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Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching
St Irenaeus of Lyons, tr. Robinson, 1920
Chapter 4
For it is necessary that things that are made should have the beginning of their making from some great cause; and the beginning of all things is God. For He Himself was not made by any, and by Him all things were made. And therefore it is right first of all to believe that there is One God, the Father, who made and fashioned all things, and made what was not that it should be, and who, containing all things, alone is uncontained.1 Now among all things is this world of ours,2 and in the world is man: so then this world also was formed by God.
Notes
- In IV, xxxiv. 2 he quotes, as “Scripture,” the Shepherd of Hermas, Mand. 1: Πρῶτον πάντων πίστευσον ὅτι εἷς ἐστὶν ὁ θεός, ὁ τὰ πάντα κτίσας καὶ καταρτίσας, καὶ ποιήσας ἐκ τοῦ μὴ ὄντος εἰς τὸ εἶναι τὰ πάντα, καὶ πάντα χωρῶν, μόνος δὲ ἀχώρητος ὤν. Cf. also I, xv. 1.
- IV, xxxiv. 1: “in omnibus autem et nos, et hunc mundum qui est secundum nos:” I, xv. 1: “etenim mundus ex omnibus:” III, xi. 7: “in omnibus ergo est et haec quae secundum nos est conditio.”