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State of the question. We now explain the idea of
creation with respect to the efficient cause.
First objection. It appears that God cannot create
anything because, as the ancient Greek philosophers
said, nothing is made of nothing, and God cannot do the
impossible. The axiom, nothing is made of nothing, was
formulated by Parmenides and from his time it was accepted
by the Greek philosophers. This axiom can be understood
as meaning that nothing is made without an efficient cause
and then it is a formula of the principle of causality,
namely, nothing is made except from some subject.
Second objection. Averroes objected that if creation is
to make something out of nothing, to be created is to
become something. But all becoming is a change
presupposing a subject.
Third objection. Averroes insisted that what becomes is
not yet made. In other words, whatever is made must
first become, and all becoming presupposes a subject.
Fourth objection. An infinite distance cannot be
crossed. But between nothing and being there is an
infinite distance.
Reply. Nevertheless the reply is in the affirmative and
of faith, as was said above. In the body of the article
St. Thomas shows that it is not only possible but
necessary that all things are created by God from
nothing. He presents an explicative process of reasoning
which resembles a reduction to absurdity:
If God acted only from some presupposed subject, it
follows that that subject would not be caused by Him.
But there can be nothing outside God that is not caused
by Him.[801] Therefore we must say that God
produces things in being from nothing.
Creation on the part of God is explained by showing not
only that God actually created heaven and earth but that
heaven and earth could not exist except by creation from
nothing.
Reply to first objection. How can this ancient axiom,
nothing is made from nothing, be reconciled with
creation. If we understand the axiom to mean that nothing
is made from no cause, it remains true for creation,
because there is a creative cause. If it is understood to
mean that nothing is made from no subject, this is true of
both substantial and accidental change but not of the
production of the total being of any thing.
Reply to second objection. St. Thomas points out that
creation is not a change, because every change presupposes
a subject which is different now than it was before. This
will be explained at greater length in the following
article.
Reply to third objection. Where there is neither change
or movement there is no priority of time of the becoming
with respect to the actual making. But, as St. Thomas
says, in those things that are made without movement,
that is, in an instant, the becoming and the making are
simultaneous. For example, the mental word is forming
and it is instantly formed, something is being created and
it is instantly created, a dead man rises and he is
instantly resuscitated. The ancients thought that
illumination took place in an instant and therefore St.
Thomas said, a thing is lighted and it is instantly
illuminated. We now know that the movement of light is
not instantaneous but that it is extremely swift in
comparison with the velocity of the transmission of sound.
Reply to fourth objection. Is there an impassible
distance between nothing and the finite thing that is
produced? There would be an infinite distance if nothing
were a positive terminus and if there were an infinite
middle between the terminus a quo and the terminus ad
quem. But nothing is a negative terminus and the distance
is negatively infinite and can be overcome by an infinite
active potency, as will be explained later[802]
Doubt. What is creation taken actively? It is a divine
action, formally immanent and virtually transient, as
will be explained in the third article, when we consider
creation taken passively.
Such is the explanation of creation on the part of the
efficient cause. We are still explaining the same notion
and the same revealed truth, "In the beginning God
created heaven and earth." We have not gone on to a new
truth by any illative process but we are only explaining
the word "created" by stages with respect to the terminus
a quo, the agent, and the terminus ad quem.
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