The Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University

1. Those that suppose that there was a creation before the Mosaic creation, generally suppose the Mosaic creation to respect only this globe of the earth, and that the heavenly bodies in general were created before, concerning which I would observe:

(1) That this don't well agree with the account Moses gives of the fourth day's work of the creation he gives an account of. The accounts we have of the creation of the heavenly bodies, here and elsewhere from time to time in the Old Testament, with reference to Moses' account, are

so expressed that it would be most unreasonable to understand their mention they make of the creation of sun, moon and stars of any other than a proper making, creation and formation, and not merely a scattering away of fogs and mists that were over the face of the earth, so that they might have been seen here on the face of the earth, if there had been any inhabitants here to see them.

(2) Nor does it well agree with his account of the creation of the light on the first day. For if the Mosaic creation was only of this earth, then we must suppose the sun was created before, and so the light would have existed before.

(3) If any should suppose that the Mosaic creation, though it extended beyond this earth, yet it respected only the solar system, I think there is no manner of reason to suppose any other than that, as the whole visible universe, the many suns or fixed stars that belong to it, are all one frame, so that they were created together, not first one and then two, or first ten and then ten more, so gradually increasing the number till they came gradually to be so many millions. As if we find a stately building erected, it would be unreasonable to suppose any other than that it was built together, and not first one stick of timber hewed and then, after a long time, another.

2. They that suppose there was any creation before the Mosaic creation, suppose the angels to have been created before, in opposition to which I would observe:

(1) That place in Nehemiah 9:6, "Thou, even thou, art Lord alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee." Here I think it most reasonable to suppose that Nehemiah has reference to the very same creation that God speaks of in Exodus 20:11, "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is." The descriptions are the same. The things spoken of as created are plainly the same. The creation Nehemiah speaks of includes the angels. They are included in the host of heaven that he mentions, as part of the creation he speaks of, as is plain by what he says further of the host of heaven at the end of the verse, "and the host of heaven worshippeth thee." The angels are evidently that host of heaven that worships God.

(2) Christ's eternity is largely set forth by his existing before the creation of this lower world, and all the parts of it, Proverbs 8:22–30, which would [not] be proper and significant if many created beings had existed long before these things, as well as he.

(3) God expresses his own eternity by that, that he was before the day, and that he then existed alone, existing before any other being that men erroneously worship as God. From whence we may conclude that no created ANGELS, who of old and most ages of the world have been worshipped as gods, had any existence before the day. And from Isaiah 43:13, with the three foregoing verses: from this place it is probable that the angels were created the first day with the light. See Pfaffius, Theologiæ Dogmaticæ et Moralis, pp. 190–91.Christoph Matthew Pfaff, Institutiones theologiæ dogmaticæ et moralis (Tubingen, 1720).