Note 121 — Chapter XVIII
Reading edition
The idea that "bara" meant to create out of nothing is a modern invention, and most likely called forth by the contact between Jews and Greeks at Alexandria. The Greeks believed that matter was co-eternal with the Creator, and it was probably in contradistinction to this notion that the Jews first asserted that God made all things out of nothing. The word, however, only calls forth the simple conception of fashioning or arranging.—Chips, vol. i. p. 132.