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Traditional Christianity holds to a doctrine formally declared in the Fourth Lateran Council which states: “We firmly believe and simply confess that there is only one true God, ... creator of all things invisible and visible, spiritual and corporeal; who by his almighty power at the beginning of time created from nothing (de nihilo condidit) both spiritual and corporeal creatures.” (“Constitutions,” Fourth Lateran Council, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, ed. Norman P. Tanner (London:Sheed & Ward, 1990), 1:230.)
The problem with this doctrine is that it cannot be found in the Bible. For one, the word "create" as used in the Bible refers to fashioning something out of existing matter. As noted scholar Stanley Jaki has said:
I begin with a caution: we must protect against the unwarranted assumption that the very use of the word “create” means “creation out of absolute nothing.” The caution which is in order about taking the [Hebrew] verb bara in the sense of creation out of nothing is no less needed in reference to the [English] word creation. Nothing is more natural, and unadvised, at the same time, than to use the word as if it has always denoted creation out of nothing. In its basic etymological origin the word creation meant the purely natural process of growing or of making something to grow. This should be obvious by a mere recall of the [Latin] verb crescere. The crescent moon [derived from crescere] is not creating but merely growing. The expression ex nihilo or de nihilo had to be fastened, from around 200 A.D. on, by Christian theologians on the verb creare to convey unmistakably a process, strict creation, which only God can perform. Only through the long-standing use of those very Latin expressions, creare ex nihilo and creatio ex nihilo, could the English words to create and creation take on the meaning which excludes pre-existing matter. Stanley L. Jaki, Genesis 1 Through the Ages (Royal Oak, Mich.: Real View Books, 1998), 5-6.
It is easy to trace a shift in the teachings of the Early Church fathers on this. Note that Justin Martyr taught that the Earth was created out of existing matter.
And we have been taught that He in the beginning did of His goodness, for man's sake, create all things out of unformed matter; and if men by their works show themselves worthy of this His design, they are deemed worthy, and so we have received--of reigning in company with Him, being delivered from corruption and suffering. (First Apology X [ANF: 1:165])
Not to long after we see a shift in early Christian thinking as noted by James Hubler:
Creatio ex nihilo appeared suddenly in the latter half of the second century c.e. Not only did creatio ex nihilo lack precedent, it stood in firm opposition to all the philosophical schools of the Greco-Roman world. As we have seen, the doctrine was not forced upon the Christian community by their revealed tradition, either in Biblical texts or the Early Jewish interpretation of them. As we will also see it was not a position attested in the New Testament doctrine or even sub-apostolic writings. It was a position taken by the apologists of the late second century, Tatian and Theophilus, and developed by various ecclesiastical writers thereafter, by Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Origen. Creatio ex nihilo represents an innovation in the interpretive traditions of revelation and cannot be explained merely as a continuation of tradition. (James N. Hubler, "Creatio ex Nihilo: Matter, Creation, and the Body in Classical and Christian Philosophy through Aquinas" (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1995), 102)
Peter Hayman concurs:
“Nearly all recent studies on the origin of the doctrine of creation ex nihilo have come to the conclusion that this doctrine is not native to Judaism, is nowhere attested in the Hebrew Bible, and probably arose in Christianity in the second century C. E. in the course of its fierce battle with Gnosticism.” (Peter Hayman, “Monotheism – A misused word in Jewish Studies?”)
Given the overwhelming evidence of the meaning of "creation" in the Bible, shouldn't Bible-based Christian denominations be teaching that divine creation is "ex-materia" (from previously existing matter), instead of "ex-nihilo" (from nothing)?
The problem with this doctrine is that it cannot be found in the Bible. For one, the word "create" as used in the Bible refers to fashioning something out of existing matter. As noted scholar Stanley Jaki has said:
I begin with a caution: we must protect against the unwarranted assumption that the very use of the word “create” means “creation out of absolute nothing.” The caution which is in order about taking the [Hebrew] verb bara in the sense of creation out of nothing is no less needed in reference to the [English] word creation. Nothing is more natural, and unadvised, at the same time, than to use the word as if it has always denoted creation out of nothing. In its basic etymological origin the word creation meant the purely natural process of growing or of making something to grow. This should be obvious by a mere recall of the [Latin] verb crescere. The crescent moon [derived from crescere] is not creating but merely growing. The expression ex nihilo or de nihilo had to be fastened, from around 200 A.D. on, by Christian theologians on the verb creare to convey unmistakably a process, strict creation, which only God can perform. Only through the long-standing use of those very Latin expressions, creare ex nihilo and creatio ex nihilo, could the English words to create and creation take on the meaning which excludes pre-existing matter. Stanley L. Jaki, Genesis 1 Through the Ages (Royal Oak, Mich.: Real View Books, 1998), 5-6.
It is easy to trace a shift in the teachings of the Early Church fathers on this. Note that Justin Martyr taught that the Earth was created out of existing matter.
And we have been taught that He in the beginning did of His goodness, for man's sake, create all things out of unformed matter; and if men by their works show themselves worthy of this His design, they are deemed worthy, and so we have received--of reigning in company with Him, being delivered from corruption and suffering. (First Apology X [ANF: 1:165])
Not to long after we see a shift in early Christian thinking as noted by James Hubler:
Creatio ex nihilo appeared suddenly in the latter half of the second century c.e. Not only did creatio ex nihilo lack precedent, it stood in firm opposition to all the philosophical schools of the Greco-Roman world. As we have seen, the doctrine was not forced upon the Christian community by their revealed tradition, either in Biblical texts or the Early Jewish interpretation of them. As we will also see it was not a position attested in the New Testament doctrine or even sub-apostolic writings. It was a position taken by the apologists of the late second century, Tatian and Theophilus, and developed by various ecclesiastical writers thereafter, by Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Origen. Creatio ex nihilo represents an innovation in the interpretive traditions of revelation and cannot be explained merely as a continuation of tradition. (James N. Hubler, "Creatio ex Nihilo: Matter, Creation, and the Body in Classical and Christian Philosophy through Aquinas" (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1995), 102)
Peter Hayman concurs:
“Nearly all recent studies on the origin of the doctrine of creation ex nihilo have come to the conclusion that this doctrine is not native to Judaism, is nowhere attested in the Hebrew Bible, and probably arose in Christianity in the second century C. E. in the course of its fierce battle with Gnosticism.” (Peter Hayman, “Monotheism – A misused word in Jewish Studies?”)
Given the overwhelming evidence of the meaning of "creation" in the Bible, shouldn't Bible-based Christian denominations be teaching that divine creation is "ex-materia" (from previously existing matter), instead of "ex-nihilo" (from nothing)?
