And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
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Bede
AD 735
On the seventh day God rested from all his works, and sanctified and blessed it; and the seventh age is eternal rest in another life, in which God rests with his saints in eternity after the good works, which He accomplished in them throughout the six ages of this world. However, this age of the height of peace and rest in God, is and will be everlasting; but then it begins for mankind, when the proto-martyr Abel with his body entered the rest of the tomb, but with his soul [entered] the joy of eternal life. There that rich man saw the poor man resting, while he himself was twisted in hell [reference to ‘Dives and Lazarus’].This sabbath of the holy souls will last until the end of the age; and when the last age of the world, after its evening about which we have already spoken, will have attained its end when the Antichrist has been killed by the Lord Jesus, then also that sabbath [rest] will be granted to the bodies rising to life eternal with greater blessing and sanctity. And there...
After Moses spoke about the reptiles, the cattle, and the beasts, about mankind and about their blessing on the sixth day, he turned to write about God's rest that took place on the seventh day saying, "Thus heaven and earth were finished, and all their host. And God rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done." [ Gen2:1-2 ]
From what toil did God rest? For the creatures that came to be on the first day came to be by a gesture, except for the light which came to be through His word. And the rest of the works which came to be afterwards came to be through His word. What toil is there for us when we speak one word, that there should be toil for God because of the one word a day that He spoke? If Moses, who divided the sea by his word and his rod, did not tire and Joshua, son of Nun, who restrained the luminaries by his word, did not tire, then what toil could there have been for God when He created the sea and the luminaries by [ His ] word?
Indeed, it was not bec...
He rested That is, he ceased to make any new kinds of things. Though, as our Lord tells us, John v. 17. He still worketh, viz. by conserving and governing all things, and creating souls. (Challoner)
Seventh day. This day was commanded, Exodus xx. 8, to be kept holy by the Jews, as it had probably been from the beginning. Philo says, it is the festival of the universe, and Josephus asserts, there is no town which does not acknowledge the religion of the sabbath. But this point is controverted, and whether the ancient patriarchs observed the seventh day, or some other, it is certain they would not fail, for any long time, to show their respect for God's worship, and would hardly suffer a whole week to elapse without meeting to sound forth his praise. The setting aside of stated days for this purpose, is agreeable to reason, and to the practice of all civilized nations. As the Hebrews kept Saturday holy, in honour of God's rest, so we keep the first day of the week, by apostolic traditio...
Rest is taken in two senses, in one sense meaning a cessation from work, in the other, the satisfying of desire. Now, in either sense God is said to have rested on the seventh day.
First, because He ceased from creating new creatures on that day, for, as said above (1, ad 3), He made nothing afterwards that had not existed previously, in some degree, in the first works; secondly, because He Himself had no need of the things that He had made, but was happy in the fruition of Himself. Hence, when all things were made He is not said to have rested "in" His works, as though needing them for His own happiness, but to have rested "from" them, as in fact resting in Himself, as He suffices for Himself and fulfils His own desire. And even though from all eternity He rested in Himself, yet the rest in Himself, which He took after He had finished His works, is that rest which belongs to the seventh day. And this, says Augustine, is the meaning of God's resting from His works on that day (Gen. a...
