The Literal Meaning of Genesis
BOOK ELEVEN 153 nite and appropriate limits to their powers, and there is a balance of good and evil, with the result that the whole is beautiful when these parts are appropriately and justly ordered within it: However, it is manifestly true, as anyone can see, that it is unjust for God, without any fault on a creature's part, to condemn in it what He Himself has created in it. It is also evident and certain from the Gospel text that the Devil and his angels were condemned, for the Lord foretold that He would say to those on His left, Go into everlasting fire, which has been prepared for the Devil and his angels.°? Hence, we cannot possibly believe that it was the nature created by God that merited punishment by eternal fire; rather, it was the Devil's own free will.
CHAPTER 22
Why God created angels and men who He knew would turn from Him.
29. It is not the nature of the Devil that is meant when Scripture says, This 1s the beginning of the work fashioned by the Lord, which He made to be mocked by Hts angels.°* But this statement could refer to a body formed of air that God gave him in keeping with his evil will; or to the role assigned to him whereby God made him, in spite of his will, useful for the good; or to the fact that God, knowing this creature would be evil by his own free choice, none the less made him, not holding back His goodness but giving life and being to a will that would be depraved; for God foresaw the many good effects He would bring about from him by His divine goodness and power. But the Devil is said to be the beginning of the work fashioned by the Lord, which He made to be mocked by Hts angels, not because he was the first creature to be made, nor because he was made from the beginning as an evil creature; but God, knowing that he would have an evil will bent on harming the good, created him to be a benefit for the good.
This is the meaning of the words, to be mocked by His angels;