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2. The Creation of Men.
When the earth was endowed
with all the riches of the almighty goodness of heaven and blessed for all time,
God said: ‘Let us create men, an image that is like us.’.’
God marvellously formed the body of the first man from the earth and breathed
life and soul into him and called him Adam, which means ‘formed from earth’, so
that we might remember from whence we were taken. Adam looked into the beautiful
new creation with childlike joy. God brought the animals to him, and he named
them and rejoiced with them, but he could not speak to them. They did not
understand him, and when he had seen them all, he sighed, that he was alone
after all.
Then the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on the man, and when he awoke, God
brought to him a virgin who was of his flesh and of his bones, and he recognised
with joyful terror that she was like him, and when he spoke to her she answered
him. Then the Lord God joined their hands together and said to them as a father
to his children, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it.
Behold, I have given you everything.’
With this, God blessed the first human couple, indeed, he blessed the entire
human race with fatherly love and established the holy covenant of marriage.
Adam then gave the woman the name Eve, which means ‘mother of the living’.
So God completed the creation of the heavens and the earth. In six days, what
may be called days, he completed them, and God looked upon all that he had
created, and behold, it was very good. Hence the divine ordinance that man
should labour for six days and rest on the seventh day, that the seventh day
should be a feast of thanksgiving for all God's bodily good deeds in creation
and a holy day of rejoicing.
God does man much good in a week; for creation is new every day, and its
blessing continues in itself unceasingly in becoming and growing, in nourishing
and multiplying. Whoever has worked for six days and can see that his work is
good, and thinks of God who has nourished and blessed him, the seventh day
becomes a quiet and holy day of joy.
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