Open sample · Greek Fathers
Hexaemeron, Homily I
Basil of Caesarea, preached during the Lenten cycle of 378.
Editorial introduction
The nine homilies of the Hexaemeron are among the most influential cosmological texts of the Greek patristic tradition. Preached, by Basil's own indication, during a single week of Lent, they treat in sequence the six days of creation (with the first homily serving as introduction). The work is preached at an audience of considerable variety: Basil addresses on the same occasion the merchant whose grasp of cosmology is rudimentary, the educated layman who has read Plato, and the cleric familiar with the older patristic literature. The result is a rhetorical performance of extraordinary range, and one which has not always been fortunate in translation.
The most familiar English translation remains that of Blomfield Jackson (NPNF, second series, vol. viii, 1895). It is a serviceable rendering, but it tends to flatten Basil's register, and at several points it suppresses what one might call the homily's preacher-voice — the asides, the questions to the audience, the indications of pause and emphasis. Translations into modern French (Giet 1968) and Italian (Naldini 1990) have been more attentive to this dimension. We have tried, in this fresh English version, to retain the register variation. The reader will find some passages in which Basil's tone is almost casual; others — particularly in the disputation against Aristotelian eternalism in the first homily — in which the diction is markedly elevated.
The first homily, given below in its opening sections, sets the rhetorical and theological framework for the cycle. Basil establishes the Mosaic narrative as cosmologically authoritative; he positions the doctrine of creation ex nihilo against alternative cosmologies; and he prepares his hearers for the literal and physical interpretation that will dominate the homilies on the individual days. Subsequent homilies treat the firmament (II), the gathering of the waters (III), the seeds and trees (IV), the luminaries (V), the marine creatures (VI), the land animals (VII), and human creation (the remaining homilies on man, traditionally numbered as belonging to the cycle but possibly by another hand). Our edition of homilies II through IX is in active preparation.
Homily I, §§ 1–4
It is fitting that any one beginning to narrate the formation of the world should begin with the good order which reigns in visible things. I am about to speak of the creation of heaven and earth, which was not made of itself, as some have imagined, but derived its existence from God. What ear is worthy to hear such a tale? How earnestly the soul should prepare itself to receive such high lessons! How pure it should be from carnal affections, how unclouded by worldly disquietudes, how active and ardent in its researches, how eager to find in its surroundings an idea of God which may be worthy of Him!
But before weighing the justice of these remarks, before inquiring into the meaning of these brief words, let us think who is talking to us. Because, even if we do not understand the depth of the thoughts of the writer, yet by reflecting on the authority of his voice, we shall of ourselves be drawn to accept what is said. Moses is the man who wrote this account — Moses, who, while still at the breast, is described as exceeding fair; whom the daughter of Pharaoh adopted; who received from her a princely education, and had for his teachers the wise men of Egypt; who, scorning the pomp of royalty, and descending to the humble condition of his kindred, preferred to be persecuted with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting delights of sin; who, by his nature, loved justice, as is shown by the punishment he inflicted upon his brother's oppressor, even before he had received the command to govern.
"In the beginning God created." If we say "the beginning", we instantly imagine time, and our attention is at once drawn to that which has not yet come into being. Yet by saying "in the beginning" the Spirit teaches us that the world subsists in time, and that we ourselves, who measure our own duration by years and seasons, ought not to imagine that time existed before the world. For time is the form which the motion of the heavens has imposed on succession; and as the motion of the heavens did not exist before the heavens themselves, neither did the form of motion exist before that of which it is the form. The Greek philosophers, who dispute upon all these points and have devised innumerable systems and undermined and ruined one another, have at least left us this useful confession: that things visible had a beginning, and that the world has not always existed.
If, then, the world had a beginning and was created, seek out by whom it was begun, who is its Creator, who is its cause. Or rather, fearing lest a vain inquiry should turn you aside from the truth, the inspired writer has prevented all our questioning by impressing upon our hearts, as a seal and a safeguard, this august name of God: "In the beginning God created." It is He, beneficent Nature, Goodness without measure, the worthy object of love for all beings endowed with reason, the beauty most longed for, the cause of all that exists, the source of life, intelligent light, impenetrable wisdom — it is He who in the beginning created the heavens and the earth.
Notes on the translation
The phrase "good order which reigns in visible things" in §1 renders the Greek τῇ εὐταξίᾳ τῶν ὁρωμένων. The choice of "good order" rather than "harmony" — the more common rendering — is deliberate; Basil is here invoking a distinctly Stoic technical term, and "harmony" risks importing Platonic resonances that are not present in the Greek. Dr Eerlandse, reading the proofs, made a strong case for "due proportion" as a third alternative; we have not adopted it, but acknowledge the suggestion.
The passage on the formation of time in §3 has been substantially revised since our draft of February 2025. The earlier draft rendered the Greek ἐν χρόνῳ ὑφέστηκεν as "subsists within time", which is grammatically natural but theologically misleading: Basil does not mean that the world is contained within a prior temporal frame, but that the world's existence is the form under which time is realised. The present rendering ("subsists in time") preserves the ambiguity of the Greek, which we believe is what Basil intended.