The True Conception of the World according to Hildegard von Bingen – translated by Dean H. Kenyon

Helmut Posch
The True Conception of the World
according to Hildegard von Bingen

The Kolbe Center
for the Study of Creation
www.kolbecenter.org

“Write what you see and hear! Make known the wonders that you experience! Write them down and speak!”

ISBN: 978-0-9760166-6-3

TrueConceptWorld_PB.indd 1

Translated by Dean H. Kenyon The Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation
Mount Jackson, VA
6/14/16 11:48 AM

Helmut Posch
The True Conception of the World
according to Hildegard von Bingen
Translated by Dean H. Kenyon
The Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation Mount Jackson, VA Helmut Posch

The True Conception of the World
according to Hildegard von Bingen
2016 Dean H. Kenyon/Kolbe Center
All rights reserved
Books may be ordered by contacting: The Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation
952 Kelly Road Mt. Jackson, VA 22842 www.kolbecenter.org
ISBN: 978-0-9760166-6-3
Illustrations: Bradi Barth (p. 70, 76), Dennis di Cicco (p. 177, 178) Special photograph on back cover by Dennis di Cicco: The sun during its annual path, taken with a special camera from Feb. 27, 1978 to Feb. 17, 1979 on 44 different days, at about 8:30 a.m. eastern American time.

This book has been published through the generosity of Patrick Earl Carter and his family.
Patrick was born on December 6, 1963, and entered eternity on October 14, 2015. Please pray for him and for his family. May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through
the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

St. Hildegard’s “visions and subsequent reflections [present] a compendium of the history of salvation from the beginning of the universe until its eschatological consummation… [St. Hildegard witnessed to the truth that] Creation is an act of love by which the world can emerge from nothingness. Hence, through the whole range of creatures, divine love flows as a river. Of all creatures God loves man in a special way and confers upon him an extraordinary dignity, giving him that glory which the rebellious angels lost. The human race may thus be counted as the tenth choir of the angelic hierarchy.”
Pope Benedict XVI, Apostolic Letter declaring St. Hildegard of Bingen a Doctor of the Church.
The Copernican Revolution outshines everything since the rise of Christianity and reduces the Renaissance and Reformation to the rank of mere episodes, mere internal displacements within the system of medieval Christendom. Since it changed the character of men’s habitual mental operations even in the conduct of the non-material sciences, while transforming the whole diagram of the physical universe and the very texture of human life itself, it looms so large as the real origin both of the modern world and of the modern mentality, that our customary periodization of European history has become an anachronism and an encumbrance.
Herbert Butterfield, The Origins of Modern Science: 1300-1800, 1957, pp. 7-8.
There is no planetary observation by which we on Earth can prove that the Earth is moving in an orbit around the sun. Thus all Galileo’s discoveries with the telescope can be accommodated to the system invented by Tycho Brahe just before Galileo began his observations of the heavens. In this Tychonic system, the planets . . . move in orbits around the sun, while the sun moves in an orbit around the Earth in a year. Furthermore, the daily rotation of the heavens is communicated to the sun and planets, so that the Earth itself neither rotates nor revolves in an orbit.
Physicist I. Bernard Cohen, Birth of a New Physics, revised and updated, 1985, p. 78.
The most recent scientific findings vindicate the Church of 1633.
Fr. Walter Brandmuller, Vatican’s Chief Historian, Light and Shadows: Church History amid Faith, Fact and Legend, Ignatius Press, 2009, p. 13.
The Earth, also, God commanded to stand in the midst of the world, rooted in its own foundation.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent, 1566

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am indebted to physicist Dr. Robert Bennett for many helpful suggestions for improving the manuscript. I am also indebted to Barbara Bershak for her tireless work on the formatting of the manuscript.
Dr. Dean H. Kenyon

PREFACE
Most of the influential books of modern times have been about revolution; the book you hold in your hands is about restoration - the restoration to all human beings of a true perspective on their sublime dignity as children of God, on their uniquely privileged position in time and space, and on the uniquely privileged position of their earthly home. This work of restoration is the fruit of the loving labor of three souls: St. Hildegard of Bingen, Benedictine nun and Doctor of the Church; Austrian author and IT specialist Helmut Posch, who distilled the writings of St. Hildegard on Creation in the original text of this book; and biophysicist Dr. Dean H. Kenyon, who translated Mr. Posch’s distillation into English, drawing upon a lifetime spent in the pursuit of truth as a natural scientist.
The original source of the content of this book, St. Hildegard of Bingen, was a twelfth century German Benedictine Abbess who possessed the gift of miracles and who received many prophetic insights into the Holy Scriptures. At the suggestion of her friend St. Bernard of Clairvaux, St. Hildegard’s private revelations were investigated by Pope Eugenius III who vouched for the authenticity of her gift of prophecy. In the apostolic letter in which he declared St. Hildegard a Doctor of the Church, Pope Benedict XVI wrote that in St. Hildegard’s visions and subsequent reflections “she presents a compendium of the history of salvation from the beginning of the universe until its eschatological consummation…” in which she witnessed to the truth that:
Creation is an act of love by which the world can emerge from nothingness. Hence, through the whole range of creatures, divine love flows as a river. Of all creatures God loves man in a special way and confers upon him an extraordinary dignity, giving him that glory which the rebellious angels lost. The human race may thus be counted as the tenth choir of the angelic hierarchy.
The first two chapters of this book contain the substance of St. Hildegard’s visions of the work of Creation, the beauty of the first-created world, and the Fall of mankind. These visions illuminate but in no way contradict what the Catechism of the Council of Trent splendidly called the “sacred history of Genesis” revealed to Moses. Whereas most young people in Catholic and nonCatholic communities all over the world are taught that the bodies of the first human beings evolved from a common ancestor of chimpanzees and humans a few hundred thousand years ago, St. Hildegard affirms the constant witness of all of the Fathers, Doctors, Popes and Council Fathers of the Catholic Church in their authoritative teaching, that God created all of the different kinds of creatures in the beginning of creation, by acts of His Divine Will, for mankind; and that He created our first father Adam, body and soul, from the virgin Earth, and our first mother Eve, from Adam’s side, setting them as the king and queen of a perfectly beautiful, complete and harmonious universe, free from death, deformity and disease. St. Hildegard goes on to bear witness to the cosmic catastrophe of the

Fall of the angels, and the subsequent Fall of mankind, which brought corruption and death to the material universe.
The third and fourth chapters of this book complete the restoration of a “true conception of the world” by describing St. Hildegard’s visions concerning the relationship between the Earth and the rest of the universe. For many decades, most young people in Catholic and non-Catholic communities all over the world have been taught that they inhabit not a fixed Earth, but a wandering “planet,” a speck of dust, floating in a remote and utterly unexceptional corner of a vast universe. This Earth, they are told, came into existence 4.5 billion years ago, after 9.3 billion years of cosmic evolution from the moment of a Big Bang explosion some 13.8 billion years ago. Human beings, they are informed, evolved from sub-human primates only in the last one million years, thus confirming that the human race has only existed for .00138% of the entire history of the universe, a little more than one one-thousandth of one per cent of the elapsed time since the beginning of the world. These devastating propositions are presented not as the result of wild extrapolation from a small body of observable evidence but as FACTS which only a fool would deny, so that if any student harbors any hope that his home in space and time might be anything but utterly insignificant, it is the job of every good and conscientious teacher to eradicate that hope by a repeated administration of the above mentioned “facts.” Indeed, it would be entirely fitting to place over the entrance to most of the classrooms of the world the same sign that Dante claimed to have seen over the entrance to Hell: Abandon hope all ye who enter here.
One might object that Catholic and non-Catholic Christian students receive a redemptive rescue from this all but universal hopelessness. After all, they are told that God became a man on this Earth, that His Blessed Mother and His Apostles and disciples walked the Earth with Him, that He was resurrected from the dead on this planet, that He ascended to Heaven from here, and that He will return here to judge the living and the dead at the end of the world. But this would be to underestimate the devastating effects of the indoctrination described above. For most young people, the importance that would seem to be attached to this Earth by the Supreme Being through the Incarnation, Resurrection, Ascension and return to Earth of His Son, is swallowed up by the “scientific fact” of Earth and mankind’s infinitesimal significance relative to the spatial and temporal extension of the universe.
What these Catholic and non-Catholic Christian students are rarely, if ever, told is that all of the Apostles, Fathers, Doctors, Popes and Council Fathers in their authoritative teaching believed and proclaimed that God Himself had revealed that the Earth is not a “planet,” but the spiritual and physical capital of the entire universe, created on the very first day of Creation, a few thousand years ago, fixed and motionless at the center of the world, furnished and adorned by the creative fiat of God to be the unique home of the first human beings Adam and Eve and their descendants, in view of the foreordained Immaculate Conception

of the Blessed Virgin Mary the Mother of God, and of her Divine Son, the GodMan Jesus Christ. What students are also rarely, if ever, told, is that the greatest mystical Saints and Doctors of the Church, those men and women who were given Church-approved revelations from God about the creation of the world, from the time of the Apostles until today, all testified to the centrality of the Earth and of mankind in time and space. If they are given this information, these favored few are quickly informed that this quaint and outdated view has been falsified by the discoveries of Copernicus, Galileo, Newton and other great scientists who eventually proved that the Earth is, in fact, a speck of dust floating in a remote and unexceptional region of a vast universe.
Rarer than “the Friends of the Cross” - of whom St. Louis de Montfort said that there is perhaps one in this country and one in another - are those students who are taught the truths contained in the book that you are about to read: who are taught that, in reality, the alleged “facts” of the Big Bang, of the non-centrality and heliocentric motion of the Earth, are not really “facts” at all, but wild extrapolations from a very limited set of observations, confounded and contradicted not only by the unanimous testimony of the Fathers, Doctors, Mystical Saints, Popes and Council Fathers in their authoritative teaching, but by the empirical findings of natural scientists. Dr. Dean H. Kenyon has done the English-speaking world an immense service by translating the monumental work of Helmut Posch on the writings of St. Hildegard of Bingen, Doctor of the Church, on creation, so that the younger generation can at last be liberated from four centuries of bondage to the Copernican myth and receive once again the right understanding of their (and the Earth’s) divinely-ordained central position in time and space.
In conclusion, I would like to make one clarification to avoid any misunderstanding, especially on the part of non-Catholic readers. Neither the author, the translator, nor the publisher of this work claims that it is infallible or that it ought to be placed on the same level as the inerrant Word of God. St. Hildegard would be the first to insist that all that she wrote about her visions must be interpreted in the light of God’s Word as understood in His Church from the beginning. For example, when St. Hildegard describes the six days of creation as each lasting the equivalent of a month, we should understand this as a subjective impression of the time that it took for God to accomplish the great and wondrous things that He did on each day by the power of His Divine Fiat. She in no way contradicts the Word of God which tells us that “there was evening and there was morning, the third day . . .” or that “the heavens, the Earth, the seas and all they contain” were literally created in six days, each consisting of an evening and morning. Nevertheless, we believe that this is just the kind of work that St. Paul had in mind when he told the Church in Thessalonica to “despise not prophecy” (I Thes 5:20) because no one who reads this book in the light of God’s Word, and in His Church, will fail to be inflamed with the love of God that consumed St. Hildegard of Bingen.

Through the prayers of the Mother of God and of St. Hildegard, Doctor of the Church, may the Holy Spirit enlighten the readers of this book so that all may rightly understand the privileged position of the Earth and of mankind in time and in space, and in relation to the triune God, the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier of the world.
Feast of St. Eutychius April 6, 2016 Hugh Owen, Director Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation

CONTENTS
Foreword........................................................................................................... 1 A Look at History............................................................................................... 3 Unity.................................................................................................................. 5 The Copernican Revolution .............................................................................. 5 Knowledge Replaces Faith! .............................................................................. 6 Charles Darwin ................................................................................................. 6 The “Big Bang”..................................................................................................7 At the End of the Modern Era ........................................................................... 8 Hildegard von Bingen, Light of the Century ...................................................... 9 Opposition is Certain....................................................................................... 13 Comments on Chapter I .................................................................................. 14 Chapter 1: The Creation ............................................................................... 16 The First Day of Creation ................................................................................ 17 On the Decision and the Fall in the Angelic World .......................................... 22 On the Fall of Lucifer....................................................................................... 23 On Hell ............................................................................................................ 25 The Jubilation of the Faithful Angels ............................................................... 27 The Second Day of Creation........................................................................... 32 The Third Day of Creation............................................................................... 37 The Fourth Day of Creation ............................................................................ 41 Is There a God or Not? ................................................................................... 47 The Fifth Day of Creation ................................................................................ 48 Creation or Evolution? .................................................................................... 54

The Sixth Day of Creation ............................................................................... 56 The Soul Comes from Heaven........................................................................ 61 The Creation of Adam and Eve....................................................................... 62 On the Animation of Adam .............................................................................. 63 The Seventh Day of Creation.......................................................................... 66 Chapter 2: The Fall........................................................................................ 69 In Paradise… .................................................................................................. 70 The Day After: Rebellion of the Elements ....................................................... 77 The Trilogy of Man .......................................................................................... 79 The Time of Lawlessness ............................................................................... 81 The Flood........................................................................................................ 83 The Incarnation of the Son of God .................................................................. 85 A “Gynecological Report” ................................................................................ 86 And the WORD Became Flesh ....................................................................... 88 The Glory of the Souls in Paradise ................................................................. 90 The Day of Judgment...................................................................................... 93 Our Life: A Final Round .................................................................................. 97 Evolution did not take place ............................................................................ 99 Chapter 3: On the Structure of the Cosmos ............................................. 101 On the Structure of the World ....................................................................... 102 The Six Shells of the Universe ...................................................................... 103 The 4 Elements............................................................................................. 107 Interaction of the Elements ........................................................................... 111 Fire................................................................................................................ 112

The Language of Nature ............................................................................... 114 In the Beginning Was the WORD.................................................................. 117 If the Light Withdraws…................................................................................ 118 The Second Speed of Light .......................................................................... 119 The Ecliptic ................................................................................................... 120 Faith Obligates.............................................................................................. 123 The Wind Blows in the Cosmos .................................................................... 123 Space Current: The Cause of Gravity ........................................................... 127 The 16 Main Stars......................................................................................... 128 The Universal Medium .................................................................................. 130 The Attraction of the Stars ............................................................................ 133 The Position of the Earth .............................................................................. 136 The Cosmos: Precisely Made to Measure .................................................... 137 Chapter 4: Celestial Mechanics According to Hildegard von Bingen .... 141 Copernicus or Hildegard? ............................................................................. 142 The Sun’s Roller Coaster .............................................................................. 149 The Reshaping of the Cosmos ..................................................................... 151 The Sun - A Planet!....................................................................................... 153 A Half-Year Night .......................................................................................... 156 The Planetary Gear System.......................................................................... 157 The Physical Constant 2732 ......................................................................... 158 The Decimal Annual Circle ........................................................................... 159 The Astronomical Scale ................................................................................ 162 Astronomical Calculations without Kepler, Newton and Einstein! ................. 164

Our Earth: The Archimedean Point in the Universe ...................................... 170 The Seven Planets........................................................................................ 172 The Planets - A Help for the Sun! ................................................................. 173 Every year the sun paints an eight................................................................ 179 The Equation of Time: The Tachograph of the Sun ...................................... 179 The Path of the Sun ...................................................................................... 181 The Cardan Function .................................................................................... 186 The Circular Path of the Sun......................................................................... 189 The Ellipse: A Mathematical Cheat Sheet!.................................................... 189 What is Precessional Motion?....................................................................... 191 The Continuing Eight .................................................................................... 192 Where does the acceleration come from? .................................................... 193 The Periodic Acceleration ............................................................................. 194 The Position of the Solar Axis ....................................................................... 200 Independent mathematicians confirm Hildegard’s world view....................... 203 The sky is not magic ..................................................................................... 205 The Scientific “Proofs” that the Earth Rotates ............................................... 207 Rotation of the Earth: A Catastrophe! ........................................................... 213 Glossary........................................................................................................ 216 dBase4 Program ........................................................................................... 220 Index ............................................................................................................. 230

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The answer to the question "Why the universe?" can only be found by someone who casts his gaze on the whole universe. In a woodcut from the time of the Copernican revolution a man sticks his head out of the vault of Heaven and tries to fathom the mysteries behind it. Whoever reads this book without prejudice will be able to present the Hildegardian Revolution to the followers of Copernicus.
FOREWORD
Today nobody doubts the validity of the heliocentric world view, which has become the universally accepted theory based on the work of Copernicus, Kepler and Newton. Kepler's Laws and Newton's Axioms are the universally accepted fundamental foundations for all astronomical calculations, which because of their exact results are regarded as indisputable truth. Hence, in this respect, no more fundamental changes are expected in astronomy. Celestial mechanics is firmly established and whoever doubts it cannot expect to be accepted by the profession with open arms. A few years ago a mathematical institute in Switzerland demonstrated that one can also look at the circulation of the planets as a centripetal effect of an eddy field and then make calculations that are just as exact. The profession, however, remains silent. Did it possibly see that the pillars of "secure knowledge" were in danger? The eddy field version corresponds exactly to those cosmological statements which the gifted visionary St. Hildegard von Bingen made 850 years ago. When I came across Hildegard’s works 20 years ago, I did not anticipate that one day I would be discussing her Vision of the Cosmos. My attention was focused for a long time on her medical statements, which in the meantime are experiencing a big renaissance. Anyone who studies the visionary records more closely sooner or later encounters Hildegard's Vision of the Cosmos, which, as it itself attests, does not depict human knowledge but divine revelation. If that is the case, her world view must be true and this revealed truth must correspond to reality. So far hardly anyone has dared to attach more than an allegorical meaning to her words, especially since her statements are virtually diametrically opposed to our modern world view! So according to the Hildegardian world view it is not the Earth that rotates

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but the firmament! And the sun, so Hildegard writes, would be no fixed star but a planet that circles the Earth daily! Who dares to take such statements seriously? Does that not make one a laughing stock of the learned? The long-standing engagement with the writings of Hildegard has given me so much insight that I must rule out that her visionary statements had to do with medieval views or her personal opinion. Therefore I overcame my reservations and got to the bottom of the matter.
Meanwhile, some years have passed in which I was allowed to find out on the basis of Hildegard’s statements, how the universe really works. The increase in knowledge that we win through Hildegard is very large and explains many things that are still unacceptable according to current knowledge. I also come to the conclusion that our current view of the world cannot be correct, because our existence on a rotating Earth would be impossible. Have physicists thought about the physical consequences of rotation of the Earth? For the adopted rotation of the Earth in 24 hours, the peripheral speed at the equator is about 1,670 km/h. So a point would move with this angular velocity relative to the stationary firmament. That is faster than sound! Due to the law of inertia the Earth's atmosphere would have become differentiated, and gale-force storms around the world would have resulted. Moreover, the oceans would have to rush around the globe – like the film of water on a rotating grinding wheel! If you don't simply imagine that the laws of physics don't exist, then the waters of the oceans must rush around the Earth like a raging current and the continents must be inundated by a continuous storm tide as high as a house. Do you really believe that we would notice nothing from a rotation of the Earth when even a short vibration due to an earthquake suffices to reduce everything to rubble? Hildegard's world view not only makes the Earth motionless again and once again in the center of the universe, but it also gives many other undreamt-of insights to mankind! I have sympathy for anyone who regards the world view of Hildegard with skepticism. But one should strive for the truth and objectively confront new discoveries. In its ultimate depth Hildegard's grandiose Vision of the Cosmos can hardly be grasped by our human mind. However, the more one examines the topic, the more reasonable Hildegard's cosmological statements become. One starts to recognize as it were the miraculous cooperation and the mutual dependence between creator and creature. Through access to this new knowledge reverence for HIM who has created everything also arises again. In the end, writes Hildegard, through the visionary revelations we should be better able to see God in everything. That is the point of all of Hildegard's works and also the point of this book. Hence I sincerely wish that all readers will be strengthened in their faith and in the truth through the Hildegardian world view.
St. Georgen, in Holy Week, 1998

3 Why the Universe?

A Look at History
Gallery of Astronomers

The Greek Ptolemy (circa 90-168 A.D.) taught that the Earth was at rest in the center of the world (= the geocentric view). The sun, moon and planets, bounded by a sphere of fixed stars, move on circular paths around the Earth. He explained the visible divergences by small additional circles (epicycles) centered on the orbits of the planets.
The canon Nikolaus Kopernikus (1473 - 1543), in his heliocentric world view, moved the sun to the center. The Earth, moon and planets move in circular pathways around the sun. He retained the epicycles of Ptolemy. The Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe (1546 - 1601) believed that the planets moved around the sun which itself, however, like the moon, moves around the Earth, which is at rest at the center of the universe.

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The German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571 – 1630), based on the prior work of Tycho Brahe, postulated that the planets revolved around the sun in elliptical orbits. In this way the heavenly bodies moved more rapidly when nearer the sun and more slowly when further away. His 3 Keplerian Laws resolved nearly all the inconsistencies of that time in the planetary motions.
The Italian mathematician and astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564 – 1642) built telescopes with up to 32X magnification. He supported the heliocentric world view with his observations above all of the phases of Venus and the moving sunspots. So he came into conflict with the Ptolemaic world view favored by the Church.
Geocentric (Ptolemaic) World View with the Earth In the Center

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Heliocentric (Copernican) World View with the Sun In the Center
Unity
Up until the time of Hildegard the Church and the State built a “coexistence.” There was only the Church and therefore no separation of denominations. Also the Middle Ages were marked by a mystic-religious world view. The people lived in a world of belief. They felt dependent on a divine Omnipotence whose goodwill was always to be gained anew by pleas and prayers. Aware of their unworthiness, the faithful complied with the hierarchical order, which was in turn embedded in a Natural Law order. Above all stood the almighty God. Training, education and the higher academic studies were the monopoly of the Church. Every statement which did not correspond to the biblical world view was denounced as heretical. Thus, for example, in the 14th century Cecco d'Ascoli was burnt at the stake because, contrary to ecclesiastical (= state) teaching, he had claimed that the Earth is no floating island, but a sphere.
The Copernican Revolution
During the Inquisition the State and the Church made many enemies, above all in intellectual circles. They became the breeding ground for conspiracies against the oppression. In spite of the oppression the world view of that time was no longer tenable. Towards the end of the 15th century Copernicus came up with the theory of the heliocentric view of the world. He maintained that it wasn’t the Earth that was in the middle of the universe, but the sun. Thanks to his position as canon, geologist, doctor and astronomer he was not burnt at the stake. Nevertheless, the Church fought for 100 years against these new teachings.

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Since the Copernican Revolution, man has suffered a loss of orientation. The heliocentric view of the world drove the Earth out of the crosshairs of the cosmic center. Pushed to the edge by Copernicus, it took on an eccentric existence. With the elimination of a favored position in space man lost both his home and his identity.
Knowledge Replaces Faith!
The opponents of the Church rushed from victory to victory. New findings displaced the old world view. The spiritual upheaval began. Knowledge as an antithesis of the modern times started to substitute for the mystic-religious world view! Now, it was blow after blow.
With stunning logic the brilliant mathematician and astronomer Isaac Newton demonstrated a lawful celestial order, which, independent of a divine will, was not only explainable, but was even predictable. He created the mechanical world view of classical physics upon which the later materialists based their philosophy of nature. The Church had no answers on Newton's findings. She went on the defensive, because she was not prepared for this development. Her opponents cleverly took advantage of this by accusing the clergy of hindering progress. The biblical arguments were refuted bit by bit and the new natural science increasingly won respect. The thirst for research and discovery took off. The discovery of the law of gravity by Newton (after 1680) was celebrated as a great success against the oppressors. The new buzzword was causality. This principle of cause and effect served as proof that God was not moving the planets with invisible hands, but that the law of gravitation alone is responsible for it. Science knew everything better than the theologians, who mystified all natural events and attributed them to the work of God alone. For the clergy it was one deep blow after another.
Charles Darwin
This would of course lead to a whole range of important people who were shaped by the new view of the world. We will content ourselves with the most outstanding figures. Among these is certainly the natural scientist Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882). His claim that man was not the creation of a divine Image, but that he developed from the ape lineage, would cast doubt on an important teaching of the Church. Science, accustomed to success, had little interest in establishing the truth. She wanted to raze the last bastions of the Church. Whereas Newton produced mathematical proof, now mere hypotheses were established as laws. Darwin's views were recorded in all the science textbooks, although his hypotheses ( = assumptions) were controversial from the beginning. Although his theory has been scientifically refuted x-fold, nevertheless newly printed books for all school levels cheerfully teach that apes were our evolutionary forebears.

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A Caricature of Darwin
Here the satisfaction of science comes to light, with each of its advances to have refuted the Bible more and more. The gloating of the opponents of the Church is clearly expressed in the letter of Engels to Karl Marx: "This book (by Darwin) is a splendid thing, finally the theology of creation is done for." And Karl Marx was filled with enthusiasm: "This book contains the natural foundation of our theory (communism)." The new world view now also served to help bring political systems to power.
In the East religion was explained as the opiate of the people and was forbidden by law. Incorrigible believers were incarcerated or eliminated. The open persecution of Christians in the absolutist States persists up until the present time! How much suffering and sacrifice up until now must be posted to the account of this anti-Christian view of the world, God alone knows. In any case, based upon it, communism was established in the East and capitalist materialism in the West.
The “Big Bang”
After this rapid development in all fields of science, with genetic engineering in the lead, fewer and fewer blank spots remained on the researcher's map. And people eagerly tried to close these gaps also. And the actual act of creation, the beginning of everything, was still missing. One would have in comparison to creation history a scientific and therefore more plausible account. It’s well-known which idea a researcher came to here: Everything is supposed to have begun with the chance occurrence of a Big Bang (Urknall). Modern cosmology understands this to be a four-dimensional expansion of space-time. Although no one can imagine such a thing, the four-dimensional spatial continuum is scarcely doubted! Some experts on the other hand consider the expansion theory to be untenable. But we can be sure of this: man was thrown completely off track with

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this space-time explosion. It led to the excesses of relativity theory in which Euclidean space began to bend and curve. Meanwhile scientific dogmas end with the prospect in the foreseeable future of being able to fly into the past. Only one must be careful not to fly too fast because at the speed of light every speck of dust becomes an infinitely large and infinitely heavy mass. Even though such a thing is inconceivable, few scientists today doubt this claim. For most people, these theories are inconceivable and instill more uneasiness. The monstrous finds an equivalent in the irrationalism which merged into primeval fear in the case of the atomic bomb. The prevailing world view is reflected in history and culture.
The Big Bang or Urknall is supposed to have occurred 15 billion years ago according to current theory.
Just as the Big Bang took place by chance, all life, according to modern science, began to develop by chance. Mankind is not the creation of God but thanks to evolution man worked his way up ever higher from a single cell over the course of billions of years and then sprang forth from the lineage of the apes. Science fundamentally rejects a Creator or Originator. Nevertheless it enjoys a higher status than the Church, whose influence and importance are increasingly melting away. The centuries-long decline was not stopped by the two world wars, as the empty churches demonstrate. The enlightened person enters these religious sites at best with a camera to pictorially capture the whiff of the past. It would be an illusion to believe that these modern people can be re-evangelized through activities and programs of committed believers. The disbelief runs too deep.
At the End of the Modern Era
Modern science has undoubtedly brought us the greatest technical progress in the history of mankind. Nevertheless there is growing doubt about whether it deserves the claim that it is a panacea. Since the Copernican Revolution the question of the origin of the universe has become a domain of natural science. Today only the statements of such high-level authorities in physics as Isaac

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Newton, Edwin Hubble, and Albert Einstein among others are considered competent. The opinion of philosophers, theologians and metaphysicians is hardly ever included in scientific investigations as it was in earlier times. To whom, however, does this matter exclusively belong? Why do we believe that the cosmological theories of a Pythagoras, a Thomas Aquinas or a Saint Hildegard of Bingen have nothing more to say to us? Who wants to deny the Church the right to have some say in this matter?
As events of recent history teach, nothing has come of the paradise of workers and peasants. Communism, a pillar of this modern age, has now collapsed. The timberwork of the capitalist West is beginning to moan and creak. Modern science’s flight of fancy could be over because it is increasingly being discredited by its contemptuous and destructive activities in genetic and atomic technology. Thus, it creates more problems than it can solve. The world has in fact become more modern because of it, but also more menacing.
A science that denies the Creator, and therefore divests itself of personal responsibility, is unconscionable. Only in this way can we characterize the construction of atomic bombs and the intrusion into human embryonic development. But if ethics and morals do not provide standards for it [i.e., science], then it is dangerous for mankind. The Church has long since given up the fight against science. It is of course not its job to preach a scientific world view. That’s why this science exists without any competition today. The only alternative to it is that Spirit of Science which the Church recognizes as a gift of the Holy Spirit.
Are Hildegard’s writings not inspired by the same Spirit that hovered over the waters at the beginning of the Creation? Was the Author of her works not the Wisdom of God?
Hildegard von Bingen, Light of the Century
Saint Hildegard was a great figure of the Middle Ages. The bright radiance which illuminated her life came from the gift which was already apparent in her tender childhood. It was only at the age of fifteen that she was surprised to find out that not all people have this charisma.
In her autobiography she remarked:
“From my first beginning, as God awakened me in the womb of my mother by the Breath of Life, He imprinted this display on my soul.”
At the age of 42, she received the specific order from God:

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“Write what you see and hear! Make known the wonders that you experience! Write them down and speak!”
After initial resistance, Hildegard began her great work, SCIVIAS (= Know the Ways [of the Lord]), on which she worked for ten years. Among others, she heard the words:
“They (the writings) surpass all that the ancient seers were permitted to see of My secrets.”
Hildegard wanted to submit to the judgment of the Church. Therefore, she turned over her transcribed visions to an examining commission appointed by Pope Eugene III. On the occasion of the Synod of Trier the Pope himself now read aloud parts of Scivias and declared to the assembled cardinals and bishops that Hildegard was the Light of the Century.
After the Pope confirmed her gift of prophecy and she thereby had received the Church’s recognition, she listened to her interior inspirations and wrote down the content of further visions. In the course of this, her second great work, The Book of the Meritorious Life (Liber vitae meritorum), was written. It is a kind of study of life in which the repayments for good and bad deeds are described. After that came her most monumental work, The Book of Divine Works (Liber divinorum operum), which contained ten visions all together, and which the seer needed seven years to write down. It is a kind of theology of the cosmos. Because her statements differ from our modern picture of the world we will go into the question of how worthy of belief Hildegard’s statements are. In her extensive correspondence I found an interesting passage on this point. Hildegard wrote:
“Like the sun, moon and stars are mirrored in the water, so the words, writings, virtues and certain works of men present themselves to me, and shine back again. Whatever I saw or learned in these visions I long remembered.
But what I do not see as a visionary, I don't know, because I am unlettered. I have only been instructed in the simple reading of letters, and what I write I see and hear in the visions and use no unnecessary additional words. I express them in unpolished Latin as I hear them in the vision.” (Correspondence)
From this we can conclude that without doubt Hildegard recorded only the words she perceived in her visions. In the introduction to the book on the cosmic visions we learn the foundation of the visions. Hildegard writes:
“ Then a voice rang out from Heaven and said to me:

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You poor creature, daughter of multiple tribulations by which, so to speak, you have been thoroughly cooked by so many grave bodily torments: In spite of everything the profundity of the Mysteries of God has flowed through you! For the benefit of mankind transmit in writing what you see with your inner eyes and what your soul perceives with your interior ears. In this way people will learn to know their Creator and no longer refuse to worship Him solemnly and reverently. Therefore, write this down, not as your heart would like it but as My testimony wills it, that I am without beginning or end of life. This vision was not invented by you, nor was it for another person to devise, but I have arranged everything before the beginning of the world. And just as I already knew these things before the creation of man, so I also saw ahead of time all that was necessary for him.”
“Write what you see and hear! Make known the wonders that you experience! Write them down and speak!”
Who else besides the Creator of all that exists, the Alpha and Omega Who sees the beginning and the end and is subject to no temporality, can tell us how He made the world? God must reveal Himself to us because we are not omniscient. Only an overall view of what has been and what is to come gives the complete picture. However, man cannot find this out by himself; he must let the Creator tell him. That’s why the Creation cannot just be an object of science, since scientific work must be comprehensible. The Creation is however neither comprehensible nor reproducible!
Through Hildegard’s works we are therefore led, from a higher point of view, into knowledge which goes far beyond our contemporary horizon. What has been seen by Hildegard is astounding to us because it rejects the world view that has been depicted by science.

12 The Ruler of All

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Opposition is Certain
In this book the attempt is undertaken for the first time to honor the cosmic vision seen by Hildegard in an unbiased manner. Despite our modern view of the world, the necessary conclusions are drawn and a celestial mechanics is derived that corresponds with Hildegard's statements. It is easy to see that differing statements on the part of science do not remain unchallenged. One will try to hold on to the "secure knowledge" by means of competent self-appointed referees. The experts represent understandably enough the current established school of thought, which is why a correction by the non-establishment is hardly to be expected. So does everything remain as it was?
The heliocentric world view of Copernicus as shown in his work Cellarius (17th Cent.)

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One circumstance could lead to change: After many centuries of the clergy on the defensive, the world view described by Hildegard is opening up. This is not only consistent with the biblical account of Creation, but it also confirms the previous position of the Church derived from it, that mankind is at the center of the cosmos. Hildegard's cosmic visions agree with the Church, which did not recognize the heliocentric world view even though the scientific weight of proof was almost overpowering and overwhelming. It sounds incredible, but Copernicus deceived himself:
The Earth is no wandering planet but the fixed point of the universe. Hildegard turns our modern world view upside down.
Comments on Chapter 1
In the following 1st chapter we devote ourselves to that biblical account of Creation which is described in detail by Hildegard in the 5th vision of the book DIVINORUM OPERUM. Text from the 1st Book of Moses (=Genesis) will be very carefully elucidated sentence by sentence.
The interpretations of bible passages are self-explanatory so that personal commentary is for the most part superfluous. Especially in this 1st chapter the author is named Hildegard, so that what is left for me is only the role of a moderator who provides a chronological sequence by means of short interjections. To clearly distinguish the “spokesman” bible passages, Hildegard’s text and the author’s words are printed in different typefaces.
At the beginning of this book, it is to the reader's advantage if first of all he becomes familiar with Hildegard's style, which is why in places I leave you alone with Hildegard.
The expressive choice of words requires getting used to. Generally we read much too rapidly. Statements rich in content require a working through like when students ponder their lecture notes. In this way we decipher the content and few questions remain unanswered.
At critical points, it was necessary to give the opinion of scholastic theology and, as needed, the point of view of natural science. There also comes the point at which Hildegard’s texts very clearly conflict with our school of thought. This becomes even more serious in Chapter 3. The contradictory statements can only be reasonably explained little by little. In order to read the book with intellectual profit I recommend that you adopt an impartial attitude.

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For the clearest explanation possible we will look at Hildegard’s collected works. These illuminate a particular statement from various angles.

Literature Used:

W. M. R. L. D. W. B. F. Sc.
C. C.

World and Man Rewards of Life Divine Works Berlin Fragments Scivias (Know the Ways) Causes and Cures

See also information on Hildegard’s works at the end of the book.

Instructions on Usage:
3 different typefaces in the book for: 1. Bible passages 2. Hildegard passages 3. Author Helmut Posch
The “flicker book” for the moving sun in the analemma (=solar figure eight): Take pages 127-211 between the thumb and forefinger of the right hand and rapidly leaf through the pages.

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Chapter 1
The Creation
In the fifth vision of the work Liber divinorum operum St. Hildegard was shown the six-day work of creation. In the course of this the biblical statements of the first book of Moses (Genesis = Gen) are elucidated in a threefold manner:
1. Their physical meaning 2. The theological background 3. The moral interpretation We confine ourselves here to the physical statements because the point of this book is to expound St. Hildegard’s physical world view.

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The First Day of Creation
First Day: The Lord created light. (Mosaic 12, Jh., Monreale)

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“In the beginning God created Heaven, and Earth” (Gen 1:1)
“This is to be understood in this way: In the beginning, that is, at the origin of all things which lived in the being of God as they were to be created, God made Heaven and Earth, which He brought into being by Himself. He created the raw material of all heavenly and earthly creatures: Heaven, which is the lucid matter (lucida materia), and the Earth, which is the tumultuous matter (turbulenta materia). And these two raw materials were made at the same time and appeared in a circle: in God’s circle of power in Heaven and on the Earth.
Out of that splendor which makes up eternity the aforementioned lucid matter gleamed like a condensed light, and this light shined over a turbulent mass. Heaven and Earth were flooded with light but were not marked with any boundaries, not like a man does who creates definite forms by first drawing each one individually with a pair of compasses in order to fill them in later with colors.”
“And the Earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” (Gen. 1:2a)
“The Earth was void since it had no shape yet. It was invisible and without light because it was not yet illuminated by the gleam of light from the brightness of the sun, moon and stars; it was uncultivated since no plow had plowed through it yet, and void, that is, not fit together, because it was not yet filled: It did not yet have green areas and sprouts and the blossoming of herbs and trees. It would not be said of Heaven that it was without form and void, because it produced no crops. And darkness – which had not yet been penetrated by a beam of light so that no shapes were yet illuminated – covered the face of the abyss, that unstructured confusion of the Earth which is the face of the abyss that can be seen, while the abyss itself remains hidden because the Earth covers the abyss like the body the soul so that it cannot be seen.”
“And the Spirit of God moved over the waters.” (Gen. 1:2b)
For God’s Spirit is life. And this life caused the waters to flow so that through them the Earth was firmly established and was not wafted up by the wind like dust. As the Holy Ghost was poured into mankind so the inshore waters also have their streaming course and wash all impurity away, like the Holy Ghost [washes away] the filth of sin.

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“And God said: Be light made. And Light was made.” (Gen. 1:3)
God spoke, He, the inextinguishable Light, that can be darkened by no one. Through His Word it rang out like thunder: ‘Let light be made!’ – and light was made. Immediately the unending light invisible to men shined, nevermore to be darkened. Living circles of light, the angels, adhere to it. For God is life, and His Word does not sleep, but appears as life. And what the Word brought forth, God has determined for His glory. It was not the light of the sun since the sun did not yet exist, and because the radiance of the sun did not appear over the Earth the whole time but it was darkened time and again.”
“And God saw the light that it was good; and He divided the light from the darkness. And He called the light Day, and the darkness Night.” (Gen. 1:4,5a)
“God saw that the light was good, because it reflected the glory of His countenance, and thus He separated it from the darkness. The purposes of the two should not be confused, because one is imperishable while the other however lapses into offense. From God there comes the day because God by His Word allowed the light to arise first, which He called day. It is not our solar day, but an endless daytime which is oppressed by no darkness in its intensity. And the darkness, it is not that which flees before the light of the sun, but that which no light can brighten. But the darkness that lay over the face of the abyss, and which He had not yet illuminated (universe), he called night. The night, which lacks the day, is blind. However, the day is separated from the night. Divorced from the blindness of the night, it shines in splendor. So God separated the light from the darkness of the night.”
“And there was evening and morning: the first day.” (Gen. 1:5b)
“It was the end of this work and its beginning: a single glorious perfection. Because when God’s Word allowed the light to arise, that was His beginning, the morning so to speak, but His perfection was like the evening when the completion became clear.” (W. M., pp. 205 ff.)
Already after the First Day of Creation the heavenly precincts were fully completed in perfect glory. Heaven is called day, because there is an unending daytime there. In this everlasting Day is a subtle, bright material, which no earthly eye can see. During the creation of these heavenly rooms their inhabitants, the nine choirs of angels, also came into being at the same time. The heavenly

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spirits are living beings of light that constantly see God. In Genesis the creation is described as a work of six days. For theologians the question arises as to how God can create a world in time although there is no time in Him, but only the present. St. Thomas Aquinas certainly occupied himself with this question in his Summa theologica. So don’t be astonished if some clerics spent time in this difficult matter on Hildegard’s question: How should it be understood if one reads: He Who dwells in eternity has created all things simultaneously, when it is reported that God distributed His works over six days?”
Hildegard answered It from her vision:
“The almighty God, Who is life without beginning or end, and Who continuously knows about everything, had already prepared the matter for all heavenly and earthly things, namely Heaven as luminous matter, and the Earth, which was an opaque material. But this luminous matter flashed forth from the splendor of eternity as a dense light that shined over the opaque matter in such a way that it connected with it. And the two matters were created simultaneously and appeared as in a circular orbit. For with the first fiat (Let there be!) the angels came forth from the said luminous matter together with their own glowing light. And because God is simultaneously God and man, he created the angels according to the Father’s countenance, and man, whom he would clothe with his garments, He formed after His own image and likeness. Thus, by the command of almighty God, each creature appeared of an opaque material according to its kind of nature.
The six days are six works, because the beginning and end of each work was called a day. Also there was no pause after the creation of the raw material, but immediately, as it were, the Spirit of God hovered over the waters, and afterwards there was no delay but God said immediately: ‘Let there be light!’ – and there was light.” (Correspondence)
This clarifies the question of the days of work. God created the world by the expression of His will. After the sounding of the command: “Let there be!,” things took on their shape and form.
“God existed before the creation of the world, without beginning, because HE IS. He was the light and all glory, and remains it forever. He was always the life. And so when God intended to create the world he needed nothing further to do so, because the whole fabric of the universe already existed in His will. Namely, as God’s intention came out of its shell to create all of reality, the material of the world came forth out of the Will itself, as God willed it, still unformed and like a dark lump.”

21 On the first “Day” of Creation the heavenly spaces and the matter as raw material were created. This is the unilluminated, dark universe, which was called night. Because it was from the outset intended for another purpose different from Heaven, therefore, the two places were physically separated. While Heaven was already finished, the universe still had to be refined and constructed throughout. There was neither sun nor moon, nor any twinkling stars.
Man in the Center of the Cosmos (see p. 140) Besides the Day (Heaven) and the Night (the universe) a third realm exists: the Darkness. Concerning this impenetrable darkness that no light can illuminate, it can only be said of this place that it is the abyss. Above the abyss is the dark universe. It is the face of the abyss, because it is visible, while the abyss remains hidden: “For the universe covers the abyss like the body the soul, so that it cannot be seen”

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The text distinguishes between two different darknesses:
 “The impenetrable darkness was not that which fled away from the light of the sun, but that unending darkness which no light can illuminate.”  “The darkness which lay over the face of the abyss, and which God had not yet illuminated.”
For now, we can localize three different spaces:
1. The Heavens (Day) Light 2. The Universe (Night) illuminated 3. The Abyss (Darkness) unilluminated
The biblical account of Creation continues to the Second Day of Creation without reporting an incident. Later a seductive serpent suddenly appears in Paradise. Where does evil come from? Was it really a rebellion of angels in Heaven? For the sake of the chronology of events we are interested at this point in what else took place on the first Day of Creation:
On the Decision and the Fall in the Angelic World
“There was at that time an innumerably large throng of angels who wanted to become something on their own. For while they saw their magnificent splendor and glittering beauty shining forth in sparkling abundance. they forgot their Creator. They had not yet begun to praise God, so they believed on their own that the radiance of their glory was so great that no one could withstand them. So they even wanted to eclipse God’s glory. However, since they then saw that they could never exhaust His wonderful mysteries, they turned away from Him in complete abhorrence. They who should have praised Him said in deceptive conceit that they wished to choose another god in his luster. Therefore, they fell into the darkness, thrown back to such a helplessness that they can only do something in the created world if the Creator permits it. God had so adorned the first of all the angels, Lucifer, with the fullness of the beauty which He had bestowed on the Creation, that from it all his host burst forth in splendor. But then he, the one who turned to opposition, became more hideous than all horrors. For in the force of His wrath the holy Godhead flung him to that place which is without any light.” (W. M. 29)

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The Fall of the Angels (Duc de Berry) And Hildegard writes something similar in her medical book, as follows:
On the Fall of Lucifer
“Lucifer, however, toward midnight (in the North), saw an empty place where nothing happened, and he wanted to take up residence there with the intention of setting in motion more and greater things than God there, because he did not know of God’s intention to create the rest of the creatures. Because he had not seen the Father’s countenance, he neither knew His mighty will, nor had he tested His goodness, because before he could have found out about this, he had already tried to revolt against God. God had not yet revealed this, but kept it secret, just like a powerful and steadfast man acts who hides his power for a time from his fellowmen who know nothing about it, until he can learn what these think of him and what they might start or could do. As Lucifer now in his perverse will raised

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himself up to nothingness, because what he wanted to do was emptiness, so he fell down into the same (emptiness) and could find no foothold because he had no ground under him. But he had neither the highest heights above him nor the deepest depths under him, which could have stopped him and protected him from the fall. When he flung himself into the void the undertaking of this upswing produced evil, and soon aroused, through the contending wrath of God, evil in itself, impure and without light, like a wheel turning over and rotating, and allowed the glowing darkness within him to become visible. So the evil was divorced from the good, and there has been no contact between the good and the evil, nor between the evil and the good. However, God, the Father of the good, remained unaffected by this like a wheel, because His Fatherhood is full of His goodness, and so this Fatherhood is the most just, the most loving, the strongest and the most powerful, and considered according to this standard, is comparable to a wheel.”
“Hell is outside the world toward the North in unending length and width!” (B. F. 41) “In hell are those who die unrepentant, without calling on God. In the upper punishments above the entrance to hell are those who always having done evil, however at the moment of death call on God and repent.” (B. F. 39) “Where the sun rises in the lengthening day (Tropic of Capricorn), and where it turns back (Tropic of Cancer), there Paradise ends; and as far as the sun moves forward at noon in summer, so far does the arc of Paradise extend.” (B. F. 55)

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After all these statements we must supplement our depiction of the First day of Creation with a wider realm of space. Through the fall of the angels, hell came into being in the North outside the universe. In a vision Hildegard is shown hell from the outside. She describes this terrible place in her work, “The Rewards of Life” (Liber Vitae Meritorum):
On Hell
“I saw still further deep black, dreadful, and immense darknesses which burned completely without the essence of a flame, and on which the described darknesses imposed a burden, since they were building up their inner power. In the middle of this lay hell, which had within itself every kind of agony, misery, stench and torture. But I could see none of what took place therein, like in that darkness, since I did not see this gloom from the inside, but only from the outside. And I surely wanted to see nothing in hell itself. On the other hand, I heard from it a remarkable and excessive wailing of complaints, further violent and untold gnashing of teeth of the wretched souls, and the innumerable, boundless crunching of tortures. It was a din like the sounds of a thundering sea and like the roar of many waters. For all the possible sorts of punishments that exist are found in hell, because the stronghold of the evil spirits is here, who pour into mankind all the vices which correspond with them. These punishments are of a kind that no soul weighed down by a body can examine or understand because they exceed all human measure. And I saw and understood this by the living Spirit.
And once again I heard the voice speaking to me out of the living Light: That which you see is true and it is as you see it, only much worse…” (R.L. 269)
“That is why the man who endeavors to avoid the agonies of hell should reject the devil and flee from his insinuations. For that, he should adopt the faith of the fiery source that everyone took who went without sin. He should protect this by upright conduct, by which he attains eternal joy for which everyone who loves God is prepared. But just as no human tongue can describe every joy, so no human wisdom can depict the misery of hell.
All of this was shown and brought to expression by the living voice of the living and uncreated light, and it is the truth. The man of faith respects this, and he keeps it firmly in mind in his good conscience.” (R. L. 275)

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The fallen angels were transformed into devils. But they retained intellect and reason. In the book, Scivias, we learn that by their fall they have lost every splendor:
“The fact that you see the great splendor, which was taken from them immediately upon their extinction, returning to the enthroned One, signifies:
The transparent and powerful splendor, which the devil lost because of his arrogance and his presumption, …returned to God the Father for safekeeping among His secrets. The magnificence of his glory was not to be useless, but God saved it for another created light….He saved his splendor for the clay. He shaped it into a man and clothed him with quite contemptible earthy matter (natura terrae), so that he does not rise to divine semblance. Because He wonderfully created him, but not with so frail and wretched a form that man was wrapped in, he could not remain in his arrogance, because there is only one God without beginning and end in eternity. Therefore, it is the most criminal of all offenses to want to be the equal of God.
But now I, the God of Heaven, have carefully retrieved to Myself the radiant light which withdrew from the devil because of his malice, and bestowed it upon the clay of the Earth that I have shaped to my image and likeness.
A man behaves this way if his son dies and there are no children to come into his inheritance. Because he has no heir, the father takes this inheritance and, in his heart, reserves it for a second son not yet born to him. He gives it to him after birth (natus ex ipso).
The devil, of course, perished without an inheritance, i.e., without a good work done with the right intention. For he never did anything good, nor did he undertake to do so. That’s why another received his inheritance; he also fell, but had an inheritance, namely a beginning in obedience. He very willingly took on the obedience even though he didn’t do the deeds that go with it; but the mercy of God completed this work in the incarnation of the good Heir. And so man recovered his inheritance in Christ since he did not initially despise the commandment of God, whereas the devil did not want to serve his Creator willingly at all, but proudly sought his own glory. Therefore, he did not receive his glory, but perished in ruin.” (Scivias III/1)

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Holy Angels at the Throne of God (Fra Angelico)
The Jubilation of the Faithful Angels
“After the ruin of this ancient enemy, the heavenly choir began to sing the praise of God, because His adversary had fallen. There could no longer be a place for him in Heaven. Then the angels really saw the miracles of God in even greater glory than they had seen them before. They also saw that such a battle would never again rage in Heaven and no one else would fall from Heaven. However, in the mirror of the pure Godhead, they also saw that the number of fallen spirits would be restored by fragile vessels. In their jubilation that they knew that the number of the fallen would be restored in such a way, they forgot about the fall itself, as if it had never happened.” (W. M. 249) Creation history was now very much anticipated. The heavenly radiant garment that was bestowed on Lucifer returned to God and was kept for man, which God had planned from eternity. After the foregoing it turns out that the second son also falls and likewise loses this garment of light. However, he does not fall entirely as far as Lucifer because he at least tried to obey. Did God not know that

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man also would act against His will, and could He not have prevented it? Does God not foresee events?
“Everything that God worked He had in His present before the beginning of time. In the pure and holy Godhead all visible and invisible things gleamed without temporal moment and without passage of time for all eternity like trees and other natural things are reflected in nearby water yet not being physically in them even though their outlines appear in this mirror. When God said: ‘Let there be!’, the things were immediately wrapped in their form, just as His foreknowledge had seen them bodiless before time. As everything that lies before a mirror gleams, so in the Holy Godhead all His works appeared timeless. But how can God be said to be without foreknowledge of His works? After all, each of His works comes fully into operation once it is clad with its body which is attached to it, since the holy Godhead foreknew how they would assist him as a servant with knowledge and understanding. The foreknowledge of God went on ahead, and his work followed.” (W. M. 29)
God not only saw everything in advance, He also planned everything in advance. That’s why nothing could come into being if it was not already in the foreknowledge, i.e., in the Providence of God. As soon as God said: “Let there be!”, things were wrapped in their material clothing and were immediately functional and complete. The timeless preview images were conceptual designs!

29 The entire creation is a self-contained program, and thought out and built up in all particulars. The above text confirms that. As soon as God makes His will known, what is intended becomes actual reality by His WORD. There are no things that were not in divine Providence. So, for instance, iron, salt, oil, etc., were provided as raw materials. But there were no mountains of sugar or seas of honey. Whatever our phantasy could imagine, there are only those creatures and things that lay in God’s Providence. He planned everything
with love, wisdom and humility. These characteristics of God are spoken of in the eighth vision:
Thus Speaks the Figure of Love:
“I, Love, am the splendor of the living God. Wisdom produced its work with me, and humility, which is rooted in the living spring, is my assistant; peace is bound to it.

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I have designed man, who finds his roots in Me as a form, just as one sees the form of each thing in the water. Thus I am a living well, because everything created is in me as a form…
My glory has also overshadowed the prophets, who, from holy inspiration, foretold the future, just as everything that God created was a form before it came to be.
But reason speaks with tone, and the tone is like the thought, and, so to speak, the word the work.
The writing, Scivias, has also arisen from this form, shaped by a woman who was as it were only a shadow of strength and health, since those powers themselves were not at work in her.” (W. M. 265)
The text refers to a binding natural law order of each work. Nothing can come into being without an intellectual theoretical plan! Thoughts create realities! Words in the sense of articulated planning are the prerequisites for a work. Nothing can come into being from a featureless void. Each work (OPUS) presupposes the Spirit, the LOGOS.

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God created everything out of love! And this love is neither reciprocated by us, nor recognized. Thus, God is the “pure freedom from needs, completely, within and outside Himself. It is He Who has made all in all. That’s why He’s present in every created work.” (W. M. 176)
One observes that on the second Day of Creation the firmament was constructed to be movable, but at that time it was still not illuminated and without rotation.
And God said: “Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters.” (Gen. 1:6)
“This is to be understood in this way: God, Who is the inextinguishable Light, through His burning WORD (= the Son of God) called the firmament into being, this mobility being so consolidated by the upper signs that it cannot become unsteady. And He put it in the middle of the waters, while He thus separated water from water…
He gathered water of the sea as in a tube. And thus is the firmament now. He also placed the primeval flood waters in treasure chambers, which the Earth is. In this manner God set the firmament between the waters, in order that water separates from water. God carried out this separation before He had illuminated the firmament. And it stood in its place still not illuminated and without rotation. And it waited for the moment when it would be lit up by its Creator. But every creature exists initially as a root (prototype), to reproduce through procreation, just as the winter keeps the root and the summer the blossoming of the green vitality. God drafted the creatures of the Earth with His drawing compass to bring them to life according to their proper nature. Only on man did He breathe His Spirit, the other creatures he animated only with an air-like blowing, that passes over with the clouds.” (W. M. 211)
To this day we lack understanding of the separation of the lower from the upper waters. Is there water out there in space? Should we assume that there is water in interstellar space? The same question was also put to Hildegard, whereupon she answered:
“God separated the waters under the firmament from those above the firmament, therefore, so that as the lower waters were intended for earthly purposes, so the upper would be for higher purposes. God separated the waters under the firmament from those above the firmament for the reason

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The Second Day of Creation
Second Day: A firmament was made between the waters and was a distinction between the waters. (Mosaic 12. Jh., Monreale)

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that, as the lower waters are intended for earthly purposes, so also the upper waters are there for higher purposes. In the upper waters there is nothing that grows or declines like in the lower waters, in which everything that lives, grows and declines like man. Rather these upper remain in the same original condition as God created them, and flow in their cycles. They are of a different material from the lower waters, namely much more refined and invisible to our eyes. By their moisture and their fire, which become perceptible by their warmth, they attach the firmament to themselves, like the body is supported by the soul and because of that does not dissolve. However, the waters under the firmament are coarser, a mirror of the heavenly lights, i.e., the sun, the moon and the stars. They contain countless living beings of all kinds, which arise out of them and live. That’s why the purposes of the upper and lower waters are totally different.” (Correspondence)
First we stress that in the upper waters there is nothing that grows or diminishes. Thus, Hildegard’s text rules out that there are other worlds or organic life in the universe. The interstellar spaces, however, are not empty, even though with our eyes we can see neither ether nor any upper waters. The upper water is a medium of subtle material in its original state (as hydrogen?) and invisible to the eye.
“And God made the firmament. And he divided the waters that were under the firmament from those that were over the firmament, and it was so.” (Gen. 1:7)
“God created the firmament of the world by division of the waters lying over it from those lying beneath, and thus the firmament appeared.”
“And God called the firmament, Heaven.” (Gen. 1:8)
“But every thing that holds another is quite rightly called its firmament. Thus, He also called the firmament of the world Heaven since this towers over everything, and forever bears witness of His glory. Just as a man who sees something cannot fully understand what it is, so indeed man does not fully know God, Whom he however sees by faith.
However, man will only be able to see Heaven, which is God’s dwellingplace, when he has become completely spiritual, because this exceeds his sensory capacity and his knowledge. For this reason, the Prophet says:

34 “The heavens show forth the glory of God, and the firmament declareth the work of His hands.” (Ps. 18[19]:2) That is to say: All the endowments of the firmament are rightly called Heaven, since God alone put them in place. His knowledge is not required of creatures, because there is no one who could tell with his intellect how He created this. That’s why they tell of these wondrous deeds of God which are sketched in the firmament just like in a mirror: The sun points to the Godhead, the moon to the humanity of the Son of God, and the stars to His other mysteries. And thus an innumerable throng of believers bears witness to God, Who is God and Man. No one is able to count them, as He also is immeasurable in His glory. However, the firmament in its luminous service proclaims man, who is the work of God’s hands, because he is made according to its pattern. Hence it reveals man, where it obviously bears his marks.
Heaven with the upper waters arches over sea and dry land.

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“And the evening and the morning were the second day.” (Gen. 1:8)
“God finished His work with the same zeal with which He had begun it because He organized all His works in the same balanced way.” (W. M. 212)
We will never fully understand the cosmos. In the end it remains mysterious and beyond our powers of imagination. By firmament all proportions and dimensions are meant, which became effective with the stability of secure laws of nature in the second phase of Creation. So, for example, the waters of the ocean gathered together like in a hose. The division of the waters obviously took place by the law of gravity, which in this phase resulted in rational order.
Consequently the Earth was centered in the middle of the cosmos and formed the Archimedean point about which everything rotates. It is the scene of the whole of world history!
The cosmic water layer, a rarefied substratum, gives the whole cosmos stability, as the body is made secure by the soul. Amazing: The invisible supports the visible! Because of this the Earth, like an atomic nucleus so to speak, can occupy a stable location at the center of the hollow sphere of the universe.
In order to give houses, bridges and machines the necessary stability and function all our earthly plans must observe the physical laws. The right dimensions and proportions arise from these. Similarly the entire Creation was ordered according to measure, number and weight. People asked Hildegard: “How does one understand the saying: You have ordered all things according to weight, measure and number?”
“God has set up the tent of our body with just the right measurements that it does not exceed the weight and size of him who dwells in it. Thus the sun, moon, fire, air, water and Earth are also given just the right weight, number and dimensions. Man, who depicts the whole Creation, also persists in the right dimensions because all his parts are filled by the soul, so that he can neither wither nor suffer any privation as long as the soul dwells in him. Pride, however, which elevates itself above everything that God has determined and despises man, wants neither to recognize nor to worship Him. The arrogant, with deadly effect, keeps himself exiled in homeless-ness away from all creatures. He has no correct measure, since he destroys everything that God in His providence and wisdom has properly arranged and provided.” (Correspondence)

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The dimensions and numbers have a much higher meaning than is accepted by mathematicians. They are ordered to man, who
“cannot grasp the nature of a thing other than by name or recognize the variety of things other than by number.” (W. M. 169)
What is real in nature is the materialization of a spiritual work, determined by measure, number and weight. Thus, for example, the atomic model turns out to be more real than the atom itself. Therefore, an intellectual reality, a plan precedes actual nature. The real things are hidden and secure in it, as Plato said. The greatest mysteries are thus in the name and number, which find a parallel in the harmony of musical notes. But the haughty has no appreciation for correct measure. Insight into the order of salvation is barred to him; he destroys everything that is right. We can calculate and forecast things with astonishing precision, so that one almost has the impression that there reigns in nature an almost mathematical, so to speak, correspondence with our intellect. We think up how the planets should move – and they actually move that way.
Science rejects a mental plan of Creation. This position is in contradiction to physical laws. The idea that there is a number-theoretical blueprint behind the laws of nature is not new, but an ancient Platonic conception. However, we are surprised by Hildegard’s statement that nature is laid out in the decimal system! The number 100 is ordered to man,
“since all lawful regulations are based on decimal numbers.” (B. F. 63)
“God also said: ‘Let the waters that are under the Heaven be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.’ And it was so done.” (Gen. 1:9)
“That means that through the Word, the inextinguishable, the waters that had remained behind under the firmament flowed together into one place. Thus the Earth could appear, that the material hidden by Him does not remain useless…
And God called the dry land Earth, which is the mother of all that blossoms on the Earth. For the first man was also formed from her. The gathering of the waters He called the sea, out of which stream all waters, as if they were generated by it.

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The Third Day of Creation
Third Day: The waters under Heaven are gathered into special places so that the dry land appears. (Mosaic 12. Jh., Monreale)

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“And God saw that it was good. And He said: Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth. And it was so done.” (Gen. 1:10b, 11)
“God saw that everything that he had made was properly and well ordered for His service. By His living Word he commanded the maternal Earth to blossom forth with the growth and blooming of herbs yielding productive seeds. They were to multiply by their seeds, by which they were born again anew, since every sprout carries its own seed in itself, by which it does not stray from its nature.” (W. M. 217)
The same can be said of the trees, repeated mutatis mutandis. The Third Day also closes with the words:
“And God saw that it was good.” (Gen. 1:12)
“This means that all these things were necessary for man, whom He intended to create, and they preceded him so that they would be available to him for later use, and man would suffer no shortage.
“And the evening and the morning were the third Day.” (Gen. 1:13)
“It was the end and the beginning, in which the third work was completed. But God had fashioned the above-mentioned three works in advance, even though they were not yet illuminated by the circulating lights! Like fire is quiet before it is enflamed by the breath of wind, but then is aroused and flares up by the breath of the wind, God’s work was also silent in His Providence before it became evident; however, aroused by the power of the living Word, it appeared in its form. That’s why, from my inspiration, it says in the book of the prophet Isaiah:”
“I have always held my peace, I have kept silence, I have been patient; however, I will now cry out as a woman in labor.” (Isa. 42:14)
On the third Day of Creation the terrestrial water gathered in the sea setting the five continents free. The now elevated dry land is the material basis for a future vegetation. All things germinating, growing and thereafter always multiplying were established in all their various kinds and forms. It surprises us that at this stage the universe was still shrouded in darkness. How can anything grow without sunlight and the warmth of the sun? If seawater collected, then positive

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temperatures must have prevailed on the Earth. How is this possible without sunlight and solar warming?
“By His arrangement God sent the breath of the Spirit so that by it the waters flowed, which were born by nobody unless by Him, so that they cleanse all forms. No water has generated a different water, but it is as it was created; and it is the dwelling place of all the living things that are in it, like Heaven is the dwelling place of the angels. If fire and water were to grow like other creatures, such as a child or a tree, then the other fashioned creatures would perish.” (B. F. 61)
The Spirit of God takes the place of the missing warmth from the sun. He for the first time animates matter. In the seclusion of the dark universe the seeds of all kinds of plants, herbs and trees arise on Earth. When God instructs matter to produce green herbs and creative seeds, that is an act of creation which in turn brings a higher order into Creation. Dead matter begins by the power of greening, which as a life carrier first makes growth and flourishing possible! So the great variety of flowers and blossoms points to the Creator, Who not only brought His inner beauty to expression, but also created the material requirements and technical possibilities in order to make this a reality. The power of greening sets sequences of events in motion. It is not possible to explain these processes with existing scientific methods alone. Behind these processes somebody is hidden, namely someone who knows what information is necessary to enable plant growth by cell division, for example. And this information must be written down in the DNA (the carrier of genetic information) in such a way that a cell can develop itself. With the words “Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed…”, God brought dead matter to life with the power of greening. It cannot be produced experimentally from a mixture of ammonium,

40 water vapor and methane, even if, with the help of lightning, chemical compounds like amino acids and a pair of bases are formed in the process. This kind of science does not apply here.
Life from the laboratory? Since the laboratory experiment of Miller and Urey (1953) it is deemed to be proven that life arose out of the primordial soup. Of course artificial lightning in a mixture of gases forms left- and right-handed amino acids, which can lead to no proteins suitable for life!

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The Fourth Day of Creation
Fourth Day: “Lights are placed in the firmament of Heaven.” (Mosaic 12. J.H., Monreale)

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“And God said: Let there be lights made in the firmament of Heaven, to divide the day and the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years: To shine in the firmament of Heaven, and to give light upon the Earth. And it was so done.” (Gen. 1:14,15)
“This is to be understood in the following way: By divine order the light of the firmament revealed God’s work to be beautiful and glorious, just as the soul makes the body beautiful and glorious, although after the transgression, as a result of its conception, this body is frightfully filthy. Nevertheless, man just like the higher beings will be transformed, if he is raised anew from the dead. God established and divided the tasks of these lights by day and night, because the needs of man depend on both of these distinctions. So man with his gift of reason should recognize by the light which kind this or that creature is, and how the times of day, of night and of the year would be named by these signs, and that these lights which are burning in the firmament illuminate the Earth itself and everything on it. All this is ordered just as God commanded it to appear.”
“And God made two great lights: a greater light to rule the day; and a lesser light to rule the night: and the stars. And He set them in the firmament of Heaven to shine upon the Earth. And to rule the day and the night, and to divide the light and the darkness.” (Gen. 1:16-18a) “God by His Word let the two lights shine brightly: the larger by day, but a smaller by night, whereby the one remains settled in its permanent condition and neither grows nor decreases, while the other waxes and wanes with the signs of the firmament. With these two lights God foresaw how He would complete His work, and that is man in his dual nature. Hence

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man is heavenly in his recognition of the good, and earthly in evil. Knowledge of the good is indeed from God and heavenly, and no one can snatch it away from the rational soul. It towers above evil, which amuses itself by sordid things like the reptiles of the Earth that are in line with evil knowledge and reinforced by the earthly, shamelessly creep about on the Earth at night. The knowledge of evil together with the filth of sin is inferior to the good, and also recognizes this, even though it detests the good. The good is the stronger warrior and resists evil, and if he falls, he is put right again by repentance. So that he does not relapse, it does not cease to protect him, because the good is like the day, but the evil is like the night.
The wicked amuses himself with evil and accomplishes it when a strong temptation (delicatio) leads him to it. With these two insights man differentiates the pure from the impure things.
The day knows about the night and withdraws before it, and the night recognizes the day and flees before it. In this manner the good is separated from the evil, because each detests the other. Thus man’s nature is heavenly and earthly. At first, when the heavens were shaken by the fall of the angels, God reestablished them with the weak nature of the Earth. In this way the Earth is the foundation of the sky, and the sky has been built over the Earth with even greater wonders than it displayed to the first angels. So man, created from Earth, is the consummate work of God (plenum opus Dei).
Also the stars sparkle from the moon like the flame that blazes from the fire, and glowing light flows through them throughout the whole world structure like when a flame shines through a sieve. Thus they illuminate the whole firmament, and as they were once put up they will remain until the Day of Judgment. They shine more brightly with the waning than with the waxing of the moon, since they are not completely visible with an increasing moon because of the intensity of its light. They hasten toward the sun and announce the day, and they aid the moon in the illumination of the night. And thus they separate the light from the darkness as they in their service point to the day and the night.”
“And God saw that it was good.” (Gen. 1:18)
“In the circular course of the light He demonstrated the perfection of His work. He found it beautiful and prepared for His service after the darkness had been driven away.”
“And it was evening and morning: the fourth day.” (Gen. 1:19)

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“The four elements, namely fire, air, water and Earth, in which all things were based and prepared, came out of concealment by the grace of God and became manifest.” (W. M. 223)
Finally light! Only in the fourth phase of creation, the sun, moon and stars were created. You could also say that God on the Fourth Day created the yet to appear fourth element, namely fire.
How much time elapsed from the first to the fourth work of creation? Was it — according to our reckoning of time — only moments, days, or billions of years? It would be most interesting to know. There is a comment on this In Hildegard’s “Notebook”:
“Given that God said: ‘Let there be light!’, and there was light and then a day was made by evening and morning; and then God extended this time just like a month is now, until the same light became established in its condition.
“God also said: ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters.’ And it continues: ‘And the second day was made by evening and morning’; and then this time was also extended just like a month is now, until the firmament became firmly established in its condition. And it is to be likewise understood in the case of the creation that came forth on the third day and on the fourth day and on the fifth day; and these times were lengthened to five months.” (B. F. 57)
Accordingly God needed no more and no less than half a year for the entire Creation! After six months the whole universe was “ready for use.” According to our modern ideas such statements are unbelievable and fantastic! But isn’t the following in the Book of Wisdom?
“For the whole world before thee is as the least grain of the balance, and as a drop of the morning dew, that falleth down upon the Earth.” (Wis. 11:23)
No man would know anything about the beginnings if God had not revealed it to us. Does not the example of the raising of Lazarus tell us that God himself can instantly restore a man in decay?
“Lord, by this time he stinketh, for he is now of four days.” Jesus saith to her (Martha): “Did not I say to thee, that if thou believe, thou shalt see the glory of God?” They took therefore the stone away. And Jesus lifting up his eyes said:

45 “Father, I give thee thanks that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always; but because of the people who stand about have I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.” When he had said these things, he cried with a loud voice: “Lazarus, come forth!” And presently he that had been dead came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: “Loose him, and let him go.” (John 11:39b-44)
The Raising of Lazarus (Nicholas Froment, 1461) In this example we see that the creation obeys the WORD made flesh. Lazarus was instantaneously completely restored spiritually as well as bodily! Nature obeys the Lord in the Word! And the same man, namely Jesus, was also at work when the world was created. He was the WORD that in the beginning was with God. And without the WORD nothing would have come to be. And without the WORD nothing would have come into being. We can only be informed by the revelations on creation because, after all, none of us was present when God created the world.

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The constellations do not change. They will remain unchanged and motionless until Judgment Day! Later we will learn that the firmament actually rotates, but does not expand as astrophysicists believe. The whole Creation, by the way, occurred before the beginning of time, because TIME in the modern sense of a succession of days first began after the Fall. By then everything was long completed. Geologists, who think about the periods of development of the Earth’s crust, speak mostly of millions of years. So, for example, the Carboniferous period began about 350 million years ago. The latest research results tell a different story. Dr. Joachim Scheven (Heidelberg University) writes among other things:
“The many hundreds of meters thick Silurian and Devonian graywackes (Silurian and Devonian are periods of Earth history) in Scotland, England and Wales, and in the slatey mountains of the Rhineland, were the result, according to current knowledge, of a series of submarine turbid currents…The formerly assumed millions of years, which would have been necessary for their formation, shrink to the order of days.”
And the radiometric dating methods using radioactive isotopes offer no certainty. The nuclear physicist H. Schneider has published an investigation of research results which casts doubt on the value of radiometric dating methods. He says:
“Since not all physical quantities can be measured there always remains, despite different methods of measurement, some unknown quantity. This makes it easier to select ‘desired values.’ The standard, to which the geological time scale was adapted, is the putative theory of evolution. A supporter of this science says: ‘What doesn’t fit, stays in the drawer —at least one doesn’t make a fool of himself’.”
Schneider closes his investigations with the words: “What one measures are isotope concentrations, but no ages! The conclusions drawn from measurements are and remain speculation.”
Thus, for example, a rock that originated with the eruption of a volcano from the magma in 1801 in Hawaii was estimated by radiometric dating to have an age between 160 million and 3 billion years. In reality it was 160 years old. You can see how much leeway this field of experimentation allows. The dating methods provide no definitive statement, especially since the time scale can be altered in any way you like.
Also in the same vein Eduard Ostermann (in Our Earth — a Young Planet), through a series of scientifically confirmed facts, comes to the following conclusion:

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“There is no evidence of a humanity that is millions, indeed billions of years old. Quite the contrary: Everything points to a humanity that is no older than 7,000 years.”
Is that enough? Not to tire the reader, we'll let it go with these examples, which clearly show that cheating occurs even in the natural sciences. So it was with the famous skull of Piltdown Man, long sold as the sought after link between apes and men, until some researchers found out that the skull of a human had been prepared with the lower mandible of an ape. But this is not the only deliberate misleading in this field.
An English scientist bluntly admitted:
“Evolution is unproven and unprovable. But we believe in it because the only alternative is the creative act of a god, and that is unthinkable!”
Because of that the question of the true world view becomes a matter of belief. Actually our existence is determined by the question:
Is There a God or Not?
This question determines our life more than all others. Besides it’s not the case that the answer just falls into our lap; it must be gained and achieved by laborious effort. This battle begins as soon as a man gets beyond the age of parental protection:
“People carry in their hearts the battle between acknowledgement and disavowal of faith. How? One acknowledges me, the other denies me. And this struggle leads to the question: Is there a God or not? Then the Holy Ghost’s answer to the question rings out in people: There is a God, who created you; but He has also redeemed you. As long as this question and answer persist in man he will not lack the power of God, because the capacity for repentance depends on this question and answer. However, when a man doesn’t have this question, then there is also no answer of the Holy Ghost, because this man dispels the gift of God and hurls himself into death without asking for repentance. The virtues offer these combative discussions to God, because in God’s eyes they are the evidence that shows the intention with which God is worshipped or denied.” (Sc. I/5)
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. (Gen. 1:20)

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The Fifth Day of Creation
Fifth Day: The waters swarm with living animals, and birds fly on the Earth under the firmament of Heaven. (Mosaic 12. Jh., Monreale)

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“By His Word God commanded that the waters should produce reptiles and birds with living souls, just like flowers that sprout out of the branches of trees. God indeed created the creatures, then he let others emerge from them. That is to say, he foresaw what would be necessary for the whole created order in the firmament and under the firmament, which was touched by Him, just as the form is created first, to be shifted afterwards to every work.
All the animals that swim in the water and fly in the air emerged in such a way that the water would not fail to complete the work that was to be executed by this form. And the air was not to remain devoid of corporeal and living aviators, which would be made out of the air and vivified. So the fish, because of the swimming, are called swimming animals, and the aviators, because of the flying, birds. Man by himself cannot swim perfectly and cannot fly at all. Rather he walks along with his feet on the Earth, from which he was created.
Fish and birds are of a purer begetting than the begetting of the higher living things, because the Holy Ghost sanctified water before all the other elements. And as water towers above all pure and impure things, so also the soul permeates everything and towers above the flesh. The human soul is made in the image of God and works with the whole creation in man. God is in all creatures and He surpasses all creatures, because in Him there is neither beginning nor end.

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And 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. (Gen. 1:21)
“God formed the kinds of fish in the waters, and He gave them a living soul out of a windy incandescence. Therefore, they live remarkably begotten out of the water, and they appeared as the first among all the reptiles. Because the living breath of the Spirit is greater than the form of the body, therefore the waters brought forth the first living things since water is a sacred as well as a spiritual kind. Of course the kind of procreation which takes place in the water is more wonderful than that act of procreation which was debased through the initial deception of the old serpent, since the taste for sin arose with the lust of the flesh. But because the devil cannot destroy the restoration in water, he hates water. In His Son God washed away the scales of original sin by the bath of baptism. In this connection the devil can no longer dismantle man, since he does not know how the Virgin conceived this Man who, by means of water, dissolved all taste for sin. And since the devil remains unaware of the birth of the Virgin, who knew her womb to be inviolate, indeed unscathed, therefore neither can he destroy the generation from the Spirit and water.
By the fish God symbolized that man moves by the living soul, just as fish rapidly move in the water. By the birds He pointed out that man can fly everywhere by his reason, like birds are carried along by the air. So it is with the religious, who keep themselves away from everyday people to serve the spiritual food which is given to their kind, just like the fish and the birds separated from the other living things to live in the water and the air.”
Kingfish

51 “And God saw that it was good. And He blessed them saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the waters of the sea: and let the birds be multiplied on the Earth.” (Gen. 1:21b-1:22) “God saw, that is to say, He confirmed that it was good. The aforementioned kinds of fish and birds were to contain air, by which they would live. He blessed them so that they would lack nothing and bade each one to grow into its form according to its kind and to increase in number, like the seeds and fruits of the Earth grow and sprout. Thus the fish were to fill the waters since they dwelt there, and the birds were to rise up en masse and adapt to their preserve on the Earth and dwell there.”
Barn Swallow
“And the evening and morning were the fifth day.” (Gen. 1:23) “The end and beginning of this working day indicate that work with which God established the five human senses through which the soul wanders in the human being. After all, what the soul sees is of a spiritual nature, since it derives its powers of vision from a spiritual inspiration. It distinguishes what is visible and what is not; it can surely recognize that its power of reason resembles the intellect of angels. It itself lives invisibly like the

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angels. It only moves the form of its body, which is, as it were, its garment with which it is covered so as not to be seen. And yet every creature should recognize this soul since it is lively motion.” (W. M. 226)
Who knows his soul, this living movement? It has community with the angels, who are our soul mates.
“God has indeed joined angels and men together into a unique spiritual reality. He has placed man under the protecting power of the angels, and He did it in the Old as well as in the New Testament, although He has associated both to each other with greater affection in the New than in the Old Covenant. For in the Old Covenant the angel was, so to speak, the voice that was sent to the people; however, in the New Testament he is with man as one like the voice with the Word.” (R. L. 48)
That fifth Day of Creation is greatly expanded in length by the proponents of evolution theory. Yet the billions of years are the lesser evil. A fatal flaw in reasoning suggests that living beings arose spontaneously by chance and developed ever higher from single-celled organisms by small genetic modifications until finally man — as the present highest stage of development — arose out of the line of the apes.
Had the genetic experiments of the monk Gregor Mendel been brought to the world’s attention in Darwin’s time we would have been spared all the speculation about the origin of species. Mendel’s Laws of Inheritance demonstrate that genetic information does not change. Neither in crossing varieties nor hybrids. The species are preserved, whether it is an ant, dog or cat. All forms remain limited to the members of a kind. It is inherently not possible to cross a kind with others, because the DNA molecules do not match. Only modern genetic engineering makes it possible for genes to be transferred as molecular units across all species boundaries between any living organisms whatever. Natural processes and modern genetic engineering are however two completely different things. If sometimes variations occur by mutations — whether by increased radioactivity or chemical damage to genetic factors — no new species is produced because these living beings damaged by mutations have lower chances for survival and die off by natural selection. Mutations are not an advance but hindrances for a species, because the formation of a new organ would not take place all at once but gradually. Could, for example, a perfect eye suddenly appear in place of the black spot as the organ of sight in the earthworm? Even evolutionists do not expect that. As long as a new organ is in the making it would be an impediment for this species. The disabled worm could not withstand millions of years of selective pressure. By the way, it’s gotten out that the long sought transitional forms were never found. The genetic structure

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controls the preservation of the species, which is why no elephant has yet arisen from an ant. A being can neither develop into a being of a higher kind nor even into a being of a lower kind. The whole debate about the origin of species is futile as long as we know nothing at all about what life really is. The essence of life remains incomprehensible to us humans, as we learn from Hildegard:
“The Name of God, however, on which the true faith is founded, is such that He has no beginning. All creatures arise from Him. He is the Life, by which all life breathes. That’s why He also is worshipped by the whole creation. In accordance with the three basic powers that reign in this Name, every creature that has a name likewise consists of three principles. The dead (withered, foul) creation has no special name, since it is not alive. However, these three powers are attached to the name of the living creature: the first is seen, the other known, the third is invisible. You can see the body of a living thing and know that it generates life, but you can’t know or see where its life comes from.” (W. M. 180)
In the fifth act of creation ensouled living things arose for the first time, which represented a quantum leap compared to the green vegetation, because animals with a soul are intelligent creatures. They must have the ability of perception, otherwise the swallow would not find the way into the open air through a tilted stable window to search for food for the young. Every perception however is a conveying of knowledge and therefore an intellectual process. There are intellectual capacities that have an effect on matter. Mind remains mind and matter remains matter. Both interact with each other in living organisms. The gentle spiritual breeze animates the material body.
We see the swallow which incubates its eggs in its nest. We are also aware of the mating and know that after the incubation period the young hatch from the eggs. But how the new life originated will remain forever hidden from us. Even if we were to film and investigate every process, all this would not be sufficient to find out what life is. The breath of life of creatures is just as invisible as the human soul.
Whoever thinks about how a perfect living being emerges from an egg after a couple of weeks of incubation must be struck with amazement. Consider the innumerable biochemical processes that are required to “make” out of the fertilized ovum a downy chicken or small bird with amusing little eyes, a cheeky little beak and nimble legs. Each small change — from hour to hour — testifies to exceedingly complex biochemical processes.
Had that One Who is Life not created all the kinds as prototypes, there would have been no creatures, since no living beings can arise by themselves or

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entirely by chance. The biological requirements alone are not sufficient. Without a fertile living organism there is no life, be it plant, animal or man. “In each kind of living thing God made only two, namely a male and a female, which were already fertile in seed, which later spread over the whole Earth and reproduced. He did not make two of each kind of trees and herbs, but several of each kind over the whole Earth.” (B. F. 51)
Creation or Evolution?
Professors, doctors and docents tell us that, for example, the swallows originated entirely by themselves and by chance one day in Earth history. In a letter to the Romans Paul warned against what the godless evolutionists and anthropologists teach (anthropology is the study of man). “Because that which is known of God is manifest in them. For God hath manifested it unto them. For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; his eternal power also, and divinity: so that they are inexcusable. Because that, when they knew God, they have not glorified him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened. For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of a corruptible man.” (Rom. 1:19-23)
Swallowtail Butterfly

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The theory of evolution is a worthless theory, with which the unbelievers have exchanged the glory of the everlasting God for a phantasy. They have driven out the account of the Creation, and many theologians have accommodated themselves to this false theory of science. And yet an evolution has never taken place! With the law of entropy physics confirms that a universe left to chance doesn’t lead to life, but to death. Also, in the entire universe, even the slightest tendency toward the self-organization of matter is unknown. The theory of evolution is a false doctrine with far-reaching consequences: Many people regard the Creation account to be in conflict with the teachings of science and therefore no longer believe in God. The theory of evolution is portrayed as if it were certain knowledge. Accordingly the universe originated by the big bang. The Earth developed out of a gas cloud, lower organisms originated out of inanimate material, and these evolved into ever higher organisms. Finally man emerged from the line of the apes. And all this by pure chance, without any planning and without a Creator God!
This atheistic doctrine is dinned into children from elementary school through university studies, and into adults by the mass media, scientific journals and books.
But the truth is the following: with the phantasy of the theory of evolution science started a fuss which, according to the words of Paul, is without excuse! Whoever expounds this false doctrine will have to render an account to God.
“And God said: Let the Earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the Earth, according to their kinds.” (Gen. 1:24)
“This is to be understood as follows: By His inextinguishable Word God commanded that the Earth bring forth living animals after their kind, that is, various animals in their forms and kinds: farm animals to serve man, reptiles from which man learns the fear of God, also predators, which show him the honor of God. Every animal has its nature in itself.”
“And it was so done.” (Gen. 1:24)
“Because man has this abundance of them, he can select what is useful to him and can disregard what could harm him. In this way his position of honor is intended to be complete. The domestic animals join with man, the reptiles detest him, and the predators flee from him. He is meant to be Lord over each of them.”

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The Sixth Day of Creation
Sixth Day: Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. (Mosaic 12. Jh., Monreale)

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“And God made the beasts of the Earth according to their kinds, and cattle, and every thing that creepeth on the Earth after its kind.” (Gen. 1:25) “That is, the wild animals that frighten man by their ferocity. The livestock (draft animals) that serve him, reptiles that hide from him, as this was just described.”
“And God saw that it was good. And he said: Let us make man to our image and likeness: and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts, and the whole Earth, and every creeping creature that moveth upon the Earth.” (Gen. 1:25-26) “With the gaze of His kindness God saw that it was good and beneficial that the whole Earth is abundantly for the honor of man. And He said to us, when He, so to speak, invited us to a banquet, that we are a force of an essence of the Godhead in three Persons.”
“Let us make man to our image.” (Gen. 1:26) “That is to say: By each portion of garment that germinates in the Virgin’s womb with which the Person of the Son is clothed for the salvation of man. He was to come forth from her womb, while she herself remained intact. The Godhead will never again withdraw from this raiment, but the human

58 soul sheds the dead body for the redemption of the man, and puts on again Him Whom God’s power resurrected.” “Let us make man to our likeness” (Gen. 1:26) “that he consciously and wisely can understand and distinguish what he puts into effect with his five senses. By reason of his life, which is hidden inside him and which no creature in its corporeality can perceive, he should know that he rules over the fish that swim in the water, over the birds in the air, over the untamed beasts, over the whole creation that dwells on the Earth, as well as over every reptile that moves on the Earth. Because human reason should tower over all of these.”
“And God created man to his own image: to the image of God he created him: male and female he created them. And God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the Earth.” (Gen. 1:27-28) “God created man in the form of human flesh, with which His Son was to be clothed without stain, just like man makes his clothing according to his likeness, and after the form that God knew in advance before all time. He created man: the male of greater power, the female of softer strength. He ordered both forms in the right measurements of length and breadth in all

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parts, as he also established the length, depth and width of the other creatures so that none of them would improperly overstep the other.
Thus God has drawn the whole creation in man. But He put inside him the likeness of the angelic spirit, which is the soul. And this brings about the form of man. However, it cannot be seen by any creature, as long as it is in the body, just as the Godhead cannot be seen by any mortal creature.
The soul comes from Heaven, the body from the Earth; the soul is known through faith, the body however through the power of vision.
He created them as male and female: the male first, then the female, who is taken out of a man and creates the offspring, just as the man shows by the power of his fertility what is creatively hidden in him. Through the winter as well as the summer the fruits grow and come into the light, and without both of these nothing would ripen. Thus the blossoms and the fruit are fed from the roots of a tree, which contain the power of greening; but they come from one unit. Thus many are produced by the man and the woman, which nevertheless are descended from a single Creator. If the man were alone or the woman remained alone, not a single person would arise. Hence man and woman are a unity, where the man is, so to speak, the soul, while the woman is the body.
And they whom the angels behold are blessed as they recognize and praise Him. And He commanded man to grow and increase and multiply in numbers, and by his power to fill the Earth and subdue it. Wherever in fact the Earth is cultivated, there they can break forth in fruitfulness. They are to reign over the animals that swim in the waters and fly in the air. For they tower above them by the range of the five senses, even all living beings which have life in them from the life-giving air, because they are, by the glory of reason, superior to them.
When man will have attained the full number determined by God, then he arrives at that Earth, consisting of earthly people, that is called the ‘land of the living.’ Then he will have fellowship with the Lamb in Heaven.
O how overwhelming is the joy that God condescended to become a man: He emerges among the angels as divine and is human in man! Therefore, He must truly be believed as God and man. And therefore God has also appointed man to His likeness and to completion, which will never depart from him. He acted like a father who gives his son the inheritance to which he is entitled, as He subjugated to him the fish and the birds and all living things that lack the faculty of reason and move on the Earth.”

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“And God said: Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat: And to all beasts of the Earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to all that move upon the Earth, and wherein there is life, that they may have to feed upon. And it was so done.” (Gen. 1:29-30)
“God said in his inextinguishable Word that He has given man the seedbearing herbs as well as the fruit-bearing trees to serve as food. Not that he is nourished with all herbs and fruits, but with every living thing that feeds on herbs and the fruit of trees. He also granted them to live off those creatures that dwell on the Earth and the birds and all beings that live here or there. Everything that lives on the Earth is indeed nourished by the freshness of greening life that springs up out of the Earth. But it is not the case that every living thing is nourished only by herbs and fruits, rather that one living organism constitutes the food for another, and this confirms the use of the above-mentioned herbs and greening branches. The command of God is fulfilled in such a way that everything that exists is subject to the will of God. But every arrangement in the Creation is prepared for the sake of man. For man, whose soul is immortal, will after the Last Day see God, Who never began and will have no end. As long as man waxes and wanes like the moon, that is, as long as he is mortal man will only see God in so far as it pleases Him to reveal himself to man in the shadowy image of prophecy. When God created the beginning of man He

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foresaw the Day of Judgment, but also that time in which a man born from a mother’s womb would be born again by water in the Holy Ghost.”
“And God saw all the things that he had made, and they were very good.” (Gen. 1:31)
“For He had created all creatures in comprehensive perfection without any defect; and it was also good in so far as it lacked nothing.”
“And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.” (Gen. 1:31)
“After that perfect beginning which God had made in the named creatures and in man, for whom He predestined the place of the fallen angels, the Sixth Day shone forth in the perfect man. And this day shows man in advance the six ages of the world with their various tasks in the work of the world.” (W. M. 236)
After these impressive statements we emphasize a few key words: To our likeness:
Adam becomes the model for God’s Son who wants to become a man in this form. The harmoniously placed proportions do not correspond to chance, but to divine measurements! All creatures are drawn in man, which is why he symbolizes the entire Creation, and, in the sense of the word, represents a microcosm.
The Soul Comes from Heaven
How are we to know that man has an immortal soul? It must be revealed to us because without revelation man cannot understand the meaning of existence.
The command of God is fulfilled in such a way that everything that exists is subject to the will of God.
Nature is subject to the will of God. This means that it obeys His every word! This WORD is law. When the Bible says that God created the animals and plants each according to its kind we find a confirmation of this statement in, for example the natural law of Mendel’s principles. God made the intercrossing set of genes constant. Within a certain range there are possibilities of variation, but the boundaries cannot be exceeded. The Bible says precisely this about the kinds! The WORD is in the Bible with the claim of truth, and it is similarly enshrined in Creation as the law of nature. Thus, there is a law of truth!

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The accusation that the simple account of Creation is not scientific proves to be false. Whereas the evolutionary theory of the origin of the kinds is not adequate, the laws of nature confirm the Word of God! According to the evolutionary doctrine, transitional forms between the kinds would have to be found in the Earth’s sediments. But to date the search has been unsuccessful. The complex animals appear suddenly, as in the Creation account! The fossils do not support the theory of evolution, but the Creation account.
Moreover the fossil organisms point to a great natural event, because they died suddenly. That’s why their form has been preserved. With a natural death, they would be oxidized by bacteria and therefore would not be preserved in their form. This is strongly in favor of the Biblical report on the event of the Flood.
Science teaches a model of the world without God. With its anti-Biblical teaching it leads —partially unconsciously— a fight against God. It is not the task of man to serve science! Not all scientists have just the one goal of destroying the authority of the Bible. Nevertheless, the claim to authority and truth is made in the name of science, and in this way a materialistic and atheistic world view is imposed on mankind.
The true science —the Scientia Dei— is at odds with this. It is the science of God, the Spirit of science! St. John refers to the coming of this Holy Spirit:
“And when he is come, he will convince the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment. Of sin: because they believed not in me.” (John 16:8-9)
It is sin, not to have believed!
The Creation of Adam and Eve
In her book on medicine Hildegard mentions hitherto completely unknown details on the creation of Adam:
“When God created man, clay was aggregated by the water and out of this man was formed, and God sent into this form the breath of life from fire and air. Because the human form consisted of clay and water, the clay became flesh by the fire of the breath of life, and blood by its air from the water with the help of which the clay had been aggregated. When God created Adam the radiance of the Godhead shone all around the mass of clay out of which he was made. Then, after it was given a shape, this lump of clay appeared in the external lines of its limbs, but inside it was hollow.

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God Created Man (cutting from the Pantheon Bible)
After that, in the interior of the form out of the same mass of clay God created the heart, the liver, the lungs, the stomach, the abdominal viscera and the brain as well as the eyes and the tongue together with all the other internal organs. When God allowed the breath of life to enter the mass of clay, such components as the bones, the marrow and the vessels, were attached by the same breath of life. Then the breath of life spread out in the mass of clay like a snail fits inside its shell, and the power of greening lies in a tree. The individual parts were consolidated like silver assumes a different form when the smith throws it into the fire. So the breath of life is seated in the heart. Finally, flesh and blood were created in the same mass out of the spiritual fire.” (C. C. 72)
On the Animation of Adam
“When Adam still consisted of Earth the fire allowed him to rise up, the air awoke him, and water passed through him in such a way that he was fully set in motion. Then God sent a sleep down upon him, and now he was cooked with these powers so that now his flesh warmed up due to the fire, and by the air he breathed, and the water went through him like in a water mill. When he later awoke he was a prophet of the heavenly things, knowledgeable in all the powers of creatures and in all the arts. God transferred all creatures to him, so that with his virility he adopted them because he was acquainted with them and had knowledge of them. For man as such represents all creatures, and the breath of life that has no end of life is in him.” (C. C. 76)

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There was still no Eve. She was created out of one of Adam’s ribs. How is that to be understood? For that purpose let’s read Hildegard’s text:
“After God had created Adam, when God caused him to sleep, Adam felt a strong sense of love while asleep. And out of his rib God created a form for the man’s love, and thus the woman is the man’s love. As soon as the woman was formed, God gave the man the instinct of procreation, so that he would create sons through his love of the woman. When Adam caught sight of Eve he was filled with wisdom, because he saw before him the mother through whom he would produce sons. But when Eve looked at Adam she saw him as if she were looking into Heaven and like the soul aspires upward that desires the heavenly, because her hope was directed toward the man. Thus there will and can be a mutual love only between man and wife, and no others.” (C. C. 207)
In her notes Hildegard in fact records the exact chronological sequence of events in the creation of Adam and Eve, up until their Fall:
“And then: ‘Let us make man according to our image and likeness.’ The time in which Adam received the outline, the form and the breath of life was extended to be like a week is now. When God sent a sleep on Adam and took the rib, was one week. When God led Eve to Adam and into Paradise and gave the commandment, was a week; when Adam ate the fruit and was expelled from Paradise, was a week; which together make one month.” (B. F. 57)
From the clay model to the finished human being took one week. While Adam slept in the second week, Eve was created. In the third week God led both of them into Paradise. They lived there for a week in happiness and harmony. By the following fourth week they already fell, and this ended their paradisiacal existence.

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Two pairs of little dragonflies mating.
“God the Father had such joy within Him that He caused the whole Creation to come into being through His Word. Hence the
Creation also pleased Him, and He takes into his arms every creature that lovingly touches him.”

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The Seventh Day of Creation
Seventh Day: On the Seventh Day God rested from all His works that He had made. (Mosaic 12. Jh., Monreale)

67 “So Heaven and Earth and all their adornments were completed.” “That is to say: the upper and lower elements are completed in such abundance and perfection, together with all their additions with their powers, that they rejoice in the superabundance of harmonious advantages without any defects.” “ And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made: and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done.”
“The completion of the various described six days of work was called the Day of Rest, because God completed everything that He had preordained to be created. And so God rested on the Seventh day since He had performed all His work in every form. God blessed the Seventh Day and sanctified it, since in it He ceased from each of His works that He had planned to do. God blessed the Seventh day with renown and sanctified it with the dignity of a holiday, since in it the whole Creation lives, made in rotund fullness. God allowed this order of Creation to unfold in the creative Word according to His prior purpose, out of which then all other begotten beings were to come. That’s why all the hosts of angels and all the inscrutable mysteries of the Godhead praised their God on account of the perfection of the work of God, since He had completed all His work with the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit.” (W. M. 249)

68 The entire Creation lives in HIM and God is in all creatures. We are not alone, not lonely and godforsaken. All life is a life from God, Who is among us, until the end of time. God is not dead. On the contrary, everything lives through Him, because He is the Life.
The universe according to the vision of St. Hildegard from the book Scivias.

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Chapter 2
The Fall
Cardinal Ratzinger has said: “The inability to understand original sin and make it comprehensible is really one of the most serious problems of current theology and pastoring.” (R/79-80) If modern man no longer feels in need of redemption, then the whole structure of faith is threatened. This plight is due in large part to today’s scientific world view, which is based on the theory of evolution. The result is that the biblical account of Creation is reinterpreted and denied in part. Hildegard’s works offer us a unique insight on this subject. Her statements on Creation and Redemption go far beyond our current knowledge without contradicting the teaching of the Church. Since we have learned in Chapter 1 how God created the world, we are now interested in what happened to Adam and Eve in Paradise.

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In Paradise…
In Paradise there was no time in the sense of an earthly transitoriness. Adam and Eve did not age. There was as yet no alternation of day and night as we have today. The whole creation was in stationary peace and harmony. For Adam and Eve it was to have been an eternal day and an eternal existence, because they were immortal as long as they kept God’s commandment. Also the whole universe was illuminated with heavenly light, which is why not just the Earth, but the whole cosmos, was paradisiacal. “Yes God created Adam that he should live forever without change. But he fell through disobedience, when he listened to the advice of the serpent. That’s why the serpent believed that he would be lost once and for all. But that was not God’s will. He awarded the world to man as an exile, in which he now conceived his children in sin and bore them.” (W. M. 181)
Paradise (Bradi Barth)

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“The Earth was not to have been illuminated by the radiant circle of the sun, but permeated by the living light of eternity. Meanwhile man disobeyed the divine commandment, and thus he was thrown back into the mutability of earthly things.” (W. M. 253)
“Before the Fall of Adam the four elements were bright and soft. Fire did not burn, air was refined, water did not flood…” (B. F. 40)
Adam was a highly gifted and perfect man who knew all the secrets of nature, because the foundation of the whole Creation was laid in him. And even more:
“Before the Fall Adam knew the song of the angels and all kinds of music, and had a voice sounding like the tone of the monochord.” (C. C. 225)
In the 38 theological questions in Wibert’s letter to Hildegard the question was asked:
“What manner of speaking did God use, and in what form did He appear to the first man…?”
“God spoke to Adam in the language of the angels, which he knew and understood well. At that time, by the wisdom received from God and by the spirit of prophecy, he knew all the languages that would later be invented by men, and he had complete knowledge of all creatures. For the Lord appeared to him in inconceivable glory, more beautiful than any creature; and after the Fall He consorted with him in Paradise in a flame of fire.” (Correspondence)
In which language did Adam and Eve likely converse?
“Adam and Eve spoke a Teutonic language that is not divided into different forms like the Romance languages.” (B. F. 58)
And they gave the creatures Teutonic, that is, German names! Who would have thought this?
As was discussed already several times, the paradisiacal existence suddenly came to an end. We know something of what happened at that time. After his banishment from Heaven, Lucifer could only watch how God completed His Creation. To his astonishment a new creature appeared that was clothed with, of all things, that heavenly light that once was his beauty:

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“When the devil had seen the woman, he discovered — in the knowledge full of envy by which he realized that he was thrown out of Heaven —, what God had given man for clothing…”
Now the devil realized what glory he had lost and looked upon this human pair with grueling envy:
“And he sharpened his rage against the woman because he realized that, as the child-bearer, she was the root of the entire human race.”
Therefore, the devil observed the pair and reflected on how he could harm them. Lucifer did not yet know that Adam and Eve had received a command imposed by God. The seducer certainly recognized Eve as the mother of all men. That’s why, with the help of the serpent, the devil sought to induce the pair to fall already in the first generation. This was the only chance to plunge all mankind into disgrace “by nature.” The Holy Scripture reports:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise? And the woman answered him, saying: Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die. And the serpent said to the woman: No, you shall not die the death. For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil. And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and when they perceived themselves to be naked…” (Gen. 3:1-7a)
Some theologians suggest that there was a sexual offense in the Fall of Man. But what could Adam and Eve have done wrong? They had God’s command to multiply. This act was only thought of differently when it was consummated after Adam’s Fall. Hildegard made an interesting note on this:
“If Adam and Eve had remained in Paradise, they would have produced children without the yearning for sexual intercourse, so that at the appointed time the man would have gone to the woman without the blaze of desire and he would have snuggled up side by side with the woman in chaste love and embrace; and thus they would have perspired while gently sleeping. Then the woman would have become pregnant from the perspi-
 RSV: “…was to be desired to make one wise…” (Translator’s note)

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ration of the man, and while she would have gently slept, the woman by the power of God would have painlessly secreted the offspring from her side like perspiration, like God brought Eve out of Adam, and like the Church arose out of Christ’s side, because man would not have been a transgressor. He would not have been nourished by women’s milk, but when he was born he would have eaten the food specified by God, and he would not have aged…” (B. F. 60)
The Fall was not a sexual offense, but the disregard of that single command that God imposed on them as a test of obedience: The fruit of the forbidden tree is not to be eaten! However, they ate:
“Eve did not share the fruit but ate all of it and gave another whole fruit to Adam.” (B. F. 55)
The consequences of this for Adam and Eve were drastic:
“All the vessels of the woman would have remained intact and healthy, if Eve had always remained in Paradise. But when she had regarded the serpent with approval, her sight with which she had looked at the heavenly things was extinguished, and when she listened to the serpent approvingly, her hearing with which she had heard heavenly things, was closed, and with the enjoyment of the apple the radiance which until then had illuminated her was darkened.” (C. C. 160)
The approving glance at the tempter already blinds, and listening to the evil one and agreeing with him deafens. The act — the eating of the forbidden fruit — resulted in the couple losing the heavenly garment of light and the spiritual vision. By turning to the evil one Eve lost her spiritual innocence and with it also the ability of heavenly perception.
“Before the original sin, when the soul in its innocence ruled the body, the first parents had spiritual eyes.” (Correspondence)
After the Fall fleshly eyes were opened to them. As a result, they literally entered another world, because their perception was now sensual. In no other way did Adam fare:
“Before Adam had transgressed the divine commandment, that which today is the gallbladder in man shone brightly like a crystal in him and with

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the taste of good works. That which today is man’s black bile was radiant in him at that time like the dawn, and held the consciousness and the perfection of good works. But when Adam had transgressed the command, the glow of innocence in him was darkened, his eyes, which before saw the heavenly, were extinguished, the gall turned into bitterness, the black bile into the darkness of godlessness, and he himself transformed into a completely different kind. Then sadness overcame his soul, and soon an excuse for this was sought in anger. Because sadness gave birth to anger, sadness, anger and whatever else brings harm have also come over men (were inherited) from their progenitor.” (C. C. 220)
Now it is understandable why the pair did not notice before their fall that they were naked: Their angelic radiance illuminated the body. In place of the gall bladder Adam had a glowing crystal within him, and instead of black bile a fluorescent material flowed enveloping the body with light. However, with the enjoyment of the forbidden fruit the crystal developed into bile acid and biliary pigment, and the fluorescent matter became black bile, that substance that is involved in every serious illness. The fruit produced a biochemical reaction and damaged the organism in such a way that it was only capable of living for a limited time. The really new thing was biological dying, death.
“With the transgression of the divine command man underwent a bodily and spiritual transformation. The purity of his blood was altered to a different composition, so that instead of the former purity he pours out the foam of his seed. Had man remained in Paradise he would have continued to live in unchanging and perfect condition. However, after the transgression, all this has turned into a different and bitter way.” (C. C. 58)
The eating of the forbidden fruit also set the gastrointestinal tract in motion. It was not previously overburdened with food. That was an irreparable mistake that resulted in death. The offence of the first human couple was really the eating of a forbidden fruit:
“The original sin stemmed from that food which transformed sound and happy human nature itself into mortality. With this food the good conscience, so to speak, fell asleep, but the evil rose up to a perverse way of life. For the transgressors of justice have deviated from the real truth. Human nature became an unfamiliar, toxic shoot, and in fact by the mouth of the serpent who cunningly asked why only man was not permitted to consume the apple. But since the first pair transgressed God’s command on the advice of the serpent, people died the death. That’s why also the children that come from them are already at conception alienated in the death of ungodliness from the protection of holiness.” (R. L. 111)

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The Tree of Knowledge: “Of this tree thou shalt not eat.” In comparison with the unalterable fate of the fallen angels mankind still had incredible good fortune. Why? “Had Adam fallen before Eve his fall would have been so violent and so completely incurable that man then would have fallen into such a great and irreclaimable hardening that he neither would have wanted to be redeemed nor could have been. But since Eve, who after all was weaker than the man, was the first to break the divine command, it would have been easier to expunge the guilt. The flesh and skin of Adam were stronger and harder than they are now in man because Adam was made out of Earth and Eve out of him. But when they had begotten sons their flesh became more and more frail and weak, and it will be like this until the Day of Judgment.” (C. C. 79) Again and again people went on the search for the lost Paradise. They sought an area, a specific place. However, Paradise was not a place and not a limited region, but a condition. It was the heavenly harmony between God and man and

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between man and the cosmos. Man was endowed from Heaven and the whole universe shone with heavenly light. Heaven was open and the universe as a whole was Paradise.
The Fall of Adam and Eve (Bradi Barth) After Adam’s fall “all the elements were shrouded in deep darkness; during that period Adam was sent into the exile. Now as he saw the light of this world he rejoiced, because he himself belonged to the darkness, and he said with tears: I have to live differently now, as God had previously blessed me to live! So then he began to work in sweaty toil. Earlier, before Adam and Eve had broken the divine command, they shone with a radiance like the sun, and this radiance was, so to speak, their clothing. But after the transgression of the divine commandment they no longer shone like they had before, but became dark and remained in this darkness. When they now saw that they no longer had their former radiance they noticed that they were naked and clothed themselves with tree leaves, as it is written.” (C. C. 78) The loss of Paradise was connected with a change in the whole environment and had personal consequences for the couple. The Fall precipitated a rush of events. The pair lost their biological immortality through the loss of the heavenly garments, and at the same time they lost their spiritual vision, which had allowed them to look into Heaven. Adam and Eve became blind to the spiritual world, so Heaven was closed to the inhabitants of the Earth. But also the heavenly light that illuminated the cosmos withdrew from it.

77 Adam and Eve opened earthly eyes and now the Earth was brightened by the sun. Adam’s fall led in effect to a transformation of the whole universe. It is often said that by this disobedience the entire cosmos was set in motion.
The Day After: Rebellion of the Elements
“Since man revolted against God, the Creation opposed him, although earlier it was subject to him. And thus all the elements of the Earth, which previously rested in a deep peace, were thrown into turmoil and presented a terrifying sight: Made for the service of man the Creation had experienced no opposition whatever; but when man became disobedient and did not listen to God it also lost its peace and fell into turmoil. It brought many great disadvantages to man….” (Sc. I/2) Similar statements run through all the works of Hildegard: “Before the fall of Adam the elements did not move, neither the sun nor the moon marked the passage of time; after the Fall and after his death all things moved as they do now, because before his fall everything was in the gleam of the first light.” (B. F. 40)
The Crucifixion (Masaccio, 1401-28)

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“Before the fall of Adam the firmament was immovable and did not rotate. But after his fall it began to move and to turn round. But from the Day of Judgment it will again be motionless, like it was in the first stage of Creation before Adam’s fall.” (C. C. 24)
This is really strong stuff. The above statement should be read a few times, because the dramaturgy of the whole of human history lies hidden in this short text! The firmament rotates! This physical change is not meant to be taken allegorically, but in all seriousness should be seen as an event that became necessary. The physical-biological changes gave birth as it were to the transitory, TIME. By the Fall of Man time began in the sense of a passing sequence of events.
“The length of time was determined by the revolution of the sun.”
Instead of the unending day there was a transitory day of 24 hours. The couple entered a changed world having the opposites of day and night, of good and evil, of life and death.
So now man had also fallen and he was threatened with the same fate as the devil. Adam and Eve had thoughtlessly squandered their claim to eternal bliss. Without the Son of God’s rescue operation man would have been as lost as the fallen angels. After the demise the devil would have had claim to souls because man listened to him and not God. Heaven was closed! What a tragic fate for the first pair of people and what an apparent failure for God. Does this not mean that God indeed foresees everything but does not predetermine everything? Could He not have prevented this reaching for the apple? Why didn’t God stop the devil from enticing man into a forbidden action?
“God did not want to oppose him in His power, but overcame him in humility through His Son. And because Lucifer mocked God’s justice, he could not, by the righteous judgment of God, comprehend the Incarnation of the only-begotten of God. Because by this hidden counsel the lost sheep was restored to life. Why then, you rebellious people, are you so stubborn? God did not want to desert man, but sent His Son to rescue him. This is how God crushed the origin of pride in the ancient serpent. Because when man was snatched away from death the underworld opened its gates and Satan cried out: ‘Oh alas, who will come to my aid?’ And the whole satanic clan tortured itself snorting fury, and when they saw that the faithful souls were snatched away from them they asked in amazement what sort of

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mighty power this could be that they with their leader could not withstand it. Thus man was raised above the heavens, because through God’s Son God appeared in man, but man also appeared in God….
God’s Son set him free by His blood and victoriously led him to heavenly glory. How did this happen? In humility and love.” (Sc. I/2)
“But why did the almighty God allow His only Son, who was without any sin, to endure such suffering? Apparently for this reason, so that the old deceiver would have no cause to oppose God. But man had often accepted Him, and in particular had followed His behest. If a sinful man had been killed for others, then the evil spirit would have claimed that he could free nobody since he himself would have been rightly convicted of sin, about which he was in agreement with him. Hence, he also had no possibility to free himself or another from the noose of captivity. Thus the living God gave His Son in order to redeem man by the robe of His humanity.” (W. M. 272)
“And thus redeemed man shines in God, and God in man. That is to say, man in communion with God in Heaven now has a brighter glory than before. This would not have been so if the Son of Man had not clothed Himself with flesh; for if man had remained in Paradise, God’s Son would not have suffered on the Cross. But since man was deceived by the cunning serpent, God was moved with sincere compassion so that He decided to allow His only begotten to take on flesh in the most pure Virgin. And so after the Fall of Man many luminous powers of virtue rose in Heaven….” (Sc. I/2)
Fallen man is the lost sheep that is sought by the Son of God and pressed to His heart. Being called home by baptism and faith in God is the most important event of his life. Every man must return home as a lost son and share in the joy of being received back into God’s grace. By the work of salvation this homecoming leads to a paradisiacal joy of comfort and safety.
The Trilogy of Man: homo constitutus — destitutus — restitutus
As a created work of God man from his origin had an optimal constitution and along with it an existence that was completely free of problems in the Creation which served him. Hildegard designated the first man as the homo constitutus! Because of his failure the whole environment changed, and also the biology of man changed into a homo destitutus, a weak, frail being that since Adam’s fall is subject to sickness and death. Sickness and death are the significant features

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of this existential destitution (= degeneration), which is associated with black bile. It causes melancholy, sickness and death. Genetic transference occurs through the toxic foam of the seed, because reproduction also became destitute.
Because God had mercy on man He sent His Son for salvation. Nevertheless, during the work of salvation our biological frailty remained unchanged; what was created was only the possibility of ultimate, in the sense of the word, restitution (=restoration to the original condition). Man now has the chance through baptism and faith in God to be a brighter glory than ever before, to be a homo restitutus. Also this is implied in the Bible passage:
“But as many as received him, he gave them power to be made the sons of God.”
Man must make every effort to receive God, and persistently to believe in the triune God, and to live in such a way, no matter what the circumstances, that he achieves the heavenly glory after this transitory life, because there is no alternative. Ultimately we are left with only two possibilities: Either to enter into the inheritance of God, or to be thrown into the everlasting fire as an unrepentant and unbelieving person. Therefore, we should regard our life as a time of probation and use it accordingly. Only this attitude makes many hardships more bearable. However a life may proceed it has the prospect of impermanence. Life is and remains a time of probation and testing:
Why did God create man in such a way that he could sin?
“Therefore, listen to me and understand, you who say in your heart: What is this and why is it so? Oh, why are you so foolish in your heart, which has been created for you in the image and likeness of God? How could such a great honor and glory like what is bestowed on you remain without testing, as if you were without meaning and purpose?
Gold must be proved by fire and precious gemstones must be cleaned and polished, and all such materials are investigated for all their properties. In other words, you foolish people, how could that which is created in the image and likeness of God persist without being tested? For man more than any other creature must be tested, and therefore purified by the whole Creation. Flesh by flesh, Earth by water, fire by cold, battle by defeat, good by evil, beauty by ugliness, poverty by wealth, sweetness by bitterness, health by sickness, length by shortness, hardness by softness, height by depth, light by darkness, Paradise by suffering, the Kingdom of Heaven by hell, earthly with earthly, heavenly with heavenly. Thus man was tested by the whole creation, namely in Paradise, on Earth and in the underworld; then he was transferred to Heaven. You can see clearly only a little of all the many things that are hidden from your eyes. And why do you laugh at

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that which is right, understandable, just and good from God in all His blessings? Why are you indignant about it? God is just, but the human race is unjust in its contempt for the divine commandments while it strives to be wiser than God.” (Sc. I/2) Perhaps we now understand our world of contrasts a little bit better. With Adam’s fall, the static universe turned into a dynamic wheel of time, into which man is born. Our life is like a shooting star coming out from God which is incorporated into the wheel of time, to leave again after such and so many revolutions of the universe. Each revolution corresponds to a day. No one is entitled to a certain number of days because no one knows how much time he has. Constantly new sparks flow into the wheel of the world, while others have to leave it again. In the end the inextinguishable spark, our soul, returns to God and is weighed: the grain goes into the barn, the chaff is burned. When the full number is reached, then the turning wheel of time has fulfilled its purpose and will stand still again.
The Time of Lawlessness
After Adam’s fall there came a time of total lawlessness: “No twofold command was to be imposed on Adam. Why? I gave him one command regarding the tree as he looked at Me in the innocence of his heart. But he scorned Me and agreed with the cunning serpent. This proved to be so pernicious that now no mortal eye can see Me any more, as long as men live in this fleeting world. But because Adam transgressed My commandment, he together with his kind, remained without commandment until the time which proclaimed the generosity of My Son. (Sc. II/2)
Moses with the Tables of the Law, angry with the Israelites, who worship the golden calf.

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Between the lines we gather that God was deeply disappointed in His creatures. From now on mortal man could no longer see Him! God now leaves men on their own. Then it went all haywire in the truest sense of the word:
“But when Adam was expelled from Paradise, the water — before the Flood — did not yet flow in strong currents, nor did it have the fluidity it would acquire later. It had on its surface, as it were, a skin (membrane) that somewhat restricted its movement so that it only flowed slowly. And at that time the Earth was not yet so muddy, but dry and easily friable since it was not yet saturated with water. However, in accordance with its primary purpose, it yielded an abundance of fruit. At that time men had forgotten God and acted more like animals than according to the will of God. Hence it came about that many loved animals more than people, so that women as well as men mixed with animals and had relations with them to such an extent that the image of God in them was almost completely destroyed. The whole human race was changed into monsters, and transformed so that in fact some men modeled their way of life and voice after the way of wild animals in their walking about, howling and life. Before the Flood wild animals as well as livestock were not yet as wild as they became later. Neither did men flee from them nor they from men and they were not afraid of one another.
Wild animals and livestock gladly dwelt with humans, and humans with them, because in their first appearance they came into being at nearly the same time. But the wild animals caressed the people and these in turn caressed the animals. That’s why they loved one another in more and more unnatural ways and mated with each other. But meanwhile Adam had begotten several sons who were so filled with the Spirit of God that they did not want to get involved in anything disgraceful, but remained holy. Therefore they were called sons of God.
These looked around and investigated where such people would be who did not get involved with the livestock and who would not have debased themselves by intercourse with them even though they were sons of the transgressors of the law, as mentioned above. Therefore, they were also called sons of men because they were not run-down in their outward appearance or by association with animals. From their daughters they took wives for themselves and begat children with them, as it is written: ‘The children of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful.’ But still today there are both wild and domestic animals which, in the manner mentioned above, have adopted from people a lot of the nature of man.
Then the outcry against this injustice rose up to the eyes of God, because the image of God had been mutilated and destroyed, and His original

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purpose had been transformed into unchastity. As the Spirit of God, Who hovered over the water at the Creation of the world, sent the waters, and the skin thereof tore apart, the water became nimble in its course and drowned men…” (C. C. 79ff)
This first lawless epoch is described with similar words in the 7th vision of the book, World and Man. At that time men were of such strength that they were ready for even the largest and wildest animals. The power of the Sun was much stronger then, which is why plants and animals had a special vigor and became very large.
Stained by the venom of the serpent, the savage people worked totally for the taste of meat, and not according to the breath of the soul. And the tempter spoke to them through the animals: “I am the one who created you.” In this manner he enticed them to defile themselves with the animals, so that the image of God would be destroyed in man. If the product of their unnatural union was of the human kind, they hated it, but if it had more of the form of an animal, they caressed it.
Some of Adam’s descendants knew that their forefather was in Paradise and was sent into exile because of his disobedience. Those did not mix with the livestock, even though they were harassed and ridiculed by the savage beings. So they sought refuge on high mountains. In this seclusion a moral strength could develop which prevented them from sinning. They sighed and said: “Where will we search for the One who created us?” However, God shrouded Himself in silence. No wonder when we consider the gap that occurred between the planned creation and reality.
The Flood
“But after the Earth was filled with such a perverse people, I Who Am could no longer tolerate this criminal outrage. I decided to destroy the people in the water, with the exception of the few who acknowledged me.” (W. M. 253)
“Since I could no longer tolerate that kind of thing, I drowned them in the Flood.” (W. M. 285)
“For during the Flood the water saturated the whole world to the bottom of the penetrable Earth (i.e., to the core) and transformed it into slime, as it will also glow on Judgment Day down to the same depth, because man from then on will no longer need it. For God exercises his judgments on man by water and fire…” (D. W. 395)

84 God lowered the corpses into this slime, so that afterward they could no longer be found. So the Earth was thoroughly cooked by the heat of the sun and became different than it was before. But after the Flood human nature became weak and sickly, and it has remained in this state.
Noah’s Ark “However, those whom the Lord had preserved to produce a new race of men burned in terror in the fear of God by the judgment of God that they had seen and began to present their offerings to the glory of God.” As a sign of the final stroke of the first and inglorious epoch, God altered a physical law: water lost its original consistency, the membrane ruptured, and thus the Flood came. It was the first “rain.” Previously only dew fell on the Earth. After the Flood the water remained highly fluid and finely dispersed so that the colors of the waters are reflected in a bow in the light of the sun. “For after the Flood God created a new Earth with a “new” people. And He placed the bow over the clouds.” (W. M. 254)

85 Before the Flood the whole world was already full of men and animals. However, there were still no extensive forests and no large rivers that would have been an obstacle for man. It was only after the Flood that individual springs and rivulets expanded into great rivers and torrents and mighty forests grew up which then separated man and animals from one another. “From now on, the people from generation to generation had less and less vigor than the people before the Flood. And just as the Earth was altered, so also the changing powers of people were weakened, because they had followed the old waylayer.” (W. M. 254) So with the Flood the first age of the world came to an end. Truly no time of glory for mankind.
The Incarnation of the Son of God
Only Noah’s descendants understood that they were lost, and gradually developed a longing for redemption and homecoming. The second age of the world, from the Flood to the Incarnation of the Redeemer, was a rocky road and a preparation for the Savior. The foundation for postdiluvian man is laid in the Old Testament: first in the Semitic and then in the Jewish people. A genetically refined family tree, distinguished by virtue, had to grow up for that spotless creature who was to be worthy to bear the Son of God. The one chosen was the immaculate Virgin Mary.
The Annunciation (Fra Angelico)

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The Dogma of the Immaculate Conception is now celebrated on December 8 as the Solemnity of the Virgin Mary Mother of God conceived without sin. It is believed by many theologians, just like the great festival of March 25, when the Annunciation is commemorated, that event when the WORD became flesh in her womb, without the participation of a man. It is the belief of the Church that Mary was a virgin before, during and after the birth (Lateran Council 649). In human terms it is difficult to conceive that anyone can bring a child into the world without violating virginity. Hildegard was shown how this occurred. The following text is not only unique in all of world literature, it amounts to a “gynecological report” on Mary the Mother of God.
A “Gynecological Report”
“The Holy Ghost will come upon you, that is, go beyond human nature in you, so that without the warmth and touch of a man, you will conceive a son, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, that is, the power of God will replace any carnal ardor of desire in you by a comforting spirit, so that you think nothing of human desire, and he will completely remove any ardor from you.
The warmth of a man enkindles a woman so that she conceives. Hence the warmth of the living and inextinguishable fire went forth and enkindled the Virgin and made her fruitful; and God cleansed the foam of human pleasure from her blood, and from her most pure and clean blood, God formed a small coagulum into a ball, and the warmth remained in the aforementioned fire. The abovementioned flame stitched itself into the coagulum and remained within it, and yet did not separate from the fire. And this coagulum formed the child and became flesh, and thus the child grew to its birth. As this was approaching, the Blessed Virgin’s strength was somewhat weakened and she dozed as if sleeping, and the child came out of her side without her knowledge, without pain, without injury and without soiling, like Eve out of Adam’s side and not out of the cervix, because it did not go there, for if it had come out from there, an injury would have been produced there, but because the mother was not injured there, the child did not come out from there. And an amnion did not surround this Child in the womb of the Virgin Mother according to the nature of other children, because He had not been conceived by male seed.