Chapter III: The world was created in time, that is, on the first day of time

The proponents of the pre-Genesis world apply the words of Moses: In principio Deus creavit cælum et terram [In the beginning God created heaven and earth]—apply, we say, the word principio to a kind of time of indefinite duration, anterior to the several creations of the six days. We find it affirmed nowhere, they say, that God created heaven and earth on the first day, but in the beginning; and the beginning may have taken place at a remote epoch, even beyond the periods during which all the physical revolutions whose trace geology has recovered were accomplished.

This interpretation of the word in principio is condemned by Scripture and by tradition. Moses himself reveals to us the sense which we must give to this word

principio, that is, that of the beginning of the world, when he says: “The Lord God had planted, from the beginning, a garden of delights, in which he placed the man whom he had formed.¹” The Psalmist, speaking of the creation of the world, replaces the word principium with initium, the beginning of time: “In the beginning, Lord, you founded the earth; and the heavens are the work of your hands.²”

Jesus Christ in the Gospel is still more explicit: “From the origin of creatures,” he says, “God formed man and woman.³”

The creation of man and woman therefore dates from the beginning of all creatures. Thus this is the only sense which the Fathers and the councils gave to these words: in principio.

Saint Basil, in his Hexaemeron, expresses himself in these terms: “Because many thought that the world is coeternal with God, the sacred historian deliberately chose these expressions, and said: in the beginning, that is: from the origin of time, God created, etc.⁴”

Saint Ambrose uses the same language: “At the beginning of time God made heaven and earth; for time began with this world, and not before this world.⁵”

Saint Augustine, combating the error of those who “admit, it is true, that the world was made by God, but who maintain that the epoch of its creation is not that of the origin of time, in such a way that this creation would be scarcely comprehensible,” shows that time began with the world: “It is beyond doubt,” he says, “that the world was made, not in time, but with time.⁶”

The Fourth Council of the Lateran, summarizing the traditions of the preceding centuries, decreed that “the Creator of all things is the God who, by his almighty action, drew at once from nothing, at the beginning of time, each of the creatures, that is, the angelic creatures and the terrestrial creatures.⁷”

We are not unaware that several authors interpret these words: in principio Deus creavit, etc. [in the beginning God created, etc.], in the sense that the word principio signifies “in the Word of God, who is the beginning and the end of all things.⁸” But Saint Thomas gives us the reason for this spiritual sense, which in no way destroys the literal sense. To this question: “Did the creation of things take place at the beginning of time?” he answers affirmatively, because in Genesis it is written: “In the beginning God created heaven and earth, that is, heaven and earth were created at once and at the same time.⁹”

He then gives the reason for which this word, in principio, is taken in a spiritual sense: “This expression of Genesis, in principio, is taken in three different senses in order to exclude three errors. Indeed, some have supposed that the world has always existed and that time had no beginning: it is to repel this idea that it is said: in principio, in the beginning, namely at the beginning of time. Others have thought that creation had two beginnings, one for good, one for evil;

it is to repel this idea that it is said: in principio, that is, in God the Son, according to this word of the Apostle: It is in him, that is, in the Son, that all things were created. Some, on the contrary, maintained that corporeal things were created by God through the intermediary of spiritual creatures, and it is to repel this idea that it is said: God created heaven and earth in the beginning, that is, before all beings. These four things were designated as having been created at once, namely the empyrean heaven, corporeal matter which must be understood under the name of earth, time, and the angelic nature.¹⁰”

Suarez professes the same doctrine in his Treatise on the Six Days, chapter nine.

Another question which the Fathers and

the theologians posed to themselves, which they resolved diversely and with which the popes and the councils occupied themselves, is connected with that which we have just examined and corroborates, from a certain point of view, our thesis. We wish to speak of the time of the year in which the world was created. It is certain that, Scripture keeping silence concerning this time, only tradition can be invoked to fix it. Among the most celebrated theologians, some, such as Petau and Natalis Alexander, think that the world was created in autumn, either, they say, because, at the beginning of the world, the trees were laden with ripe fruit, which occurs in autumn and not in spring, or because the most ancient peoples of the East dated the beginning of the year from autumn. But the greatest number of theologians and Fathers maintain that the world was created in spring. They support their assertions with the following arguments:

Saint Ambrose says: “God created heaven and earth at that beginning when the Jews celebrate Passover, because it was necessary for the world to take its origin at the epoch when the season of spring is favorable to all things.¹¹”

The same reasons are alleged by Saint Basil

in his Hexaemeron, and by Saint Gregory of Nazianzus in his Sermon on the Birth of the Savior.

Saint Cyril of Jerusalem adopts the same opinion; he says, speaking of spring: “This season is that of the first month in which the Hebrews celebrate the feast of Passover; it is also that of the creation of the world; for it was then that God said: Let the earth bring forth verdant plants, etc.¹²”

In his Commentary on Exodus, Theodoret sets forth that “God formed the creatures at that time when the germination of the trees takes place. Indeed, it is when spring begins that one ordinarily sees the meadows flower, the fields produce their seeds, the trees form their fruits.¹³”

Saint John Damascene uses the same language: “The course of the sun determines four different seasons; in the first is spring, for it is in spring that the Lord made the universality of things.¹⁴”

“It was fitting, indeed,” says Saint Augustine, “that the world should be redeemed at the same time in which it was created; in order to show that he had rightly made all things according to the will of his Father, the eternal Word willed to redeem and reform the world by his Passion, at the epoch when he had created it, that is, at the equinox.¹⁵”

The Fathers did not limit themselves to indicating the epoch at which God created the world: they even fixed its day, which is Sunday: die dominica [on the Lord’s day]. This is what the Church herself proclaims in the hymn of the Sunday office, when she says: “This day is the first of all days, that on which the world received existence, that on which the Creator, in rising again, delivered us by his death.¹⁶”

This is what Saint Leo, pope, teaches in his letter to Dioscorus, bishop of Alexandria, in which he recommends to him that he maintain the practice of ordaining deacons and priests on Sunday: “On this day,” he says, “which is consecrated by so many mysteries of the divine benefits, so that all that the Lord established as most exalted may be accomplished in the solemnity of this

day. It is on this day that the world took its origin, and it is also on this day that, through the resurrection of Christ, death found its ruin and life its beginning.¹⁷”

The holy Council of Trent confirms this opinion when it says: “One must offer the holy sacrifice of the Mass at least on Sunday, on which God created light, rose from the dead, and poured out the Holy Spirit upon his disciples.¹⁸”

Thus Suarez declares that this is the belief of the whole School: “For it is established,” he says, “that it was on Sunday that the world was created, as to the substance of heaven and earth, and that light was made on the same day, not only spiritual and angelic light, but also material light, by whose existence that day was the first of all, as Saint Augustine and Bede remark.¹⁹”

The consequences to be drawn from the two considerations developed in this chapter appear to us compelling and decisive. If any pre-Genesis world had existed before the present world, or if the days of Moses were not ordinary days, it would be absurd to say that the world was created on Sunday in spring; and what God says and repeats in chapters XVI, XX, and XXXV of Exodus, and in chapter V of Deuteronomy, concerning the sabbath, would become inexplicable:

“Gather (the manna) for six days; but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord; this is why none of it will be found.²⁰”

“You shall work six days; as for the seventh day, it is the sabbath of the Lord; remember to sanctify the sabbath.²¹”

“You shall work for six days; the seventh day shall be for you a holy day; it is the sabbath and the rest of the Lord.²²”

“You shall work for six days; the seventh is the day of the sabbath, that is, the rest of the Lord your God.²³”

“God completes his work on the seventh day.—He rested on the seventh day.—He blessed the seventh day, etc.²⁴”

The sanctification of the sabbath was therefore preserved in memory of the rest of the Lord, who began his works on Sunday and completed them in six days, in order to rest on the seventh day. But these repeated recommendations of the Lord, this rest, this sabbath, this Sunday, in six days, are nonsense in the opinion of the proponents of the two systems which we combat.