the mystical temple of god 576 determined by the pattern of any limbs, but just as it has been said, “Your hand has destroyed the nations” and “You brought out your people with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm,” so it had also been said, “Your hands, O Lord, have made me and fashioned me.” For limbs of this kind are used to signify the power and might of God” (LCG).10 Therefore it was the power of God that created man. But if we consider the manner of our creation, we shall observe that our race possesses an even greater excellence than can be imagined. Assuredly, when the eternal Trinity was about to create man, It did not wish to undertake this task without a deliberation, but as It was about to make something of the utmost and greatest importance, weighing carefully It said: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness” (Gen 1:26). For this reason Gregory of Nyssa11 appropriately exclaims: “O what a wonder! The sun is made, but no deliberation precedes; the heavens and every creature are produced by just a word: it was to the creation of man alone that the Creator of the universe approached His task in a certain way with deliberation, saying: “Let us make man.”12 Behold, man, your dignity! But listen to Ambrose when he is advising how much you are obliged to your Creator for His grace: “Man was created,” (he says), “with the deliberation of the Holy Trinity and by the work of the Divine Majesty, so that he might understand from the honor of his initial condition how much he owes his Creator: and might love his Creator all the more ardently, and might understand how wondrously he was created by Him.”13 What [else can be said]? 10 Augustinus, in: LCG, f.54v (in Gen., Chap. II), where, however, there is no indication of the work of St. Augustine’s from which this quotation comes. It should be noted that it is not quoted word for word from LCG, but adapted somewhat to the text. 11 St. Gregory of Nyssa (d. 394) wrote mainly works of exegesis. Cf. Danielou Giovanni, Gregorio Nisseno: ECat VI, 1099. 12 St. Gregory of Nyssa, On the Making of Man, 3: PG 44, 135. A similar idea is expressed by St. Gregory in his work Prayer 1 on the words “Let us make man etc.” PG 44, 259. 13 Ambrose, On the Dignity of the Human Condition, 1: PL 17, 611.
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