Works of Philo of Alexandria

Philo — Works Vol. I, Yonge — Section 17

IX. Moses is rigbt also when he says, that " darkness was over the face of the abyss." For the air is in a manner spread above the empty space, since having mounted up it entirely fills all that open, and desolate, and empty place, which reaches down to us from the regions below the moon. And after the shining forth of that light, perceptible only to the intellect, which existed before the sun, then its adversary darkness yielded, as God put a wall between them and sepa- rated them, well knowing their opposite characters, and the enmity existing between their natures. In order, therefore, that they might not war against one another from being con- tinually brought in contact, so that war would prevail instead of peace, God, turning want of order into order, did not only separate light and darkness, but did also place houndaries in the middle of the space between the two, by which he sepa- rated the extremities of each. For if they had approximated they must have produced confusion, preparing for the contest, for the supremacy, with great and unextinguishable rivalry, if boundaries established between them had not separated them and prevented them from clashing together, and these boun- daries are evening and morning ; the one of which heralds in the good tidings that the sun is about to rise, gently dissi- pating the darkness : and evening comes on as the sun sets, receiving gently the collective approach of darkness. And these, I mean morning and evening, must be placed in the class of incorporeal things, perceptible only by the intellect ; for there is absolutely nothing in them which is perceptible by ON THE CREATION OF THE WORLD. 9