Fully Accurate Quotes

Creation and Evolution

Here is a growing collection of contextually accurate quotes from Westcott and/or Hort about Creation and Evolution: affirming the creation of man by God, the existence of Adam, the reality of the Fall, etc.:

"All things] The exact form (pavnta) expresses all things taken severally, and not all things regarded as a defined whole (ta; pavnta, Col. 1:16). The thought to be brought out is that of the vast multiplicity of created things (spirits, matter, & c.). Of all these no one came into being without the Word. For this reason the term “the world” (oJ kovsmo", John 1:9, 10) is purposely avoided." (Westcott, The Gospel According to St. John, p.4)

"There is that in the believer which never dies, even though he seems to die; and conversely, Adam died at the moment of his disobedience, though he seemed still to live. (Westcott, The Gospel According to St. John, p.138-139)

About Satan's roll in the Fall: "He was a murderer from the beginning] When creation was complete he brought death upon the race of men by his falsehood (Rom. 5:12). For even before he had fallen through want of truth. He stood not in the truth (ejn th'/ ajl.)—the divine Sum of all truth—because there is no truth (oujk e[stin ajl.)—no fragmentary truth which has affinity with the Truth—in him.
   The reference appears to be to the Fall and not to the death of Abel (1 John 3:12). The death of Abel was only one manifestation of the ruin wrought by selfishness (see 1 John 3:8 ff.)." (Westcott, The Gospel According to St. John, p.137)

"Creation was brought under the consequences of sin through man (Gal. 3:22) and so redemption came to creation through man. Comp. 1 Cor. 15:28; Rom. 8:19." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Ephesians, p.14)

"th'" peripoihvsew"] GOD'S own possession, all that which GOD has made His own in earth and heaven, not men only, who had fallen from Him, and earth which had shared the consequences of man's fall, but all created things, gathered together in the last crisis of their history. ‘Creation’ held ‘in the bondage of corruption’ required redemption." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Ephesians, p.17-18)

"The word heir marks the original purpose of Creation. The dominion originally promised to Adam (Gen. 1:28; compare Ps. 8) was gained by Christ. And so, in regard to the divine economy, the promise made to Abraham (compare Rom. 4:13; Gal. 3:29) and renewed to the divine King (Ps. 2:8), which was symbolised by the ‘inheritance’ of Canaan (Ex. 23:30), became absolutely fulfilled in Christ." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.8)

On Heb 2:16: "Nothing is said of the effect of the Incarnation on angels, or other beings than man. Man's fall necessarily affected all creation, and so also did man's restoration. But here the writer is simply explaining the fitness of the Incarnation." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.55)

"Man as created had for his end this perfect exercise and perfect development of every human faculty that so he might bring all to God, fulfilling in this way the conception of sacrifice. And sin has not altered the obligation: Rom. 12:1 f. " (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.310)

"Heb. 11:3. The belief in creation—the belief in a divine will manifested in the existence of the world—is the necessary foundation for the life of faith in all its manifestations. Hence this primary action of faith is declared first. By faith we attain to the assurance that the world—history—is not the result of blind fate but answers to an expression of the will of God; and so we can attain to fresh victories corresponding to our position, even as in the past the heroes of faith triumphed.
   The verse presents two distinct thoughts. It declares the fundamental act of faith by which we apprehend the fact of creation, and then points out the consequence which ought to follow from it in our view of the world, as it lies before us. The conception of creation by God's word rightly leads to a present belief in the power of God as Preserver and Governor of that which He created." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.352)

"The purpose and end of the knowledge gained by faith as to the creation of the world is the conviction that the visible order as we observe it, as a whole (to; blep.), has not come into being by simple material causation." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.353)

"No purely physical explanation of the origin of the world is possible. Things that appear cannot give an explanation of the origin of the universe which we see." (Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p.353)

"the law of marriage laid down in Genesis as given to Adam was for St Paul a preliminary indication of a hidden Divine purpose or ordinance, the full meaning of which was to be revealed only by the revealing of Christ as the Head of His spouse the Church’ (Hort, Prolegomena to Romans and Ephesians, p. 160).

"We must therefore seek the explanation rather in the distinctive feature of man’s creation in Gen. 2:7, the special imbreathing from God Himself, by which man became, in a higher sense than the animals, “a living soul.” " (Hort, The Epistle of St. James, p.34)

"We see that at the beginning of all things God Himself, making all things. He is not the earth, or the heavens, or anything that is therein: He is distinct from them all: He made them all: He was before them all. He made them according to a plan and order. Each part of the world had its own work to do, its own place in His great scheme. Last of all came man. The world was older than man, it supplied the materials for man: man was part of the world, and was meant to remember that. On the other hand, there was that in man which cold be found nowhere else in the world. If he mere clay was kneaded of the dust of the earth, the pattern was a heavenly one. His truest likeness was to be found in God Himself. Though he was younger than the world, he was to be the first example of that which meets us so often in the Bible, and in our own life. The elder was to serve the younger. God gave man dominion over the older world, and all that it contained. It was not only to be beautiful and glorious for the delight of its Maker, it was to be useful for the service of man. But here came a most necessary lesson. God pronounced the whole world Good. In the course of time man in his pride would look down on the world. Nay worse, when he became evil himself, he would lay blame on the world. He would pretend that the only thing which made him sin was his connexion with the earth, his own body, and all the things which had charms for his bodily senses." (Hort, Sermons on the Books of the Bible, p.28-29)

"This unique position of man in the visible order is emphasised by other details. He has dominion over other creatures (i. 28): he assigns to them their names (ii. 19 f.): he finds among them no companion fitted for himself (ii. 18, 20). As he appears first in his true nature hs is 'little lower than a divine being' (Ps. viii.), at perfect peace in himself, towards nature and towards God. He is made for God and, to this end, he is made 'in the image of God.'" (Westcott, The Gospel of Life, p. 192)

"we must keep firm hold on the fact of the Fall and on the consequences of the Fall" (Westcott, The Gospel of Life, p.196)

"while the details of the records of the Creation and of the Fall are but rarely referred to in the Bible, the facts and the doctrines - that is the interpretation of the facts - which they preserve, the three postulates of religion, are universally affirmed." (Westcott, The Gospel of Life, p.199)

"The revelation through the Incarnation completes all that was revealed before: Christ came ‘not to destroy but to fulfil’: and this revelation is briefly comprehended in the words ‘God is light,’ absolutely pure, glorious, self-communicating from His very nature. He imparts Himself, and man was made to receive Him; and, in spite of sin, man can receive Him. Thus the fundamental ideas of Christianity lie in this announcement: ‘God is light’; and man turns to the Light as being himself created in the image of God (Gen. 1:27; 1 Cor. 11:7) and recreated in Christ (Eph. 2:10; Col. 3:10)." (Westcott, The Epistles of John, p.14)

"As to the relation of the two titles ‘the Father’ and ‘my Father,’ it may be said generally that ‘the former suggests those thoughts which spring from the consideration of the moral connexion of God and man in virtue of the creation of man ‘in the image of God,’ while the latter points to those which spring from what has been made known to us in the course of the history of the world, the revelation of the connexion of the Incarnate Son with God and with man." (Westcott, The Epistles of John, p.30)