Back Ex nihilo nihil fit Danish Ex nihilo nihil fit German Ουδέν εξ ουδενός Greek Nada surge de la nada Spanish Ex nihilo nihil fit Estonian هیچ چیز از هیچ حاصل نمی‌شود Persian Ex nihilo nihil fit Finnish Ex nihilo nihil fit ID Ex nihilo nihil fit Italian 無からは何も生じない Japanese

Creatio ex materia

This article is about creation of the universe from preexisting material. For creation of the universe out of nothing, see Creatio ex nihilo.

Creatio ex materia is the notion that the universe was formed out of eternal, pre-existing matter. This is in contrast to the notion of creatio ex nihilo, where the universe is created out of nothing. The idea of creatio ex materia is found in ancient near eastern cosmology, early Greek cosmology such as is in the works of Homer and Hesiod,[1] and across the board in ancient Greek philosophy.[2] It was also held by a few early Christians, although creatio ex nihilo was the dominant concept among such writers. At some point, creatio ex materia came to be accepted in Mormonism.[3]

Greek philosophers came to widely frame the notion of creatio ex materia with the philosophical dictum "nothing comes from nothing" (Greek: οὐδὲν ἐξ οὐδενός; Latin: ex nihilo nihil fit). Although it is not clear if the dictum goes back to Parmenides (5th century BC) or the Milesian philosophers,[4] a more common version of the expression was coined by Lucretius, who stated in his De rerum natura that "nothing can be created out of nothing".[5]

Alternatives to creatio ex materia include creatio ex nihilo ("creation from nothing"); creatio ex deo ("creation from God"), referring to a derivation of the cosmos from the substance of God either partially (in panentheism) or completely (in pandeism), and creatio continua (ongoing divine creation).[6][7]

  1. ^ De Almeida 2021.
  2. ^ Chambers 2021, p. 96–103.
  3. ^ Harrell 2011, p. 233–234.
  4. ^ Roecklein 2011, p. 37–56.
  5. ^ Mumford 2021, p. 8.
  6. ^ Oord 2014, p. 3.
  7. ^ McQuillan 2019, p. 140.

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