Commentary on Genesis

Tertullian (155–240)

It is to the order of the works that the word beginning has reference, not to the origin of their substances. The Greek term for beginning, which is aρχh, admits the sense not only of priority of order, but of power as well; whence princes and magistrates are called aρχοντες . Therefore in this sense too, beginning may be taken for princely authority and power. It was, indeed, in His transcendent authority and power, that God made the heaven and the earth. [Against Hermogenes 19] With respect to the heaven, it informs us first of its creation—"In the beginning God made the heaven:" Genesis 1:1 it then goes on to introduce its arrangement; how that God both separated "the water which was below the firmament from that which was above the firmament," Genesis 1:7 and called the firmament heaven,—the very thing He had created in the beginning[Against Hermagenes 26]

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• More works by Tertullian

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