St. Augustine’s Philosophy and Influence on Christian Thought
St. Augustine’s Life and Works
Early Life and Conversion
Born in Tagaste in 354, St. Augustine’s early life was marked by a quest for truth. At 19, Cicero’s Hortensius ignited his love of philosophy, leading him to explore Manichaeism. He opened rhetoric schools in Carthage and Rome, where he encountered the influential Bishop Ambrose. Neoplatonism played a crucial role in freeing him from Manichaean materialism, paving the way for his conversion to Christianity. Baptized by St. Ambrose, Augustine returned to Tagaste, founded a monastic community, and later became the Bishop of Hippo.
The City of God
Augustine’s magnum opus, The City of God, written between 413 and 416, defends Christians against pagan criticisms. The first ten books address pagan errors, while the remaining twelve expound Christian faith. The work presents a linear conception of history, contrasting with the cyclical view of the Greeks, and explores the interplay of faith and reason in understanding Christian truth. Reason prepares the way, while faith illuminates and guides the search for truth. Reason, in turn, clarifies and explains the content of faith.
Influences on St. Augustine’s Thought
Plato and Neoplatonism
Augustine was influenced by Plato’s philosophical and anthropological dualism, as well as the utopian vision of the Republic, reflected in his concept of two cities. He adapted Platonic Forms and the idea of divine knowledge, emphasizing God’s illumination of the human intellect. However, Augustine rejected the Neoplatonist concept of emanation, asserting that God created the world ex nihilo. Evil, for Augustine, is not a separate entity but a deprivation of good.
Skepticism
Augustine confronted the skepticism of the New Academy, which questioned the possibility of certain knowledge. He countered their arguments by emphasizing self-consciousness—the soul’s knowledge of itself—as evidence of the intelligible world. He argued that even skeptics possess certain knowledge, such as the knowledge of their own doubt (“If I am mistaken, I am”).
Manichaeism
Augustine’s early adherence to Manichaeism, with its dualistic view of good and evil, shaped his later reflections on the problem of evil. He ultimately rejected Manichaean dualism, defending the unity of consciousness and arguing that pure evil does not exist.
Pelagianism
Augustine opposed Pelagius’s denial of original sin. He argued that humanity inherited sin from Adam and Eve, requiring divine grace for salvation. This debate led to a new concept of personhood within Christianity, linking sin with servitude and grace with freedom.
Gnosticism
Augustine also addressed Gnosticism, which posited a series of divine intermediaries (eons) between God and the world. He rejected the Gnostic view that the material world was created by an evil eon and affirmed the goodness of God’s creation.
St. Augustine’s Legacy
Patristic and Scholastic Philosophy
St. Augustine is considered the most important of the Latin Fathers. Patristic philosophy, emerging from the apologists, emphasized the connection between reason and faith. Augustine’s thought dominated the Middle Ages until the 13th century, when Aristotelian philosophy, championed by St. Thomas Aquinas, gained prominence.
Augustinianism
: characterized by stating that one can not separate faith from reason and Philosophical Theology, by dualistic anthropology: Man is an immortal soul that uses a mortal body, hence the knowledge is internalized, the ethics proactive: predominance of the will over the intellect, the ontology: hilemorfismo applied to all substances, and about God, there is distrust of the physical evidence their existence, and preference of the ontological argument. 2. St. Anselm of Canterbury. It’s famous ontological argument for the existence of God from the very idea of God: “All men, even he that believeth not, has an idea, a definition of God: a being that is impossible to think of a greater than him “. This definition is included there. This definition has been denied by St. Thomas and accepted by all rationalist philosophers.3.San Bonaventure follower of St. Augustine. In terms of impact. The theory of evil will carry great weight in the history of Christianity, and he will resurrect in philosophical and theological discussions of the Protestant Reformation period. When transmitted over the centuries, the philosophy of St. Augustine led to the current Augustinian. One of the most important part of this current will be St. Anselm of Canterbury. The thought of S. Augustine mark the Middle Ages until the thirteenth century, where host St. Thomas Aristotelian philosophy be the second great stream of Christian thought, but distinguish faith and reason as to its origin, its objects and domains. Later in the Renaissance will be a renewed interest in the Augustinian Neoplatonism. At the beginning of the modern era, Descartes will present its “code ergo sum” to be a history of self Augustine. St. Augustine is the antecedent to the starting point of Descartes ‘I think’.