על בריאת העולם י״דOn the Account of the World's Creation 14
א׳
1[45] On the fourth day, the earth being now finished, he ordered the heaven in varied beauty. Not that He put the heaven in a lower rank than the earth, giving precedence to the inferior creation, and accounting the higher and more divine worthy only of the second place; but to make clear beyond all doubt the mighty sway of His sovereign power. For being aware beforehand of the ways of thinking that would mark the men of future ages, how they would be intent on what looked probable and plausible, with much in it that could be supported by argument, but would not aim at sheer truth; and how they would trust phenomena rather than God, admiring sophistry more than wisdom; and how they would observe in time to come the circuits of sun and moon, on which depend summer and winter and the changes of spring and autumn, and would suppose that the regular movements of the heavenly bodies are the causes of all things that year by year come forth and are produced out of the earth; that there might be none who owing either to shameless audacity or to overwhelming ignorance should venture to ascribe the first place to any created thing,
ב׳
2[46] ‘let them,’ said He, ‘go back in thought to the original creation of the universe, when, before sun or moon existed, the earth bore plants of all sorts and fruits of all sorts; and having contemplated this let them form in their minds the expectation that hereafter too shall it bear these at the Father’s bidding, whensoever it may please Him.’ For He has no need of His heavenly offspring on which He bestowed powers but not independence: for, like a charioteer grasping the reins or a pilot the tiller, He guides all things in what direction He pleases as law and right demand, standing in need of no one besides: for all things are possible to God.