Posted: Aug 20, 2018 4:48 pm
Spinozasgalt wrote:
Erm, which theologians? Because the way you have God's essence standing in for an outside substance looks and sounds like ex Deo rather than ex nihilo. And that would again be steering close to something like process theology or panentheism. Neither of those count as classical theism.
Creatio ex nihilo means that God did not use a pre-existing substance to make the world with. He just used his own omnipotence and essence. That isn't to say that the created order is an "emanation" from God's own being, that has become separate and detached from him, but rather a complete manifestation of God's essential existence.