God and the world. In thus ignoring all other doctrines, the Scriptures leave us under the necessity of believing that God cre- ated the world out of nothing.
2. The descriptions of the work of creation given in the Bible, preclude tlie idea of emanation or mere formation. God said, " Let there be light, and there was light." In Ps. xxxiii. 6, it is said, " By the word of the Lord were the heavens made ; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth." And in verse 9 : " He spake and it was done ; he commanded and it stood fast." It was, therefore, in the words of Melancthon, already quoted, Dieente seu juheiite Deo, that the universe was called into exist- ence. " Nam quid est aliud tota creatura," Luther asks, " quam verbum Dei a Deo prolatum, seu productum foras ? . . . . Mun- dum et omnia creavit facillimo opere, dicendo scilicet, ut non plus negotii Deo sit in creatione, quam nobis in appellatione." ^
3. The same doctrine is involved in the absolute dependence of all things on God, and in his absolute sovereignty over them. " Thou, even thou, art Jehovah alone ; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou pre- servest them all." (Neh. ix. 6.) " By Him were all things cre- ated, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invis- ible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers : all things were created by Him, and for Him : and He is before all things, and by Him all things consist." (Col. i. 16, 17.) " Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." (Rev. iv. 11.) The all things spoken of in these passages is made to include everything out of God. There can, therefore, be no preexisting matter, existing independently of his will. Everything out of God is said to owe its existence to his will.
4. The same doctrine is included in the Scripture doctrine that the universe (ra iravra) is e'/c Oeov, of God ; that He is its source, not in the Gnostic sense, but in the sense consistent with other representations of the Bible, which refer the existence of all things to the command of God. The universe, therefore, is " of Him " as its efficient cause.
5. The Apostle in Heb. xi. 3, begins his illustration of the nature and power of faith by referring to the creation as the great fundamentartruth of all religion. If there be no creation, there is no God. If the universe was called into being out of nothing, then there must be an extramundane Being to whom it owes its exist-
1 Genesis, i. 5; Works, Wittenberg edit. 1555 (Latin), vol. vi. leaf 5, p. 2.
560 PART I. — THEOLOGY. [Ch. X. — Creation.
ence. The creation is a fact which we know only by revelation. What the sacred writer here asserts is, Firet, that the Avorlds (atwie?, all contained in time and space) were created, set in order, and established, by the simple word or command of God. Com- pare Ps. Ixxiv. (Ixxiii.) 16, in the Septuagint, a-v KarripTL(T<a rjXiov koX creXyvqv. Secondly, this being the case, it follows that the universe was not formed out of any preexisting substance. Thirdly, God is not a mere former, but the creator of the ordered universe. The difference among commentators in the interpretation of this passage does not affect its general sense. The words are et's to /xt/ ck (batvo- ixkvtav TO. (SXe-TTOfieva ytyovivai. The first question is whether cts to ex- presses the design, or simply the consequence. In the former case, the meaning is that God created the worlds by a word in order that; {. e., in order that men might know that the things seen were not made of what already existed. In the latter, it is simply stated as a fact, that as creation was by a word, it was not out of any preexisting substance. The other doubtful point in the passage is the construction of the negative particle /xt;. It may be con- nected with 0atvo/x,evoji'. This passage is then parallel with 2 Mace, vii. 28, e^ ovK ovTiiiv iTTOLrja-ev avTo. 6 ^eos ; in the Latin, " Peto, nate, ut aspicias ad coelum, et terram, et ad omnia, quae in eis sunt ; et intelligas, quia ex nihilo fecit ilia Deus, et hominum genus." Delitzsch, in his commentary on this Epistle, shows that neither the position of the negative before the preposition, nor the use of /x^ in- stead of ov is any valid objection to this interpretation. Others, however, prefer to connect the [j-rj with yeyovevai, i. e., " the worlds were not made out of the phenomenal." The sense in either case is substantially the same. But the question arises, What is the implied antithesis to the phenomenal? Some say the real, the ideal, the thoughts of God. Delitzsch says we must supply to [x-tj Ik (jiaivoixivtav, aW Ik vorjTwv, " and these vor]Ta. are the eternal invisi- ble types, out of which, as their ideal ground and source, visible things by the fiat of God have proceeded." This is Platonism, and foreign to the Scriptural mode of thinking and teaching. What- ever is real is phenomenal ; that is, every substance, everything which really exists manifests itself somewhere and somehow. The proper antithesis, therefore, to (paivofxevwy is ovk ovtwv. " The worlds were not made out of anything which reveals itself as existing even in the sight of God, but out of nothing."
In Rom. iv. 17, God is described as He " who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not, as though they were." To call may here be taken in the sense of commanding, controlling