Monday, January 01, 2007

Q65 A3: Whether corporeal creatures were produced by God through the medium of the angels?

No. Corporeal creatures were produced immediately by God because in the act of coming into being the imperfect must be made before the perfect: and it is impossible that anything should be created, save by God alone.

No secondary cause can produce anything, unless there is presupposed in the thing produced something that is caused by a higher cause. But creation is the production of a thing in its entire substance, nothing being presupposed either uncreated or created. Hence it remains that nothing can create except God alone, Who is the first cause.

Therefore, in order to show that all bodies were created immediately by God, Moses said: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth."