Six Homilies on the Creation 1.1–1.7

The whole aim of godliness is the correction of our souls. For all the teachings of godliness look to this, the salvation of our souls. This is what the Word of God labors for; this is what the law of Moses lays down; this the rational tongues of the prophets proclaim; for this the apostles cry out with mouths that are never silent. For everything is on our behalf and for our sake, so that our affairs may run toward correction and attain godliness. Every holy book, then, takes our salvation as its starting point, as I said before. But this book of creation is the beginning, source, and power of everything in the law and the prophets. And just as a house cannot stand unless a foundation is laid beneath it, so neither can the beauties of creation shine unless the account of creation has first received its beginning. I know, indeed, that many of the holy Fathers have entered into the account of creation and have said many great and glorious things, as the grace of the Holy Spirit measured out to them. And though many great and wonderful things have been said before, nothing prevents what we have to say from being said as well, as the grace of the Holy Spirit may supply. For just as those before us were not hindered by those before them, so neither are we hindered by those before our generation. For to them, to us, and to those before them there is one grace, supplying the power of the Holy Spirit. For “all these,” he says, “one and the same Spirit works, distributing to each one individually as he wills.” So what comes from the Fathers is not thrown out; rather, what comes from us is set beside it. Even if their contributions are great and ours small, ours are still built up together with theirs. For just as, when a large stone serving as a squared block is set in a building and shakes a little, a small stone slipped beneath it steadies it, so the things said by the Fathers, receiving small additions, make the building of the Church greater. I ask your love to attend to the thoughts in what is said: not whether they are unfamiliar, but whether they are true. For what is customary is not always true, nor is what is unfamiliar false; everywhere one asks whether what is said is truth or falsehood. And I ask you neither to do me a favor like a friend, accepting the words without examination, nor like an enemy to throw out the word because it is strange, but to look everywhere …

“In the beginning,” he says, “God made the heaven and the earth.” This history is a writing of Moses the lawgiver and a revelation of the Holy Spirit. It contains a creation brought about by the power of God and revealed to Moses by prophetic grace. For Moses did not say these things as a historian but as a prophet. He said what he did not see, and narrated things he did not witness. For just as we said long ago that there are three kinds of prophecy (the first kind of prophecy is by speaking, the second by deed, the third by deed and word), so here too there are three parts of prophecy: prophecy about things present, prophecy about things to come, prophecy about things past. For example, a prophet, say Isaiah, was not present at what happened in Moses' time; but since the spirit of Moses was in him, revealing to him what had happened, it was prophecy. Again, there is prophecy about things present: as when someone standing before the prophet wishes to hide something in his mind, and the prophet exposes him, as Elisha did Gehazi, foretelling what is to come and showing what is hidden. Moses told what had happened before; others, what was to come. So we must attend to this history not as a story but as a true prophecy spoken by the Holy Spirit. What is the prophet's aim? Moses set himself two tasks: to set out teaching and to sketch out legislation. For though he was a lawgiver, he did not begin with legislation but with creation. Why did he wish first to show God as maker and Master of the universe? So that God might be shown to legislate not for strangers but for his own. For if he had not first shown him as maker of the world, he would not have been shown a credible lawgiver of the world. To legislate for strangers is a matter of force; to train one's own follows naturally. And in the same way John the evangelist did not set down Christ's legislation first, until he had stated his lordship, saying: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being that has come into being. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. He came to his own, and his own did not receive him.” When he had called him Maker and Creator, then he brings him in as teacher and lawgiver of the universe. Again, another aim of Moses. Why did blessed Moses mention heaven and earth and sea and waters and what comes from them, but not mention angels or archangels or Seraphim or Cherubim? Because he fitted his legislation to the times then. For he knew whom he was addressing: people who had come out of Egypt, who had learned the Egyptian error about sun and moon and stars, rivers and springs and waters. So he left aside the creation of the invisible things and spends his word on the visible ones, to persuade those who worshiped them not to think them gods but works of God. Nor was it necessary then to tell them about angels and archangels, lest he feed their disease again. For if, without seeing angels, they said […], how much more, had they heard of angels or archangels, would they have thought them gods. But he mentions heaven and earth, mountains and waters, and all that comes from them, so as to make known the invisible one from things seen and show the craftsman from his works. The three youths in Babylon did the same. Since they were among that nation that fought against God, where there was no knowledge of God but idols were worshiped, they say in the furnace: “Bless the Lord, all you works of the Lord.” Why did they not stop there, but name angels, heavens, earth, fire, water, cold, heat, and the like, counting creation part by part? So as to wash the whole creation and cleanse all that was made, and leave no spark of impiety. So here too Moses, wishing to drive out the Jews' Egyptian error, mentions heaven and earth as things made, to show the things made and bring to mind the one who made them: “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.”

Give me your mind here. I marvel how John and Moses had the same opening. For this one says, “In the beginning he made,” and that one says, “In the beginning was.” But the one spoke usefully and the other properly. Where there is creation, Moses set down “made”; where there is the Creator, the evangelist set down “was.” Great is the difference between “made” and “was”: the one came into being, not having existed; the other was, always being. “In the beginning he made,” and “In the beginning was.” To be belongs to God, to come into being belongs to creatures, as the evangelist also distinguishes. For of the Savior he says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” Six times he says “was,” to express being. But of the servant, when he had proclaimed the one who is and came to the slave, John, he says: “There came …” God he was, but man he became. And if they dare to say of the Savior too that the Savior was, having come into being, he differs in nothing from the earth. Attend, I beg you. If the heretic says that Christ was, having come into being, and before coming into being was not, what more has he than the earth? For of the earth too Moses said: “And the earth was.” If, then, they take “In the beginning was” of being made, and not of the eternal nature, he has nothing more than the earth. Both God the Word was, and the earth was; but he was in the beginning without having come into being, always being, while the earth was, having come into being. For the lawgiver did not say first, “And the earth was,” until he had said, “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth”: first “made,” and then “was.” We know, brothers, that these subtle questions seem difficult to the minds of most people. But on a fast day we ought to discuss the deeper thoughts, with souls that are more sober. “In the beginning was,” and “In the beginning he made”: they gave the opening in the same words, “In the beginning” and “In the beginning,” to show that there is one root of godliness, which both taught the lawgiver and enlightened the theologian. For the two Testaments are sisters, given by one Father; that is why they also speak in harmony, for they have almost the same image and likeness. And just as sisters born of one father have the marks of likeness, so the two Testaments, begotten of one Father, bear a great resemblance. Indeed, in the Old Testament the law goes first and the prophets follow; and in the new grace the Gospel goes first and the apostles follow. There, the twelve prophets, Hosea and those with him, and four: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel; in the New, twelve apostles and four evangelists. There again God's first calling began with brothers: he took Moses and Aaron as the first heralds; and in the Gospel he makes Peter and Andrew his first calling. There the grace was single, here double: there two brothers were called, Moses and Aaron; here a double pair of brothers, Peter and Andrew, James and John. Since the Savior wished to stamp on us the love that is according to the Holy Spirit and to make us brothers in disposition and in spirit, he took nature as a foundation, fixed onto it the affections of nature, and on it builds the foundation of the Church. The first sign in the Old, the river changed into blood; the first sign in the New, water into wine. But this is not the time to recount the whole likeness in order; let us return to our subject. “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.” In six days God made all things. But the first day differs from the days after it. For on the first day God made things out of what did not exist; from the second day on God made nothing out of what did not exist, but changed what he had made on the first day as he willed. And you who have considered and searched: if you find the truth, agree; if you do not find the truth, accuse me, and I accept the accusation, for it gives me a full defense.

On the first day, then, God made the materials of the creatures; on the other days, the shaping and ordering of the creatures. I mean this: he made the heaven when it did not exist, not this one but the one above it; for this one came into being on the second day. God made the upper heaven, of which David also says: “The heaven of heaven is the Lord's.” This is an upper story. And just as in a house, the Lord, having built the world, laid this heaven over it as a middle roof, with the waters above it. That is why David says: “Who roofs his upper rooms with waters.” So he made the heaven when it did not exist, the earth when it did not exist, the abysses when they did not exist, winds, airs, fire, water. He made the matter of all that came into being on the first day. But someone will surely say: “It is written that he made the heaven and the earth, but nothing is written about water and fire and air.” First, brothers, when he said that the heaven and the earth came into being, he expressed the things contained by the things that contain them. For just as, when he said, “God made the man, taking dust from the earth,” he named the creature but did not count its members, nor did he say, “God made eyes and ears and nose,” but by saying “the man” included all the members; so by saying “God made the heaven and the earth,” he included everything, and brought in with them the darkness and the abysses as things made. For “darkness,” he says, “was over the abyss.” The mass of waters is called the abyss. That the abysses too were made, Scripture testifies, saying: “Before he made the abysses, before the earth came to be.” So the abysses too were made. Then hear when the air was made: “And a spirit of God was borne over the waters.” He does not mean the Holy Spirit here, for the uncreated is not counted with creation; he calls the movement of the air “spirit.” And just as it is written in the account of Elijah the prophet, “And the heaven grew dark with cloud and wind,” so here too he calls the nature of the air “spirit.” It remains to show where fire came into being. God said, “Let there be light,” and the nature of fire came into being. For this fire is not the only fire: the powers above are fire too, and the fire above is akin to the fire we have. You ask why the one is quenched and the other is not. Well, God made the angels spirits, and our souls spirits, but our souls in bodies and the angels outside bodies. As it is with souls and angels, so one can see it with fire: the fire above is without matter, the fire below is with matter. For the fire above is akin to this one, just as our soul is akin to the angels, since they are spirits and souls are spirits, as the three youths also say, “Bless, spirits and souls of the righteous,” and again, “Who makes his angels spirits.” So a soul does not appear without a body, nor can fire be seen without tow or brushwood or some other matter. And creation teaches that this fire is not foreign to that one. For many people often borrow fire from the sun and light a flame; if it were foreign, how could what is foreign be taken from it? Again, there is in heaven a great immaterial fire, so that on Mount Sinai fire appeared which God brought into view not with wood beneath it but from that immaterial fire itself; and as one might say that this fire is small beside that great one, so Moses too says: “From heaven the Lord made his voice heard, and God showed his great fire,” to show that this one is small. All of it, then, is fire: lightning, the stars, the sun, the moon; and the fire we have is akin to them. And see how lightning shows its kinship with the stars by its name: astrapē and astra. And the Savior too, to show that fire and lightning are akin, says in the Gospel: “The lamp of the body is the eye. If then your eye is full of light, your whole body will be full of light.” So the Savior. Then he adds: “As when the lamp lights you with its lightning,” calling the lamp's gleam lightning.

So everything came into being: fire came into being, the abysses came into being, winds, the four elements, earth, fire, water, air. For what he passed over, as it were in passing, Moses sums up, saying: “In six days God made the heaven and the earth and all that is in them.” And just as with the body he did not name all the members, so with creation he did not list everything, even though all things were furnished together with the world. If there were no fire in the earth, we would not today strike fire from a stone, or from wood; for wood rubbed together produces fire. Attend carefully, then. “Darkness,” he says, “was over the abyss.” Did God make darkness, then, someone asks? We know that the thought is deep; but since we are often among both those who listen lovingly and those who like to find fault, we must not leave the word unexamined, lest the promise be great and the result small. Where, then, does darkness come from? For God, they say, did not make it; God, they say, is the maker of neither darkness nor gloom. What, then, is darkness? Many have wanted to say that it is a shadow cast by the heaven: when the upper heaven came into being, they say, and the lights stayed above, the earth was left bare and darkness came about. But the upper heaven is full of light, not dark; even if it had no sun or moon or stars, it had its own shining nature. If, then, the heaven lay above and the earth was spread out below, the one shining from above and the other lit from below, where does the darkness come from? It seems to me that since water lay over the surface of the earth, and mist and gloom had gathered about the waters (as happens even now over rivers), the mist, raising gloom, made clouds, and the clouds, overshadowing, made darkness. That a cloud brings darkness, Scripture says: “And the heaven grew dark with clouds.” But we must not be ignorant of the heretics' allegories either. Some heretics have dared to say that the darkness is the devil and the abyss the demons; and when God said, “Let there be light,” that is, the Son, [the devil] is not only equal to him in honor but even older. But this impiety ought not even to be mentioned; we have brought it forward so that you may not be ignorant of what is said. The darkness then, therefore, was the darkness from the clouds. So too there was darkness in Egypt, not because it was night but because a mist had formed. So it was also on Mount Sinai: there was darkness, not because night had come, but because a cloud overshadowed it. So too at the cross of Christ there was darkness, not because night came on, but because a shadow and a screening had come about. So we must not handle the divine oracles carelessly. “And a spirit of God was borne over the water.” He calls the wind “spirit,” as he says elsewhere, “With a violent wind you will shatter the ships of Tarshish,” calling the movement of the air “spirit.” Do not think that air is one thing and wind another: the air itself, when moved, makes wind, as experience testifies. Often with a fan or a linen cloth we stir the still air, and from the movement of the air we make wind. So to show by the word “spirit” that wind is a movement of air, he said “was borne”; for it is the property of wind to be borne over creation. “God said: Let there be light.” Why did Moses not say, “God said: Let there be heaven; let there be sea,” but there “made” and here “said”? Since with us word comes before work (we speak first, then work), he wished to show God working first, to present creation as swifter than any word. When God works the materials by power, he says “made”; but when he was about to set all things in order, and light was the beginning of the world's order, he brings in a fitting word. And again, since God's first work was light and his last work was man, God first works light by word and afterward man by deed, completing the whole from light to light.

And how light and man belong together, hear. Light shows the things that are; man is the light of the world: when he came in, he showed you the light of art, the light of knowledge. Light showed the grain; understanding made bread. Light showed the cluster on the vine; the light of understanding showed the wine in the cluster. Light showed the wool; the light of man showed the garment. Light showed the mountain; the light of understanding showed the quarry. That is why the Savior also calls the apostles light, saying, “You are the light of the world.” Why does he call them light? Not only to honor them, but also to show the hope of the resurrection. For just as light, setting in the evening, is not destroyed but hidden, and after being hidden appears again, so man too, sent to the tomb as to a setting, is kept for the dawn of the resurrection. “Let there be light.” He told what came into being, but did not disclose the manner; nor did he learn it. “That light came into being,” he says, “I know; how it came into being I do not grasp.” That is why the Savior also said to the apostles, “It is not for you to know times or seasons, which the Father has set by his own authority.” If, then, it is not for us to know times or seasons, can we grasp the Master of times and the maker of the ages by human reasonings? “God said: Let there be light, and there was light.” O that holy and great power! O great wonders! Light came into being, and God calls the light day and the darkness night. Why does he call it “day” (hēmera)? Because everything bright and cheerful is called “gentle” (hēmeron). That is why we call kindness “gentleness” (hēmerotēs), and call tame beasts “gentle.” “And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night.” Why “night” (nyx)? Because at night it brings a man, as he sleeps, to remember death, all but saying: “Learn, man, who you are. You are mortal; you are a slave to sleep; why do you imagine things above you?” For night is compunction (katanyxis); whence David too says, “What you say in your hearts, be pierced with compunction on your beds.” Indeed, at night a man lies neither dead nor alive. Ask a heretic: “What is he? Alive or dead?” If he says, “Alive,” say: “Why then does he not perceive those who are talking or walking about?” If he says, “Dead,” say: “How then does he breathe?” For what breathes is not dead, and what does not perceive is not alive. You do not see yourself, yet you imagine things above you. But let this be enough on the first day. For evening has overtaken us, as there it overtook the works of the first day; and we have set these things out as best we could, though the thoughts were deep. It is for the faithful to search what has been said and to inquire …

But we, nurslings of holy fasting, who have feasted on heavenly things while our bodies go without food, let us be eager to keep the fast holy. For “Sanctify a fast,” he says. Do we sanctify it, or are we sanctified by it? The prophet said this in place of “keep it holy.” For just as, when we pray, “Hallowed be your name,” we are not praying on behalf of his name (for his name hallows all things), but since his name has been called upon us (for we are called Christians from Christ), he says, “Let your name be hallowed in us.” For with the Holy One all things are holy; nothing that is not holy draws near to God, for God is holy, resting among the holy. His heaven too is holy: “He will hear him from his holy heaven.” The angels are holy: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory with his holy angels.” The land that holds his worship is holy: “And he will set his will,” it says, “to pervert the covenant against his holy land.” And David: the court is holy: “Worship the Lord in his holy court.” Isaiah: the temple is holy: “For your temple is holy, wonderful in righteousness.” The irrational sheep sacrificed in those days were called holy: “As holy sheep,” it says, “in Jerusalem.” The covenant is holy: “And he will grow strong with many against his holy covenant.” The city itself was called holy: “And upon your holy city, Jerusalem, the city of our fathers.” For nothing that is not holy approaches God. Hence Paul says, “and the holiness without which no one will see God.” We have fasted from bread; let us fast also from injustice. You do not eat bread? Do not eat the flesh of the poor, lest God say of you too, “Those who eat up my people as they eat bread.” You do not drink wine? Do not let anger make you drunk, lest you hear from the lawgiver, “Their anger is like the serpent's,” and again, “Their wine is the rage of dragons.” For when you oppress a poor man and he groans, he is found before God eating the bread of tears. That is why God also says, “My altar was covered with tears.” So God rebukes those weeping at the altar, saying, “Priests, come in, weep.” But he rebukes them not because they themselves wept, but because those who were wronged, orphans and widows, made their pleas there at the altar. And to show that he speaks of them, he added, “with weeping and wailing and toil.” It is worth looking further at our sacrifices. The word of God is set before us as the soul's table. A fasting body is sanctified; a soul that is not fed wastes away. May the body fast from sins and the soul feast on the divine teachings. You cannot eat the bread of Christ and the bread of tears, as Paul says: “You cannot partake of the table of Christ and the table of demons.” The one who fasts must abstain from foods, and first of all from sins. For every day angels note who has resolved to abstain from greed, or sexual immorality, or injustice. These fasts the angels record and God stores up. For just as, brothers, governors report everything to the emperor by their dispatches, so the angels report to God all that happens, not teaching one who does not know, but fulfilling the ministering rank given them in creation. I would call the one who eats ten thousand times more blessed than the one who fasts and does injustice. I say this not to abolish fasting but to proclaim godliness. For eating is not bad; sinning is evil, as God says of a certain righteous man: “Did your father not eat? And he did my will.” So also elsewhere: “The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth, and the fast of the tenth shall be for you joy and gladness and good feasts; and love the truth.” But the light our senses perceive has shone out, so that the maker of light may be proclaimed. Evening has overtaken us, sealing the course of the day. The beginning was good; let the end be added. Do not push it away carelessly, but hear David: “For the end; do not destroy.” May the God of this light enlighten you all with word, law, faith, righteousness, and self-control, in Christ Jesus our Lord, through whom and with whom be glory to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, to the ages of ages. Amen.