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Against Hermogenes

Chapter XX.--Meaning of the Phrase--In the Beginning. Tertullian Connects It with the Wisdom of God, and Elicits from It the Truth that the Creation Was Not Out of Pre-Existent Matter.

But in proof that the Greek word means nothing else than beginning, and that beginning admits of no other sense than the initial one, we have that (Being) ¹ even acknowledging such a beginning, who says: "The Lord possessed ² me, the beginning of His ways for the creation of His works." ³ For since all things were made by the Wisdom of God, it follows that, when God made both the heaven and the earth in principio--that is to say, in the beginning--He made them in His Wisdom. If, indeed, beginning had a material signification, the Scripture would not have informed us that God made so and so in principio, at the beginning, but rather ex principio, of the beginning; for He would not have created in, but of, matter. When Wisdom, however, was referred to, it was quite right to say, in the beginning. For it was in Wisdom that He made all things at first, because by meditating and arranging His plans therein, ⁴ He had in fact already done (the work of creation); and if He had even intended to create out of matter, He would yet have effected His creation when He previously meditated on it and arranged it in His Wisdom, since It ⁵ was in fact the beginning of His ways: this meditation and arrangement being the primal operation of Wisdom, opening as it does the way to the works by the act of meditation and thought. ⁶ This authority of Scripture I claim for myself even from this circumstance, that whilst it shows me the God who created, and the works He created, it does not in like manner reveal to me the source from which He created. For since in every operation there are three principal things, He who makes, and that which is made, and that of which it is made, there must be three names mentioned in a correct narrative of the operation--the person of the maker the sort of thing which is made, ⁷ and the material of which it is formed. If the material is not mentioned, while the work and the maker of the work are both mentioned, it is manifest that He made the work out of nothing. For if He had had anything to operate upon, it would have been mentioned as well as (the other two particulars). ⁸ In conclusion, I will apply the Gospel as a supplementary testimony to the Old Testament. Now in this there is all the greater reason why there should be shown the material (if there were any) out of which God made all things, inasmuch as it is therein plainly revealed by whom He made all things. "In the beginning was the Word" ⁹ --that is, the same beginning, of course, in which God made the heaven and the earth ¹⁰ --"and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him nothing was made." ¹¹ Now, since we have here clearly told us who the Maker was, that is, God, and what He made, even all things, and through whom He made them, even His Word, would not the order of the narrative have required that the source out of which all things were made by God through the Word should likewise be declared, if they had been in fact made out of anything? What, therefore, did not exist, the Scripture was unable to mention; and by not mentioning it, it has given us a clear proof that there was no such thing: for if there had been, the Scripture would have mentioned it.

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Adversus Hermogenem

XX.

[1] Sed ut nihil aliud significet Graeca uox quam principium et principium nihil aliud capiat quam initium, habemus etiam illam initium agnoscere quae dicit: Dominus condidit me in opera sua. Si enim per sophiam dei omnia facta sunt, et caelum ergo et terram deus faciens in principio, id est initio, in sophia sua fecit. [2] Denique si principium materiam significaret, non ita scriptura instruxisset: In principio deus fecit sed 'Ex principio'; non enim in materia sed ex materia fecisset. De sophia autem potuit dici: In principio. In sophia enim primo fecit in qua cogitando et disponendo iam fecerat, quoniam, et si ex materia facturus fuisset, ante in sophia cogitando et disponendo iam fecerat, quoniam [et si] erat initium uiarum, quia cogitatio et dispositio prima sophiae sit operatio de cogitatu uiam operibus instituens. [3] Hanc et inde auctoritatem scripturae mihi uindico, quod et deum qui fecit et ea quae fecit ostendens unde fecerit non proinde testatur. Nam cum in omni operatione tria sint principalia, qui facit et quod fit et ex quo fit, tria nomina sunt edenda in legitima operis enarratione, persona factoris, species facti, forma materiae. Si materia non edetur, ubi et opera et operae operator eduntur, apparet ex nihilo eum operatum; proinde enim ederetur ex quo, si ex aliquo fuisset operatus. [4] Denique euangelium ut supplementum instrumenti ueteris adhibebo, in quo uel eo magis debuerat ostendi deus ex aliqua materia uniuersa fecisse, quo illic etiam per quem omnia fecerit reuelatur. In principio erat sermo ---- in quo principio scilicet deus fecit caelum et terram ---- et sermo erat apud deum et deus erat sermo. Omnia per illum facta sunt et sine illo factum est nihil. Cum igitur et hic manifestetur et factor, id est deus, et facta, id est omnia, et per quem, id est sermo, nonne et unde omnia facta essent a deo per sermonem exegisset ordo profiteri, si ex aliquo facta essent? Ita quod non fuit, non potuit scriptura profiteri et non profitendo satis probauit non fuisse, quia profiteretur, si fuisset.