Chapter XI. The Opinions of the Hebrews Concerning God as the First Cause of the Universe

THEIR system then sets forth the first principle of theology by beginning from the power which made and organized the universe, not by syllogistic reasoning or plausible arguments, but in a more dogmatic and didactic manner of divination by aid of the Holy Ghost, under whose inspiration Moses commenced his doctrine of God in the following manner: ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.’ [1]

Then he says: ‘God said, Let there be light, and there was light.’ [2] And again: ‘God said, Let there be a firmament: and it was so.’ [3] And again: ‘God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, yielding seed after his kind and in his likeness, and every fruit-tree yielding fruit, whose seed is in itself, after his kind, upon the earth: and it was so.’ [4] And again: ‘God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years: and it was so.’ [5]And again: ‘God said, Let the waters bring forth moving creatures of living souls after their kind, and all the fowls of the heaven after their kind: and it was so.’ [6] And again: ‘Let the earth bring forth four-footed beasts and creeping things and wild beasts of the earth after their kind: and it was so.’ [7]

The Scripture then by saying in these places ‘God said’ represents the divine command, and that God willed all things to be thus made, not, however, that we need suppose Him to speak with a voice and words. But summing up the whole statement, it says: ‘This is the book of the generation of heaven, and earth, in the day that God made the heaven and the earth, and all things that are therein.’ [8]

Such is the theology of the Hebrews, instructing us that all things subsist by the creative Word of God: and afterwards it teaches that the whole world was not left thus desolate by Him who constructed it, as an orphan by his father, but that it is for ever administered by the providence of God; so that God is not only the Organizer and Maker of the whole, but also the preserver, and administrator, and king, and ruler, presiding for ever over the sun itself and moon and stars and the whole heaven and world, overlooking all things with His great eye and divine power, and present with all things both in heaven and earth, and arranging and administering all things in order.

And in the very same way the succeeding prophets also with corresponding inspiration spake at one time in the person of God Himself, saying: ‘I am a God at hand,saith the Lord, and not a God far off. Shall a man do anything in secret, and I not know it? Do not I fill the heaven and the earth? saith the Lord.’ [9]

And at another time they spake of God thus: ‘Who measured the water with His hand, and the heaven with a span, and all the earth with His fist? Who set the mountains by measure, and the hills by a balance? Who knew the mind of the Lord, and who became His counsellor?’ [10] And again: ‘Who set the heaven for a canopy, and spread it out as a tent to dwell in.’ [11] And again: ‘Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath showed all these.’ [12] And then: ‘The LORD God that created the heaven, and fixed it, that established the earth and that which is therein, and giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk thereon, I am the LORD God.’ [13] And presently: ‘I stretched forth the heaven by Myself, and established the earth.[14] I am the LORD God: there is none beside Me.’ [15]

And again: ‘Thus shall ye say unto them: The gods which made not the heaven and the earth, let them perish from the face of the earth, and from under the heaven. The Lord who made the earth by His power, established the world by His wisdom, and by His understanding stretched out the heaven, and brought up clouds from the end of the earth; He made lightnings for rain, and brought forth winds out of His treasures. Every man is become too brutish for knowledge.’ [16]

And again: ‘Whither shall I go from Thy spirit, and where can I be hidden from Thy presence? If I go up into heaven, Thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, there Thou art. If I should take my wings in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall Thy hand lead me.’ [17]

These and the like are the statements of the theologians later than Moses, who were themselves also Hebrews, and spake concerning God in accordance with their earliest forefathers. But listen now to those who were before Moses, men beloved of God and highly blessed, the first Hebrews, and the very first of them all, Abraham, who has been pronounced the forefather of the whole Jewish race.

‘And Abraham said to the king of Sodom, I will lift up mine hand unto the Most High God, who created the heaven and the earth.’ [18] And even before Abraham Melchizedek is introduced as priest of the Most High God, blessing Abraham in these words: ‘Blessed be Abraham of the Most High God, who delivered thine enemies into thy hand: and blessed be the God who created the heaven and the earth.’ [19]

In addition to this the narrative introduces Abraham as conversing thus with his servant: ‘Put thine hand under my thigh, and I will make thee swear by the LORD the God of heaven, and the God of the earth.’ [20] And he adds: ‘The LORD the God of heaven, and the God of the earth, that took me from my father’s house, and from the land where I was born.’ [21]

Besides all these passages, in the appearance of God to Moses himself, when Moses asked whom he must believe God to be, the answer says: ‘I AM THAT I AM. Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.’ [22]

Let these extracts suffice as examples from among ten thousand in the theology of the Hebrews. Is it then right to set in comparison with them the theologies of the wise men of Greece? Some of whom declared that there is no God at all, and others assert that the stars are gods, and that they are red-hot masses of metal, fixed in the sky like studs and plates, and others that God is an artistic fire proceeding in a regular course; and others that the world is not administered by divine providence, but by a kind of irrational nature; and others that things in heaven alone are administered by God, but not things on earth also; and again that the world is uncreated, and was not made by God at all, but subsists spontaneously and accidentally; and others that the complex whole is made up of certain indivisible and minute corpuscles devoid of life and reason.

The doctrines, however, drawn from the oracles of the Hebrews concerning the God of the universe are briefly such as I have described: and after the God of the universe the next thing is to review the doctrines of the Hebrew philosophy concerning the first principle of things created.