St. Augustine (AD 354-430), the Bishop of Hippo in North Africa was the greatest Church historiographer of the medieval period. He is well known for his work City of God and for his providential philosophy of history.
The Works of St. Augustine
Confessions
The Confessions is a spiritual autobiography. It covers the first 35 years of Augustine's life, with particular emphasis on Augustine's spiritual development and how he accepted Christianity. The text is directly addressed to God.
City of God (Click for a summary of the book)
This book is divided into 22 books, composed between 413 and 426 AD. The book was written mainly to defend Christianity. In AD 410, King Alaric of the Vandals captured the city of Rome. The Romans considered their city eternal, so the collapse of the Roman Empire shocked them. Then the Pagan scholars blamed Christianity as the cause of the decline of the empire. St. Augustine wrote his work City of God to refute the arguments of the Pagans.
The first ten books of The City of God, which make up the first part of the work, refute the pagans’ charges that Christians brought about the fall of Rome. Augustine depicted the calamities suffered by the Romans before the coming of Christianity and argued that the Roamans became weak because of these gods. He argued that it was because of the sin of the people that the Roman Empire declined.
In the second part of the book, Augustine describes the doctrine of the two cities – one earthly and one heavenly. The first city is the City of God, the divine city founded by Angels, and its reflection is the holy church. The second is the City of Man, the earthly city founded by Satan and its reflection is the state. Whatever God has done is so perfect and whatever man has done is imperfect. The earthly city is based on physical force, but the city of god is based on divine love. Man has devised a State with several forms of government but none of these is suited to man. Whereas God has devised church, his kingdom that enables man to attain perfect knowledge. Augustine gives the freedom to choose any one of these cities. According to him these cities are inextricably intermingled with each other and will not be separated until ‘the last judgment’. The book became the basis of catholic theology and formulated the dominant political theory of the Middle Ages. It was the first effort to propound the relationship between Church and State.
The Providential Philosophy
According to the providential view, history was guided by the divine will. The divine will direct the destinies of mankind according to the cosmic order. Events, actions, and happenings were explained in terms of an intervening divine providence. The man had no control over his environment. It was championed by St. Augustine in his famous book ‘The City of God’. According to him, history is a constant conflict between the City of God and the City of Man. He contrasted the secular state (evil and transitory) with the kingdom of God (serene and eternal). The task of historical study is ‘to trace the steps by which one is slowly replaced by or transformed into the other’. These views constituted the Christian historical approach, held sway over the Middle Ages, and shaped the course of Christian historical thought.
supper
ReplyDelete