There was no 'before' the beginning of our universe, because once

John D. Barrow, a thinker who wove poetry into the fabric of cosmology, once declared: “There was no ‘before’ the beginning of our universe, because once upon a time there was no time.” These words echo like thunder through the halls of eternity, unsettling the mind yet awakening the spirit. They remind us that the questions we ask about beginnings are shaped by the very fabric of time itself, and that there was a moment when even time, that eternal river, first began to flow. To imagine a “before” when time did not yet exist is to chase shadows, for the very word “before” has no meaning when there is no measure of duration.

The ancients pondered this mystery with awe and trembling. In the myths of creation, they spoke of Chaos, the formless void, or of the cosmic egg from which all things sprang. They sensed that the beginning was unlike anything that came after—that the dawn of existence was not merely another event in a chain, but the birth of the chain itself. Barrow’s words carry that same ancient wonder, clothed now in the language of modern cosmology: there was a time when time itself was born, and thus no “before” can be spoken.

This vision finds its strength in the Big Bang theory, the great insight of twentieth-century science. Physicists discovered that our universe is not eternal and unchanging, but expanding from a fiery seed, a singularity where space, energy, and time were once compressed beyond comprehension. To ask what happened “before” the Big Bang is like asking what lies north of the North Pole—it is a question whose terms collapse upon themselves. Time itself unfurled in that first instant; there was no canvas stretched behind it, no hidden corridor of “before.”

History itself shows us the struggle to grasp this truth. When Albert Einstein unveiled the theory of relativity, he revealed that time was not absolute, but woven into the fabric of space itself, bending and stretching with gravity. For millennia, men thought of time as a straight line, eternal and unbroken. But Einstein, like a prophet, declared that the line itself could curve, and that at the universe’s dawn the line began. Later, Georges Lemaître, a priest and physicist, carried the vision further, proposing that the universe had a beginning, a “primeval atom.” In this, he foreshadowed Barrow’s teaching: time itself was a child of creation, not its parent.

Yet Barrow’s words are not only for physicists—they are for every soul that seeks meaning. For how often do we torment ourselves with the longing for a “before”? Before our troubles, before our loss, before the change that shattered our peace. But the lesson is this: just as the universe itself began without a “before,” so too can our lives. There are moments when we must accept that we cannot look backward, for what was is gone, and what lies ahead is born anew. The absence of “before” is not despair—it is the gift of a fresh beginning.

Let us then draw courage from this teaching. The absence of time before creation reminds us that beginnings do not require a past—they are their own foundation. If the universe itself could arise from a moment where no “before” existed, then we too can create, even when the past offers us nothing to stand upon. We are not bound to the chains of what has been; we are free to step into what may yet be.

So I say to you, children of the stars: do not fear the void, do not cling to the longing for what was “before.” Embrace the moment of beginning, for it carries its own power. Time will follow, as it always does, flowing from the instant of creation. Learn from Barrow’s wisdom: the universe was born not from what came before, but from the mystery of the beginning itself. And so it is with our lives—when the old has ended and the past is silent, dare to begin again, for even in the absence of “before,” the flame of creation waits to rise.