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Liber Divinorum Operum (Book of Divine Works)/Book 2 · Liber Divinorum Operum — Pars 2
Chapter 47LDO.2.47

VISIO QUINTA, cap. XLVII

The Perfection of Creation

Heaven and earth, along with all their elements, are complete and rejoice in their God-given usefulness.

"Therefore heaven and earth are perfect, and all their adornment." This is how you should think about it: the upper and lower elements, along with all the forces adjacent to them, are so full and complete that, with every lack removed, they rejoice in an abundance of fitting usefulness.

The Rest and Blessing of the Seventh Day

God completed his work and rested on the seventh day, blessing and sanctifying it because all creation was fully accomplished.

"And God completed on the seventh day the work that he had made, and rested on the seventh day from every work that he had accomplished." The completion of the six distinctions of the works mentioned above is called the seventh day, since God led everything he had preordained to create to perfection. And so he rested on the seventh day, ceasing from work, because he had perfected all his work in its forms. And he blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it he had ceased from all his own work, which God created to be made. God blessed the seventh day with praise, and sanctified it with the honor of solemnity, because every creature was fully created in it, which God had preordained to be made, and from which other things proceed, begotten.

Angelic Praise and the Seven Gifts

The angelic host praises God for perfecting all his work through the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit.

And so all the angelic host, and all the hidden mysteries of the Divinity concerning the perfection of God's work, were blessing God and praising him, because with the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit he had perfected all his work.

Allegorical Fulfillment in Christ

The creation narrative finds its allegorical fulfillment in the Incarnation, the Gospel, and the Holy Spirit's work within the Church.

Or consider it another way: How all of this is brought to fulfillment, in allegorical terms, through the Incarnation of the Son of God, the preaching of the Gospel, and the working of the Holy Spirit, in the children of the Church and in those who submit to the Christian faith.

Read the original Latin

« Igitur perfecti sunt coeli et terra, et omnis ornatus eorum . » Hoc considerandum sic est: Superiora et inferiora elementa cum omnibus sibi adjacentibus viribus tanta plenitudine et perfectione perfecta sunt, ut omni penuria ablata, in abundantia convenientis utilitatis gaudeant. « Complevitque Deus die septimo opus suum quod fecerat, et requievit die septimo ab omni opere quod patrarat . » Completio sex distinctionum praefatorum operum dies septimus appellata est, cum Deus omnia quae creare praeordinaverat ad perfectum duxit. Ac sic requievit die septimo operari cessans, quoniam omne opus suum in formis suis perfecerat. Et benedixit dici septimo, et sanctificavit illum, quia in ipso cessaverat ab omni opere suo, quod creavit Deus ut faceret. Deus benedixit diei septimo cum laude, atque eum cum honorificentia solemnitatis sanctificavit, quoniam omnis creatura in illo pleniter creata existit, quam Deus praeordinaverat fieri, de qua alia genita procedit. Unde et omnis angelica turba, omniaque occulta mysteria Divinitatis, de perfectione operis Dei Deo benedicebant, ipsumque laudabant, quia cum septem donis Spiritus sancti omne opus suum perfecerat.

Item alio modo?

Qualiter haec secundum allegoriam per Incarnationem Filii Dei et praedicationem Evangelii et operationem sancti Spiritus compleantur in filiis Ecclesiae, et subjectis fidei Christianae.

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