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The City of God

Chapter 15.--How We are to Understand the Words, "The Devil Sinneth from the Beginning."

As for what John says about the devil, "The devil sinneth from the beginning" ¹ they ² who suppose it is meant hereby that the devil was made with a sinful nature, misunderstand it; for if sin be natural, it is not sin at all. And how do they answer the prophetic proofs,--either what Isaiah says when he represents the devil under the person of the king of Babylon, "How art thou fallen, O Lucifer, son of the morning!" ³ or what Ezekiel says, "Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering," ⁴ where it is meant that he was some time without sin; for a little after it is still more explicitly said, "Thou wast perfect in thy ways?" And if these passages cannot well be otherwise interpreted, we must understand by this one also, "He abode not in the truth," that he was once in the truth, but did not remain in it. And from this passage, "The devil sinneth from the beginning," it is not to be supposed that he sinned from the beginning of his created existence, but from the beginning of his sin, when by his pride he had once commenced to sin. There is a passage, too, in the Book of Job, of which the devil is the subject: "This is the beginning of the creation of God, which He made to be a sport to His angels," ⁵ which agrees with the psalm, where it is said, "There is that dragon which Thou hast made to be a sport therein." ⁶ But these passages are not to lead us to suppose that the devil was originally created to be the sport of the angels, but that he was doomed to this punishment after his sin. His beginning, then, is the handiwork of God; for there is no nature, even among the least, and lowest, and last of the beasts, which was not the work of Him from whom has proceeded all measure, all form, all order, without which nothing can be planned or conceived. How much more, then, is this angelic nature, which surpasses in dignity all else that He has made, the handiwork of the Most High!

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De civitate Dei (CCSL)

Caput XV: Quid sentiendum sit de eo, quod dictum est: ab initio diabolus peccat.

Illud etiam, quod ait de diabolo Iohannes: ab initio diabolus peccat, non intellegunt, si natura talis est, nullo modo esse peccatum. sed quid respondetur propheticis testimoniis, siue quod ait Esaias sub figurata persona principis Babyloniae diabolum notans: quomodo cecidit Lucifer, qui mane oriebatur; siue quod Hiezechiel: in deliciis paradisi dei fuisti, omni lapide pretioso ornatus es? ubi intellegitur fuisse aliquando sine peccato. nam expressius ei paulo post dicitur: ambulasti in diebus tuis sine uitio. quae si aliter conuenientius intellegi nequeunt, oportet etiam illud, quod dictum est: in ueritate non stetit, sic accipiamus, quod in ueritate fuerit, sed non permanserit; et illud, quod ab initio diabolus peccat, non ab initio, ex quo creatus est, peccare putandus est, sed ab initio peccati, quod ab ipsius superbia coeperit esse peccatum. nec illud, quod scriptum est in libro Iob, cum de diabolo sermo esset: hoc est initium figmenti domini, quod fecit ad inludendum ab angelis suis - cui consonare uidetur et psalmus, ubi legitur: draco hic, quem finxisti ad inludendum ei - , sic intellegendum est, ut existimemus talem ab initio creatum, cui ab angelis inluderetur, sed in hac poena post peccatum ordinatum. initium ergo eius figmentum est domini; non enim est ulla natura etiam in extremis infimisque bestiolis, quam non ille constituit, a quo est omnis modus, omnis species, omnis ordo, sine quibus nihil rerum inueniri uel cogitari potest; quanto magis angelica creatura, quae omnia cetera, quae deus condidit, naturae dignitate praecedit.