mark of arrogance to value oneself more highly than the world; but not merely is it not a mark of arrogance, rather is it a mark of wisdom, to realize that one is a conscious and rational being, and that Orion and Canicula are not. Again, he says 'If we saw a handsome mansion, we should infer that it was built for its masters and not for mice; so therefore we must deem the world to be the mansion of the gods.' Assuredly I should so deem it if I thought it had been built like a house, and not constructed by nature, as I shall show that it was. |
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14. Septuagint, Ecclesiasticus (Siracides), 24.8, 39.1, 39.8 (2nd cent. BCE - 2nd cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 399 | 24.8. "Then the Creator of all things gave me a commandment,and the one who created me assigned a place for my tent. And he said, `Make your dwelling in Jacob,and in Israel receive your inheritance. 39.1. On the other hand he who devotes himself to the study of the law of the Most High will seek out the wisdom of all the ancients,and will be concerned with prophecies; 39.1. Nations will declare his wisdom,and the congregation will proclaim his praise; 39.8. He will reveal instruction in his teaching,and will glory in the law of the Lords covet. |
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15. Septuagint, Wisdom of Solomon, 6.22, 9.10, 9.16-9.17 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of the world Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 399 | 6.22. I will tell you what wisdom is and how she came to be,and I will hide no secrets from you,but I will trace her course from the beginning of creation,and make knowledge of her clear,and I will not pass by the truth; 9.10. Send her forth from the holy heavens,and from the throne of thy glory send her,that she may be with me and toil,and that I may learn what is pleasing to thee. 9.16. We can hardly guess at what is on earth,and what is at hand we find with labor;but who has traced out what is in the heavens? 9.17. Who has learned thy counsel, unless thou hast given wisdom and sent thy holy Spirit from on high? |
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16. Philo of Alexandria, On The Life of Abraham, 1, 243, 2 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 171 | 2. But since of these things some are portions of the world, and some are accidents, and since the world is the most perfect and complete of all things, he has normally assigned the whole book to that subject. We have then examined with all the accuracy that was in our power, in what manner the creation of the world was arranged in our previous treatises; |
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17. Philo of Alexandria, On Husbandry, 96-97 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159; Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 178 | 97. But, in the allegorical explanations of these statements, all that bears a fabulous appearance is got rid of in a moment, and the truth is discovered in a most evident manner. The serpent, then, which appeared to the woman, that is to life depending on the outward senses and on the flesh, we pronounce to have been pleasure, crawling forward with an indirect motion, full of innumerable wiles, unable to raise itself up, ever cast down on the ground, creeping only upon the good things of the earth, seeking lurking places in the body, burying itself in each of the outward senses as in pits or caverns, a plotter against man, designing destruction to a being better than itself, eager to kill with its poisonous but painless bite. But the brazen serpent, made by Moses, we explain as being the disposition opposite to pleasure, namely, patient endurance, on which account it is that he is represented as having made it of brass, which is a very strong material. |
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18. Philo of Alexandria, On The Confusion of Tongues, 14 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159 | 14. Those, then, who put these things together, and cavil at them, and raise malicious objections, will be easily refuted separately by those who can produce ready solutions of all such questions as arise from the plain words of the law, arguing in a spirit far from contentious, and not encountering them by sophisms drawn from any other source, but following the connection of natural consequences, which does not permit them to stumble, but which easily puts aside any impediments that arise, so that the course of their arguments proceeds without any interruption or mishap. |
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| 19. Philo of Alexandria, On The Preliminary Studies, 62, 61 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 |
| 20. Philo of Alexandria, On The Decalogue, 156 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 |
21. Philo of Alexandria, On Giants, 58 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 | 58. "And there were giants on the earth in those Days." Perhaps some one may here think, that the lawgiver is speaking enigmatically and alluding to the fables handed down by the poets about giants, though he is a man as far removed as possible from any invention of fables, and one who thinks fit only to walk in the paths of truth itself; |
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22. Philo of Alexandria, Against Flaccus, 46 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 72 | 46. on which account they frequent all the most prosperous and fertile countries of Europe and Asia, whether islands or continents, looking indeed upon the holy city as their metropolis in which is erected the sacred temple of the most high God, but accounting those regions which have been occupied by their fathers, and grandfathers, and great grandfathers, and still more remote ancestors, in which they have been born and brought up, as their country; and there are even some regions to which they came the very moment that they were originally settled, sending a colony of their people to do a pleasure to the founders of the colony. |
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23. Philo of Alexandria, On The Creation of The World, 118, 153-157, 170, 172-177, 3-7, 72, 77, 79-88, 171 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 177 | 171. In the second place he teaches us that God is one; having reference here to the assertors of the polytheistic doctrine; men who do not blush to transfer that worst of evil constitutions, ochlocracy, from earth to heaven. Thirdly, he teaches, as has been already related, that the world was created; by this lesson refuting those who think that it is uncreated and eternal, and who thus attribute no glory to God. In the fourth place we learn that the world also which was thus created is one, since also the Creator is one, and he, making his creation to resemble himself in its singleness, employed all existing essence in the creation of the universe. For it would not have been complete if it had not been made and composed of all parts which were likewise whole and complete. For there are some persons who believe that there are many worlds, and some who even fancy that they are boundless in extent, being themselves inexperienced and ignorant of the truth of those things of which it is desirable to have a correct knowledge. The fifth lesson that Moses teaches us is, that God exerts his providence for the benefit of the world. |
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24. Philo of Alexandria, On The Posterity of Cain, 60 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •on the creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 179 | 60. for Moses says that the spies came to Chebron, and these three are Acheman, and Jesein, and Thalamein, of the sons of Enoch: and this he adds, "and Chebron was built seven years before Janis, in Egypt," and these synonymous appellations are distinguished according to their species in a most natural manner. Chebron, being interpreted, means compunction, and this is of two kinds; one with reference to the soul being joined to the body, the other with reference to its being adapted to virtue. |
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25. Philo of Alexandria, On The Sacrifices of Cain And Abel, 13 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 | 13. For they who have come into the billows and heavy waves of life must be borne on by swimming, not being able to take hold of any firm point of the matters which lie within the province of knowledge, but depending on what is only likely and probable. But it becomes a servant of God to lay hold of the truth, disregarding and rejecting all the uncertain and fabulous statements which rest on the conjectures of plausible men. |
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26. Philo of Alexandria, On Dreams, 2.174-2.175 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 97 | 2.174. thus thinking well (to eu phronein) is the derivation of the word joy (euphrosyneµ), being a great and brilliant thing so that, says Moses, even God himself does not disdain to exhibit it; and most especially at that time when the human race is departing from its sins, and inclining and bending its steps towards justice, following of its own accord the laws and institutions of nature. 2.175. "For," says Moses, "the Lord thy God will return, that he may rejoice in thee for thy good as he rejoiced in thy fathers, if thou wilt hear his voice to keep all his commandments and his ordices and his judgments which are written in the book of this Law." |
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27. Philo of Alexandria, On The Special Laws, 1.51 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 | 1.51. And he receives all persons of a similar character and disposition, whether they were originally born so, or whether they have become so through any change of conduct, having become better people, and as such entitled to be ranked in a superior class; approving of the one body because they have not defaced their nobility of birth, and of the other because they have thought fit to alter their lives so as to come over to nobleness of conduct. And these last he calls proselytes (proseµlytou |
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28. Philo of Alexandria, On The Life of Moses, 1.24, 1.150-1.154, 1.157, 2.25, 2.31, 2.48, 2.103, 2.129, 2.209-2.210 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 61, 72, 159; Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 171, 172 | 1.24. And this knowledge he derived also from the Egyptians, who study mathematics above all things, and he learnt with great accuracy the state of that art among both the Chaldaeans and Egyptians, making himself acquainted with the points in which they agree with and differ from each other--making himself master of all their disputes without encouraging any disputatious disposition in himself--but seeking the plain truth, since his mind was unable to admit any falsehood, as those are accustomed to do who contend violently for one particular side of a question; and who advocate any doctrine which is set before them, whatever it may be, not inquiring whether it deserves to be supported, but acting in the same manner as those lawyers who defend a cause for pay, and are wholly indifferent to the justice of their cause. 1.150. And when he had received this authority, he did not show anxiety, as some persons do, to increase the power of his own family, and promote his sons (for he had two 1.151. for he kept one most invariable object always steadily before him, namely, that of benefiting those who were subjected to his authority, and of doing everything both in word and deed, with a view to their advantage, never omitting any opportunity of doing anything that might tend to their prosperity. 1.152. Therefore he alone of all the persons who have ever enjoyed supreme authority, neither accumulated treasures of silver and gold, nor levied taxes, nor acquired possession of houses, or property, or cattle, or servants of his household, or revenues, or anything else which has reference to magnificence and superfluity, although he might have acquired an unlimited abundance of them all. 1.153. But as he thought it a token of poverty of soul to be anxious about material wealth, he despised it as a blind thing, but he honoured the far-sighted wealth of nature, and was as great an admirer as any one in the world of that kind of riches, as he showed himself to be in his clothes, and in his food, and in his whole system and manner of life, not indulging in any theatrical affectation of pomp and magnificence, but cultivating the simplicity and unpretending affable plainness of a private individual, but a sumptuousness which was truly royal, in those things which it is becoming for a ruler to desire and to abound in; 1.154. and these things are, temperance, and fortitude, and continence, and presence of mind, and acuteness, and knowledge, and industry, and patience under evil, and contempt of pleasure, and justice, and exhortations to virtue and blame, and lawful punishment of offenders, and, on the contrary, praise and honour to those who did well in accordance with law. 1.157. for God possesses everything and is in need of nothing; but the good man has nothing which is properly his own, no, not even himself, but he has a share granted to him of the treasures of God as far as he is able to partake of them. And this is natural enough; for he is a citizen of the world; on which account he is not spoken of as to be enrolled as a citizen of any particular city in the habitable world, since he very appropriately has for his inheritance not a portion of a district, but the whole world. 2.25. And that beauty and dignity of the legislation of Moses is honoured not among the Jews only, but also by all other nations, is plain, both from what has been already said and from what I am about to state. 2.31. He, then, being a sovereign of this character, and having conceived a great admiration for and love of the legislation of Moses, conceived the idea of having our laws translated into the Greek language; and immediately he sent out ambassadors to the high-priest and king of Judea, for they were the same person. 2.48. for he was not like any ordinary compiler of history, studying to leave behind him records of ancient transactions as memorials to future ages for the mere sake of affording pleasure without any advantage; but he traced back the most ancient events from the beginning of the world, commencing with the creation of the universe, in order to make known two most necessary principles. First, that the same being was the father and creator of the world, and likewise the lawgiver of truth; secondly, that the man who adhered to these laws, and clung closely to a connection with and obedience to nature, would live in a manner corresponding to the arrangement of the universe with a perfect harmony and union, between his words and his actions and between his actions and his words. 2.103. and in all the seven there were seven candles and seven lights, being symbols of those seven stars which are called planets by those men who are versed in natural philosophy; for the sun, like the candlestick, being placed in the middle of the other six, in the fourth rank, gives light to the three planets which are above him, and to those of equal number which are below him, adapting to circumstances the musical and truly divine instrument. 2.129. not but what he has also assigned their two appropriate virtues to those two kinds of reason which exist in each of us, namely, that which is uttered and that which is kept concealed, attributing clearness of manifestation to the uttered one, and truth to that which is concealed in the mind; for it is suitable to the mind that it should admit of no error or falsehood, and to explanation that it should not hinder anything that can conduce to the most accurate manifestation. 2.209. Moreover, in accordance with the honour due to the Creator of the universe, the prophet hallowed the sacred seventh day, beholding with eyes of more acute sight than those of mortals its pre-eminent beauty, which had already been deeply impressed on the heaven and the whole universal world, and had been borne about as an image by nature itself in her own bosom; 2.210. for first of all Moses found that day destitute of any mother, and devoid of all participation in the female generation, being born of the Father alone without any propagation by means of seed, and being born without any conception on the part of any mother. And then he beheld not only this, that it was very beautiful and destitute of any mother, neither being born of corruption nor liable to corruption; and then, in the third place, he by further inquiry discovered that it was the birthday of the world, which the heaven keeps as a festival, and the earth and all the things in and on the earth keep as a festival, rejoicing and delighting in the all-harmonious number of seven, and in the sabbath day. |
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29. Philo of Alexandria, On Flight And Finding, 121 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 | 121. Those, then, who have no desire for either discovery or investigation have shamefully debased their reason by ignorance and indifference, and though they had it in their power to see acutely, they have become blind. Thus he says that "Lot's wife turning backwards became a pillar of Salt;" not here inventing a fable, but pointing out the proper nature of the event. |
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30. Philo of Alexandria, On The Embassy To Gaius, 150 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 72 | 150. And we have evidence of this in the temples, and porticoes, and sacred precincts, and groves, and colonnades which have been erected, so that all the cities put together, ancient and modern, which exhibit magnificent works, are surpassed, by the beauty and magnitude of the buildings erected in honour of Caesar, and especially by those raised in our city of Alexandria. |
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| 31. Philo of Alexandria, Allegorical Interpretation, 1.43-1.45, 2.19, 2.24 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •on the creation of the world •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159; Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 179 |
| 32. Philo of Alexandria, Questions On Genesis, 1.8 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159 |
33. Philo of Alexandria, Who Is The Heir, 216 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 61 | 216. And a thing very similar to this appears to me to be very clearly shown in the matter of the sacred candlestick; for that also was made having six branches, three on each side, and the main candlestick itself in the middle made the seventh, dividing and separating the two triads; for it is made of carved work, a divine work of exquisite skill and highly admired, being made of one solid piece of pure gold. For the unit, being one and single and pure, begot the number seven, which had no mother but is born of itself alone, without taking any additional material whatever to aid him. |
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| 34. Philo of Alexandria, That The Worse Attacks The Better, 125 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 |
35. Josephus Flavius, Jewish Antiquities, 1.15-1.23, 1.186 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 111, 156 | 1.15. And now I exhort all those that peruse these books, to apply their minds to God; and to examine the mind of our legislator, whether he hath not understood his nature in a manner worthy of him; and hath not ever ascribed to him such operations as become his power, and hath not preserved his writings from those indecent fables which others have framed, 1.16. although, by the great distance of time when he lived, he might have securely forged such lies; for he lived two thousand years ago; at which vast distance of ages the poets themselves have not been so hardy as to fix even the generations of their gods, much less the actions of their men, or their own laws. 1.17. As I proceed, therefore, I shall accurately describe what is contained in our records, in the order of time that belongs to them; for I have already promised so to do throughout this undertaking; and this without adding any thing to what is therein contained, or taking away any thing therefrom. 1.18. 4. But because almost all our constitution depends on the wisdom of Moses, our legislator, I cannot avoid saying somewhat concerning him beforehand, though I shall do it briefly; I mean, because otherwise those that read my book may wonder how it comes to pass, that my discourse, which promises an account of laws and historical facts, contains so much of philosophy. 1.19. The reader is therefore to know, that Moses deemed it exceeding necessary, that he who would conduct his own life well, and give laws to others, in the first place should consider the divine nature; and, upon the contemplation of God’s operations, should thereby imitate the best of all patterns, so far as it is possible for human nature to do, and to endeavor to follow after it: 1.20. neither could the legislator himself have a right mind without such a contemplation; nor would any thing he should write tend to the promotion of virtue in his readers; I mean, unless they be taught first of all, that God is the Father and Lord of all things, and sees all things, and that thence he bestows a happy life upon those that follow him; but plunges such as do not walk in the paths of virtue into inevitable miseries. 1.21. Now when Moses was desirous to teach this lesson to his countrymen, he did not begin the establishment of his laws after the same manner that other legislators did; I mean, upon contracts and other rights between one man and another, but by raising their minds upwards to regard God, and his creation of the world; and by persuading them, that we men are the most excellent of the creatures of God upon earth. Now when once he had brought them to submit to religion, he easily persuaded them to submit in all other things: 1.22. for as to other legislators, they followed fables, and by their discourses transferred the most reproachful of human vices unto the gods, and so afforded wicked men the most plausible excuses for their crimes; 1.23. but as for our legislator, when he had once demonstrated that God was possessed of perfect virtue, he supposed that men also ought to strive after the participation of it; and on those who did not so think, and so believe, he inflicted the severest punishments. 1.186. 4. Now Abram dwelt near the oak called Ogyges,—the place belongs to Canaan, not far from the city of Hebron. But being uneasy at his wife’s barrenness, he entreated God to grant that he might have male issue; |
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36. Josephus Flavius, Jewish War, 4.530-4.533 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 111 | 4.530. Now the people of the country say that it is an ancienter city, not only than any in that country, but than Memphis in Egypt, and accordingly its age is reckoned at two thousand and three hundred years. 4.531. They also relate that it had been the habitation of Abram, the progenitor of the Jews, after he had removed out of Mesopotamia; and they say that his posterity descended from thence into Egypt, 4.532. whose monuments are to this very time showed in that small city; the fabric of which monuments are of the most excellent marble, and wrought after the most elegant manner. 4.533. There is also there showed, at the distance of six furlongs from the city, a very large turpentine tree and the report goes, that this tree has continued ever since the creation of the world. |
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37. New Testament, John, 1.1, 1.14, 3.13, 3.31, 6.38, 7.37, 12.44, 16.28, 17.5 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of the world Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 399| 1.1. ΕΝ ΑΡΧΗ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος. 1.14. Καὶ ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο καὶ ἐσκήνωσεν ἐν ἡμῖν, καὶ ἐθεασάμεθα τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ, δόξαν ὡς μονογενοῦς παρὰ πατρός, πλήρης χάριτος καὶ ἀληθείας·?̔ 3.13. καὶ οὐδεὶς ἀναβέβηκεν εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν εἰ μὴ ὁ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καταβάς, ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. 3.31. Ὁ ἄνωθεν ἐρχόμενος ἐπάνω πάντων ἐστίν. ὁ ὢν ἐκ τῆς γῆς ἐκ τῆς γῆς ἐστὶν καὶ ἐκ τῆς γῆς λαλεῖ· ὁ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἐρχόμενος ἐπάνω πάντων ἐστίν· 6.38. ὅτι καταβέβηκα ἀπὸ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ οὐχ ἵνα ποιῶ τὸ θέλημα τὸ ἐμὸν ἀλλὰ τὸ θέλημα τοῦ πέμψαντός με· 7.37. Ἐν δὲ τῇ ἐσχάτῃ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ μεγάλῃ τῆς ἑορτῆς ἱστήκει ὁ Ἰησοῦς, καὶ ἔκραξεν λέγων Ἐάν τις διψᾷ ἐρχέσθω πρός με καὶ πινέτω. 12.44. Ἰησοῦς δὲ ἔκραξεν καὶ εἶπεν Ὁ πιστεύων εἰς ἐμὲ οὐ πιστεύει εἰς ἐμὲ ἀλλὰ εἰς τὸν πέμψαντά με, 16.28. ἐξῆλθον ἐκ τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ ἐλήλυθα εἰς τὸν κόσμον· πάλιν ἀφίημι τὸν κόσμον καὶ πορεύομαι πρὸς τὸν πατέρα. 17.5. καὶ νῦν δόξασόν με σύ, πάτερ, παρὰ σεαυτῷ τῇ δόξῃ ᾗ εἶχον πρὸ τοῦ τὸν κόσμον εἶναι παρὰ σοί. | 1.1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 1.14. The Word became flesh, and lived among us. We saw his glory, such glory as of the one and only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth. 3.13. No one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven. 3.31. He who comes from above is above all. He who is from the Earth belongs to the Earth, and speaks of the Earth. He who comes from heaven is above all. 6.38. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. 7.37. Now on the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink! 12.44. Jesus cried out and said, "Whoever believes in me, believes not in me, but in him who sent me. 16.28. I came out from the Father, and have come into the world. Again, I leave the world, and go to the Father." 17.5. Now, Father, glorify me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world existed. |
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38. New Testament, 1 Thessalonians, 5.5 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 227| 5.5. πάντες γὰρ ὑμεῖς υἱοὶ φωτός ἐστε καὶ υἱοὶ ἡμέρας. Οὐκ ἐσμὲν νυκτὸς οὐδὲ σκότους· | 5.5. You are all sons of light, and sons of the day. We don't belong to the night, nor to darkness, |
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39. Josephus Flavius, Against Apion, 2.257 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 61 | 2.257. Nay, Plato principally imitated our legislator in this point, that he enjoined his citizens to have the main regard to this precept, “That every one of them should learn their laws accurately.” He also ordained, that they should not admit of foreigners intermixing with their own people at random; and provided that the commonwealth should keep itself pure, and consist of such only as persevered in their own laws. |
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| 40. Sextus, Against The Mathematicians, 9.75-9.76 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •rationality, of the creation of the world) Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 107 |
| 41. Galen, On Fullness, 7.525 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •rationality, of the creation of the world) Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 111 |
| 42. Alexander of Aphrodisias, On Mixture, 2.17.32-218.6, 216.14-217.1, 217.7, 217.8, 217.9, 217.13, 217.14, 217.15, 217.16, 217.17, 217.18, 217.19, 226.24, 226.25, 226.26, 226.27, 226.28, 226.29 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 112 |
43. Origen, Against Celsus, 1.20, 4.36, 4.41 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 156 | 1.20. And yet, against his will, Celsus is entangled into testifying that the world is comparatively modern, and not yet ten thousand years old, when he says that the Greeks consider those things as ancient, because, owing to the deluges and conflagrations, they have not beheld or received any memorials of older events. But let Celsus have, as his authorities for the myth regarding the conflagrations and inundations, those persons who, in his opinion, are the most learned of the Egyptians, traces of whose wisdom are to be found in the worship of irrational animals, and in arguments which prove that such a worship of God is in conformity with reason, and of a secret and mysterious character. The Egyptians, then, when they boastfully give their own account of the divinity of animals, are to be considered wise; but if any Jew, who has signified his adherence to the law and the lawgiver, refer everything to the Creator of the universe, and the only God, he is, in the opinion of Celsus and those like him, deemed inferior to him who degrades the Divinity not only to the level of rational and mortal animals, but even to that of irrational also!- a view which goes far beyond the mythical doctrine of transmigration, according to which the soul falls down from the summit of heaven, and enters into the body of brute beasts, both tame and savage! And if the Egyptians related fables of this kind, they are believed to convey a philosophical meaning by their enigmas and mysteries; but if Moses compose and leave behind him histories and laws for an entire nation, they are to be considered as empty fables, the language of which admits of no allegorical meaning! 4.36. Celsus in the next place, producing from history other than that of the divine record, those passages which bear upon the claims to great antiquity put forth by many nations, as the Athenians, and Egyptians, and Arcadians, and Phrygians, who assert that certain individuals have existed among them who sprang from the earth, and who each adduce proofs of these assertions, says: The Jews, then, leading a grovelling life in some corner of Palestine, and being a wholly uneducated people, who had not heard that these matters had been committed to verse long ago by Hesiod and innumerable other inspired men, wove together some most incredible and insipid stories, viz., that a certain man was formed by the hands of God, and had breathed into him the breath of life, and that a woman was taken from his side, and that God issued certain commands, and that a serpent opposed these, and gained a victory over the commandments of God; thus relating certain old wives' fables, and most impiously representing God as weak at the very beginning (of things), and unable to convince even a single human being whom He Himself had formed. By these instances, indeed, this deeply read and learned Celsus, who accuses Jews and Christians of ignorance and want of instruction, clearly evinces the accuracy of his knowledge of the chronology of the respective historians, whether Greek or Barbarian, since he imagines that Hesiod and the innumerable others, whom he styles inspired men, are older than Moses and his writings - that very Moses who is shown to be much older than the time of the Trojan War! It is not the Jews, then, who have composed incredible and insipid stories regarding the birth of man from the earth, but these inspired men of Celsus, Hesiod and his other innumerable companions, who, having neither learned nor heard of the far older and most venerable accounts existing in Palestine, have written such histories as their Theogonies, attributing, so far as in their power, generation to their deities, and innumerable other absurdities. And these are the writers whom Plato expels from his State as being corrupters of the youth, - Homer, viz., and those who have composed poems of a similar description! Now it is evident that Plato did not regard as inspired those men who had left behind them such works. But perhaps it was from a desire to cast reproach upon us, that this Epicurean Celsus, who is better able to judge than Plato (if it be the same Celsus who composed two other books against the Christians), called those individuals inspired whom he did not in reality regard as such. 4.41. After this he continues as follows: They speak, in the next place, of a deluge, and of a monstrous ark, having within it all things, and of a dove and a crow as messengers, falsifying and recklessly altering the story of Deucalion; not expecting, I suppose, that these things would come to light, but imagining that they were inventing stories merely for young children. Now in these remarks observe the hostility - so unbecoming a philosopher- displayed by this man towards this very ancient Jewish narrative. For, not being able to say anything against the history of the deluge, and not perceiving what he might have urged against the ark and its dimensions - viz., that, according to the general opinion, which accepted the statements that it was three hundred cubits in length, and fifty in breadth, and thirty in height, it was impossible to maintain that it contained (all) the animals that were upon the earth, fourteen specimens of every clean and four of every unclean beast - he merely termed it monstrous, containing all things within it. Now wherein was its monstrous character, seeing it is related to have been a hundred years in building, and to have had the three hundred cubits of its length and the fifty of its breadth contracted, until the thirty cubits of its height terminated in a top one cubit long and one cubit broad? Why should we not rather admire a structure which resembled an extensive city, if its measurements be taken to mean what they are capable of meaning, so that it was nine myriads of cubits long in the base, and two thousand five hundred in breadth? And why should we not admire the design evinced in having it so compactly built, and rendered capable of sustaining a tempest which caused a deluge? For it was not daubed with pitch, or any material of that kind, but was securely coated with bitumen. And is it not a subject of admiration, that by the providential arrangement of God, the elements of all the races were brought into it, that the earth might receive again the seeds of all living things, while God made use of a most righteous man to be the progenitor of those who were to be born after the deluge? |
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| 44. Plotinus, Enneads, a b c d\n0 4.8[6]4.35 4.8[6]4.35 4 8[6]4\n1 4.8[6]4.32 4.8[6]4.32 4 8[6]4\n2 4.8[6]4.34 4.8[6]4.34 4 8[6]4\n3 4.8[6]4.31 4.8[6]4.31 4 8[6]4\n4 4.8[6]4.33 4.8[6]4.33 4 8[6]4\n5 6.7 6.7 6 7 \n6 6.7.13 6.7.13 6 7 \n7 6.7.1 6.7.1 6 7 \n8 6.7.2 6.7.2 6 7 \n9 6.7.3 6.7.3 6 7 \n10 6.7.12 6.7.12 6 7 \n11 6.7.4 6.7.4 6 7 \n12 6.7.5 6.7.5 6 7 \n13 6.7.11 6.7.11 6 7 \n14 6.7.10 6.7.10 6 7 \n15 6.7.9 6.7.9 6 7 \n16 6.7.6 6.7.6 6 7 \n17 6.7.7 6.7.7 6 7 \n18 6.7.8 6.7.8 6 7 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 123 |
| 45. Papyri, Papyri Graecae Magicae, 1, 10-19, 2-3, 5-9, 4 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 170 |
46. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of The Philosophers, 7.156 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •rationality, of the creation of the world) Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 113 | 7.156. And there are five terrestrial zones: first, the northern zone which is beyond the arctic circle, uninhabitable because of the cold; second, a temperate zone; a third, uninhabitable because of great heats, called the torrid zone; fourth, a counter-temperate zone; fifth, the southern zone, uninhabitable because of its cold.Nature in their view is an artistically working fire, going on its way to create; which is equivalent to a fiery, creative, or fashioning breath. And the soul is a nature capable of perception. And they regard it as the breath of life, congenital with us; from which they infer first that it is a body and secondly that it survives death. Yet it is perishable, though the soul of the universe, of which the individual souls of animals are parts, is indestructible. |
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| 47. Eusebius of Caesarea, Preparation For The Gospel, 9.27.4 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 61 |
| 48. Augustine, Confessions, 8.2.3 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 222 |
49. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, 2.24-2.28 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 222 | 2.24. 37. And all these omens are of force just so far as has been arranged with the devils by that previous understanding in the mind which is, as it were, the common language, but they are all full of hurtful curiosity, torturing anxiety, and deadly slavery. For it was not because they had meaning that they were attended to, but it was by attending to and marking them that they came to have meaning. And so they are made different for different people, according to their several notions and prejudices. For those spirits which are bent upon deceiving, take care to provide for each person the same sort of omens as they see his own conjectures and preconceptions have already entangled him in. For, to take an illustration, the same figure of the letter X, which is made in the shape of a cross, means one thing among the Greeks and another among the Latins, not by nature, but by agreement and pre-arrangement as to its signification; and so, any one who knows both languages uses this letter in a different sense when writing to a Greek from that in which he uses it when writing to a Latin. And the same sound, beta, which is the name of a letter among the Greeks, is the name of a vegetable among the Latins; and when I say, lege, these two syllables mean one thing to a Greek and another to a Latin. Now, just as all these signs affect the mind according to the arrangements of the community in which each man lives, and affect different men's minds differently, because these arrangements are different; and as, further, men did not agree upon them as signs because they were already significant, but on the contrary they are now significant because men have agreed upon them; in the same way also, those signs by which the ruinous intercourse with devils is maintained have meaning just in proportion to each man's observations. And this appears quite plainly in the rites of the augurs; for they, both before they observe the omens and after they have completed their observations, take pains not to see the flight or hear the cries of birds, because these omens are of no significance apart from the previous arrangement in the mind of the observer. 2.25. 38. But when all these have been cut away and rooted out of the mind of the Christian we must then look at human institutions which are not superstitious, that is, such as are not set up in association with devils, but by men in association with one another. For all arrangements that are in force among men, because they have agreed among themselves that they should be in force, are human institutions; and of these, some are matters of superfluity and luxury, some of convenience and necessity. For if those signs which the actors make in dancing were of force by nature, and not by the arrangement and agreement of men, the public crier would not in former times have announced to the people of Carthage, while the pantomime was dancing, what it was he meant to express - a thing still remembered by many old men from whom we have frequently heard it. And we may well believe this, because even now, if any one who is unaccustomed to such follies goes into the theatre, unless some one tells him what these movements mean, he will give his whole attention to them in vain. Yet all men aim at a certain degree of likeness in their choice of signs, that the signs may as far as possible be like the things they signify. But because one thing may resemble another in many ways, such signs are not always of the same significance among men, except when they have mutually agreed upon them. 39. But in regard to pictures and statues, and other works of this kind, which are intended as representations of things, nobody makes a mistake, especially if they are executed by skilled artists, but every one, as soon as he sees the likenesses, recognizes the things they are likenesses of. And this whole class are to be reckoned among the superfluous devices of men, unless when it is a matter of importance to inquire in regard to any of them, for what reason, where, when, and by whose authority it was made. Finally, the thousands of fables and fictions, in whose lies men take delight, are human devices, and nothing is to be considered more peculiarly man's own and derived from himself than anything that is false and lying. Among the convenient and necessary arrangements of men with men are to be reckoned whatever differences they choose to make in bodily dress and ornament for the purpose of distinguishing sex or rank; and the countless varieties of signs without which human intercourse either could not be carried on at all, or would be carried on at great inconvenience; and the arrangements as to weights and measures, and the stamping and weighing of coins, which are peculiar to each state and people, and other things of the same kind. Now these, if they were not devices of men, would not be different in different nations, and could not be changed among particular nations at the discretion of their respective sovereigns. 40. This whole class of human arrangements, which are of convenience for the necessary intercourse of life, the Christian is not by any means to neglect, but on the contrary should pay a sufficient degree of attention to them, and keep them in memory. 2.26. For certain institutions of men are in a sort of way representations and likenesses of natural objects. And of these, such as have relation to fellowship with devils must, as has been said, be utterly rejected and held in detestation; those, on the other hand, which relate to the mutual intercourse of men, are, so far as they are not matters of luxury and superfluity, to be adopted, especially the forms of the letters which are necessary for reading, and the various languages as far as is required - a matter I have spoken of above. To this class also belong shorthand characters, those who are acquainted with which are called shorthand writers. All these are useful, and there is nothing unlawful in learning them, nor do they involve us in superstition, or enervate us by luxury, if they only occupy our minds so far as not to stand in the way of more important objects to which they ought to be subservient. 2.27. 41. But, coming to the next point, we are not to reckon among human institutions those things which men have handed down to us, not as arrangements of their own, but as the result of investigation into the occurrences of the past, and into the arrangements of God's providence. And of these, some pertain to the bodily senses, some to the intellect. Those which are reached by the bodily senses we either believe in testimony, or perceive when they are pointed out to us, or infer from experience. 2.28. 42. Anything, then, that we learn from history about the chronology of past times assists us very much in understanding the Scriptures, even if it be learned without the pale of the Church as a matter of childish instruction. For we frequently seek information about a variety of matters by use of the Olympiads, and the names of the consuls; and ignorance of the consulship in which our Lord was born, and that in which He suffered, has led some into the error of supposing that He was forty-six years of age when He suffered, that being the number of years He was told by the Jews the temple (which He took as a symbol of His body) was in building. John 2:19 Now we know on the authority of the evangelist that He was about thirty years of age when He was baptized; Luke 3:23 but the number of years He lived afterwards, although by putting His actions together we can make it out, yet that no shadow of doubt might arise from another source, can be ascertained more clearly and more certainly from a comparison of profane history with the gospel. It will still be evident, however, that it was not without a purpose it was said that the temple was forty and six years in building; so that, as more secret formation of the body which, for our sakes, the only-begotten Son of God, by whom all things were made, condescended to put on. 43. As to the utility of history, moreover, passing over the Greeks, what a great question our own Ambrose has set at rest! For, when the readers and admirers of Plato dared calumniously to assert that our Lord Jesus Christ learned all those sayings of His, which they are compelled to admire and praise, from the books of Plato- because (they urged) it cannot be denied that Plato lived long before the coming of our Lord! - did not the illustrious bishop, when by his investigations into profane history he had discovered that Plato made a journey into Egypt at the time when Jeremiah the prophet was there, show that it is much more likely that Plato was through Jeremiah's means initiated into our literature, so as to be able to teach and write those views of his which are so justly praised? For not even Pythagoras himself, from whose successors these men assert Plato learned theology, lived at a date prior to the books of that Hebrew race, among whom the worship of one God sprang up, and of whom as concerning the flesh our Lord came. And thus, when we reflect upon the dates, it becomes much more probable that those philosophers learned whatever they said that was good and true from our literature, than that the Lord Jesus Christ learned from the writings of Plato - a thing which it is the height of folly to believe. 44. And even when in the course of an historical narrative former institutions of men are described, the history itself is not to be reckoned among human institutions; because things that are past and gone and cannot be undone are to be reckoned as belonging to the course of time, of which God is the author and governor. For it is one thing to tell what has been done, another to show what ought to be done. History narrates what has been done, faithfully and with advantage; but the books of the haruspices, and all writings of the same kind, aim at teaching what ought to be done or observed, using the boldness of an adviser, not the fidelity of a narrator. |
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| 50. Augustine, Commentary On Genesis, 2.4.7, 4.24.41 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 222 |
51. Augustine, The City of God, 10.31-10.32, 11.2-11.8, 13.14 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 222, 226, 227 | 10.31. Why, then, do we not rather believe the divinity in those matters, which human talent cannot fathom? Why do we not credit the assertion of divinity, that the soul is not co-eternal with God, but is created, and once was not? For the Platonists seemed to themselves to allege an adequate reason for their rejection of this doctrine, when they affirmed that nothing could be everlasting which had not always existed. Plato, however, in writing concerning the world and the gods in it, whom the Supreme made, most expressly states that they had a beginning and yet would have no end, but, by the sovereign will of the Creator, would endure eternally. But, by way of interpreting this, the Platonists have discovered that he meant a beginning, not of time, but of cause. For as if a foot, they say, had been always from eternity in dust, there would always have been a print underneath it; and yet no one would doubt that this print was made by the pressure of the foot, nor that, though the one was made by the other, neither was prior to the other; so, they say, the world and the gods created in it have always been, their Creator always existing, and yet they were made. If, then, the soul has always existed, are we to say that its wretchedness has always existed? For if there is something in it which was not from eternity, but began in time, why is it impossible that the soul itself, though not previously existing, should begin to be in time? Its blessedness, too, which, as he owns, is to be more stable, and indeed endless, after the soul's experience of evils - this undoubtedly has a beginning in time, and yet is to be always, though previously it had no existence. This whole argumentation, therefore, to establish that nothing can be endless except that which has had no beginning, falls to the ground. For here we find the blessedness of the soul, which has a beginning, and yet has no end. And, therefore, let the incapacity of man give place to the authority of God; and let us take our belief regarding the true religion from the ever-blessed spirits, who do not seek for themselves that honor which they know to be due to their God and ours, and who do not command us to sacrifice save only to Him, whose sacrifice, as I have often said already, and must often say again, we and they ought together to be, offered through that Priest who offered Himself to death a sacrifice for us, in that human nature which He assumed, and according to which He desired to be our Priest. 10.32. This is the religion which possesses the universal way for delivering the soul; for except by this way, none can be delivered. This is a kind of royal way, which alone leads to a kingdom which does not totter like all temporal dignities, but stands firm on eternal foundations. And when Porphyry says, towards the end of the first book De Regressu Animœ, that no system of doctrine which furnishes the universal way for delivering the soul has as yet been received, either from the truest philosophy, or from the ideas and practices of the Indians, or from the reasoning of the Chald ans, or from any source whatever, and that no historical reading had made him acquainted with that way, he manifestly acknowledges that there is such a way, but that as yet he was not acquainted with it. Nothing of all that he had so laboriously learned concerning the deliverance of the soul, nothing of all that he seemed to others, if not to himself, to know and believe, satisfied him. For he perceived that there was still wanting a commanding authority which it might be right to follow in a matter of such importance. And when he says that he had not learned from any truest philosophy a system which possessed the universal way of the soul's deliverance, he shows plainly enough, as it seems to me, either that the philosophy of which he was a disciple was not the truest, or that it did not comprehend such a way. And how can that be the truest philosophy which does not possess this way? For what else is the universal way of the soul's deliverance than that by which all souls universally are delivered, and without which, therefore, no soul is delivered? And when he says, in addition, or from the ideas and practices of the Indians, or from the reasoning of the Chald ans, or from any source whatever, he declares in the most unequivocal language that this universal way of the soul's deliverance was not embraced in what he had learned either from the Indians or the Chald ans; and yet he could not forbear stating that it was from the Chald ans he had derived these divine oracles of which he makes such frequent mention. What, therefore, does he mean by this universal way of the soul's deliverance, which had not yet been made known by any truest philosophy, or by the doctrinal systems of those nations which were considered to have great insight in things divine, because they indulged more freely in a curious and fanciful science and worship of angels? What is this universal way of which he acknowledges his ignorance, if not a way which does not belong to one nation as its special property, but is common to all, and divinely bestowed? Porphyry, a man of no mediocre abilities, does not question that such a way exists; for he believes that Divine Providence could not have left men destitute of this universal way of delivering the soul. For he does not say that this way does not exist, but that this great boon and assistance has not yet been discovered, and has not come to his knowledge. And no wonder; for Porphyry lived in an age when this universal way of the soul's deliverance - in other words, the Christian religion - was exposed to the persecutions of idolaters and demon-worshippers, and earthly rulers, that the number of martyrs or witnesses for the truth might be completed and consecrated, and that by them proof might be given that we must endure all bodily sufferings in the cause of the holy faith, and for the commendation of the truth. Porphyry, being a witness of these persecutions, concluded that this way was destined to a speedy extinction, and that it, therefore, was not the universal way of the soul's deliverance, and did not see that the very thing that thus moved him, and deterred him from becoming a Christian, contributed to the confirmation and more effectual commendation of our religion. This, then, is the universal way of the soul's deliverance, the way that is granted by the divine compassion to the nations universally. And no nation to which the knowledge of it has already come, or may hereafter come, ought to demand, Why so soon? Or, Why so late?- for the design of Him who sends it is impenetrable by human capacity. This was felt by Porphyry when he confined himself to saying that this gift of God was not yet received, and had not yet come to his knowledge. For though this was so, he did not on that account pronounce that the way it self had no existence. This, I say, is the universal way for the deliverance of believers, concerning which the faithful Abraham received the divine assurance, In your seed shall all nations be blessed. Genesis 22:18 He, indeed, was by birth a Chald an; but, that he might receive these great promises, and that there might be propagated from him a seed disposed by angels in the hand of a Mediator, Galatians 3:19 in whom this universal way, thrown open to all nations for the deliverance of the soul, might be found, he was ordered to leave his country, and kindred, and father's house. Then was he himself, first of all, delivered from the Chald an superstitions, and by his obedience worshipped the one true God, whose promises he faithfully trusted. This is the universal way, of which it is said in holy prophecy, God be merciful unto us, and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us; that Your way may be known upon earth, Your saving health among all nations. And hence, when our Saviour, so long after, had taken flesh of the seed of Abraham, He says of Himself, I am the way, the truth, and the life. John 14:6 This is the universal way, of which so long before it had been predicted, And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for out of Sion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Isaiah 2:2-3 This way, therefore, is not the property of one, but of all nations. The law and the word of the Lord did not remain in Zion and Jerusalem, but issued thence to be universally diffused. And therefore the Mediator Himself, after His resurrection, says to His alarmed disciples, These are the words which I spoke unto you while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me. Then opened He their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures, and said to them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. Luke 24:44-47 This is the universal way of the soul's deliverance, which the holy angels and the holy prophets formerly disclosed where they could among the few men who found the grace of God, and especially in the Hebrew nation, whose commonwealth was, as it were, consecrated to prefigure and fore-announce the city of God which was to be gathered from all nations, by their tabernacle, and temple, and priesthood, and sacrifices. In some explicit statements, and in many obscure foreshadowings, this way was declared; but latterly came the Mediator Himself in the flesh, and His blessed apostles, revealing how the grace of the New Testament more openly explained what had been obscurely hinted to preceding generations, in conformity with the relation of the ages of the human race, and as it pleased God in His wisdom to appoint, who also bore them witness with signs and miracles some of which I have cited above. For not only were there visions of angels, and words heard from those heavenly ministrants, but also men of God, armed with the word of simple piety, cast out unclean spirits from the bodies and senses of men, and healed deformities and sicknesses; the wild beasts of earth and sea, the birds of air, iimate things, the elements, the stars, obeyed their divine commands; the powers of hell gave way before them, the dead were restored to life. I say nothing of the miracles peculiar and proper to the Saviour's own person, especially the nativity and the resurrection; in the one of which He wrought only the mystery of a virgin maternity, while in the other He furnished an instance of the resurrection which all shall at last experience. This way purifies the whole man, and prepares the mortal in all his parts for immortality. For, to prevent us from seeking for one purgation for the part which Porphyry calls intellectual, and another for the part he calls spiritual, and another for the body itself, our most mighty and truthful Purifier and Saviour assumed the whole human nature. Except by this way, which has been present among men both during the period of the promises and of the proclamation of their fulfillment, no man has been delivered, no man is delivered, no man shall be delivered. As to Porphyry's statement that the universal way of the soul's deliverance had not yet come to his knowledge by any acquaintance he had with history, I would ask, what more remarkable history can be found than that which has taken possession of the whole world by its authoritative voice? Or what more trustworthy than that which narrates past events, and predicts the future with equal clearness, and in the unfulfilled predictions of which we are constrained to believe by those that are already fulfilled? For neither Porphyry nor any Platonists can despise divination and prediction, even of things that pertain to this life and earthly matters, though they justly despise ordinary soothsaying and the divination that is connected with magical arts. They deny that these are the predictions of great men, or are to be considered important, and they are right; for they are founded, either on the foresight of subsidiary causes, as to a professional eye much of the course of a disease is foreseen by certain pre-monitory symptoms, or the unclean demons predict what they have resolved to do, that they may thus work upon the thoughts and desires of the wicked with an appearance of authority, and incline human frailty to imitate their impure actions. It is not such things that the saints who walk in the universal way care to predict as important, although, for the purpose of commending the faith, they knew and often predicted even such things as could not be detected by human observation, nor be readily verified by experience. But there were other truly important and divine events which they predicted, in so far as it was given them to know the will of God. For the incarnation of Christ, and all those important marvels that were accomplished in Him, and done in His name; the repentance of men and the conversion of their wills to God; the remission of sins, the grace of righteousness, the faith of the pious, and the multitudes in all parts of the world who believe in the true divinity; the overthrow of idolatry and demon worship, and the testing of the faithful by trials; the purification of those who persevered, and their deliverance from all evil; the day of judgment, the resurrection of the dead, the eternal damnation of the community of the ungodly, and the eternal kingdom of the most glorious city of God, ever-blessed in the enjoyment of the vision of God - these things were predicted and promised in the Scriptures of this way; and of these we see so many fulfilled, that we justly and piously trust that the rest will also come to pass. As for those who do not believe, and consequently do not understand, that this is the way which leads straight to the vision of God and to eternal fellowship with Him, according to the true predictions and statements of the Holy Scriptures, they may storm at our position, but they cannot storm it. And therefore, in these ten books, though not meeting, I dare say, the expectation of some, yet I have, as the true God and Lord has vouchsafed to aid me, satisfied the desire of certain persons, by refuting the objections of the ungodly, who prefer their own gods to the Founder of the holy city, about which we undertook to speak. of these ten books, the first five were directed against those who think we should worship the gods for the sake of the blessings of this life, and the second five against those who think we should worship them for the sake of the life which is to be after death. And now, in fulfillment of the promise I made in the first book, I shall go on to say, as God shall aid me, what I think needs to be said regarding the origin, history, and deserved ends of the two cities, which, as already remarked, are in this world commingled and implicated with one another. 11.2. It is a great and very rare thing for a man, after he has contemplated the whole creation, corporeal and incorporeal, and has discerned its mutability, to pass beyond it, and, by the continued soaring of his mind, to attain to the unchangeable substance of God, and, in that height of contemplation, to learn from God Himself that none but He has made all that is not of the divine essence. For God speaks with a man not by means of some audible creature dinning in his ears, so that atmospheric vibrations connect Him that makes with him that hears the sound, nor even by means of a spiritual being with the semblance of a body, such as we see in dreams or similar states; for even in this case He speaks as if to the ears of the body, because it is by means of the semblance of a body He speaks, and with the appearance of a real interval of space - for visions are exact representations of bodily objects. Not by these, then, does God speak, but by the truth itself, if any one is prepared to hear with the mind rather than with the body. For He speaks to that part of man which is better than all else that is in him, and than which God Himself alone is better. For since man is most properly understood (or, if that cannot be, then, at least, believed) to be made in God's image, no doubt it is that part of him by which he rises above those lower parts he has in common with the beasts, which brings him nearer to the Supreme. But since the mind itself, though naturally capable of reason and intelligence is disabled by besotting and inveterate vices not merely from delighting and abiding in, but even from tolerating His unchangeable light, until it has been gradually healed, and renewed, and made capable of such felicity, it had, in the first place, to be impregnated with faith, and so purified. And that in this faith it might advance the more confidently towards the truth, the truth itself, God, God's Son, assuming humanity without destroying His divinity, established and founded this faith, that there might be a way for man to man's God through a God-man. For this is the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. For it is as man that He is the Mediator and the Way. Since, if the way lies between him who goes, and the place whither he goes, there is hope of his reaching it; but if there be no way, or if he know not where it is, what boots it to know whither he should go? Now the only way that is infallibly secured against all mistakes, is when the very same person is at once God and man, God our end, man our way. 11.3. This Mediator, having spoken what He judged sufficient first by the prophets, then by His own lips, and afterwards by the apostles, has besides produced the Scripture which is called canonical, which has paramount authority, and to which we yield assent in all matters of which we ought not to be ignorant, and yet cannot know of ourselves. For if we attain the knowledge of present objects by the testimony of our own senses, whether internal or external, then, regarding objects remote from our own senses, we need others to bring their testimony, since we cannot know them by our own, and we credit the persons to whom the objects have been or are sensibly present. Accordingly, as in the case of visible objects which we have not seen, we trust those who have, (and likewise with all sensible objects,) so in the case of things which are perceived by the mind and spirit, i.e., which are remote from our own interior sense, it behooves us to trust those who have seen them set in that incorporeal light, or abidingly contemplate them. 11.4. of all visible things, the world is the greatest; of all invisible, the greatest is God. But, that the world is, we see; that God is, we believe. That God made the world, we can believe from no one more safely than from God Himself. But where have we heard Him? Nowhere more distinctly than in the Holy Scriptures, where His prophet said, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1 Was the prophet present when God made the heavens and the earth? No; but the wisdom of God, by whom all things were made, was there, Proverbs 8:27 and wisdom insinuates itself into holy souls, and makes them the friends of God and His prophets, and noiselessly informs them of His works. They are taught also by the angels of God, who always behold the face of the Father, Matthew 18:10 and announce His will to whom it befits. of these prophets was he who said and wrote, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And so fit a witness was he of God, that the same Spirit of God, who revealed these things to him, enabled him also so long before to predict that our faith also would be forthcoming. But why did God choose then to create the heavens and earth which up to that time He had not made? If they who put this question wish to make out that the world is eternal and without beginning, and that consequently it has not been made by God, they are strangely deceived, and rave in the incurable madness of impiety. For, though the voices of the prophets were silent, the world itself, by its well-ordered changes and movements, and by the fair appearance of all visible things, bears a testimony of its own, both that it has been created, and also that it could not have been created save by God, whose greatness and beauty are unutterable and invisible. As for those who own, indeed, that it was made by God, and yet ascribe to it not a temporal but only a creational beginning, so that in some scarcely intelligible way the world should always have existed a created world they make an assertion which seems to them to defend God from the charge of arbitrary hastiness, or of suddenly conceiving the idea of creating the world as a quite new idea, or of casually changing His will, though He be unchangeable. But I do not see how this supposition of theirs can stand in other respects, and chiefly in respect of the soul; for if they contend that it is co-eternal with God, they will be quite at a loss to explain whence there has accrued to it new misery, which through a previous eternity had not existed. For if they said that its happiness and misery ceaselessly alternate, they must say, further, that this alternation will continue for ever; whence will result this absurdity, that, though the soul is called blessed, it is not so in this, that it foresees its own misery and disgrace. And yet, if it does not foresee it, and supposes that it will be neither disgraced nor wretched, but always blessed, then it is blessed because it is deceived; and a more foolish statement one cannot make. But if their idea is that the soul's misery has alternated with its bliss during the ages of the past eternity, but that now, when once the soul has been set free, it will return henceforth no more to misery, they are nevertheless of opinion that it has never been truly blessed before, but begins at last to enjoy a new and uncertain happiness; that is to say, they must acknowledge that some new thing, and that an important and signal thing, happens to the soul which never in a whole past eternity happened it before. And if they deny that God's eternal purpose included this new experience of the soul, they deny that He is the Author of its blessedness, which is unspeakable impiety. If, on the other hand, they say that the future blessedness of the soul is the result of a new decree of God, how will they show that God is not chargeable with that mutability which displeases them? Further, if they acknowledge that it was created in time, but will never perish in time - that it has, like number, a beginning but no end - and that, therefore, having once made trial of misery, and been delivered from it, it will never again return thereto, they will certainly admit that this takes place without any violation of the immutable counsel of God. Let them, then, in like manner believe regarding the world that it too could be made in time, and yet that God, in making it, did not alter His eternal design. 11.5. Next, we must see what reply can be made to those who agree that God is the Creator of the world, but have difficulties about the time of its creation, and what reply, also, they can make to difficulties we might raise about the place of its creation. For, as they demand why the world was created then and no sooner, we may ask why it was created just here where it is, and not elsewhere. For if they imagine infinite spaces of time before the world, during which God could not have been idle, in like manner they may conceive outside the world infinite realms of space, in which, if any one says that the Omnipotent cannot hold His hand from working, will it not follow that they must adopt Epicurus' dream of innumerable worlds? With this difference only, that he asserts that they are formed and destroyed by the fortuitous movements of atoms, while they will hold that they are made by God's hand, if they maintain that, throughout the boundless immensity of space, stretching interminably in every direction round the world, God cannot rest, and that the worlds which they suppose Him to make cannot be destroyed. For here the question is with those who, with ourselves, believe that God is spiritual, and the Creator of all existences but Himself. As for others, it is a condescension to dispute with them on a religious question, for they have acquired a reputation only among men who pay divine honors to a number of gods, and have become conspicuous among the other philosophers for no other reason than that, though they are still far from the truth, they are near it in comparison with the rest. While these, then, neither confine in any place, nor limit, nor distribute the divine substance, but, as is worthy of God, own it to be wholly though spiritually present everywhere, will they perchance say that this substance is absent from such immense spaces outside the world, and is occupied in one only, (and that a very little one compared with the infinity beyond), the one, namely, in which is the world? I think they will not proceed to this absurdity. Since they maintain that there is but one world, of vast material bulk, indeed, yet finite, and in its own determinate position, and that this was made by the working of God, let them give the same account of God's resting in the infinite times before the world as they give of His resting in the infinite spaces outside of it. And as it does not follow that God set the world in the very spot it occupies and no other by accident rather than by divine reason, although no human reason can comprehend why it was so set, and though there was no merit in the spot chosen to give it the precedence of infinite others, so neither does it follow that we should suppose that God was guided by chance when He created the world in that and no earlier time, although previous times had been running by during an infinite past, and though there was no difference by which one time could be chosen in preference to another. But if they say that the thoughts of men are idle when they conceive infinite places, since there is no place beside the world, we reply that, by the same showing, it is vain to conceive of the past times of God's rest, since there is no time before the world. 11.6. For if eternity and time are rightly distinguished by this, that time does not exist without some movement and transition, while in eternity there is no change, who does not see that there could have been no time had not some creature been made, which by some motion could give birth to change - the various parts of which motion and change, as they cannot be simultaneous, succeed one another - and thus, in these shorter or longer intervals of duration, time would begin? Since then, God, in whose eternity is no change at all, is the Creator and Ordainer of time, I do not see how He can be said to have created the world after spaces of time had elapsed, unless it be said that prior to the world there was some creature by whose movement time could pass. And if the sacred and infallible Scriptures say that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, in order that it may be understood that He had made nothing previously - for if He had made anything before the rest, this thing would rather be said to have been made in the beginning,- then assuredly the world was made, not in time, but simultaneously with time. For that which is made in time is made both after and before some time - after that which is past, before that which is future. But none could then be past, for there was no creature by whose movements its duration could be measured. But simultaneously with time the world was made, if in the world's creation change and motion were created, as seems evident from the order of the first six or seven days. For in these days the morning and evening are counted, until, on the sixth day, all things which God then made were finished, and on the seventh the rest of God was mysteriously and sublimely signalized. What kind of days these were it is extremely difficult, or perhaps impossible for us to conceive, and how much more to say! 11.7. We see, indeed, that our ordinary days have no evening but by the setting, and no morning but by the rising, of the sun; but the first three days of all were passed without sun, since it is reported to have been made on the fourth day. And first of all, indeed, light was made by the word of God, and God, we read, separated it from the darkness, and called the light Day, and the darkness Night; but what kind of light that was, and by what periodic movement it made evening and morning, is beyond the reach of our senses; neither can we understand how it was, and yet must unhesitatingly believe it. For either it was some material light, whether proceeding from the upper parts of the world, far removed from our sight, or from the spot where the sun was afterwards kindled; or under the name of light the holy city was signified, composed of holy angels and blessed spirits, the city of which the apostle says, Jerusalem which is above is our eternal mother in heaven; Galatians 4:26 and in another place, For you are all the children of the light, and the children of the day; we are not of the night, nor of darkness. 1 Thessalonians 5:5 Yet in some respects we may appropriately speak of a morning and evening of this day also. For the knowledge of the creature is, in comparison of the knowledge of the Creator, but a twilight; and so it dawns and breaks into morning when the creature is drawn to the praise and love of the Creator; and night never falls when the Creator is not forsaken through love of the creature. In fine, Scripture, when it would recount those days in order, never mentions the word night. It never says, Night was, but The evening and the morning were the first day. So of the second and the rest. And, indeed, the knowledge of created things contemplated by themselves is, so to speak, more colorless than when they are seen in the wisdom of God, as in the art by which they were made. Therefore evening is a more suitable figure than night; and yet, as I said, morning returns when the creature returns to the praise and love of the Creator. When it does so in the knowledge of itself, that is the first day; when in the knowledge of the firmament, which is the name given to the sky between the waters above and those beneath, that is the second day; when in the knowledge of the earth, and the sea, and all things that grow out of the earth, that is the third day; when in the knowledge of the greater and less luminaries, and all the stars, that is the fourth day; when in the knowledge of all animals that swim in the waters and that fly in the air, that is the fifth day; when in the knowledge of all animals that live on the earth, and of man himself, that is the sixth day. 11.8. When it is said that God rested on the seventh day from all His works, and hallowed it, we are not to conceive of this in a childish fashion, as if work were a toil to God, who spoke and it was done,- spoke by the spiritual and eternal, not audible and transitory word. But God's rest signifies the rest of those who rest in God, as the joy of a house means the joy of those in the house who rejoice, though not the house, but something else, causes the joy. How much more intelligible is such phraseology, then, if the house itself, by its own beauty, makes the inhabitants joyful! For in this case we not only call it joyful by that figure of speech in which the thing containing is used for the thing contained (as when we say, The theatres applaud, The meadows low, meaning that the men in the one applaud, and the oxen in the other low), but also by that figure in which the cause is spoken of as if it were the effect, as when a letter is said to be joyful, because it makes its readers so. Most appropriately, therefore, the sacred narrative states that God rested, meaning thereby that those rest who are in Him, and whom He makes to rest. And this the prophetic narrative promises also to the men to whom it speaks, and for whom it was written, that they themselves, after those good works which God does in and by them, if they have managed by faith to get near to God in this life, shall enjoy in Him eternal rest. This was pre-figured to the ancient people of God by the rest enjoined in their sabbath law, of which, in its own place, I shall speak more at large. 13.14. For God, the author of natures, not of vices, created man upright; but man, being of his own will corrupted, and justly condemned, begot corrupted and condemned children. For we all were in that one man, since we all were that one man, who fell into sin by the woman who was made from him before the sin. For not yet was the particular form created and distributed to us, in which we as individuals were to live, but already the seminal nature was there from which we were to be propagated; and this being vitiated by sin, and bound by the chain of death, and justly condemned, man could not be born of man in any other state. And thus, from the bad use of free will, there originated the whole train of evil, which, with its concatenation of miseries, convoys the human race from its depraved origin, as from a corrupt root, on to the destruction of the second death, which has no end, those only being excepted who are freed by the grace of God. |
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| 52. Basil of Caesarea, Homiliae In Hexaemeron, 3.8 (4th cent. CE - 4th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 222 |
| 53. Proclus, In Platonis Timaeum Commentarii, 2.5.11-2.5.31, 2.103.27-2.103.30, 2.105.30-2.105.31, 2.107.14-2.107.19 (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 124 |
| 54. Proclus, In Platonis Cratylum Commentaria, 169 (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation of world soul Found in books: d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 123 |
| 55. Zacharias, Ammonius Sive De Mundi Opificio Disputatio, None (5th cent. CE - 6th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 72 |
| 56. Proclus, Theologia Platonica ( ), 6.8, 6.10, 35.23-4, 46.8-14 (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: nan nan nan nan |
| 57. Proclus, Institutio Theologica, 164-166, 204, 2153, 68, 109 (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 123 |
| 58. Damaskios, De Principiis, 2.117-2.118 (5th cent. CE - 6th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •creation, of world Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 72, 100, 113, 114 |
| 59. Olympiodorus The Younger of Alexandria, In Platonis Gorgiam Commentaria, 21.1 (6th cent. CE - 6th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •rationality, of the creation of the world) Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 114 |
| 60. Eratosthenes, Ap. Strabo, None Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 174 |
| 61. Iamblichus, Commentary On Plato’S Timaeus, 50 Tagged with subjects: •creation of world soul Found in books: d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 124 |
| 62. Aristeas, 2 Baruch, 3.37 Tagged with subjects: •creation, of the world Found in books: Levison (2009), Filled with the Spirit, 399 |
| 64. Tim., Plato, None Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 181 |
| 65. Stobaeus, Eclogues, 1.155 Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Celykte (2020), The Stoic Theory of Beauty. 110 |
| 66. Aristobulus, Ap. Euseb. Praep. Evang., 7.13.10, 13.12.9, 13.12.11-13.12.12 Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 72, 73 |
67. Strabo, Geography, 1.1.19, 1.2.14 Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Bloch (2022), Ancient Jewish Diaspora: Essays on Hellenism, 159; Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 174 | 1.1.19. But even the theoretical portion of geography is by no means contemptible. On the one hand, it embraces the arts, mathematics, and natural science; on the other, history and fable. Not that this latter can have any distinct advantage: for instance, if any one should relate to us the wanderings of Ulysses, Menelaus, and Jason, he would not seem to have added directly to our fund of practical knowledge thereby, (which is the only thing men of the world are interested in,) unless he should convey useful examples of what those wanderers were compelled to suffer, and at the same time afford matter of rational amusement to those who interest themselves in the places which gave birth to such fables. Practical men interest themselves in these pursuits, since they are at once commendable, and afford them pleasure; but yet not to any great extent. In this class, too, will be found those whose main object in life is pleasure and respectability: but these by no means constitute the majority of mankind, who naturally prefer that which holds out some direct advantage. The geographer should therefore chiefly devote himself to what is practically important. He should follow the same rule in regard to history and the mathematics, selecting always that which is most useful, most intelligible, and most authentic. 1.2.14. Eratosthenes thinks it probable that Hesiod, having heard of the wanderings of Ulysses, and of their having taken place near to Sicily and Italy, embraced this view of the case, and not only describes the places spoken of by Homer, but also Aetna, the Isle of Ortygia, near to Syracuse, and Tyrrhenia. As for Homer, he was altogether unacquainted with these places, and further, had no wish to lay the scene of the wanderings in any well-known locality. What! are then Aetna and Tyrrhenia such well-known places, and Scyllaion, Charybdis, Circaion, and the Sirenussae, so obscure? Or is Hesiod so correct as never to write nonsense, but always follow in the wake of received opinions, while Homer blurts out whatever comes uppermost? Without taking into consideration our remarks on the character and aptitude of Homer's myths, a large array of writers who bear evidence to his statements, and the additional testimony of local tradition, are sufficient proof that his are not the inventions of poets or contemporary scribblers, but the record of real actors and real scenes. |
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| 68. Simplicius of Cilicia, In Aristotelis Physicorum Libros Commentaria, 7.13, 24.25, 25.6, 25.7, 32.5-34.4, 36.24, 36.25, 36.26, 36.27, 36.28, 36.29, 36.30, 36.31, 144.25-147.21, 157.25-161.20, 227.24, 232.30, 232.31, 232.32, 243.13 (missingth cent. CE - 5th cent. CE) Tagged with subjects: •nan Found in books: Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 113 |
| 70. De An. Procr.,, Plutarch, None Tagged with subjects: •creation of the world Found in books: Niehoff (2011), Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria, 72 |
