Specifically, this refers to the
Christian church doctrine that God created the universe and all within from
void or "nothing."
Milton actually contradicts this doctrine in
Paradise Lost when he writes "
In the Beginning how the Heav'ns and Earth / Rose out of
Chaos." The
Creation story in
Genesis 1 leaves this
up for grabs, stating "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. / And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the
Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. / And God said,
Let there be light: and there was light ..." Thus the Scriptures state that the earth was "
without form" and "
void," yet that there was darkness, a "deep," and "waters."
Like many theological and metaphysical questions, this question may be regarded as absurd and inconsequential to the onlooker, but as a key doctrine to the debating theologian. Most of the Church, Protestant and Catholic, subscribes to the ex nihilo doctrine--certainly all the Fundamentalist/Special Creationist faction would.