On the
concept of God creating from “non-being” (cf. 2 Maccabees 7:28 and creation “ουκ εξ οντων”), Werner Foerster wrote:
In the religion of many peoples chaos stands
at the beginning of being and becoming. It may be understood mythically as
Tiamat, as the original water, as the abyss, as night or darkness. But the
decisive point is that it is felt to be something supremely negative,
abstracted and unqualified. Chaos is the world without its form in history, in
space and time. It is unfashioned matter as a mythical quantity. Hence it can
also be described philosophically as ἄποιον, as that which is without quality,
or as μὴ ὄν, as that which has no being in the true sense (Cf. Indian
speculations, Scharbau, 75 ff., 79: “Hence the non-existent is not absolute
nothing but … the metaphysical substance … in an uncrystallised state.”). Man
thus moves away as far as he can from the present being of the world. The world
arises out of chaos because in it are seeds, or an egg, the cosmic egg, or a
bud. Or there is reference to chaos as the “mother which fashions all things.”
This implies a cosmic becoming after the analogy of becoming in nature. As the
plant develops spontaneously out of the “lifeless” seed, so does the world out
of unqualified chaos. (Werner Foerster, “Κτίζω, Κτίσις, Κτίσμα, Κτίστης,” ed.
Gerhard Kittel, Geoffrey W. Bromiley, and Gerhard Friedrich, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament
(Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1964–), 3:1001)
In other words, with respect to the phrase, “God made them from non-being,” this “non-being” does not express absolute non-existence, only the prior non-existence of the heavens and earth. They were made to exist after not existing. In Wisdom of Solomon 11:17, the author speaks of God’s “all-powerful hand which created the world out of formless matter” (ἐξ ἀμόρφου ὕλης). This term does not mean the world was created out of nothing, as scholars, such as Jonathan Goldstein state that there is no pre-rabbinic Jewish text that can be proved to assert the doctrine of creation ex nihilo (see his “Creation Ex Nihilo: Recantations and Restatements,” in Journal of Jewish Studies 38/2 [1987]).
For more on 2 Maccabees 7:28 and other texts, both canonical and
non-canonical, and the creation ex nihilo
vs. ex materia debate, see my friend
Blake Ostler’s article:
Also check out Daniel McClellan’s response to J.P. Holding on the topic
at:
James Patrick Holding refuted on Creation Ex Nihilo
Jaxon Washburn has a very useful collection of scholarly commentary on Gen 1:1 and how it relates to the doctrine of creation ex materia at
Ex Materia or Ex Nihilo? Creation in Genesis 1:1-2
I mention this as Trent Horn (*waves* hi Trent; glad you follow my blog and hope you enjoy the material you find here!), a very intelligent Catholic apologist, mentioned 2 Maccabees 7:28 as a key text in support for creation out of nothing in episode 301 of his The Counsel of Trent podcast, Evidence for “creation from nothing” [btw: I am the Mormon apologist Horn discusses briefly when it comes to commonalities LDS have with Catholics]). While I disagree with Horn, he is absolutely correct in zoning in on this particular doctrine as it is one of, if not the, hinge of the whole debate between Latter-day Saint and Roman Catholic (and other "mainstream"/"Orthodox") theologies.
