NPNF2-08. Basil: Letters and Select Works - Holy Bible Institute

In the Beginning God made the Heaven and the Earth.Homily I.In the Beginning God made the Heaven and the Earth.1. It is right that any one beginning to narrate the formation of the world should beginwith the good order which reigns in visible things. I am about to speak of the creation ofheaven and earth, which was not spontaneous, as some have imagined, but drew its originfrom God. What ear is worthy to hear such a tale? How earnestly the soul should prepareitself to receive such high lessons! How pure it should be from carnal affections, how uncloudedby worldly disquietudes, how active and ardent in its researches, how eager to findin its surroundings an idea of God which may be worthy of Him!But before weighing the justice of these remarks, before examining all the sense containedin these few words, let us see who addresses them to us. Because, if the weakness of our intelligencedoes not allow us to penetrate the depth of the thoughts of the writer, yet we shallbe involuntarily drawn to give faith to his words by the force of his authority. Now it isMoses who has composed this history; Moses, who, when still at the breast, is described asexceeding fair; 1365 Moses, whom the daughter of Pharaoh adopted; who received from hera royal education, and who had for his teachers the wise men of Egypt; 1366 Moses, whodisdained the pomp of royalty, and, to share the humble condition of his compatriots, preferredto be persecuted with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting delights ofsin; Moses, who received from nature such a love of justice that, even before the leadershipof the people of God was committed to him, he was impelled, by a natural horror of evil, topursue malefactors even to the point of punishing them by death; Moses, who, banished bythose whose benefactor he had been, hastened to escape from the tumults of Egypt and tookrefuge in Ethiopia, living there far from former pursuits, and passing forty years in thecontemplation of nature; Moses, finally, who, at the age of eighty, saw God, as far as it ispossible for man to see Him; or rather as it had not previously been granted to man to seeHim, according to the testimony of God Himself, “If there be a prophet among you, I theLord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house, with him will I speak mouthto mouth, even apparently and not in dark speeches.” 1367 It is this man, whom God judgedworthy to behold Him, face to face, like the angels, who imparts to us what he has learntfrom God. Let us listen then to these words of truth written without the help of the “enticing1365 Acts vii. 20, A.V.1366 cf. Joseph. ii. x. 2. So Justin M., Cohort. ad gent., Philio, Vit. Moys, and Clem. Al., Strom. i. Vide Fialon,Et. Hist. 302.1367 Num. xii. 6, 7, 8.253