Complete Works of Philo Judaeus, Vol. 1

§. 7. He says, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth," Genesis 1:1 taking "the beginning" not as some suppose, in terms of time;
6 M.for time did not exist before the world, but either came to be with it, or after it. Since time is the measure of the motion of the heaven, motion cannot be prior to the thing being moved; it is necessary for it to be established either later or at the same time. Therefore, it is necessary that time was created equal in age to the world, or younger than it. To dare to claim that it is older is truly unphilosophical. If "the beginning" is not taken here as a measure of time, it is likely that it refers to numerical order, so that "in the beginning he created" is equivalent to "he created the heaven first." Indeed, it is reasonable that it came into being first, as it is the best of created things, fashioned from the purest part of essence, because it was to be the most sacred dwelling for visible and sensible gods. For even if the Creator made all things at once, the things that were well-made still possessed order. For there is nothing beautiful in disorder. Order is the sequence and connection of certain prior and subsequent things, if not in the actual results, at least in the designs of the craftsman; for in this way they were destined to be precise, unerring, and unconfused. Therefore, first, from the intelligible world, the Creator made an incorporeal heaven, an invisible earth, and the idea of air and void; the former he named darkness, since air is black by nature; the latter he named the abyss, for the void is deep and vast. Then he made the incorporeal essence of water and spirit, and above all, the seventh, light, which was again incorporeal, an intelligible model of the sun, and of all the light-bearing stars that were destined to be established in the heaven.

§. 8. He deemed the spirit and the light worthy of privilege. For he called the former "of God," because the spirit is most vital, and God is the cause of life; and the latter, "light," because it is surpassingly beautiful. For the intelligible is as much brighter and more radiant than the visible as the sun, I think, is than darkness, day than night, and the mind—the ruler of the whole soul—than the senses of the body. He calls the invisible and intelligible divine Logos Word/Reason the image of God. And the image of this is that intelligible light, which became an image of the divine Logos Word/Reason that interpreted its creation.