Hi,
I don’t really want to enter this conversation other than to mention a historical point. The theory of creation from nothing is a theory than was developed and adopted in the later Judeo-christian movements, but the earliest Judeo-christian movements understood that the material universe was created from pre-existing matter. The historians and restorationist movements still retain the earlier doctrine where the universe was made from matter.
1) THE DOCTRINE OF CREATION FROM MATTER WAS TAUGHT ANCIENTLY
Many ancients and early Christians UNDERSTOOD a creation out of pre-existing matter, and not ex-nihilo.
Justin Martyr, in his First Apology, says : “We have been taught that He in the beginning did of his goodness, for man's sake, create all things out of unformed matter” (ex amorphou hyles). First Apology, 49.
Philo mentions : "This cosmos of ours was formed out of all that there is of water, and air and fire, not even the smallest particle being left outside" (De Plantatione 2.6). Further, "when the substance of the universe was without shape and figure God gave it these; when it had no definite character God molded it into definiteness. . ." (De Somniis 2.6.45).
Justin Martyr, in discussing this preexistent primal matter (hyle), assures us, "we have learned" from our revelations was in the tradition of Clement (c. A.D. 96) who had praised God who "has made manifest (ephaneropoiesas) the everlasting fabric (aenaon sustasin) of the world."
Athenagoras, (despite his stress on the transcendence of God), explains concerning the preexistent Son: "He came forth to be the energizing power of things, which lay like a nature without attributes, and an inactive earth, the grosser particles being mixed up with the lighter."
The physical creation of ancient accounts was accomplished by taking “lessor” or more chaotic matter, and organizing it into a “higher” or more organized and purposeful form such as the organized earth had. Old Testament Enoch describes this process: “And I called out a second time into the very lowest things, and I said, ‘Let one of the (in)visible things come out visibly, solid.’..” (2nd Enoch 26:1). From chaotic debris, the earth and other planets were formed : Quote: “And thus I made solid the heavenly circles (orbs). ...And from the rocks I assembled the dry land; and I called the dry land Earth. “ (2nd Enoch 28:1-2).
Creation from matter is implicit throughout Greco-Roman literature of the time of Christianity's inception, and there is no indication in the Christian writings that they held a different view. On the contrary, the famous late nineteenth-century study by Edwin Hatch on the inroads of Greek philosophy into early Christianity describes the tacit but widespread assumption of the coexistence of matter with God.
2) EARLY JUDAO-CHRISTIAN WRITINGS
In the Secrets of Enoch, 25.1-3, God says, "I commanded . . . that visible things should come from the unseen . . . ."
Dodd, in “The Bible and the Greeks”, p. 111 explained that to the ancients, such creation meant organization of the elements, as the Codex Brucianus "Creation is organization" (Manuscript No 96) and it explains that first, there is matter. And what is done with the matter it that it is organized into things created. Cosmos MEANS order.
The early Jewish Apocalypes of Abraham hails God as the one who brings order out of confusion, ever preparing and renewing worlds for the righteous. For example, the Jewish Mishna relates that God created many, many worlds (almost a thousand) before this one and usewd the debris from this sort of pre-existing matter to create this world
The Berlin (Mandaean) Papyrus says " At the same time, the great thought came to the elements in united wisdom, spirit joining with matter." Matter can be imbued with spirit, but it will always be undergoing change and processing.
Pistis Sophia says "I (christ) called upon Gabriel from the midst of the worlds (aeons) along with Michael, pursuant to the command of my Father...and I gave to them the task of outpouring of the light and caused them to go down into matter unorganized (chaos) and assist Pistis Sophis"
Even 2 Maccabees, which is often used to SUPPORT ex nihilo, has Syriac recensions as well as some Greek manuscripts describing an organization of [chaotic] matter, which is also the explicit position of Wisdom of Solomon 11:17 where we read of God's hand which "created the world out of unformed matter (ktisasa ton kosmon ex amorphou hyles)," Even the "non-existent" cited in 2 Maccabees 7:28 is not absolute nothing, but rather is . . . the metaphysical substance . . . in an uncrystallized state." This relative "nonbeing" referred to a chaotic, shadowy state of matter before the world was made; as we might say in biblical terms, "without form and void."
The Early writings are full of references regarding how chaotic matter is used. The ancients understood that "At a new creation there is a reshuffling of elements " This particular 'restating' of the 'conservation of mass' is from Ben Sirach. But the principle is also found in the Odes of Solomon; it's in the Ginza; it's in the Mandaean Johannesbuch; it's in Berlin Manichaean; it's in the Pistis Sophia, and it's in the oldest and most impressive Coptic writings.
The point here is simply that the creation of the material worlds from matter was the default teaching of early christianity and the ancients were NOT unaware of matter and how it was used in creation from chaotic matter (rather than the later doctrine of creation from "nothing"). It was later Juedo-christiaity which created and then adopted creation from "nothing".
Clear
φιφυσιω
