Colossians 1:17Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

"And He is before all things," he says. This belongs to God. Where now is Paul of Samosata?

"And in Him all things hold together," that is, all things are established upon Him. He continually circles around this thought, so that by persistence in words, like repeated blows, he may uproot the destructive teaching.

Indeed, if even now, after so much has been said about this and after such a long time has passed, Paul of Samosata appeared, how much more easily would he have appeared if this had not been said?

"And all things," he says, "hold together in Him." How could anything hold together in one who does not exist? Therefore even what is done through angels belongs to Him.

He constantly returns to the same point, so that by ceaseless speech, like repeated blows, he may uproot the destructive teaching. And note, he did not say that He came into being before all things, but that He is, which is proper to God. Where, then, is Paul of Samosata, who says that He received His beginning from Mary? And all things stand upon Him as upon a foundation. In this sense, precisely as foundation, He is the firstborn of creation. But this shows not His consubstantiality with creation, but that all things are upheld by Him.

Having mentioned creation, the Apostle accordingly writes also about the power of the Creator in creation, that is, about the Word of God, through whom all things were made (Jn 1:3). If creation by itself, alone and without the Son, is able to lead to the knowledge of God, then take care lest you fall by thinking that creation was brought into being without the Son. But if creation was brought into being by the Son, and all things stand by Him, then the one who rightly looks upon creation necessarily beholds the Word who created it. And through the Word, he begins also to understand the Father.

“And He is before all things,” which is equivalent to the saying, “In the beginning was the Word” (Jn 1:1).

“And He is before all things.” The Apostle did not say, “He came into being before all things,” but “He is before all things.” “And in Him all things consist.” For He is not only the Creator of all, but also provides for what He has made. He governs creation, and by His wisdom and power it stands.

It must be accepted that, from God who exists eternally, all things come into being from nonbeing wholly and perfectly, not in parts and imperfectly. They are produced from a cause incomprehensible and almighty. All things stand by Him, preserved and contained as in an all-embracing depth. To Him they are to return, as to their own end appointed for each, as the great Dionysius the Areopagite says somewhere.

The divine-principial superessentiality, whatever the superbeing of supergoodness may be, must not be hymned by anyone who loves the Truth beyond every truth as word or power, nor as intellect, life, or essence.

Rather, it must be hymned as surpassingly beyond every property, movement, life, imagination, opinion, name, word, thought, reflection, essence, state, abiding, unity, limit, infinity, and all that exists.

Since, being the being of Goodness, by the very fact of Its being It is the cause of all that exists, the good-principial providence of the Thearchy must be hymned from all things caused by It.

For in It are all things, and for Its sake. It is before all things, and in It all things have consisted. Its being is the cause of the coming-to-be and abiding of all things.

All things desire It: intellectual and rational beings rationally; those lower than these sensibly; and the rest either according to the movement of living things, or as substances suitably adapted to existence.

The beginning is verses 15 and 16. And if I also state what follows next in the Apostle, our triumph will be still more evident. For he says, “And He is before all things.” He did not say, “He came into being before all things,” but “He is before all things,” and “in Him all things consist.” He did not say, “with Him” or “after Him all things were created.” The conclusion is verse 15.

The wise Paul says that the same Word, who is the image of God the Father and equal to God the Father, was "obedient even unto death, even death on a Cross" (Phil 2:6-8).

In another Epistle, he says of the Only-begotten Son: "Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth.

And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together." Likewise: "And He is the head of the body, the Church, the beginning from the dead, the firstborn from the dead" (Col 1:15-18).

But the Word of God the Father is life and the Creator of life, as begotten of life, that is, of His Father. How then did He become "the firstborn from the dead" and "the beginning of those who have died"?

"By Him," he says, "all things were created," and below, "all things were created through Him and for Him." From this it is clear that the first "by Him" means the same as the second "through Him."

This agrees with the Gospel words: "All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing came to be that came to be" (Jn 1:3).

The phrase "for Him they were created" means the same as what follows: "and all things consist in Him." That is, everything depends on His almighty power, is embraced, contained, and governed by it.

Having said that all things were created by the Son, "in heaven and on earth," he does not name the creatures on earth individually, because they are manifest and known.

“In Him all things consist.” “He is not only the Creator of all, but also provides for what He has made. He governs creation, and by His wisdom and power it stands” (Theodoret).

Holy Scripture nowhere merges God with His creation, and the world came forth not from the essence of God, but from nothing, by the almighty word of God.

Thus the world is one distinct thing, and God is another, distinct from the world, a personal being: "He is before all things," and "God over all" (Rom 9:5).

The deist separates God too far from the world, while the pantheist brings the deity too close to the world.

Further, if everything that exists were God, or a development of the deity, then there would be no changes or deficiencies in the world. For God never changes and is perfect in all His properties and in all His life.

Yet we see changes every day and at every step, both in the nature around us and in ourselves.

In that case even the sins of rational beings would have to be referred to God, which would obviously be the height of madness.

"He often repeats the same thing so that, by the frequency of his words, like repeated blows, he may cut out the impious teaching by the root. And see: he did not say, 'He came into being before all,' but 'He is before all,' which belongs to God" (Saint Chrysostom, blessed Theodoret, blessed Theophylact).

"Whatever you may conceive, you will find that He is before it, that He preexists it, eternally abiding together with the Father and the Spirit" (Oecumenius).

"He is before all, because He alone is begotten of God the Father, from the unbegotten nature of God. All the rest exists by His power, which He has from the Father through birth.