Christian Thought and Culture up to 1600 (V81200)

Autumn Semester 2017/2018

Lavinia Cerioni

Handout Lecture 7

1. Augustine’s Life
1.1 Youth
He was born in Tagaste (North Africa) in 354 CE. While his mother was Christian, his father
was a pagan; nonetheless, his mother Monica, fervent Christian, raised him as a Christian.
He received a comprehensive education (rhetoric, philosophy, science), but he never mastered
the Greek language, which prevented him from reading Greek theologians.
He had a pretty eventful youth. Around the age of 19, he moved to Carthage, where started a
stable but illegal relationship with a woman, who he never married, and they had a son together.
After completing his studies he took a job as a grammatical teacher.
Augustine admired greatly roman rhetoricians, especially Cicero. His passion for pagan culture
made him reject his Christian education, preferring to seek answers to his endless existential
questions in philosophy. During his youth, Augustine joined a Christian group called
Manicheans.1 However, even in this case, Augustine’s questions remained unanswered.

1.2 Adulthood
Discouraged by the intellectual milieu of Carthage, he decided to move to Rome, which he
found equally disappointing. After a brief period in Rome, he moved to Milan, where he met a
highly influential Christian philosopher: Ambrose.
This meeting will changed his life completely, for the excellent rhetoric abilities and the lively
intelligence of Ambrose made him interested in Christianity again. Albeit doubtful, he became
Ambrose’s disciple.
Meanwhile, his mother joined him in Milan and convinced him to renounce his illicit
companion, who he sent back to Africa with great regrets, and to arrange a marriage with a
young girl from an aristocratic family in Milan. However, since the girl was too young to get
married, they agreed to wait three years for the wedding to happen.
During these years, specifically in 386 CE, Augustine’s life turned around utterly. This turning
point of his life is described by Augustine himself as a sort of divine revelation through the words
of the apostle Paul (Confessiones VIII, 12). Consequently, he broke his engagement and retired
with his mother and few friends in a monastery to spend a period in prayer and study of the
Scripture. During this period, Augustine was baptised by Ambrose and became a Christian.

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Manicheism: A Christian dualistic heresy. They believed there is an eternal struggle between Good
(Light) and Evil (Darkness).
Not long after this event, Augustine lost both his mother and his son. These events probably
convinced him to return to Milan, where the people of diocese asked that he was ordained priest.
Hence, Augustine was reluctantly ordained in Milan in 391 CE. In 396 CE, he became bishop of
Hippo, a city in North Africa.

1.3 Mature Age

The last period of his life was the most fecund one from a literary perspective, for he produced
many of his greatest work.
He also produced a lot of polemical writings against heretics, particularly against Pelagius.
Pelagianism is a theological heresy that claim free will is sufficient to grant salvation to
humankind. The polemic between Augustine and Pelagius about free will and God’s grace is one
of the most important in the history of the Church.
He died in 430 CE while his city was under the attack of the Vandals.2

Most of his life is narrated by Augustine in his Confessions.

2. Some of Augustine’s works:

1. Confessiones (Confessions): Lat. Confiteor = manifest, trust. Augustine wrote this book
around 400 CE. It is the story of his life, with attention to his spiritual, intellectual and
emotional development. However, it is more than a simple narration of events. Through
this work, Augustine wanted to show how God manifested in his life. It has been
considered the first autobiography ever written.
2. De libero arbitrio and De gratia et libero arbitrio. The first was written between 388-391
CE, while the second in 426-427 CE. These books reflect the shift in Augustine’s ideas
about free will.
3. Ad Simplicianum (To Simplician). 397 CE. This work represents a turn in Augustine’s
theology. It is the work in which he “discovers” grace.
4. De Trinitate (On the Trinity). 399-414 CE. Treatise on the nature of the Trinity and its
relationship with human soul.
5. De Civitate Dei (The City of God). 413-425 CE. This book was written after Rome was
sacked by the Visigoth. This event shocked the world for it was the first time in centuries
that the heart of the Empire was attacked by foreign invasions. Many people blamed this

2
A Germanic tribe that invaded the Roman Empire in the 5th Century.

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 on Christians, interpreting the fall of Rome as the fall of pagan gods. To a certain extent,
this is an apologetical writings that defend the Christian faith from the accusations of the
pagans. In addition, it makes a comparison between the City of God and the City of
Man, thus showing the eternal struggle and tension between the divine and the human.

3. De Trinitate. Augustine Trinitarian solution. (God)

As we have seen so far, Augustine is the last exponent of a long list of theologians who tried to
systematise the Trinity. Nonetheless, he is probably the most significant, for his theology will
shape the Trinitarian speculations in the centuries to come up to nowadays.

Augustine’s Trinitarian doctrine shares some of the Cappadocian assumptions:

a. God is infinite;
b. God is one substance in three persons (‘mia ousia, treis hypostasis’);
c. These three persons are defined by the relationship between themselves.

However, he disagrees with them regarding the fact that the Father is the source of the divinity
in the Godhead, which is the reason for the participation of the Son and the Spirit in the Father.

Augustine’s innovation in Trinitarian doctrines:

1. Whereas the Greek theologians insisted on the distinction of the three persons of the
Trinity; Augustine stressed the unity of God.

1. Filioque: Augustine is the one who formulated the idea that the Spirit proceeds from the
Father and the Son.
a. The Great Schism of 1054 (almost 600 years after Augustine) between the
Eastern Church and the Western Church has this doctrine as one of its main
theological reasons;

2. The Trinity is the eternal communion of love between the three persons: The Father
generates the Son and Father and Son are joined in the Holy Spirit, the eternal act of
their mutual love

2. Divinity is a distinct logical entity from any of the three persons. (e.g. Human nature is
distinct from human beings);

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 3. Whereas the Greek theologians insisted on the distinction of the three persons of the
Trinity; Augustine stressed the unity of God.

4. Augustine’s Anthropology (The creation of humankind)

Contrarily to eastern theologians, Augustine does not believe in the double creation.

Adam was created by God as a single free being.3 God placed him in the garden of Eden and
gave him his commandments. In addition, God gave to Adam the free will. In truth, Adam is
the only man who has possessed free will truly.

Despite God’s benevolence, Adam sinned by eating from the fruit of the prohibited tree:

‘Because of Adam’s sin, the whole race which descended from him became
corrupted in him, and punishable by death. So everyone who descended from him
[…] is tainted with the first sin. Because of it they are drawn through all kinds of
errors and suffering until they reach the last, never-ending punishment.’ (Augustine,
Enchiridion, 26)
Augustine formulates the doctrine of the inheritance of the original sin. Being Adam the
forefather of humankind, he has transmitted his guilt to all human beings, thus making them
prone to do evil.

5. Ad Simplicianum. A new soteriology: the grace of God.

(Salvation)

If humankind is corrupted utterly by the original sin, humans are unable to do good, for they can
only do evil. Consequently, humans NEED God’s help to do any good
God’s help comes under the form of a force acting in the human inner self: GRACE. How does
grace work?
• God’s grace is distributed discretionally by God.
• Only those who possess grace will be saved.

It is possible to detect Augustine’s doctrine of grace for the first time in his Ad Simplicianum.

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Remember: Origen believed that humankind had originally been created as a mass of logikoi, pure
intelligences. In Origen, human creation is not the personal loving act of God who created a single being,
rather the creation of multiple spiritual and intellectual beings.

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 6. Free will: De Libero Arbitrio and De Gratia and Libero Arbitrio

It is possible to see a change in Augustine’s conception of free will and grace:

a. De Libero Arbitrio. Written before the Ad Simplicianum, Augustine claims that humans
are free to exercise their free will.
b. De Gratia and Libero Arbitrio. It was written after the Ad Simplicianum. Humans need
God’s grace to exercise their free will. Grace frees humans from the tendency of evil,
resulted from Adam’s original sin; therefore, the true free will is the will free from sin.

6.1 The Pelagian Controversy.

Pelagius questioned Augustine’s doctrine of grace.

If humans cannot do anything to deserve God’s grace, why should they bother to be good?
• Pelagius’ answer: Augustine misunderstood the role of God’s grace. Humans have free
will and they are responsible for their actions.
• Augustine’s answer: God’s grace is persuasive. It pushes humans to want to do good.

7. Eschatology: De Civitate Dei. (Salvation)

Eschatologically, humans will be divided in:

• City of Man: it is dominated by the amor sui. Humans are naturally inclined to love
themselves above everything. This is the condition of humans deprived of grace.
• City of God: it is ruled by the amor Dei. It is the conditions of the chosen people, whose
heart is persuaded by God’s love and not love for themselves.

Open question: If humans are a massa damnationis4 (damned crowd) and God grants grace only to
few, does this mean that God predestined some humans to damnation?

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If humans are prone to do evil because of the original sin, they are doomed to not achieve salvation.