Whether formlessness of created matter preceded in time its formation?

❌ Objection 1 : It would seem that formlessness of matter preceded in time its formation. For it is said (Gn. 1:2): "The earth was void and empty," or "invisible and shapeless," according to another version [*Septuagint]; by which is understood the formlessness of matter, as Augustine says (Confess. xii, 12). Therefore matter was formless until it received its form.

❌ Objection 2 : Further, nature in its working imitates the working of God, as a secondary cause imitates a first cause. But in the working of nature formlessness precedes form in time. It does so, therefore, in the Divine working.

❌ Objection 3 : Further, matter is higher than accident, for matter is part of substance. But God can effect that accident exist without substance, as in the Sacrament of the Altar. He could, therefore, cause matter to exist without form.