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Library / Commentaries and Disputations on Genesis, Volume I

Book One — the works of the six days

THE WORK OF THE FIFTH DAY

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THE WORK OF THE FIFTH DAY.1

OPUS QUINTI DIEI.

God also said: Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature having life, and the fowl that may fly over the earth under the firmament of heaven. And God created the great whales, and so forth. — Verse 20.2

Dixit etiam Deus, producant aquae reptile animae viventis, et volatile super terram sub firmamento Caeli. Creavitque Deus cete grandia, et cetera. — Vers. 20.

Primis tribus diebus distinxit Deus mundum, hoc est, tria prima corpora, coelum, aquam, et terram. Nam primo die facta luce, distinxit diem a nocte, lumen a tenebris: in secundo die per firmamentum separavit aquas coelestes, ab aquis terrestribus: in tertia die aquam segregavit a terra, nam stirpes tunc productae, velut partes terrae censentur; quippe cum terrae radicibus suis infixae, ex ea oriantur, alantur et augescant. Reliquis autem tribus diebus eadem tria corpora, eorum conditor Deus, et ornavit, et variis rerum generibus replevit, eundem prorsus ordinem servans: quarto enim die caelum syderibus, quinto aquam piscibus, sexto die terram animantibus terrestribus condecoravit atque complevit. Ob hanc autem causam creata prius sunt aquatilia, quam terrestria, quamvis etiam ordine generationis, quae sunt imperfectiora, praemittere soleat natura.
In the first three days God distinguished the world, that is, the three primary bodies: the heaven, the water, and the earth. For on the first day, light being made, he distinguished day from night, light from darkness; on the second day, by the firmament, he separated the heavenly waters from the earthly waters; on the third day he sundered the water from the earth—for the plants then produced are reckoned as parts of the earth, seeing that, fixed by their roots in the earth, they arise, are nourished, and grow from it. But in the remaining three days the same three bodies their founder God both adorned and filled with various kinds of things, keeping exactly the same order: for on the fourth day he decorated and completed the heaven with stars, on the fifth the water with fishes, on the sixth day the earth with land animals. And for this reason the water-creatures were created before the land-creatures, although in the order of generation nature is wont to send the more imperfect things first.3
Sunt autem pisces ex toto genere imperfectiores, quam terrestres animantes: non sane quia pisces memoria careant, ut dicit Basilius homilia in Genesim octava, hoc enim merito refellit Augustinus libro tertio, de Genesi ad litteram capite octavo, contrarium docente experientia, et ratione qua probatur, quibuscumque animantibus est datus motus localis, quo necessaria degendae vitae quaererentur, atque compararentur, his necessariam fuisse memoriam, ne motus eorum vagus et incertus ageretur. Sunt igitur pisces imperfectiores, ut multis argumentis patet: etenim temperamentum corporis eorum multo imperfectius esse, indicium est exiguum alimentum, quod praebent pisces: quamobrem etiam ieiunantibus et macerationi corporis intentis, quibus esus animalium terrestrium interdicitur, esus tamen piscium conceditur. In piscibus quoque obscurior est figuratio et digestio membrorum. Deinde omnes sensus tam interiores, quam exteriores, imbecilles et imperfectos habent pisces, cum degant in aqua, quae crassius est corpus quam aer. Ad hoc, nunquam possunt pisces ab homine mansuefieri, nec se ab eo contrectare sinunt, nec possunt quicquam condocefieri, nec humanae consuetudinis et societatis sunt capaces: excipio paucos quosdam, velut Delphinum, de cuius...
Now the fishes are, as a whole kind, more imperfect than the land animals—not indeed because the fishes lack memory, as Basil says in his eighth homily on Genesis, for this Augustine rightly refutes in the third book On Genesis according to the Letter, chapter eight, since experience teaches the contrary, and by the reasoning whereby it is proved that whatever animals have been given local motion, by which the necessities of living are sought and procured, to these memory was necessary, lest their motion be carried on wandering and uncertain. The fishes, then, are more imperfect, as is plain from many arguments: for that the temperament of their body is much more imperfect, an indication is the scanty nourishment which fishes afford; wherefore even to those fasting and intent on the maceration of the body, to whom the eating of land animals is forbidden, the eating of fish is nevertheless allowed. In fishes, too, the shaping and arrangement of the members is more obscure. Next, fishes have all their senses, both interior and exterior, feeble and imperfect, since they live in water, which is a grosser body than air. Besides, fishes can never be tamed by man, nor do they allow themselves to be handled by him, nor can they be taught anything, nor are they capable of human familiarity and society—I except a few, such as the Dolphin, of whose...4
...cuius docilitate et amore erga homines, et cum hominibus societate ac consuetudine, mira narrant, cum alii, tum Plinius libro nono, capite octavo, et Plutarchus in libro in quo disputat, utrum ratio sit in brutis, et utrum plus rationis sit in aquatilibus quam in terrestribus.
...docility and love toward men, and society and familiarity with men, marvels are told, both by others and especially by Pliny in the ninth book, chapter eight, and by Plutarch in the book in which he disputes whether there is reason in brutes, and whether there is more reason in the water-creatures than in the land-creatures.5
Caietanus, pisces imperfectiores esse terrestribus animalibus, eo probat argumento, quod totum genus piscium est oviparum, nec ulla ex parte viviparum, terrestrium autem permulta sunt vivipara. Sed hoc esse falsum, demonstrat Basilius, homilia septima, duo faciens genera piscium viviparorum, videlicet Cartilaginata et cetaria, uti sunt delphini, et vitulus marinus. Plinius libro nono, cap. decimotertio, de piscibus loquens, Quae, inquit, pilo vestiuntur, animal pariunt, ut pristis, balaena, vitulus. Et cap. 51. eiusdem libri: Torpedo, ait, octogenos foetus habens invenitur: eaque intra se parit ova praemollia, in alium locum uteri transferens, atque ibi excludens. Simili modo omnia, quae cartilaginea appellavimus. Ita fit, ut sola piscium, et animal pariant, et ova concipiant.
Cajetan proves that fishes are more imperfect than land animals by this argument: that the whole kind of fishes is oviparous, and in no part viviparous, whereas of the land animals very many are viviparous. But that this is false Basil demonstrates in his seventh homily, making two kinds of viviparous fishes, namely the Cartilaginous and the cetaceans, such as dolphins and the sea-calf (seal). Pliny, in the ninth book, chapter thirteen, speaking of fishes, says: 'Those which are clothed with hair bring forth a living animal, as the saw-fish, the whale, the seal.' And in chapter 51 of the same book: 'The torpedo,' he says, 'is found having eighty young: it brings forth within itself very soft eggs, transferring them to another place of the womb, and there hatching them. In like manner all those which we have called cartilaginous.' So it happens that fishes alone both bring forth a living animal and conceive eggs.6
Philo tradit, propterea quinto die coepisse creationem animalium, quod animal sit animal propter sensum: quinque autem esse sensus, qui numerus congruit cum die quinto, quo creari animalia coeperunt. Verum frivola est ratio, nam nec animal, ut sit animal, opus habet quinque sensibus, sed solo tactu, quo uno cum praedita sint quaedam animalia, ceteris sensibus carent, et praeter quinque sensus externos, sunt alii sensus interiores in perfectis animalibus.
Philo hands down that the creation of animals began on the fifth day for this reason: that an animal is an animal on account of sense; and that there are five senses, which number agrees with the fifth day, on which animals began to be created. But the reasoning is frivolous, for an animal, in order to be an animal, does not need five senses, but touch alone; and since certain animals are endowed with this one alone, they lack the other senses; and besides the five external senses, there are other interior senses in the perfect animals.7
Sanctus Augustinus lib. 3. de Genesi ad litteram, capite 4. existimat hoc quinto die, non esse creatos pisces actu, sed tantummodo causaliter et potentialiter, data nimirum tunc aquis potestate pisces suo tempore procreandi. Verum hoc minime concordat cum narratione Mosis, qui ait aquam produxisse die quinto, omnia piscium genera, nec aliter hic loquitur, quam supra de productione lucis firmamenti et stellarum. Adde quod, si nunc non sunt actu creati a Deo pisces, praesertim perfecti, nunquam postea generari a natura potuissent, quippe qui non nisi a suis similibus naturaliter generari possunt. Deus autem post hos sex dies, finit naturam cuiusque rei, ab ipso conditae, naturaliter seipsam conservare, atque propagare, nam a modo productionis rerum immediate a Deo, per ipsius omnipotentiam, Deus requievit die septimo.
Saint Augustine, in book 3 On Genesis according to the Letter, chapter 4, thinks that on this fifth day the fishes were not created in act, but only causally and potentially—that is, that power was then given to the waters to procreate fishes in their own time. But this by no means agrees with the narrative of Moses, who says that the water brought forth on the fifth day all the kinds of fishes, and speaks here no otherwise than above concerning the production of light, the firmament, and the stars. Add that, if the fishes—especially the perfect ones—are not now created in act by God, they could never afterward have been generated by nature, since they can be naturally generated only from their like. But God, after these six days, lets the nature of each thing, founded by himself, naturally preserve and propagate itself; for from the mode of producing things immediately by God, through his own omnipotence, God rested on the seventh day.8
Quod autem hoc loco secundum Latinam lectionem legitur: Producant aquae reptile, maiorem emphasim habet in Hebraeo. Est enim verbum שרץ Saras, significans non quamlibet productionem, sed in maxima copia, ubertate et abundantia, ceu scaturiginem et ebullitionem quandam: Ut vel hinc probetur vulgo iactata opinio, et a sapientibus confirmata, multo uberiorem et copiosiorem esse piscium quam ceterorum animalium generationem: cuius satis manifestum signum est, ingens copia ovorum, quae in piscibus in...
But what is read in this place according to the Latin reading—Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature—has greater emphasis in the Hebrew. For the word is שרץ (sharatz), signifying not any production whatever, but production in the greatest plenty, fruitfulness, and abundance, like a kind of welling-up and bubbling-forth: so that from this very thing may be proved the commonly bruited opinion, and confirmed by the wise, that the generation of fishes is far more fruitful and copious than that of the other animals—of which a sufficiently manifest sign is the vast quantity of eggs which is found in fishes...9
...venitur, quo licet intelligere piscium quam aliorum animalium, et multitudinem et varietatem maiorem. Quod etiam testatur Aristoteles lib. 3. de Generatione animalium, cap. 11. his verbis, Hinc etiam fit, ut multiformiora sint, quae in humore gignuntur, quam quae in terra, humor enim naturam habet ad effingendum efformandumque, habiliorem quam terra. His consentanea cap. 2. lib. 9. scribit Plinius: nam cum dixisset quae sunt in aquis, et plura et maiora esse terrestribus, subdit: Causa, inquit, evidens est, humoris luxuria: pleraque etiam monstrifica reperiuntur, perplexis, et in semet aliter atque aliter nunc flatu, nunc fluctu convolutis seminibus atque principiis: ut vera fiat vulgi opinio, quicquid nascatur in parte naturae ulla, et in mari esse, praeterque multa, quae nusquam alibi. Haec Plinius, quibus consona sunt quae David cecinit in Psalmo 103. Hoc mare magnum et spatiosum manibus, illic reptilia, quorum non est numerus.
...is found, from which one may understand that the multitude and variety of fishes is greater than of other animals. This Aristotle too attests, in book 3 On the Generation of Animals, chapter 11, in these words: Hence it also comes about that the things which are begotten in moisture are more manifold than those that are begotten on land, for moisture has a nature more apt for fashioning and forming than the earth. In agreement with this Pliny writes, in chapter 2 of book 9: for when he had said that the things which are in the waters are both more and greater than the land-creatures, he adds: The cause, he says, is evident—the exuberance of moisture; many monstrous things too are found there, the seeds and first principles being entangled and rolled together within themselves now this way now that, now by blast, now by wave: so that the common opinion proves true, that whatever is born in any part of nature is also in the sea, and besides many things which are nowhere else. Thus Pliny, with which agree the things David sang in Psalm 103: This great and spacious sea by the hands [of the Lord]; there are creeping things without number.10
Sed cur Latinus Interpres pisces appellavit reptilia, cum id solis terrestribus convenire videatur? haud dubie secutus est Septuaginta Interpretes, qui Graece verterunt τὰ ἑρπετά, hoc est, Latine Reptilia. Sed Bonaventura in 2. sent. distinctione 15. ita distinguit reptile. Animal omne, inquit, quod movetur, aut movetur impellendo se in anteriora, idque facit vel pedibus et est gressile, vel alis et est volatile; aut movetur seipsum trahendo extrorsum, idque fieri potest quatuor modis: vel ut trahat se vi oris, sicut vermes: vel vi costarum et ventris sicut serpentes: vel vi pinnularum ut pisces: vel denique dicuntur repere non proprie, sicut lacertae et stelliones, qui licet pedes habeant, exiguos tamen habent, et parum se attollunt humo, magnamque partem corporis dum moventur applicant terrae: quocirca etiam ista repere dicuntur. Vide Hugonem in lib. annotationum in Genesim cap. 7. ubi tria facit reptilium genera. Pisces igitur quia similiter quodammodo moventur in aquis, ut quae vere reptilia sunt in terris, propterea Latinus Interpres et LXX. appellarunt reptilia, quamvis Hebraeum vocabulum non hoc proprie significet.
But why did the Latin Translator call the fishes 'creeping things,' since that seems to suit only land-creatures? Without doubt he followed the Seventy Translators, who in Greek rendered it τὰ ἑρπετά, that is, in Latin 'Reptilia' (creeping things). But Bonaventure, in the second book of the Sentences, distinction 15, distinguishes 'creeping thing' thus. Every animal, he says, that moves, either moves by impelling itself forward—and this it does either by feet, and is a walker, or by wings, and is a flyer; or it moves itself by drawing itself outward, and this can happen in four ways: either by drawing itself by the force of the mouth, as worms; or by the force of the ribs and belly, as serpents; or by the force of little fins, as fishes; or finally they are said to creep not properly, as lizards and newts, which, although they have feet, have them small, and lift themselves little from the ground, and apply a great part of the body to the earth while they move: wherefore these too are said to creep. See Hugh in the book of Annotations on Genesis, chapter 7, where he makes three kinds of creeping things. The fishes, therefore, because they likewise in a certain way move in the waters, as those which are truly creeping things do on land, are for that reason called 'creeping things' by the Latin Translator and the Seventy, although the Hebrew word does not properly signify this.11
Circa illud autem: Creavit Deus cete grandia, sciendum est, pro Cete, Hebraice esse התנינים Hataninim, quae vox significat dracones: eodem autem nomine dracones terrestres, atque marini appellantur neque cete, ac maximi pisces aliud videntur esse in aquis, quam dracones ac serpentes in terra. Invenimus alibi in Scriptura ingentes pisces nominari dracones, sicut Psalmo centesimo quadragesimooctavo; Dracones, et omnes abyssi, et Isaiae vigesimoseptimo, dicitur: Interficiet cetum qui in mari est, quo significatur, is qui late maris imperium tenebat, et Ezechielis trigesimosecundo, de Pharaone Rege Aegypti loquens: Draconi, inquit, qui est in mari, assimilatus es: et cap. vigesimonono, Ecce, ego ad te Pharao rex Aegypti draco magne: qui cubas in medio fluminum tuorum, etc. Non igitur per Cete, una aliqua species piscium intelligitur, sed omnes grandioris formae et vastioris corporis pisces. Meminit autem potissimum draconum, seu cetorum Moses, ut tolleret errorem existimantium (sic placet Caietano) eiusmodi anima...
But concerning that phrase, God created the great whales, it must be known that for 'whales' the Hebrew has התנינים (ha-tanninim), which word signifies dragons; and by the same name both land dragons and sea dragons are called. Nor do the whales and the greatest fishes seem to be anything else in the waters than the dragons and serpents on land. We find elsewhere in Scripture huge fishes named dragons, as in Psalm one hundred forty-eight: Dragons, and all you deeps; and in Isaiah twenty-seven it is said: He shall slay the whale that is in the sea—by which is signified him who widely held the empire of the sea; and in Ezekiel thirty-two, speaking of Pharaoh King of Egypt: Thou art likened, he says, to the dragon that is in the sea; and in chapter twenty-nine, Behold, I come against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, thou great dragon, that liest in the midst of thy rivers, etc. Not, therefore, by 'whales' is some one species of fish understood, but all fishes of larger form and vaster body. And Moses made mention especially of the dragons, or whales, to remove the error of those who thought (so Cajetan holds) that such anima[ls]...12
...animalia non esse facta ex consilio et proposito Dei, sed per accidens tanquam ex necessitate materiae: aut, ut si scias Deum ingentium maris bestiarum creatorem esse, multo facilius creditu sit idem in ceteris minoribus.
...such animals were not made from the counsel and purpose of God, but by accident, as from a necessity of matter; or, so that, if you know God to be the creator of the huge beasts of the sea, it may be much more easily believed [that he is creator] of the rest, the smaller ones.13
At enim quaeret aliquis, cur non ut in aquatilibus, itidem quoque in plantis et animalibus terrestribus proprie et nominatim aliquarum specierum mentionem fecerit Moses? Respondent quidam, quod non ita in aliis, ut in piscibus inveniantur, quae tam prodigiosam et vix credibilem corporis molem habeant. Balaenae namque, ut Basilius et Theodoretus aiunt, cum super aquas dorsum efferunt, ingentis insulae speciem exhibent. Plinius libro nono, capite trigesimo scribit: Balaenas maris Indici quaternum iugerum esse: Pristes ducenum cubitorum: anguillas vero in Gange, trecenum pedum. Et libro trigesimosecundo, capite primo citat Iubam regem Mauritaniae, qui in voluminibus ad Caium Caesarem Augusti filium, scriptis tradit, cetos sexcentorum pedum longitudinis, et trecentorum sexaginta latitudinis in Arabicum flumen intrare. Verum non minoris proceritatis arbores inveniri, patet ex his quae scribit Plinius libro decimosexto, capite 40. et ex his quae de Indicis arboribus tam Strabo, quam Plinius prodiderunt. Certe libro nono capite 12. 13. 14. mira scribit Plinius de magnitudine draconum et serpentium: ait dracones Indicos tantae magnitudinis esse, ut maximos elephantes circumplexu facile ambiant, nexuque nodi perstringant: Aethiopicos autem vicenum esse cubitorum: Serpentes autem Indicos, in tantam magnitudinem adolescere solitos, ut hauriant cervos, tantosque, Megasthenis testimonio confirmat. Nota est ad flumen Bragadam a Regulo imperatore, balistis tormentisque, ut oppidum aliquod, expugnata serpens centum viginti pedum longitudinis. Mirum sane videtur quod refert Aelianus libro decimo quinto Historiae animalium, capite vigesimoprimo.
But someone will ask, why did Moses not, as among the water-creatures, so likewise among the plants and land animals, make mention of certain species properly and by name? Some reply that there are not found in the others, as in the fishes, things which have so prodigious and scarcely credible a mass of body. For whales, as Basil and Theodoret say, when they raise their backs above the waters, present the appearance of a huge island. Pliny, in the ninth book, chapter thirty, writes: that the whales of the Indian sea are four acres in size; the saw-fishes two hundred cubits; the eels in the Ganges three hundred feet. And in the thirty-second book, chapter one, he cites Juba king of Mauretania, who in the volumes written to Caius Caesar, son of Augustus, hands down that sea-beasts six hundred feet long and three hundred and sixty wide enter an Arabian river. But that trees of no less height are found is plain from what Pliny writes in the sixteenth book, chapter 40, and from what both Strabo and Pliny have recorded about the Indian trees. Certainly in the ninth book, chapters 12, 13, 14, Pliny writes wonderful things about the size of dragons and serpents: he says the Indian dragons are of so great a size that they easily embrace the largest elephants in their coils and bind them with the knot of their fold; the Ethiopian [serpents] are twenty cubits; and he confirms, on the testimony of Megasthenes, that the Indian serpents are wont to grow to such size that they swallow stags and the like. Famous is the serpent at the river Bagrada, a hundred and twenty feet long, stormed like some town by the commander Regulus with ballistas and engines. A marvel indeed seems what Aelian reports in the fifteenth book of the History of Animals, chapter twenty-one.14

“Alexander,” he says, “when among the Indians he found very many other animals, found also a dragon, which, because the Indians thought it sacred in a certain cave and worshipped it with the utmost devotion, they therefore besought Alexander with prayers not to make an assault upon it; and this indeed he granted. But the dragon, when it perceived the din of the army (being an animal endowed with a most keen and most acute sense both of hearing and of sight), with a very great hiss and mighty blast issuing forth, terrified and threw all into confusion; it was reckoned to be seventy cubits long—for it did not appear to them whole, but only its head jutted out from the cave; its eyes are said to have reached the size of a great Macedonian shield.” Thus far Aelian.15

Alexander, inquit, cum alia pleraque animalia apud Indos invenit, tum draconem, quem quia sacrum in antro quodam, Indi existimarent et summa religione colerent, idcirco precibus Alexandrum obsecrarunt, ne in illum ipsum invaderet: quod quidem ipsum ille annuit. At enim draco, cum exercitus strepitum sensit (quod sit animal, tum audiendi tum videndi acerrimo atque acutissimo sensu praeditum) maximo sibilo et summo afflatu edito, omnes exterruit et perturbavit, septuaginta cubita longus esse existimabatur: neque enim eis totus apparuit, sed illius solum caput ex antro eminuit: eius oculi ad magni clypei Macedonici magnitudinem accessisse dicuntur. Haec ibi Aelianus.

Quibus haud dissimilia, libri vigesimiprimi suae Historiae Septentrionalis capite quadragesimoquarto, Olaus Magnus commemorat. Nihilominus tamen, maiora esse in aquis quam in terra animalia, et veterum testatur historiae, hodieque confirmat experientia, et ubertas materiae aqueae, habilitasque ad quantumvis extensionem ita esse suadet.
Things not unlike these Olaus Magnus relates, in the forty-fourth chapter of the twenty-first book of his History of the Northern Peoples. Nonetheless, that the animals in the waters are larger than those on land both the history of the ancients attests and experience today confirms, and the abundance of watery matter, and its aptitude for extension to any degree, so persuades.16
Ad declarandam autem tantam piscium molem et multiplicationem, peculiariter dicitur Deus benedixisse piscibus, dicens, Crescite et multiplicamini, benedictio autem Hebraice dicitur ברך Barach, qua voce copia et affluentia designatur, videlicet ad indicandam prope infinitam piscium multitudinem ac varietatem. Hebraei tamen dicunt propterea non terrestribus, sed aquatilibus benedixisse Deum, quod in illis esset serpens mox maledicendus. Origenes putat illud, Crescite, pertinere ad incrementum corporis: illud autem, Multiplicamini, ad multitudinis amplificationem, quae fit per propagationem. Sed non recte; nam pro Crescite, est, פרו Peru, id est, fructificare: talis enim est proles animalis, qualis est fructus arboris.
Now to declare so great a mass and multiplication of fishes, God is said in a special way to have blessed the fishes, saying, Increase and multiply; and 'blessing' in Hebrew is called ברך (barakh), a word by which plenty and abundance are designated—namely to indicate the well-nigh infinite multitude and variety of fishes. The Hebrews, however, say that God blessed the water-creatures and not the land-creatures for this reason: that among the latter was the serpent soon to be cursed. Origen thinks that the word Increase pertains to the growth of the body, but the word Multiply to the enlargement of the multitude, which comes about by propagation. But not rightly; for in place of Increase the Hebrew has פרו (peru), that is, 'be fruitful'—for the offspring of an animal is such as is the fruit of a tree.17
De variis generibus piscium, et de miraculis quae in hoc genere animalium reperiuntur, consulat lector Plinium libr. 9. et 32. necnon Isidorum libro 12. Etymologiarum cap. 6. quo loco cunctorum aquatilium species, centum quadraginta quatuor, secundum Plinium traduntur, quanquam ipse Plinius libro 9. capite 14. piscium species esse inquit 74. praeter crustis intecta quorum triginta sunt species. Sed isti loquuntur de piscibus et suo tempore et sibi tantum notis. Auctor libri 4. Esdrae cap. 6. nescio quam fabulam tradit de duobus piscibus a Deo creatis, alterum appellat Enoch, alterum Leviathan. Certe Scriptura tam apud Isaiam quam apud Iob ingentis molis et admirandae magnitudinis piscem appellat Leviathan, nam et LXX. Interpretes illis in locis Graece verterunt cete.
Concerning the various kinds of fishes, and the marvels that are found in this kind of animal, let the reader consult Pliny, books 9 and 32, and also Isidore, in the twelfth book of the Etymologies, chapter 6, in which place the species of all aquatic creatures, one hundred and forty-four, are handed down according to Pliny—although Pliny himself, in book 9, chapter 14, says that the species of fishes are 74, besides those covered with shells, of which there are thirty species. But these men speak of the fishes known in their own time and to themselves only. The author of the fourth book of Esdras, chapter 6, hands down some fable or other about two fishes created by God, the one he calls Enoch, the other Leviathan. Certainly Scripture, both in Isaiah and in Job, calls a fish of huge bulk and wondrous size Leviathan; for the Seventy Translators too, in those places, rendered it in Greek 'cete' (whale).18
Illud porro quod Moses ait, pisces esse productos ex aquis, quaeri potest quemadmodum sit intelligendum. An ut significetur pisces esse productos ex aquis tanquam ex materia, an tanquam a causa efficiente: neutro autem modo videtur id esse verum. Etenim pisces cum sint mista perfecta, non ex sola aqua constant, sed ex quatuor elementis, nec in illis aqua, sed terra praecellit ceteris, sicut Aristoteles tradit libro secundo de Generatione et corruptione textu quinquagesimo primo. Nec vero aqua vere dicetur effectrix et procreatrix piscium: quippe multa sunt genera piscium, qui tantum ex semine, nec nisi ab aliis sui similibus secundum speciem generantur. Verum, ad hoc respondendum est, pisces dici a Mose productos ex aquis tanquam ex materia: non quod ex aqua sola soleant aut etiam possint naturali via et ratione generari, sed quod in illis praepolleat aqua, non quidem quantum ad gravitatem, sed quantum ad humiditatem et frigiditatem, et ratione temperamenti piscium, quod est plane Aqueum: et quod aqua sit naturalis eorum locus habitationis, generationis, conservationis, extra quem nec gigni, nec bene habere, nec naturales actiones suas exercere, nec vitam tueri queant. Primi autem illi pisces proxime a Deo ex sola materia aquae generati sunt, additis tamen ei materiae reliquorum elementorum formis, et qualitatibus.
Furthermore, as to what Moses says, that the fishes were produced from the waters, it may be asked how this is to be understood: whether it signifies that the fishes were produced from the waters as from matter, or as from an efficient cause; but in neither way does it seem to be true. For fishes, since they are perfect mixtures, do not consist of water alone, but of the four elements; nor in them does water surpass the rest, but earth, as Aristotle hands down in the second book On Generation and Corruption, text fifty-one. Nor will water truly be called the maker and procreator of fishes; since there are many kinds of fish which are generated only from seed, and only from others like themselves according to species. But to this it must be answered that the fishes are said by Moses to have been produced from the waters as from matter—not because they are wont, or even can, be generated naturally from water alone, but because in them water predominates, not indeed as to gravity, but as to humidity and coldness, and by reason of the temperament of fishes, which is plainly watery; and because water is the natural place of their habitation, generation, and preservation, outside which they can neither be born, nor be well, nor exercise their natural actions, nor preserve their life. But those first fishes were generated immediately by God from the matter of water alone, with the forms and qualities of the other elements added, however, to that matter.19
Caeterum, ingentem nec facile explicabilem difficultatem continet, quod Latinus interpres hoc loco secutus proculdubio Septuaginta Interpretes, sic habet: Producant aquae reptile animae viventis et volatile super terram sub firmamento caeli, quibus verbis significari videtur hoc quinto die ut pisces, ita quoque volucres ex eodem aquae elemento esse factas. Atque ita propemodum omnes Ecclesiastici scriptores, tam antiqui quam recentiores sentiunt, itaque locum hunc interpretantur. Sed Rupertus in primo libro de Operibus Trinitatis capite quinquagesimo, adversus hunc sensum verborum Mosis, quem ipse probat, obiicit hoc: Si aves similiter ut pisces productae fuissent ex aquis, similiter quoque, ut illi degere deberent in aquis, cum tamen omnes vel in aere vel in terra degant. Ad hoc ita respondet: non esse productas aves ex densa materia aquae, qualis est eius quae proprie appellatur aqua, sed ex aqua tenuiori ac velut nebulosa: ita ut per aquam hoc loco, intelligenda sit non modo, quae vulgo et proprie dicitur aqua, hoc est, corpus liquidum et fluidum, sed etiam tenuior aqua, qualis est vapor vel nubes.
Moreover, it contains a vast and not easily explicable difficulty, that the Latin translator in this place, following without doubt the Seventy Translators, has thus: Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature of living soul and the flying thing over the earth under the firmament of heaven—by which words it seems to be signified that on this fifth day, as the fishes, so also the birds were made from the same element of water. And so nearly all the ecclesiastical writers, both ancient and more recent, think, and so interpret this passage. But Rupert, in the first book On the Works of the Trinity, chapter fifty, against this sense of the words of Moses—which he himself approves—objects this: that if the birds had been produced from the waters in like manner as the fishes, they ought likewise, as the fishes, to dwell in the waters, whereas all of them dwell either in the air or on the earth. To this he replies thus: that the birds were not produced from the dense matter of water, such as is that which is properly called water, but from a thinner and as it were cloudy water; so that by 'water' in this place is to be understood not only what is commonly and properly called water, that is, a liquid and fluid body, but also a thinner water, such as is vapor or cloud.20
Idem tradit Augustinus libro tertio de Genesi ad litteram, capite tertio, ait enim, vocabulo aquae intelligi debere aerem proximum terrae, in quo volant aves qui totus aqueus est, tum propter vapores ex terra et aquis per aerem elatos in sublime, tum propter tam frequentem imbrium delapsum in terras. Quicquid ergo aquarum, inquit Augustinus, sive labiliter undosum et fluidum est, sive vaporaliter tenuatum atque suspensum, ut illud reptilibus animarum vivarum, hoc volatilibus appareat distributum, utrumque tamen humida natura deputatur. Haec Augustinus. Idem significat Beatus Thomas prima parte, quaestione septuagesima prima, articulo primo.
The same Augustine hands down, in the third book On Genesis according to the Letter, chapter three; for he says that by the word 'water' is to be understood the air nearest the earth, in which the birds fly, which is wholly watery, both on account of the vapors lifted on high from the earth and the waters through the air, and on account of the so frequent fall of rains upon the earth. Whatever therefore of waters, says Augustine, is either fluidly billowy and flowing, or vaporously rarefied and suspended—so that the former appears assigned to the creeping things of living souls, the latter to the flying things—each, however, is reckoned of a humid nature. Thus Augustine. The same is intimated by Blessed Thomas, in the first part, question seventy-one, article one.21
Eugubinus in Cosmopoeia censet, tam aves quam pisces primam habuisse originem ex aqua elementari, ex qua putat etiam aerem primo esse productum. Quamvis autem prima effectio avium ex aquis provenerit, quae tamen deinceps consecuta est earum generatio et propagatio, non ex aquis fit, sed ex propriis quaeque seminibus atque principiis. Quod tamen etiamnum permultas aves in aquis degere, et propter aquas generari constet, primae avium originis et productionis ex aquis, argumentum est. Hoc etiam innuit Hieronymus in Epistola octuagesimatertia, quam scripsit ad Oceanum, illis verbis: Primum de aquis quod vivit egreditur, et pennatos fideles de terra ad caelum levat. In hac quoque sententia videtur fuisse Sanctus Ambrosius auctor eius hymni, qui feria quinta in Vesperis canitur:
Eugubinus, in the Cosmopoeia, judges that both birds and fishes had their first origin from elemental water, from which he thinks the air too was first produced. But although the first making of birds came from the waters, the generation and propagation of them which followed thereafter is not from the waters, but each from its own seeds and first principles. Yet that even now very many birds dwell in the waters, and are generated because of the waters, is an argument of the first origin and production of birds from the waters. This too Jerome intimates in the eighty-third Epistle, which he wrote to Oceanus, in these words: First, what lives comes forth from the waters, and raises the winged faithful from earth to heaven. In this opinion also Saint Ambrose seems to have been, the author of that hymn which is sung at Vespers on the fifth weekday (Thursday):22

God of great power, who, the race that has its origin from the waters, partly dost send back to the deep, partly dost raise into the air: thrusting the one sunk down into the waters, allotting the other borne up to the skies; so that, though brought forth from one stock, they may take to themselves diverse places.23

Magna Deus potentia, Qui ex aquis ortum genus, Partim remittis gurgiti, Partim levas in aera: Demersa lymphis imprimens, Subvecta caelis irrogans, Ut stirpe una prodita, Diversa rapiant loca.

Ab hac tamen communi doctrina et sententia, Caietanus et Catharinus atque Hieronymus Vielmius, lectione vigesimasecunda in Hexameron discesserunt: nec sane inscienter aut temere, siquidem tum in textu Hebraico, tum in paraphrasi Chaldaica multo secus est hoc loco, quam in Latina versione, et longe diversa redditur sententia: Hebraea quidem si Latine reddantur ad verbum, hoc sonant: Repere faciat aqua reptile animae viventis, et volatile volet super terram super faciem extensionis caeli. Paraphrasis Chaldaica sic habet: Movere faciat aqua reptile animae viventis, et avis volitet super terram iuxta faciem expansi caelorum. Hinc apparet, Mosem hoc loco non tradere, aves ex aquis esse productas: quinimo eas ex terra esse factas, apertissimis verbis docet ipse cap. 2. huius libri in quo tam Hebraice quam Chaldaice, Graece ac Latine ita legitur: Formatis igitur Dominus Deus de humo cunctis animantibus terrae, et universis volatilibus caeli, adduxit ea ad Adam, et quae sequuntur: ex quo perspicitur, aves similiter, ut terrestres animantes, e terra esse generatas.
From this common doctrine and opinion, however, Cajetan and Catharinus and Jerome Vielmi (in the twenty-second lecture on the Hexameron) departed—and not indeed unskilfully or rashly, since both in the Hebrew text and in the Chaldee paraphrase the passage stands much otherwise here than in the Latin version, and a far different sense is rendered. The Hebrew, if rendered into Latin word for word, sounds thus: Let the water make to creep the creeping thing of living soul, and let the flying thing fly over the earth over the face of the expanse of heaven. The Chaldee paraphrase has thus: Let the water make to move the creeping thing of living soul, and let the bird fly over the earth alongside the face of the expanse of the heavens. Hence it appears that Moses in this place does not hand down that the birds were produced from the waters; nay rather, that they were made from the earth he himself teaches in the plainest words in chapter 2 of this book, in which, both in Hebrew and in Chaldee, in Greek and in Latin, it reads thus: The Lord God therefore, having formed out of the ground all the animals of the earth, and all the fowls of the air, brought them to Adam—and what follows: from which it is clear that the birds, like the land animals, were generated from the earth.24
Sanctus Augustinus capite primo, libri noni, de Genesi ad litteram, dupliciter conatur respondere ad hoc Scripturae testimonium. Primo ait, illud, Ex humo, pertinere ad terrestres animantes tantum, non autem ad volucres. Sed obstat coniunctio, Et, ostendens illud: Ex humo, coniuncte intelligendum esse de terrestribus et volatilibus. Deinde inquit nomine terrae nonnunquam in Scriptura significari cum terra etiam ipsam aquam, verum nec hoc ipse bene probat, ut patet consideranti testimonia quae affert: nec ut ita esset, iuvaret eius sententiam. Quippe vult ipse aves generatas esse ex aere nebuloso et vaporoso, qui vocabulo terrae nusquam significatur, ut aqua quae labitur per terram et in ipsa continetur, unum cum ipsa corpus efficientes.
Saint Augustine, in the first chapter of the ninth book On Genesis according to the Letter, attempts in two ways to answer this testimony of Scripture. First he says that the phrase 'out of the ground' pertains only to the land animals, not to the birds. But the conjunction 'and' stands in the way, showing that 'out of the ground' is to be understood conjointly of both the land animals and the birds. Then he says that by the name 'earth' is sometimes signified in Scripture, together with the earth, the water itself as well; but this too he does not prove well, as is plain to one who considers the testimonies he brings forward; nor, even were it so, would it help his opinion. For he himself holds that the birds were generated from the cloudy and vaporous air, which is nowhere signified by the word 'earth,' as is the water which glides through the earth and is contained in it, making one body with it.25
Et vero, in ceteris Dei operibus, videlicet in astris, piscibus, terrenis animalibus, atque in ipso homine, cernitur magna quaedam convenientia, inter rem productam et elementum, ex quo vel in quo producta esse dicitur: velut inter sydera et coelum, inter pisces et aquam, inter animantes terrestres et terram, inter aves autem et aquam, nulla est convenientia, nam nec in aquis generantur aut vivunt aves, nec earum temperamentum corporis est aqueum, sed terreum vel potius aerium. Atque hoc etiam fidem habet ex eo quod, ut Moses hoc loco refert, iussit Deus aves multiplicari non in aquis sicut pisces, sed super terram: Scriptura item, aves non aquae, sed caeli, id est, aeris, volucres appellat. Praeterea sententia est Theologorum, tribus his posterioribus diebus, in uno quoque elemento creata esse a Deo, ea quibus illud elementum ornatur et impletur: at volucres seu aves, non aquam sed aerem ornant et implent, ut potius ex aere quam ex aqua creari debuerint. Quare ut hanc sententiam quae verissima est, etiam Latina translatio exprimat, cum dicit hoc loco: Producant aquae reptile animae viventis, et volatile super terram: in illo, Et volatile, non est intelligendum repeti illud, Producant aquae, quemadmodum plerique...
And indeed, in the other works of God—namely in the stars, the fishes, the land animals, and in man himself—there is seen a certain great agreement between the thing produced and the element from which, or in which, it is said to have been produced: as between the stars and the heaven, between the fishes and the water, between the land animals and the earth. But between birds and water there is no agreement, for birds are neither generated nor live in the waters, nor is the temperament of their body watery, but earthy, or rather airy. And this too gains credence from the fact that, as Moses here relates, God commanded the birds to be multiplied not in the waters like the fishes, but upon the earth; and Scripture likewise calls birds the fowls not of the water, but of the heaven, that is, of the air. Besides, it is the opinion of the theologians that in these three latter days there were created by God, in each single element, the things by which that element is adorned and filled; but the birds adorn and fill not the water but the air, so that they ought rather to have been created from the air than from the water. Wherefore, that the Latin translation too may express this opinion, which is most true, when it says here: Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature of living soul, and the flying thing over the earth—in that phrase, 'And the flying thing,' it is not to be understood that 'Let the waters bring forth' is repeated, as most...26
...plerique existimarunt, sed supplendum est verbum Volet, sicut habet Hebraea et Chaldaica lectio. Nam si repeteretur et intelligeretur verbum illud Producat, inepta profecto redderetur sententia: quomodo enim produceret aqua aves super terram, quae aquis supereminet? et quorsum producant aquae aves sub firmamento coeli? annon etiam pisces, et ceterae animantes sunt sub firmamento coeli? Si autem intelligatur verbum Volet, quod est in Hebraeo, rectissima et planissima est sententia.
...most have supposed, but the word 'Let it fly' must be supplied, as the Hebrew and Chaldee reading has it. For if that word 'Let it bring forth' were repeated and understood, the sense would surely be rendered absurd: for how would the water bring forth birds over the earth, which rises above the waters? and to what end should the waters bring forth birds under the firmament of heaven? Are not the fishes too, and the other living creatures, under the firmament of heaven? But if the word 'Let it fly,' which is in the Hebrew, is understood, the sense is most correct and most plain.27
Verumtamen, ex his duae existunt dubitationes: Una est, si aves non sunt productae ex aquis sicut pisces, cur Moses narrans productionem aquatilium, mentionem fecit volatilium? altera est, cur hic non expressit Moses aves esse productas ex terra: sicut pisces ex aquis? Sed prior dubitatio ad hunc modum explicatur. Aves eodem die, quo pisces sunt factae, ut perspicue docet Moses, cum ait: Creavit Deus cete grandia, et omnem animam viventem atque motabilem, quam produxerant aquae in species suas, et omne volatile secundum genus suum. Nam si quinto die non essent factae aves, sed die sexto, nulla erat ratio, quare die quinto Moses mentionem faceret avium, ante earum creationem: praesertim cum die sexto nullum fiat verbum de creatione avium, nec fuerit conveniens eam omnino praetermitti a Mose.
Nevertheless, from these there arise two doubts. One is: if the birds were not produced from the waters like the fishes, why did Moses, in narrating the production of the water-creatures, make mention of the flying things? The other is: why did Moses not here expressly say that the birds were produced from the earth, as the fishes from the waters? But the first doubt is explained in this manner. The birds were made on the same day as the fishes, as Moses clearly teaches when he says: God created the great whales, and every living and moving creature, which the waters brought forth according to their kinds, and every winged fowl according to its kind. For if the birds had been made not on the fifth day but on the sixth, there would have been no reason why on the fifth day Moses should make mention of the birds before their creation—especially since on the sixth day no word is said about the creation of the birds, nor would it have been fitting for it to be wholly passed over by Moses.28
Deinde, magna est similitudo, magnaque cognatio inter aves et pisces. Sive spectes utrorumque locum naturalem, hoc est, aquam et aerem: ambo enim sunt corpora diaphana, humida, agitabilia, quae facile cedunt: aer item plenus est humore aqueo, et in aquam promptissime mutabilis. Sive consideres utriusque generis animantium conformationem corporis, utrique inest levitas et agilitas: magna est similitudo inter pinnas piscium et alas avium, inter squamas illorum et harum pennas: utraque carent auribus, et per meatus quosdam aurium officio funguntur: non habent vessicam, ne volatum impediret, nec mammas, nec lac, sicut tradit Aristoteles lib. 2. de partibus animalium, cap. 12. et lib. 3. cap. 8. et lib. 3. de historia animalium, cap. 20. et multa genera avium sunt aquatilia, ut cygni, anseres, fulicae, mergi, grues, anates, halcyones, vel secundum Varronem alcedones, quae fere in aquis versantur. Denique sive spectes rationem motus utrorumque: qualis est enim natatus piscium in aquis, talis est in aere volatus avium, ut non inscite liceat dicere, pisces esse aves aquatiles, aves esse pisces aerios: utrumque item animal cauda, iter et cursum suum dirigit, et ab eo navigandi artem homines didicisse creditur. Certe Plinius lib. 10. cap. 10. ait, milvos artem gubernandi docuisse, caudae flexibus, in caelo monstrante natura, quid opus esset in profundo. Ob has igitur causas Moses productionem piscium et avium in sua narratione coniunxit.
Next, there is a great likeness and a great kinship between birds and fishes. Whether you regard the natural place of each, that is, water and air: for both are bodies transparent, humid, and easily stirred, which readily yield; and the air, too, is full of watery moisture, and most readily changeable into water. Or whether you consider the bodily conformation of each kind of animal, in both there is lightness and agility: there is a great likeness between the fins of fishes and the wings of birds, between the scales of the former and the feathers of the latter; both lack ears, and perform the office of ears through certain passages; they have no bladder, lest it should hinder flight, nor breasts, nor milk, as Aristotle hands down in the second book On the Parts of Animals, chapter 12, and book 3, chapter 8, and book 3 of the History of Animals, chapter 20. And many kinds of birds are aquatic, such as swans, geese, coots, divers, cranes, ducks, halcyons (or, according to Varro, alcedones, kingfishers), which mostly dwell in the waters. Finally, whether you regard the manner of motion of each: for such as is the swimming of fishes in the waters, such is the flight of birds in the air, so that it may not unaptly be said that fishes are aquatic birds, and birds are aerial fishes. Each animal too directs its journey and course by the tail, and from this it is believed that men learned the art of navigation. Certainly Pliny, book 10, chapter 10, says that the kites taught the art of steering, by the bendings of their tail, nature showing in the sky what was needed in the deep. For these reasons, then, Moses joined the production of fishes and birds in his narrative.29
Posteriori autem dubitationi sic occurritur: Tacuit quidem Moses hoc loco, aves e terra esse factas: verum id aperte...
But the second doubt is met thus: Moses was indeed silent in this place that the birds were made from the earth; but this he plainly...30
...aperte docuit infra, capite secundo, cur hic tacuerit, vix coniectura ulla ne divinando quidem attingi potest. Forte noluit productionis animalium ex terra mentionem facere ante diem sextum, quo videlicet principalis animalium e terra productio est facta: eo namque die creatae sunt terrestres animantes, et aquaticis et volatilibus longe praestantiores; eodemque die cunctorum animalium princeps factus est homo. Scio equidem non defuisse graves auctores, quibus visum est in genere avium reperiri quasdam, cunctis animalibus terrestribus nobiliores, atque perfectiores, cuiusmodi sunt quae voces humanas, atque adeo orationem ipsam humanam tam expresse, distincte, et ad verum reddunt, ut more hominum loqui videantur, uti sunt meruli, picae, et omnium maxime psittaci. Verum ne his assentiar, multa faciunt: et sane magis admiranda et prodigiosa, maiorisque ingenii, solertiae ac docilitatis argumenta, de canibus, vulpibus, equis, simiis, et elephantibus, scriptis prodita sunt, hodieque certis experimentis comprobata.
...he plainly taught below, in the second chapter. Why he was silent here can scarcely be reached by any conjecture, not even by divining. Perhaps he was unwilling to make mention of the production of animals from the earth before the sixth day, on which, namely, the principal production of animals from the earth was made; for on that day the land animals were created, far more excellent than the aquatic and the flying ones; and on the same day man was made, the prince of all animals. I know indeed that there have not been wanting weighty authors to whom it has seemed that in the kind of birds there are found some nobler and more perfect than all the land animals—of the sort that render human voices, and indeed human speech itself, so expressly, distinctly, and truly that they seem to speak after the manner of men, such as the blackbirds, magpies, and most of all the parrots. But that I should not assent to these, many things make: and indeed more wonderful and prodigious arguments of greater wit, cleverness, and teachableness have been recorded in writing concerning dogs, foxes, horses, apes, and elephants, and are today confirmed by sure experiments.31
Vel Moses voluit aperire originem et materiam eorum animalium quae ornant, implent, et incolunt illud elementum, ex quo, vel in quo sunt facta (cum tribus hisce posterioribus diebus Moses, ut fere tradunt Theologi, de elementorum exornatione, ac plenitudine, seu complemento agat) velut Astra Coelum, pisces aquam, terrestres animantes ipsam terram: at volatilia, licet in terra, et ex terra sint procreata, et inibi cibum capiant et requiescant, cum tamen in aere versari, et motus suos agere gaudeant, ad aeris potius, quam ad terrae ornatum, et complementum pertinere videntur.
Or Moses wished to disclose the origin and matter of those animals which adorn, fill, and inhabit that element from which, or in which, they were made (since in these three latter days Moses, as the theologians generally teach, treats of the adorning and the filling, or completion, of the elements): as the Stars [adorn] the Heaven, the fishes the water, the land animals the earth itself; but the flying things, although they are procreated on the earth and from the earth, and there take their food and rest, yet, since they delight to dwell in the air and to carry on their movements there, seem to pertain rather to the adornment and completion of the air than of the earth.32
Sed iuvat defendere priorem sententiam, propter auctoritatem Patrum, et omnium ferme Theologorum consensum, minime contemnendam. Dicamus igitur propterea factas esse aves ex aqua similiter ut pisces, quia magna est inter aves et pisces cognatio et similitudo, sicut paulo supra ostendimus, et quia animalia cetera in eo elemento versari videtur, ex quo sunt primo a Deo producta, quemadmodum pisces in aqua, in coelo sydera, et in terra terrestres animantes: aves autem fere in aere versantur, idcirco existimandum est, sicut ex Augustino, Ruperto, et B. Thoma superius docuimus, aves non esse factas ex aqua densa, quae per terram labitur, et in ipsa terra continetur, sed ex aqua in vapores tenuata, et in nubes conformata, quae inferiorem aeris regionem, in qua volitant aves, ascendit et obsidet. Ad illud autem Scripturae testimonium ex 2. c. Gen. productum: Formatis igitur dominus Deus de humo cunctis animantibus terrae, et universis volatilibus caeli, adduxit ea ad Adam, respondendum est, illam coniunctionem Et, non repetere particulam illam Ex humo, ut sit sensus: Formatis ex humo tam animantibus terrestribus, quam volatilibus, sed repetere illud participium passivum Formatis, ut sit haec Mosis sententia. Formatis ex humo animantibus terrestribus, et formatis etiam volucribus, id est, postquam...
But it is worthwhile to defend the former opinion, on account of the authority of the Fathers and the consensus of almost all the theologians, by no means to be despised. Let us say, then, that the birds were made from water in like manner as the fishes, because there is a great kinship and likeness between birds and fishes, as we showed a little above, and because the other animals seem to dwell in that element from which they were first produced by God—as the fishes in water, the stars in heaven, the land animals on the earth; but birds mostly dwell in the air. For this reason it must be thought, as we taught above from Augustine, Rupert, and Blessed Thomas, that the birds were made not from the dense water which glides through the earth and is contained in the earth itself, but from water rarefied into vapors and formed into clouds, which ascends to and occupies the lower region of the air in which the birds fly. And to that testimony of Scripture adduced from chapter 2 of Genesis—The Lord God therefore, having formed out of the ground all the animals of the earth and all the fowls of the air, brought them to Adam—it must be answered that the conjunction 'and' does not repeat that particle 'out of the ground,' so that the sense be: having formed out of the ground both the land animals and the flying things; but it repeats that passive participle 'having formed,' so that this be the sense of Moses: having formed out of the ground the land animals, and having formed also the flying things, that is, after...33
...postquam haec duo genera animantium Deus creaverat, adduxit ea ad Adam.
...after God had created these two kinds of animals, he brought them to Adam.34

Translator’s notes

  1. Section heading for the Fifth Day: the creation of the water-creatures and birds (Genesis 1:20ff.). ↩
  2. The scripture lemma for the Fifth Day, Genesis 1:20–21. ↩
  3. Marginal gloss: 'In the first three days the three primary bodies were created; in the three following they were adorned.' The structural parallel: days 1–3 distinguish heaven/water/earth, days 4–6 adorn each in turn. The decorated initial begins 'Primis'. ↩
  4. Marginal glosses: 'Basil, who says that fish lack memory: refuted by St. Augustine'; and 'Why fish are permitted to those who fast.' Cites Basil, Hexameron homily 8, and Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram 3.8 (fish do have memory, since local motion requires it). Arguments for the imperfection of fish (poor temperament, scanty nourishment, dull senses, untamable). Sentence continues onto p. 145. ↩
  5. Completes (from p. 144) the exception of the Dolphin to the rule that fish cannot be tamed. Cites Pliny, Natural History 9.8 (on dolphins), and Plutarch, De sollertia animalium (Whether land or sea animals are cleverer). ↩
  6. Marginal glosses: 'Cajetan on Genesis'; and 'Philo in the book On the Making of the World.' Cajetan's argument (all fish oviparous) is refuted by Basil (Hexameron homily 7) and Pliny (Natural History 9.13 and 9.51, on cartilaginous fish and the torpedo/electric ray): some fish are viviparous. ↩
  7. Philo, De opificio mundi (the five senses correspond to the fifth day). Pererius rejects the numerological argument: touch alone constitutes an animal, and there are also interior senses. ↩
  8. Marginal gloss: 'According to Augustine, on the fifth day the fish were not created in act.' Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram 3.4 (the 'causal' creation). Pererius objects: the fish were made actually, like the works of the other days, else they could not propagate. ↩
  9. The Hebrew verb שרץ (sharatz, 'to teem, swarm'; transliterated 'Saras' by Pererius) in Genesis 1:20 conveys teeming abundance, not mere production—evidence of the extraordinary fecundity of fish. Sentence continues onto p. 146 (catchword 'venitur', completing 'invenitur'). ↩
  10. Completes (from p. 145) the argument for the fecundity of fish. Cites Aristotle, De generatione animalium 3.11; Pliny, Natural History 9.2; and Psalm 103 (104):25–26 ('this great and spacious sea... creeping things without number'). ↩
  11. Marginal gloss: 'Why the fishes are called creeping things.' The Septuagint's τὰ ἑρπετά ('creeping things') for Genesis 1:20. Cites Bonaventure (Sentences 2, dist. 15) on the kinds of motion, and Hugh of St Victor (Annotations on Genesis, ch. 7). ↩
  12. Marginal glosses: 'What kind of fish the whales are'; and 'Cajetan on Genesis.' The Hebrew התנינים (ha-tanninim, 'the dragons/sea-monsters') for the 'cete grandia' of Genesis 1:21. Scriptural parallels: Psalm 148:7; Isaiah 27:1; Ezekiel 32:2 and 29:3 (Pharaoh as the great dragon). Sentence continues onto p. 147. ↩
  13. Completes (from p. 146) Cajetan's account of why Moses names the great whales: to refute those who held the monsters arose by chance, and to make God's creatorship of lesser things the more credible. ↩
  14. Marginal gloss: 'The enormous size of certain fish.' Why Moses names sea-monsters but not particular land species: nothing on land matches the bulk. Cites Basil and Theodoret (whales like islands); Pliny, Natural History 9.30 (whales 4 acres, saw-fish 200 cubits, Ganges eels 300 ft), 32.1 (Juba's sea-beasts), 16.40 (tall trees), 9.12–14 (Indian/Ethiopian dragons and serpents, Megasthenes; the serpent of the Bagrada killed by Regulus). Strabo on Indian trees. Aelian, De natura animalium 15.21 follows. ↩
  15. Quotation from Aelian, De natura animalium 15.21: the giant sacred dragon of India spared by Alexander, seventy cubits long, with eyes the size of a Macedonian shield. ↩
  16. Olaus Magnus, Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus 21.44 (the sea-monsters of the North). ↩
  17. Marginal gloss: 'What it means that God blessed the fishes.' The Hebrew ברך (barakh, 'to bless') connotes abundance; the Hebrews' reason for blessing sea-creatures not land-creatures (the serpent). Pererius corrects Origen: the Hebrew of Genesis 1:22 is פרו (peru, 'be fruitful'), not 'grow in body.' ↩
  18. Cites Pliny (NH 9, 32) and Isidore (Etymologies 12.6, the 144 species; Pliny NH 9.14 reckons 74 fish + 30 crustaceans); 4 Esdras 6:49–52 (the two creatures—here oddly named 'Enoch' and Leviathan; the standard text has Behemoth and Leviathan); and Leviathan in Isaiah 27:1 and Job 40–41 (rendered 'cete' by the Septuagint). ↩
  19. Marginal gloss: 'In what way the fish are said to be produced from water.' Pererius's resolution: water is neither sole matter nor efficient cause; fish are 'from the waters' as matter because water predominates in their watery temperament and is their natural element. Cites Aristotle, De generatione et corruptione 2 (text 51). ↩
  20. Marginal gloss: 'A disputation, whether the birds were created from water.' Genesis 1:20 seems to derive birds, like fish, from the water. Rupert of Deutz (De operibus Trinitatis, bk. 1, ch. 50) objects but resolves it: birds came from a 'thinner, cloudy water' (vapor/cloud). ↩
  21. Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram 3.3 (the lower air as 'watery,' assigning fish to liquid water and birds to vaporous water); both belong to 'humid nature.' Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 71, a. 1. ↩
  22. Agostino Steuco of Gubbio (Eugubinus), Cosmopoeia (birds and fish from elemental water). Jerome, Epistle 83 (to Oceanus). Lead-in to the Ambrosian hymn for Thursday Vespers. ↩
  23. The Ambrosian hymn 'Magnae Deus potentiae' (here 'Magna Deus potentia'), sung at Thursday (feria quinta) Vespers, on the creatures brought forth from the waters and divided between sea and sky—fitting the Fifth Day. ↩
  24. Marginal gloss: 'That the birds were created not from the waters, but from the earth.' Cajetan, Ambrosius Catharinus, and Girolamo Vielmi (Lecture 22) read Genesis 1:20 as 'let the birds fly,' not 'let the waters bring forth birds'; and Genesis 2:19 ('formed out of the ground... the fowls of the air') confirms birds came from earth. ↩
  25. Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram 9.1, twice tries to reconcile Gen 2:19 with birds-from-water; Pererius finds both attempts inadequate. ↩
  26. Marginal glosses: 'A great agreement between the thing produced and the element from which it is produced'; and 'The opinion of the Theologians about the things created in the three last days.' The argument from fitness: birds belong to the air, not the water. Sentence continues onto p. 151. ↩
  27. Completes (from p. 150) the grammatical point: Genesis 1:20's 'et volatile super terram' requires the verb 'let it fly' (from the Hebrew), not a repeated 'let the waters bring forth.' ↩
  28. Marginal gloss: 'Two objections.' First doubt: why mention birds in the fifth-day narrative? Answer: because birds were in fact made on the fifth day (Genesis 1:21). Sixth day says nothing of birds. ↩
  29. Marginal gloss: 'The manifold likeness and analogy between fishes and birds.' The kinship of fish and birds (their elements, bodies, lack of ears/bladder/milk, aquatic birds, mode of motion). Cites Aristotle (De partibus animalium 2.12, 3.8; Historia animalium 3.20), Varro (alcedones), and Pliny (NH 10.10, the kite teaching steering). ↩
  30. Opening of the answer to the second objection (why Moses did not here say birds were from earth); continues onto p. 152. ↩
  31. Marginal gloss: 'Whether the birds that render human voice and speech excel all the land animals in dignity of nature.' Why Moses was silent: perhaps to reserve earth-born animals for the sixth day. Pererius denies that speaking birds (blackbirds, magpies, parrots) are nobler than land beasts (dogs, foxes, horses, apes, elephants). ↩
  32. A second reason for Moses's silence about earth-born birds: birds adorn the air, so they are listed with the fifth-day water-creatures, not the sixth-day earth animals. ↩
  33. Marginal gloss: 'The author defends the common opinion and interpretation of the Fathers, on the generation of the birds from the waters.' Pererius, deferring to the Fathers, defends birds-from-water (but from vaporous, cloud-forming water, per Augustine/Rupert/Aquinas) and re-parses Gen 2:19. Sentence continues onto p. 153. ↩
  34. Completes (from p. 152) the re-parsing of Genesis 2:19, closing the disputation on whether birds were created from water. ↩