{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-7393","native_reference":{"book_number":290,"chapter_from":40,"chapter_to":40,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":22,"verse_to":22},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Ambrose of Milan</b>: Therefore, it is enough to mention the qualities and substance of the heavens that we find in the writings of Isaiah, who expressed the nature of the celestial sphere in ordinary and familiar language, saying that God has made the heavens firm like smoke, not wanting to reveal its subtle and immaterial nature. And he also speaks of its appearance, saying that God has made the heavens like a vault, within which all things in the sea and on land are enclosed. It is similarly signified when it is read: Because the Lord has stretched out the heavens. For it is extended like a skin to the dwellings and abodes of the saints; or like a book, so that the names of many who have deserved the grace of Christ by faith and devotion may be written, to whom it is said: Rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.<br/><i>— The Six Days of Creation, Book 1, Chapter 6</i></p><p><b>Basil of Caesarea</b>: \"He that stretches out the heavens as a vaulted ceiling.\" These same thoughts, let us also recommend to ourselves concerning the earth, not to be curious about what its substance is; or to wear ourselves out by reasoning, seeking its very foundation; or to search for some nature destitute of qualities, existing without quality of itself; but to realize well that all that is seen around it is related to the reason of its existence, forming an essential part of its substance.<br/><i>— HOMILIES ON THE HEXAMERON 1:8</i></p><p><b>Cosmas Indicopleustes</b>: This is the first heaven, shaped like a vaulted chamber, which was created on the first day along with the earth, and of it Isaiah speaks thus: He that hath established the heaven as a vaulted chamber. But the heaven, which is bound to the first at the middle, is that which was created on the second day, to which Isaiah refers when he says: And having stretched it out as a tent to dwell in. David also says concerning it: Stretching out the heaven as a curtain, and indicating it still more clearly he says: Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters.<br/><i>— The Christian Topography, Book 4</i></p><p><b>Cosmas Indicopleustes ((quoting Severianus of Gabala, Hexaemeron))</b>: He made therefore the heaven, not a sphere, as those vain babblers conceive—for He did not make a rolling sphere, but, as the prophet says: Who hath made the heaven as a vaulted chamber and stretched it out as a tent to dwell in; for none of us is so impious as to be persuaded by these triflers, and not by the words of the Prophet, which declare that the heaven has a beginning and an end.<br/><i>— The Christian Topography, Book 10</i></p><p><b>Cosmas Indicopleustes</b>: For the very Prophet through whom the retrogression of the sun was effected, when, by means of the dread sign, he had in reality confuted the theory of the Babylonians, by showing that the heaven is not a revolving sphere, and that they held an opinion that is erroneous, this very Prophet not long afterwards speaks thus of the figure of the heaven: He that established the heaven as a vaulted chamber; and again: The Lord God who made the heaven and fixed it, thus declaring at once that it is a vault, and that it is established and fixed and not in revolution<br/><i>— The Christian Topography, Book 8</i></p><p><b>Cosmas Indicopleustes</b>: For, contending against the divine words, which say: He that established the heaven as a vault, these most superior persons cry out in opposition and say: \"It is not so, for it is spherical, and this is manifest from the eclipses which we have already adduced.\"<br/><i>— The Christian Topography, Book 12</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: When he spoke of the heavens, Isaiah said, \"It is he who set up the heaven as a vaulted chamber and stretched it out as a tent over the earth.\" And he said of the earth, \"It is he that comprehends the circle of the earth and made the earth as if it were nothing,\" even though the earth is so great and vast.… Despite the fact that the earth is so great and so vast, God made it with such ease that the prophet could find no fitting example. So he said that God made the earth \"as if it were nothing.\"<br/><i>— AGAINST THE ANOMOEANS, HOMILY 2:24-25</i></p><p><b>Theodoret of Cyrus</b>: It is he, [Isaiah] says, who has caused the earth to appear; it is he who holds it in his hand and who directs it. As for human beings, they are no different from grasshoppers if one compares them with divine power. Then [Isaiah] teaches that God is not only the Maker of the earth but also the Creator of the heavens: \"He that set up the heaven as a chamber and stretched it out as a tent to dwell in.\" For since the earth is like the ground floor of a house and the sky simulates a roof in the form of an arch and dome, [Isaiah] has aptly compared it with a tent. And after having shown us the God of the universe as Creator, the prophetic text indicates to us his ineffable providence.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON Isaiah 12:40.22</i></p><p><b>Theodoret of Cyrus</b>: It is thus he has brought down Sennacherib, Nebuchadnezzar and thousands of others. \"And has made the earth as nothing.\" For the power of the Creator does not even have the object of his creation as a measure, but only his will: \"Our God has done in heaven and on earth whatsoever he has pleased,\" not all that he has the power [to do] but all he pleases: for he would be capable [of accomplishing] works many times greater, but God has accomplished what he judges to be best.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON Isaiah 12:40.23</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"0e0b923a49cc7442255bd6806d6b3b2eb46f36a27cb60c4a10415c4c7ba5c201","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":7393,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"786960a2830eb8ecefc1a92e54fcc1de782a27ec001049ce042e3871b75dac8b","translator":null,"work":null}