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Aristotle listed seven definitions of physis in Metaphysics, concluding that the term
encompassed everything in the sublunary world. The sun, moon, stars, and planets were
considered divine. According to Aristotle, everything on earth is comprised of the four
elements— earth, air, fire, and water— and is characterized by change, whereas celestial
objects, being perfect, never change. In describing the operations of physis, he frequently
resorted to teleology and personification— “Nature does nothing in vain, nothing superflu-
ous” — thus foreshadowing the medieval allegorical goddess Natura.^9
Like Aristotle, Plato believed that heavenly bodies were divine beings, possessing both
souls and intelligence. Plato’s cosmological scheme was elaborated upon in the third century
ce by Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism,^10 and it was the latter’s exegesis of Platonic
cosmology that was passed on to the Middle Ages.
Plato’s view of the universe is far more mystical than Aristotle’s, and there is no hint in
Plato’s writings of a personified nature goddess. In the Timaeus, Plato asserts that the “real”
universe consists of eternal, ideal forms. In contrast, the material universe was generated
by a Creator (the Demiurge), and fashioned out of formless, chaotic matter by an emana-
tion of the Demiurge called Intellect (Nous). Although the material universe is modeled
after eternal ideal forms, it is only a crude imitation of the “real” universe and is subject
to change. The Demiurge created the World- Soul, which was joined to the stars by Nous.
Plato’s concept of Nous— representing intelligence, or the rational aspect of the Creator—
suggests that the material universe, unlike abstract ideal forms, follows the rules of cause
and effect and is accessible to reason. The Platonic view of the nature of the material world
thus contrasts with the Christian idea of an omniscient Creator God whose continuing
divine intervention defies the laws of cause and effect, rendering the material universe ulti-
mately inaccessible to reason.
Bernard Silvestris was affiliated with the French school of Chartres,^11 where the chief
goal of the scholars was to unite Neoplatonism with Christian doctrine. But they also did
something revolutionary: they reinstated the feminine principle of divinity in the Creation
myth, at least symbolically. In Silvestris’s Cosmographia, “Noys” (Nous) is the daughter of
God, and Natura is the daughter of Noys. According to Peter Dronke, no writer before
Bernard had gone so far as to describe Natura as “the blessed fecundity of the womb” of the
goddess Noys.^12 The poem begins with Natura complaining to her mother about the confu-
sion and chaos of the formless universe. In response, Noys creates the heavens, the earth,
and all living creatures on it— except humans. Finally, Noys teams up with Natura and
Physis (who are for the first time distinguished from each other)^13 to create the first human
in an earthly paradise garden. Sexuality is exalted for its role in reproduction, and the penis
is singled out for particular praise as the “genial weapon” that defeats Death, while Natura
performs her role by generating the semen.
God (“Tugaton,” from the Greek word meaning “The Good”) makes only a brief appear-
ance in Cosmographia as a remote, mysterious triple- shaft of light to which Natura and her
companion Urania pray for guidance. In contrast to the biblical narrative, the Creation
is here brought about by a “feminine trinitas creatrix.” As documented by Dronke, Noys,
Natura, and Physis are closest in their attributes to the classical earth goddesses— Terra,
Tellus, and Gaia. Bernard Silvestris, a devout Christian, regarded his fable merely as a
pedagogical “wrapping” around the divine truth of Genesis— meant to illuminate, not