What Scripture Teaches About the Word

Has the divine teaching, then, which did away with the godlessness of the pagans, or the idols, passed this over in silence, and left the human race to go wholly unprovided with the knowledge of God? Not so. Rather, it meets their understanding in advance when it says, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one God”; and again, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your strength”; and again, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve, and you shall cling to him.” [a]

All inspired Scripture bears witness that the providence and ordering power of the Word also reach over all things and toward all things. One passage is enough to confirm our argument, where men who speak about God say, “You have laid the foundation of the earth, and it stands. The day continues by your ordinance.” And again, “Sing to our God on the harp, who covers the heaven with clouds, who prepares rain for the earth, who brings forth grass on the mountains, and green plants for the service of mankind, and gives food to the cattle.” But through whom does he give it, except through the one through whom all things were made? For providence over all things belongs by nature to the one by whom they were made. And who is this, except the Word of God? Of him the psalmist says in another psalm, “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the Breath of his mouth.” For he tells us that all things were made in him and through him.

That is why he also persuades us, saying, “He spoke, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created.” So too the illustrious Moses, at the beginning of his account of creation, confirms what we say by his narrative, saying: And God said, “Let us make man in our image and after our likeness.” For also, when the Word was carrying out the creation of heaven and earth and all things, the Father said to him, “Let the heaven be made,” and “Let the waters be gathered together, and let the dry land appear,” and “Let the earth bring forth plants,” and “every green thing.” So one must convict the Jews too of not truly attending to the Scriptures.

For one might ask them: to whom was God speaking, that he used the form of a command? If he were commanding and addressing the things he was creating, the words would be pointless, for they did not yet exist but were about to be made. No one speaks to what does not exist, or commands what is not yet made to be made. If God were giving a command to the things that were to be, he would have had to say, “Heaven, be made! Earth, be made! Green plants, come forth! Man, be created!” But in fact he did not do so. He gives the command like this: “Let us make man,” and “Let the green plants come forth.” This proves that God is speaking about them to someone close at hand. It follows, then, that someone was with him, to whom he spoke when he made all things.

Who, then, could it be, except his Word? For to whom could God be said to speak, except to his Word? Or who was with him when he made all created things, except his Wisdom, who says, “When he was making the heaven and the earth, I was present with him”? And in the mention of heaven and earth, all created things in heaven and on earth are included as well. Being present with him as his Wisdom and his Word, he looked at the Father and fashioned the universe, organized it, and gave it order. And since he is the power of the Father, he gave all things the strength to exist, as the Savior says, “Whatever I see the Father doing, I also do in the same way.” And his holy disciples teach that all things were made “through him and for him.”

Being the good Offspring of the one who is good, and the true Son, he is the Father’s Power and Wisdom and Word. He is not these things by sharing in them, nor as if these qualities were given to him from outside, the way they are given to those who share in him, who are made wise by him and receive power and reason in him. No, he is Wisdom itself, the Word itself, the Father’s very own Power itself, Light itself, Truth itself, Righteousness itself, Virtue itself, and in truth his Exact Imprint, his Radiance, and his Likeness. To sum it all up, he is the wholly perfect Fruit of the Father. He alone is the Son, and the unchanging Image of the Father.