Creatio ex nihilo

Creatio ex nihilo (Latin, 'creation out of nothing') is the doctrine that matter is not eternal but had to be created by some divine creative act.^[1] It is a theistic answer to the question of how the universe came to exist. It is in contrast to creatio ex materia, sometimes framed in terms of the dictum ex nihilo nihil fit or 'nothing comes from nothing', meaning all things were formed ex materia (that is, from pre-existing things).

Creatio ex materia refers to the idea that matter has always existed and that the modern cosmos is a reformation of pre-existing, primordial matter; it sometimes articulated by the philosophical dictum that nothing can come from nothing.^[2]

In ancient near eastern cosmology, the universe is formed ex materia from eternal formless matter,^[3] namely the dark and still primordial ocean of chaos.^[4] In Sumerian myth this cosmic ocean is personified as the goddess Nammu "who gave birth to heaven and earth" and had existed forever;^[5] in the Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish, pre-existent chaos is made up of fresh-water Apsu and salt-water Tiamat, and from Tiamat the god Marduk created Heaven and Earth;^[6] in Egyptian creation myths a pre-existent watery chaos personified as the god Nun and associated with darkness, gave birth to the primeval hill (or in some versions a primeval lotus flower, or in others a celestial cow);^[7] and in Greek traditions the ultimate origin of the universe, depending on the source, is sometimes Oceanus (a river that circles the Earth), Night, or water.^[8]

Similarly, the Genesis creation narrative opens with the Hebrew phrase bereshit bara elohim et hashamayim ve'et ha'aretz, which can be interpreted in at least three ways:

1. As a statement that the cosmos had an absolute beginning (In the beginning, God created the heavens and earth).
2. As a statement describing the condition of the world when God began creating (When in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was untamed and shapeless).
3. As background information (When in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, the earth being untamed and shapeless, God said, Let there be light!).^[9]

Though option 1 has been the historic and predominant view,^[10] it has been suggested since the Middle Ages that it cannot be the preferred translation based on strictly linguistic and exegetical grounds.^[11] Whereas our modern societies see the origin of matter as a question of crucial importance, this may not have been the case for ancient cultures. Some scholars assert that when the author(s) of Genesis wrote the creation account, they were more concerned with God bringing the cosmos into operation by assigning roles and functions.^[12]

Creatio ex nihilo is the doctrine that all matter was created out of nothing by God in an initial or a beginning moment where the cosmos came into existence.^[13][14] The third-century founder of Neoplatonism, Plotinus, argued that the cosmos was instead an emanation from God. This view of creation was unacceptable to Early Church Fathers and was also later rejected by Arabic and Hebrew philosophers.^[15]

Although ancient near eastern cosmology is widely seen as invoking a process of creatio ex materia,^[16][17] occasional suggestions have been made that the concept of creatio ex nihilo can be found at least in some texts, including the Egyptian Memphite Theology and the Genesis creation narrative.^[18] Hilber has rejected these interpretations, viewing both as consistent with creatio ex materia, but instead suggests some passages in the Book of Isaiah, the Book of Proverbs, and the Psalms might indicate a notion of creatio ex nihilo.^[19] The cosmogonical doxologies of the Book of Amos also present a view of creation ex-nihilo.^[20]

One of the earliest statements articulating the concept of creatio ex nihilo comes from a ~ 100 B.C. Jewish text, 2 Maccabees 7:28:^[21][22] "I implore you, my child, observe heaven and earth, consider all that is in them, and acknowledge that God made them out of what did not exist, and that mankind comes into being the same way".^[23] Some, however, have argued against interpreting Maccabees in this way.^[24][25]

In the first century, Philo of Alexandria, a Hellenized Jew, lays out the basic idea of ex nihilo creation, though he is not always consistent, he rejects the Greek idea of the eternal universe and he maintains that God has created time itself.^[26] In other places it has been argued that he postulates pre-existent matter alongside God.^[27] But other major scholars such as Harry Austryn Wolfson see that interpretation of Philo's ideas differently and argue that the so-called pre-existent matter was created.^[28]

Saadia Gaon introduced ex nihilo creation into the readings of the Jewish bible in the 10th century CE in his work Book of Beliefs and Opinions where he imagines a God far more awesome and omnipotent than that of the rabbis, the traditional Jewish teachers who had so far dominated Judaism, whose God created the world from pre-existing matter.^[29] Today Jews, like Christians, tend to believe in creation ex nihilo, although some Jewish scholars maintain that Genesis 1:1 allows for the pre-existence of matter to which God gives form.^[30]

Jewish philosophers of the 9th and 10th century adopted the concept of "yesh me-Ayin", contradicting Greek philosophers and Aristotelian view that the world was created out of primordial matter and/or was eternal.^[31]

Mainstream Christians believe in creation ex nihilo — that in the beginning there was nothing except for a single, infinite and eternal God and that God alone brought all matter, energy, time, and space into existence out of nothing.^[32]

This doctrine was widely defended in Christian circles from an early period and received its first explicit articulation by Theophilus of Antioch in a work of his known as To Autolycus in a chapter titled Absurd Opinions of the Philosophers Concerning God, "As, therefore, in all these respects God is more powerful than man, so also in this; that out of things that are not He creates and has created things that are"(2.4).^[33][34] Theophilus' statement is almost a verbatim quote of St. Paul, "God...who quickeneth the dead; and calleth those things that are not [Gr: μὴ ὄντα; L: non sunt], as those that are" (Romans 4:17). For this reason creation ex nihilo had become a fundamental tenet of Christian theology by the 3rd century.^[35][36] In late antiquity, John Philoponus was its most prominent defender.^[37]

In modern times, some Christian theologians argue that although the Bible does not explicitly mention creation ex nihilo, it gains validity from the tradition of having been held by so many for so long. Others have sought alternatives to creatio ex nihilo, such as the idea that God created from his own self (ex ipse), but this implies that the world is more or less identical with God; or that God created from pre-existent matter (ex materia), but this implies that the world does not depend on God for its existence.^[38] The notion of creatio ex nihilo underlies modern arguments for the existence of God among Christian and other theistic philosophers, especially as articulated in the cosmological argument^[39] and its more particular manifestation in the Kalam cosmological argument.^[40]

Saint Augustine of Hippo affirmed an allegorical intepretation of the six-days biblical account.^[41] 7 is a perfect and symbolic number that would indicate the perfection of creative work by God. The first three days cannot be considered as such because the Sun was created only on the fourth day. The night of the sixth day is not mentioned. Lastly, Augustine argues that it would be absurd to think of God resting on the seventh day because God possesses within himself every form of wealth and is eternally unchangeable and therefore could not have changed his state between the sixth and seventh day. Being God immutable from ever and forever, and since nothing of positive lacks in Him, therefore it is impossible that anything at a certain moment should have been added to the divine essence (for what concerns the unity of the Triune God, but not the single divine persons).^[42]

According to saint Ambrose of Milan, God's rest follows man's creation because God himself rests in the human creature, with whom he can establish a relationship of love. God's rest is thus realised in love for his creatures and thus, in the Christian vision, in redemption. It is thus that Ambrose comes to directly link the 'rest of God' with the 'rest' of Jesus upon the cross.^[43]

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints do not believe, as do traditional Christians, that God created the universe ex nihilo (from nothing).^[44] Rather, to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the act of creation is to organize or reorganize pre-existing matter or intelligence. (see Creatio ex materia above)^[45]

Most scholars of Islam share with Christianity and Judaism the concept that God is a First Cause and absolute Creator; He did not create the world from pre-existing matter.^[46][47] However, some scholars, adhering to a strict literal interpretation of the Quran such as Ibn Taimiyya whose sources became the fundament of Wahhabism and contemporary teachings, hold that God fashioned the world out of primordial matter, based on Quranic verses.^{[48][verification needed]}

The Chandogya Upanishad 6.2.1 says before the world was manifested, there was only existence, one unparalleled (sat eva ekam eva advitīyam). Swami Lokeshwarananda commented on this passage by saying "something out of nothing is an absurd idea".^[49]

Stoicism, founded by Zeno of Citium around 300 BC, includes the belief that creation out of nothing is impossible and that Zeus created the world out of his own being.^[50]

The Big Bang theory, in contrast to theology, is a scientific theory; it offers no explanation of cosmic existence but only a description of the first few moments of the existence of the current universe.^[51][52]

• Emergence – Unpredictable phenomenon in complex systems
• Emergent Universe – Cosmological models
• Genesis creation narrative – Creation myth of Judaism and Christianity
• Infinite regress – Philosophical problem
• Language isolate – Language that has no demonstrable genetic relationship with other languages
• List of Latin phrases
• Estonian vocabulary § Ex nihilo lexical enrichment
• Mormon cosmology: Mormon metaphysics – View of the universe and nature of divinity in the Latter day saint movement
• Natural theology – Theology reliant on rational and empirical arguments
• No such thing as a free lunch – Adage of the impossibility of getting something for nothing
• Problem of the creator of God – Philosophical problem
• Turtles all the way down – Statement of infinite regress
• Why is there anything at all? – Metaphysical question

• Anderson, Gary A. & Markus Bockmuehl (eds.), Creation ex nihilo, University of Notre Dame Press, 2018.