Augustine of Hippo

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Oldest known depiction of Augustine in the tradition of the author's image ( Lateran basilica , 6th century)
Church window with image of St. Augustine in Cologne Cathedral .

Augustinus von Hippo , also: Augustinus von Thagaste , Augustin or (probably not authentic) Aurelius Augustinus (born November 13, 354 in Tagaste , Roman Province , Africa proconsularis  ; †  August 28, 430 in Hippo Regius in Numidia , Numidia ) was a Numidian Doctors of the Church . Along with Jerome , Ambrose of Milan and Pope Gregory the Great, he was one of the four Latin Fathers of the Church in late antiquity and an important philosopher on the threshold between antiquity and the early Middle Ages . Augustine was initially a rhetorician in Thagaste, Carthago, Rome and Mediolanum ( Gallia cisalpina ). After years of being a Manichaean , he was baptized Christian in 387 under the influence of the sermons of Bishop Ambrose of Milan ; from 395 until his death in 430 he was bishop of Hippo Regius. His feast day in the liturgy is August 28th .

Augustine wrote numerous theological writings, most of which have survived. These scriptures are not free from contradictions. Nevertheless they formed a unit for Augustine; Christian faith is for him the basis of knowledge ( crede, ut intelligas : "believe that you may know"). The work Confessions ( Confessions ) is one of the most influential autobiographical texts of world literature. Augustine's philosophy contains elements derived from Plato , but modified in the Christian sense. This includes in particular the three-part division of reality into the world of the highest being, which is only accessible to the spirit, the spirit-soul of man and the lower world of becoming, which is accessible to the senses. The first biography of Augustine comes from Possidius von Calama , who still knew him well as a pupil.

As one of the most influential theologians and philosophers of Christian late antiquity and patristicism , he shaped the thinking of the West . In the Orthodox Church, however, he remained practically unknown; When his teaching became known in Constantinople through Greek translations in the 14th century , it met with rejection, unless it already corresponded to the consensus of other church fathers. His theology influenced the teaching of almost all western churches, whether Catholic or Protestant. The term Augustinism characterizes its reception in religion, philosophy and history.

Contemporary history background

The 4th century, when Augustine was born, was a troubled time for the Roman Empire . Emperor Constantine the Great had privileged Christianity and suppressed the influence of traditional gods (" Constantine Turn "). Constantine's sons, who succeeded him together in 337, had to defend themselves against the external threat from the Teutons and the New Persian Sassanid Empire at the borders as well as ensure peace inside: the empire was repeatedly plagued by civil wars. At the time of Augustine's birth, Constantius II , the only one of Constantine's sons to survive the power struggles, ruled the empire . More than his father and his brothers, Constantius had taken the path to transform the Christian church into an imperial church . At the same time there were violent theological disputes, since Constantius adhered to the so-called " Arianism " (in its homoic form), which was rejected especially in the West. In the end, Constantius had not achieved his goal of adopting a uniform creed for the entire imperial church.

Map of the Roman Empire with its dioceses , AD 400

The brief but remarkable reign of Julian (361–363) fell in Augustine's youth. As the last emperor, he was a follower of the old belief in gods and tried in vain to renew it. The subsequent emperors were all Christians , and Theodosius I was ultimately to declare Christianity the state religion by law (380) and forbid the polytheistic cults of gods (391/92). When the so-called mass migration began around 375, the Germanic tribes pushed back by the Huns pressed the borders of the empire more strongly than before. At the same time, the western Roman Empire sank deeper and deeper into civil wars, and the warring parties called in Germanic mercenaries , foederati . In 406/07 several warrior units crossed the Rhine border and invaded Gaul (see Rhine crossing from 406 ). At the end of his life Augustine would still experience how the Vandals translated to Africa and conquered city after city. In the year 476, the Western Roman Empire finally fell (see also late antiquity ). Roman Africa was to be lost to the empire by the Eastern Roman general Belisarius in the 530s until the "Reconquista" .

Life

Childhood and youth

In addition to the Vita Augustini of Possidius , Augustine's own writings in particular offer a great deal of information on his biography, so that he can be considered one of the best-documented figures of antiquity alongside Cicero . Augustine was born in 354 in the North African city of Thagaste in the Roman province of Numidia . Thagaste had the title of municipii , which went hand in hand with the privilege of Roman citizenship for the urban upper class consisting of officials, councilors, later in the 4th century, and then also for ordinary citizens. But a municipality also had the right to self-government within the city. The province enjoyed a relative security and a certain prosperity, even if the Donatist dispute caused unrest.

Augustine's father, Patricius, was a small landowner and worked as a city official. According to his origin, he was possibly the descendant of a Roman veteran who worshiped the Roman polytheistic belief in gods and was a pagan from a Christian perspective ; only shortly before his death (372) did he convert to Christianity and was baptized. The mother, Monica, came from a Christian Berber family as a baptized Christian . She raised Augustine in a Christian way, but did not have him baptized - infant baptism was not yet common at that time, since the idea of an original sin , from which baptism freed, was only developed through and after Augustine. Augustine had a brother, Navigius, and a sister of today unknown name who, as a widow, became head of a women's convent. His mother tongue was Latin , but he also spoke the local dialect and the Berber language of the provincial population; In addition, he initially acquired basic knowledge of Greek , which he deepened in later years as a presbyter through intensive study of the Greek Bible. In his youth he also seemed to have had an aversion to Greek authors (cf. Confessiones 1,13f), although, like Cicero, he criticized their philosophical sophistication . He also had a basic command of the Punic language .

Augustin's first name "Aurelius" is contemporary or not documented in his writings. It probably goes back to a later mistake. Years after his school days, Augustine still remembered that as an abecedarius he received a beating from his teacher because he had not practiced the letters.

A distant relative (Cornelius) Romanianus, he was one of the wealthy in Thagaste, took over a long-term patronage for Augustine , patrocinium ; active from about 374 to 386 AD. Romanianus not only owned u. a. a house in Carthage, he also supported Augustine financially and gave him an exemption from the duties that he owed the city as the son of a city councilor, curiales . This principle of "continued patronage", so Brown (2012), allowed Augustine to move further away from Thagaste in time, but to improve his position in the social hierarchy .

Study in Thagaste

Until 370 Augustine attended the school in Thagaste and the university in the neighboring city of Madauros (today M'Daourouch). Already here word (for word) exegesis was practiced, especially on the basis of Virgil . From 371 he studied rhetoric in Carthage . At sixteen, however, he had to interrupt his studies for financial reasons. Augustine returned home and joined a street gang there. In his later texts he reports of adolescent debauchery during this time.

He entered into a relationship with a woman, unknown name, from Carthage at an early age, without officially legitimizing this long-term relationship by marriage. In his book Vita brevis with fictitious letters to Augustine , he names her "Floria Aemilia" Last for years. His partner gave birth to them in 372 a son who was named Adeodatus ("The one given by God").

At this time he was intensively concerned with Cicero's book Hortensius , an introduction to philosophy similar to the Aristotelian Protrepticos , which today only exists in fragments . The text had a high priority for him for a long time, and he still considered it to be fundamental. In Augustine's own words, Cicero brought him a love of philosophy. However, he found the Bible disappointing; The Old Testament in particular repelled him, but the contradicting gender register of Christ also alienated him.

In 373 Augustine turned to Manichaeism , a Gnostic , strictly dualistic religious community that was forbidden in the Roman Empire. He worked here as an auditor (as a “listener”), that is, as a simple parishioner with limited obligations. From 382 he slowly began to turn away from Manichaeism; In 383 he had an intellectually disappointing encounter with the Manichaean Bishop Faustus von Mileve . Above all, Augustine visibly rejected the Manichean idea that good is not fundamentally more powerful than evil. Clear traces of a dualistic worldview can also be found in his later Christian writings.

Later, after Augustine had completed his studies in Carthage and taught there for a while, he returned in 374 to teach in Thagaste. Augustine and his partner lived in Romanian's house. Romanianus was baptized in 396 and converted to the Christian faith. Later, Romanianus seems to have acted as a kind of "literary agent" for him to have his works published. In his letter 72 to Paulinus von Nola , Augustine indicated that he had given his written work to Romanianus for general distribution. Romanianus was married and had a son, Licentius, who died some time after 408, twenty-two years before Augustine. From 375 Augustine lived as a teacher of rhetoric in Thagaste. There conflicts arose within the family when Augustine tried to convert his mother to Manichaeism. In the following year he went to Carthage as a rhetoric teacher, and in 383 he moved to Rome with his partner; there he founded a school again and worked again as a rhetoric teacher.

Teacher in Milan

In 384 he was appointed (with the support of Manichean friends in Rome and on the recommendation of the Roman city ​​prefect Quintus Aurelius Symmachus ) as a rhetoric teacher in Milan , where Emperor Valentinian II resided. One of his tasks now was to give the public honorary speeches to emperors and consuls.

Philosophically , Augustine orientated himself again to Cicero during his time in Milan. Through his writings he familiarized himself with the skepticism of the New Academy in order to criticize Manichaeism from here . In 385 his mother arrived in Milan, probably at that time he decided to become a catechumene of the Church (Christianity had been the " state religion " since 380 ). At the urging of his mother, who had arranged a befitting engagement for him to a Christian girl from a wealthy family, he separated in the same year from his partner , who was returning to North Africa. Their son stayed with Augustine. Before the betrothed could marry, Augustine lived with another woman for two years.

In Milan he got to know the Platonizing interpretation of the Bible through the local bishop Ambrosius . He began to be interested again in the religion of his childhood, Christianity, and studied the writings of the Neoplatonists (probably from 386), including probably treatises by Plotinus and Porphyry . Augustine gave up skepticism and from then on saw himself as a philosopher, no longer a rhetorician; Neoplatonic philosophy became fundamental to his thinking. At the same time he studied the writings of Paul , whose doctrine of grace should form a central part of his theology.

Take and read (lat. Great lege )

Conversion experience

In the same year Augustine got into an intellectual, psychological and physical crisis, whereupon he gave up his profession (Conf. VIII 2, 2–4). On August 15, 386 , the turning point brought about a religious experience, usually referred to as an experience of conversion , which completed his turn to Christianity. As a result, he decided to give up marriage, sexual intercourse, and work and to lead a contemplative life . Augustine described this experience several times. The description was most famous at the end of the eighth book (Conf. VIII 12.29) of the Confessions . It has found a strong echo in painting, literature and biographical writings.

In a state of religious unrest and uncertainty, Augustine, as he himself says, left the house where he was a guest in Milan and went into the garden, followed by Alypius . There he became aware of his misery and burst into tears. He moved away from Alypius, lay down weeping under a fig tree and spoke to God. Suddenly, according to Augustine, he heard a child's voice that supposedly kept calling out: “Take, read!” ( Latin: Tolle, lay! ). Knowing something similar about Antonius , the hermit from the desert, he understood: God commanded him to open a book and read the place where his gaze would fall first. He returned to Alypius, opened the pages with Paul's letters and read: “Not in eating and drinking, not in lust and fornication, not in quarrel and envy, but rather put on the Lord Jesus Christ and do not cultivate the flesh to excite you Desires ”( Romans 13 : 13-14  EU ). Then he became certain. The friend Alypius read the following verse: “But take care of the weak in faith” ( Rom 14.1  EU ). Referring to this, he joined Augustine. They went to Augustine's mother's house to tell her.

In keeping with the literary customs of the time, the narrative is highly stylized; the rhetoric professor Augustine has appropriately incorporated the biography of Antonius and the fig tree of the Jesus disciple Nathanael ( Jn 1.48  EU ).

Retreat to Cassiciacum

Baptism of Augustine in Milan by Ambrosius of Milan on Easter vigil 387 (April 24th / 25th)

With some relatives and friends Augustine then retired to a friend's estate in Cassiciacum (possibly today's Cassago Brianza near Lake Como ); here he wrote numerous writings. On Easter vigil 387 (April 24th / 25th) he was baptized by Ambrosius with his son Adeodatus and his friend Alypius in Milan , and legend has it that the Gregorian Te Deum was created. For him, as for many Christians of the time, baptism meant a break with the world. With relatives and friends, he prepared his return to North Africa. Since the usurper Magnus Maximus , who was at war with the ruling emperor Theodosius I in the east , had blocked the Roman ports with his fleet, the tour group got stuck in the Roman port city of Ostia . Augustine's mother Monica died here in 387. It was not until the end of 388 that Augustine reached Carthage.

Upon arrival, he and Alypius belonged to the group of "worshipers" (servi Dei) , baptized lay people who had decided to lead a life of perfection . The group settled on Augustine's family estate in Thagaste, where Augustine led his contemplative life for another two years ; During this time his son Adeodatus died, to whom his work On the Teacher ( De magistro ) of 389 had addressed. Augustine wrote the first of his numerous dogmatic pamphlets against competing Christian currents, the Genesis Commentary against the Manicheans .

Founder of the monastery and bishop in Hippo

According to the reports, Augustine is said to have gone to Hippo Regius in 391 to found a monastery for the "worshipers" . Under Roman law, Hippo Regius had the highest legal status in a city, it was a Colonia .

When visiting a friend in Hippo, he attended a sermon by Bishop Valerius (around † 396) of Hippo and was on this occasion urged by the community present to promise the bishop to be ordained a priest ; the consecration took place in the same year. Valerius made a piece of land available to Augustine on which he founded a monastery. Valerius, the incumbent bishop of Hippo, was increasingly weakened with age from the 390s and so he received permission from Aurelius of Carthage , the primate of Africa, to name Augustine as coadjutor . Augustine was consecrated by Megalius († 397), Primate of Numidia . In 394 Valerius appointed him auxiliary bishop, who increasingly represented the bishop as a designated successor. After Valerius's death, Augustine became bishop of Hippo in 396, a position he held until the end of his life. The contemplative life was over, as a bishop he had to preach and deal with questions of law and administration. He continued to lead a life of poverty and threw himself zealously on the fight against the competing Christian currents: Manichaeism, Donatism and Pelagianism . And he dictated book after book; at the end of his life there were more than 100 works. In 396/397 he first developed his theology of grace; the autobiographical Confessions ( Confessions ) he wrote 397/398; He worked on the text On the Trinity ( De Trinitate ) , one of his main works, from 399 to 419.

Due to his pioneering position in the conflict with the Donatists , for whose conversion he also used state power, Augustine became the most important leading figure of the Church in North Africa. Augustine also emphasized the independence of the North African Church to the Roman bishops. Among other things, as a reaction to the conquest of Rome by the Visigoths in 410, he wrote the book About the State of God ( De civitate Dei ) , on which he worked from 413 to 426; Here he developed the centuries-old distinction between the earthly state and the state of God (civitas terrena and civitas Dei) and contradicted the widespread view that the fall of Rome also called into question the divine plan of salvation .

Augustine died in 430 during the siege of Hippos by the Vandals under the leadership of King Geiseric (for the historical context, see the general Bonifatius , who was also known to Augustine, and late antiquity ). His bones are now in the church of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro in Ticinum Papiae / Northern Italy.

Heraclius , named as the successor of Augustine in the episcopate of Hippo Regius, was elected in 426 AD and passed on the debate between Augustine and the Arian bishop Maximinus. When Augustine designated Heraclius as his successor, he had several lawyers attend the meeting in order to record the approval of the community and to record it in a document.

philosophy

Augustine as Doctor of the Church, 1440, town church Langenzenn

Augustine's philosophy also had an impact in the Middle Ages . The following topics are particularly worth mentioning:

Concept of truth

Initially shaped by skepticism , Augustine dealt all his life with the problem of truth . In solving the problem, he anticipates René Descartes ' cogito ergo sum by establishing the unquestionable existence of the thinker (the one who doubts):

“Will someone doubt that he lives, remembers, has insights, wants, thinks, knows and judges? [...] Even if someone doubts about what he wants, he cannot doubt these doubts themselves "

- De Trinitate X, 10

He sums it up briefly with si enim fallor, sum : "Because (even) if I am wrong , then I am (but)."

Truth is always necessary and eternal for him. The ideal truths of mathematics serve as a model for him , since the sensory perceptions do not have these properties because of their unreliability and the changeability of the external world. Since the sources of truth cannot lie there, Augustine seeks them in the human spirit itself:

“Don't look outside! Return to yourself! The truth resides within a person. [...] [T] he mind does not create the truth, but finds it there. "

- De vera religione 39, 72f.

The basis of all truth for Augustine are the eternal ideas that exist in God's spirit and connect him with the world ( ideal pre-existence in God). God himself is the truth. As with Plato , with Augustine the archetypes have the ontologically highest status; they are essentials of all things. The truth is now available to man in the mediated enlightenment of the spirit through God (illumination or irradation theory). The divine spirit (mundus intelligibilis) "radiates" these ideas and rules directly into the human spirit, since the human spirit, other than its material body, is created in God's image (imago dei) . So the truth is not found outside of man, but in man himself. The exact interpretation of this theory remains controversial, but Augustine seems to advocate a moderate epistemological a priorism .

View of time

“So what is the time ? If nobody asks me about it, I know, but if I want to explain it to someone who asks, I don't know. "

- Confessiones lib. 11; likewise the following quotations

Augustine speaks about three times: the present of the past, the present of the present and the present of the future. According to Augustine, the past, present and future as such do not exist:

“How can you say that [the past and future times] are when the past is no more and the future is not yet? The present, however, if it were always present and did not pass into the past, would no longer be time, but eternity. "

Rather, the past is a memory in the present, and the future an expectation in the present, while the present itself is a moment passing from our minds from the future into the past. We measure time using one

"The impression [s] which the passing things [in our minds] produce and which remains when they have passed, the present one, [we measure], not what has passed and produced it."

The Augustinian understanding of time thus contains a subjective component of time, since we can only measure the past time as an impression in our minds, i.e. we compare different periods of time we have experienced with each other and thus always have to arrive at subjective statements, for example that time came to us longer than another. We cannot measure future things because we cannot say anything about them yet, only when they pass us by and we have gained an impression as a result, we can decide for ourselves whether that impression was longer or shorter.

Nevertheless, Augustine is not a pure time subjectivist, since for him time is still inextricably linked with things and the world:

“If nothing passed, there would be no past time; if nothing came our way, there would be no future time; would be nothing at all if there was no present time. "

Also for Augustine time is real and not pure ego time, since God created it. Augustine's concept of time is therefore inherent in the subject, but not purely subjective.

Nevertheless, this understanding stands in stark contrast to the Platonic objective conception of time , in which time is the movement of celestial bodies, for example the completion of a day is the movement from sunrise to sunset. On the other hand, Augustine argues that

"When a body moves, [we measure over time] how long it moves, from the beginning to the end of its movement, [...] because a body only moves in time"

and does not represent this itself. And even if a body does not move, we are still able to measure its standstill and say something about the duration of its standstill, which is precisely why movement cannot equal time.

theology

In Evangelium Ioannis , 1050–1100 approx., Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana , Florence

trinity

His main dogmatic work are the 15 books De Trinitate (On the Trinity ) . Augustine does not deny a difference between the individual persons, whom he sees equally eternal, equally perfect and equally omnipotent; Although he does not want to be a modalist, he is approaching modalism a lot. He regards people primarily as “relations” within the divine being.

He presented the doctrine of the exit of the spirit from father and son for the first time. This statement later led to the Filioque dispute.

Even after his death, his teaching made a decisive contribution to the Council of Chalcedon (451), as Pope Leo the Great made a key christological statement in his Tomus to the assembly that came from Augustine: “two natures in one person”, i.e. Jesus is God and man at the same time.

From premillenarianism to amillenarianism

Augustine is a representative of amillenarianism and spoke out against premillenarianism , which shaped early eschatology .

At first he thought from the perspective of 5000 years from Adam to the Incarnation of Christ, which is followed by the millennial kingdom . Then he argued, influenced by the allegorical interpretation, that the millennial kingdom does not designate an earthly kingdom, but rather designates " symbolically " the period between Jesus' first and second coming. Augustine also noted that the prospect of carnal delights and feasts in an earthly kingdom discourages serious observance of the commandments. Amillenarianism spread through Augustine in the Western Church.

predestination

Augustine is known as a representative of predestination , in which man is predestined by God for eternal life . In his late work Vom Gottesstaat ( De civitate Dei ) , before the creation of man, he assumes two angelic states, the state of evil angels (civitas diaboli) and the state of good angels (civitas dei) . Some of the angels have "groundless" "turned away" from God and become angry. After the creation of man, these two states were merged into the earthly state (civitas terrena) and the god state (civitas coelestis) , again with a dualistic orientation. After the Last Judgment , it comes full circle; In the end there are again two states: Civitas Mortalis , that is, the punishment of hell for ever and on the other hand Civitas Immortalis , the eternal rule with God (heaven). The number of people who go to heaven corresponds exactly to the number of fallen angels, so that the initial state is restored:

"The other creature endowed with reason, the human being who was completely lost through inherited and personal sins and punishments, was to add from his restored part what the fall of the demons had taken from the community of angels."

Augustine's doctrine of double predestination - with its implicit rejection of free will to decide for God or against him - was not adopted by the Catholic Church as early as the 5th century, but it exerted a very great influence on reformers such as Martin Luther and, above all, John Calvin and the drafting of the so-called five points of the Calvinist churches (English TULIP). Catholics and Arminians, on the other hand, teach the necessity of human free will cooperation regardless of their different views on human justification.

The conception of the two civitates had a significant influence on the medieval two-sword theory , which identified the two civitates with spiritual and secular power, and on the two-kingdoms-and-regiments doctrine of the Lutheran Reformation .

Original sin teaching and free will

Augustine had a major argument with Pelagius , who advocated the theory of free will and accused Augustine of still being caught in the snares of Manichaeism . Pelagius was condemned in the sense of Augustine in 418, but found his successor in Julianus of Eclanum . In this even more violent controversy, Augustine developed the doctrine of original sin . Augustine took over the interpretation of Romans Röm 5,12  EU (ἐφ᾿ ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον), which Hilarius introduced: " In him [Adam] all sinned", as if all were contained in Adam (quasi in massa) . In contrast to Pelagius, Augustine believed that original sin was transmitted physically. Augustine argued that only those who received the grace of God completely undeservedly could escape this burden of inheritance and would receive eternal life. It was clear to Augustine that

"God works in the hearts of men to make their will incline wherever he wants: either for good according to his grace or for evil according to their evil merits."

And he taught that of the minority escaping hell , few would escape painful purification after death .

Hell doctrine

Augustine believed that in hell there is endless torment. He interpreted passages like Mt 25,46  EU in such a way that the aeonian (aeternam) life as well as the aeonian punishment must be endless:

"If both are eternal, then both are inevitably either long-lasting but finite, or both are perpetual and endless."

When asked whether an endless punishment for final misconduct was not disproportionate, he replied that humans deserve "eternal evil" because of original sin . Augustine denied that a judgment could have a purifying character and postulated that it alone was punitive.

In this way, Augustine, like John Chrysostom and older teachers of the church such as Ambrose of Milan or Hieronymus or Hippolytus of Rome , the contemporary of Origen, clearly distinguished himself from Origen 's doctrine of Apocatastasis . Augustine's pattern of reasoning had a great influence on Western theology, which continues to the present day.

Relationship with the Jews

Augustine attacked the Jews for decades. In the sermon Against the Jews , written towards the end of his life , a guide to their conversion, he charged the Jews of his time with the crucifixion of Jesus: “In your fathers you killed Christ.” He called the Jews vicious, wild and cruel. In the lectures on John's Gospel from 414 to 417 he compares them with wolves, scolds them “sinners”, “murderers”, “the prophets' wine that has turned into vinegar”, “a drooling crowd”, “stirred up filth”. They are guilty of the "immense offense of godlessness". In a Good Friday sermon in 397 he had already denied them the Old Testament: "They read it as a blind person and sing it as a deaf person."

Augustine formulated the idea of ​​the "bondage" of the Jews, their "servitus", which was given in 1205 by Pope Innocent III. declared to be an "eternal" ("perpetua") and in 1234 in the collection of decrees of Gregory IX. was codified, while on the imperial side at the same time, based on the same ideas, the so-called chamber servitude of the Jews was established.

In Augustine's eyes, the Jews had a positive function for Christianity because, by not believing in the biblical prophecies about Jesus, they testified to their authenticity; “And precisely because of this witness that they give us against their will by owning and keeping the texts, they themselves are scattered over all peoples as far as the church extends.” Because they are necessary as witnesses for the church and from God should not be killed, they have a mark of Cain on their foreheads.

Pascal planned to use Augustine's argumentation in the chapter Evidence for Jesus Christ of his apology of the Christian religion , he notes in the Pensées : “(...) and it (the Jewish people) must continue to prove it, and it must be in misery, because they crucified him ”.

Confrontation with the Donatists

Augustine was one of the pioneers against the Donatists , represented here above all by Donatus Carthaginiensis , a rigorous group that had split off from the Catholic Church and saw itself as the Church of the “pure” and “saints”. Augustine, on the other hand, saw the church as a community full of sinners. He depicts them as the field on which wheat and weeds grow . In addition, he reports to the Donatist demand for holiness that the saints, too, as long as they live in the body, remain subject to sin, even if only minor offenses are involved.

In 411 there was a religious talk , the so-called collatio , as a result of which the influence of the Donatists decreased. As the Donatists' willingness to use violence increased, he advocated putting an end to this evil through harsh punishments, strict police crackdowns and a ban on access to justice. As justification, Augustine used a sentence from a parable of Jesus: "Make people come in" ( Lk 14.23  LUT ), which in the Latin Vulgate translation is translated as "compel them to enter" (compelle intrare) ( Lk 14.23  VUL ) . In this context, Augustine called “tolerance” only as “unproductive and void” (infructuosa et vana) and welcomed the “conversion” of many “through wholesome coercion” (terrore perculsi) . The Donatists were “forced” by the Roman state through expropriation, loss of inheritance rights and the banishment of the clergy from Africa. In 411 Honorius fined the Donatists, which were increased in 414 for high-ranking Romans, and had their bishops and priests banished from Africa. In 420, Augustine's last antidonatical work, Contra Gaudentium, appears .

This advocacy of violence against schismatics was seen as a justification for its approach when the Inquisition was introduced in the Middle Ages.

The Just War Doctrine

After the sack of Rome in 410 by the Visigoths , then again in 455 by the Vandals under Geiserich and in 472 by Ricimer , many refugees from Rome came to the North African provinces, which were then considered safe from invasions by Germanic “barbarians”. Since the Christianization of Rome, fewer and fewer Roman citizens had agreed to defend Rome and Germanic mercenaries had to be accepted into the army. At the same time, there was still a culminating skepticism from parts of the elite against the Christianization of the empire. Around 410 a (albeit declining) part of the social elite still believed in the traditional belief in gods, although this was not infrequently based on a conservative attitude and was less of a religious conviction. Against this reaction to the circumstances of the time, Augustine wrote his book De civitate Dei , in which he justified his theory of peace, which was then considered unsuitable and incorporated into philosophical and theological considerations, according to which not war but peace was the real law of nature. Pressed by other threatening circumstances that also called the security of North Africa into question (shortly after his death, Hippo was also reached by the vandals), Augustine tried to link this doctrine with the justification of wars of defense . He developed the theses on which the well-known doctrine of " just war " (lat. Bellum iustum ) developed further by Thomas Aquinas and others . Following on from the approaches that already existed with Cicero , he clearly emphasized that a just war declared by a legal authority should only aim to defend legitimate rights violated by the aggressor and not cause greater misery than it eliminates. Augustine emphasized that war arises from an unjust and inhumane attack. But anyone who has to wage a just war should mourn it:

“Yes, it is said, the wise man will only wage just wars. As if, if he felt human, he didn't have to mourn much more about the necessity of wars! Because if they weren't just, he wouldn't be allowed to wage them, so there would be no wars for the wise man. Only the injustice of the opposing side compels the wise to just wage war. ... So whoever looks at these great, gruesome, devastating evils with pain, confess that they are a misery. "

Augustine rejected the war in several places of his work, u. a. with the sentence that was unbelievably sharp for the time, that “one cannot prove that people are happy who always live in distress and in civil or enemy blood, in any case in human blood ...” He also taught - probably for the first time in of human history - that peace (and not war) is the natural law - created by God - (XIX, 12,13) ​​and the ultimate goal (XIX, 14) of humanity. Everything that exists exists only to the extent that there is peace in it, but war is misery.

In view of the necessity that has existed since Constantine (i.e. after the end of the persecution of Christians) to also take on state offices and Roman military service, he formulated the following compromise:

“To wage war and to expand the empire by subjugating the peoples appears to the wicked as happiness, to the good as compulsion. But because it would be worse if the unrighteous ruled over the righteous, it is not improperly called happiness that too. "

In the context of his polemics against Manichaeism, however, Augustine himself fundamentally contradicted this idea:

“Indeed, what is wrong with war anyway? That people die who will die anyway, so that those who survive can find peace? A coward may complain about it, but believers do not […]. No one should ever doubt the legitimacy of a war that is commanded in God's name, for even that which arises from human greed cannot harm either the incorruptible God or his saints. God commands war to drive out, crush, and subdue the pride of mortals. Enduring war is a test of the believers' patience to humiliate them and accept his fatherly reproaches. Because no one has power over others unless he has received it from heaven. All violence is only exercised on God's command or with His permission. And so a man can fight righteously for order even when serving under an unbelieving ruler. Whatever he does is either clearly not against God's rule, or at least not clearly against it. Even if giving an order should make the ruler guilty, the soldier who obeys him is innocent. How much more innocent must there be a man who wages a war that was commanded by God, who can never command anything wrong, as everyone who serves him knows? "

This work Contra Faustum Manichaeum is still not available in a German translation; the content did not have much of an impact on European intellectual history outside of the UK (and the US). Only a short section of the work refers to the wars ordered by God himself according to the Bible at the time of Moses, which Augustine tries to defend: According to Augustine, it follows from the omnipotence of God that ultimately there can be no war against God's will on earth. But if there are just wars, war is not bad per se . Christians are also allowed to fight for pagan or unjust rulers, because all power on earth is bestowed by God (neque enim habet in eos quisquam ullam potestatem, nisi cui data fuerit desuper) , especially in every war that is waged in God's name , since this can never order anything bad (quem male aliquid i clean non posse) . One shouldn't doubt the justice of such wars (dubitare fas non est) .

Defense against God's enemies was therefore justified for him even if it turned out as cruel as a war waged for selfish reasons. Augustine presupposes a natural order of the “good” who stand together against the “bad” partly as commanders and partly as obeys; He considered it necessary to defend this order militarily as well. Iusta autem bella definiri solent, quae ulciscuntur iniurias : Such wars can be defined as just, which avenge crimes. He also declared a war against heretics or schismatics like the Donatists to be just, in order to preserve the unity of the church with the help of the state army. Of course, the basic tone of Augustine's work is the striving for peace, which should also determine just war.

Augustine's criteria for a just war in the Roman Empire, which was shaped by Christianity, were:

  • He must serve peace and restore it (iustus finis) .
  • He may only be directed against injustices that the enemy can blame - a serious violation or threat to the legal system - that persists because of the hostile behavior (causa iusta) .
  • A legitimate authority - God or a prince (princeps) - must order war (legitima auctoritas) . In doing so, the prince must maintain internal order, that is, the given structures of command and obedience.
  • His war order must not violate God's command: The soldier must see and be able to carry out it as a service to peace.

The Church as a mediator

In his church teaching ( ecclesiology ) Augustine emphasized the role of the church as mediator between God and man. He wrote:

"I wouldn't even trust the gospel if the authority of the church didn't move me to."

Augustine's ecclesiology came to the conclusion that the church must have interpretative sovereignty and mediator character. For him it is excluded that a person can be saved and believing through the believing reception of Bible words alone as an individual without the organization of the church. A normative authority was needed to determine which of the many possible interpretations is the right one. Doctrines established in councils under the sovereignty of the Church therefore have the same status as the tradition of faith and the Bible text and claim to reflect the only correct view of faith. If one wants to believe “right” one must believe the teachings of the church.

With this approach, Jesus Christ was retained as the sole mediator between God and the individual, but the church as a "salvation organization" was placed alongside it as just as indispensable for the personal salvation of the individual.

Augustine and religious orders

Augustine gives St. Norbert von Xanten his rule, around 1140

With his theology and also as a bishop, Augustine was instrumental in the internal reorganization of the church. So he set up a rule for women and men, which is still used today in a revised version by various orders as the Augustine rule .

Augustine also gathered a group of clerics (priests, deacons, etc.) around him who led a common life and thus became the first canons . As was customary at the time, the canons of Augustine were encouraged to abstain from celibacy, which was supported by living together.

After the rule of Benedict of Nursia had found widespread use in the early Middle Ages and the Augustinian order was hardly known , ideas and ideas of Augustine were used again in the high Middle Ages , especially during the Gregorian reforms and the investiture dispute . These influenced not only the life of the regular canons (see also Augustinian Canons ), but also parts of the mendicant orders that were emerging at that time (e.g. Augustinian hermits , Dominicans , Mercedarians ).

Music theory

Augustine's early work De musica , the main part of which (books I – V) he wrote while he was still working as a rhetoric teacher, is an outstanding music-theoretical work on rhythm . It is written in dialogue form and develops an original deductive rhythm theory in a neo-Pythagorean method. His script goes far beyond the templates of the Latin metrics and is unique in Latin antiquity. Among other things, it contains the earliest theory about clock , pauses and syncope .

Beyond music theory, Book VI is a philosophical, even religious, treatise. Possibly the reason for this is that Augustine was the only one who revised this book in the years 408 to 409 and at that time had acquired a different basic attitude. He combines the art of music with theological topics and treats, among other things, the four virtues, the overcoming of temporal things, pride as the main sin, the meaning of suffering and sin.

aftermath

The history of the impact of Augustine is described in particular in the science of history and philosophy under the keyword Augustinism .

Coat of arms of the Augustinian Order ( Venice , 1777)

Augustine is shown in the depictions as a bishop in regalia , together with the other three church fathers ( Ambrosius of Milan , Hieronymus and Gregory the Great ) or with his mother Monika von Tagaste . When attributes are a book with a feather , symbolizing the scholarship, and a flaming or pierced by arrows heart , which is the symbol of God's love fiery added. These attributes are also reflected in the coat of arms of the Augustinian order.

In the western churches, Augustine is venerated as a saint . It is also of great importance for the Protestant churches, which limit the commemoration of saints to their role model function, since the doctrine of justification of the Reformation of the sole saving power of God's grace from the Protestant point of view is based on the corresponding teachings of Paul of Tarsus , but also on whose continuation is based on Augustine.

The general day of remembrance in the Protestant churches (for example EKD , ELCA and LCMS ), Roman Catholic and Anglican churches is August 28. In the Orthodox churches, where he is known as Blessed Augustine despite the rejection of some of his teachings because of his way of life , his feast day is June 15. Other special Catholic feast days are Augustine's conversion on May 5th and the transfer of the bones (of Augustine) on October 11th (in Bruges ). He is considered the father and creator of the theological and philosophical science of the Christian West and is therefore called the church father .

The theological writings of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. are essentially imbued with the teaching of Augustine. Similar to Augustine, whose turn to Christianity was triggered by the experience of the sung prayer and subsequently developed out of a dialogical relationship between the performance of liturgical celebrations and philosophical discourse, Ratzinger also thinks in the area of ​​tension between sacred action and theological reflection. In view of this structural moment in Augustine's thinking, the reference back to his person and his thinking are a logical further development of the basic spiritual attitude to be established in Augustine or Ratzinger.

The following more recent musical works refer directly to Augustine or his texts:

In his setting of the Augustine text, Stühlmeyer follows the style of psalmody models, corresponding to the synthetic parallelism of the text and at the same time uses the number combinations of the golden ratio. Brass uses Augustine's focus on the Epistles of Paul and their role in the conversion process to make them the basis of his composition. Hiller's church opera implements Augustine's confrontation with Christianity, paganism, Manichaeism and the various philosophical schools of antiquity in his opera, known as the sounding mosaic.

criticism

Augustine and his teaching were largely undisputed in the church until the Reformation. Only the emerging individualism , subjectivism and biblicism of the Reformation period and the subsequent evangelical theology took offense at various statements (doctrine of original sin, purgatory and others). Subsequently, some historians and theologians such as Alfred Adam and Wilhelm Windelband took the view that Augustine was strongly influenced by Manichaeism and Neoplatonism in the development of his teachings and that many of his ideas were biblically unsustainable. They cite doctrines such as the strong dualism that also prevails in Manichaeism , the doctrine of purgatory , the doctrine of hell, the doctrine of original sin, the doctrine of double predestination and hostility to the body and sex. Overall, according to these critics, Augustine deformed the beliefs of early Christianity almost beyond recognition.

The theologian David Edwards doubts that Augustine would do justice to Jesus Christ's image of God , since his (increasingly negative in old age) assessment of the overwhelming number of people as "massa damnata" does not explain how the Redeemer, who was a compassionate father- God represented, could be called "friend of sinners".

In a polemic , the psychoanalyst Tilmann Moser interprets the memories of his youth in the “Confessions” as an expression of a neurotic feeling of guilt and an associated longing to merge with God, which continues to have an adverse effect on countless believers to this day.

Works

Autobiographical writings

  • Confessions (dt. Confessions ) - Autobiographical writing with theological and philosophical considerations
  • Retractationes ( revisions ) - contains subsequent corrections and comments on his earlier writings

Philosophical writings

Theologically significant texts

According to legend, Augustine and Ambrosius of Milan are said to have written and composed the Te Deum together . When Augustine received the sacrament of baptism as an adult, Ambrose is said to have intoned this hymn. Augustine is said to have answered it in verses.

  • De Genesi aduersus Manicheos 389

literature

Primary texts

  • Complete digital edition based on the best edition (online resource): CAG-online (= CAG 3) - Corpus Augustinianum Gissense a Cornelio Mayer editum. Basel: Schwabe, 2013
  • The most complete printed, but uncritical edition is still vols. 32–47 in JP Mignes Patrologia Latina (Paris 1844–1864).
  • Critical text issues appear in the following rows:
    • Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum (CSEL), Vienna: Tempsky, 1865ff.
    • Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina (CCL), Turnhout: Brepolis, 1953ff.
    • Six new sermons of Augustine. Two parts (edited by Isabella Schiller / Dorothea Weber / Clemens Weidmann). In: Wiener Studien 121 (2008) 227–284; 122 (2009) 171-213
    • Bibliotheque Augustinenne (BA), Oeuvres de Saint Augustin, Paris: Desclee De Brouwer, 1949ff.
    • Nuova Biblioteca Agostiniana (NBA), Opera de S. Agostino, edizione latino-italiana, Rome: Citta Nuova 1965ff.
    • Tübingen Augustinus Center (J. Brachtendorf, V. Drecoll, also C. Horn, Th. Fuhrer) (Eds.): Latin-German complete edition in 130 volumes, overview of works
  • Selection of individual German translations:
    • Johann Kreuzer (Ed.): De trinitate (=  Philosophical Library. Volume 523). Meiner, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 978-3-7873-1651-9 .
    • What is time Latin-German, introduced, trans. and annotated by Norbert Fischer. Philosophical Library, Volume 543. Meiner, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 978-3-7873-1609-0 .
    • De musica. Introduced, trans. and annotated by Frank Hentschel. Philosophical Library, Volume 593. Meiner, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 978-3-7873-1657-1 .
    • Search for real life. Confessiones X / Confessions 10; Latin-German, introduced, trans. and annotated by Norbert Fischer. Philosophical Library, Vol. 584. Meiner, Hamburg 2006, ISBN 978-3-7873-1808-7 .
    • Augustine - Confessiones - Confessions ; Latin-German, introduced, translated and explained by Joseph Bernhart. Kösel, Munich 1955 (with reprints and new editions). It is interesting to note the biblical passages (in the text in the margin) that Augustine processed.
    • Confessions (dt. Confessions ) - Latin / German by Kurt Flasch and Burkhard Mojsisch (Introduction / trans.). Reclam's Universal Library No. 1867. Reclam, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-15-018676-3 .
    • Augustine of Hippo. Sermons to the Old Testament prophets (Sermones 42-50) . (= Patrologia. Contributions to the Study of the Church Fathers, Volume 29.) Introduction, text, translation and notes, edited by Hubertus R. Drobner. Peter Lang, Bern 2014, ISBN 978-3-631-64363-1 .
    • Hans Urs von Balthasar : The citizenship (De Civitate Dei). Edited and introduced by Hans Urs von Balthasar. From the Latin. Fischer library, Frankfurt am Main / Hamburg 1961.

literature

Philosophy bibliography : Augustine - Additional references on the topic

  • Hannah Arendt : Augustin's concept of love . Attempt at a philosophical interpretation. Springer, Berlin 1929 (Philosophical dissertation University of Heidelberg 1929, 134 pages, with Karl Jaspers , table of contents ); New editions: Foreword and editor Ludger Lütkehaus , Philo, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-8257-0343-6 and as an original reprint , edited and essay by Frauke-Annegret Kurbacher , Olms, Hildesheim 2006, ISBN 3-487-13262-1 .
  • Gerhard J. Bellinger : The life story of Augustine (354-430). Testified in his Confessiones and depicted in Benozzo Gozzoli's cycle of frescoes. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2014, ISBN 978-3-7347-3481-6 .
  • Johannes Brachtendorf: The structure of the human spirit according to Augustine. Self-reflection and knowledge of God in “De trinitate” (=  Paradeigmata. 19). Meiner, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-7873-1435-0 (also: Tübingen, University, habilitation paper, 1998).
  • Peter Brown : Augustine of Hippo. A biography (=  dtv 30759). Extended new edition. Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-423-30759-5 .
  • Volker Henning Drecoll : The emergence of Augustine's doctrine of grace (= contributions to historical theology. 109). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-16-147046-X (also: Münster, Universität, habilitation paper, 1998).
  • Volker Henning Drecoll (Ed.): Augustin manual. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2007, ISBN 978-3-16-148269-4 ( content; PDF file; 329 kB ).
  • Karl Eschweiler : The aesthetic elements in the religious philosophy of St. Augustine. Euskirchener Volkszeitung, Euskirchen 1909 (Munich, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, dissertation from July 19, 1909; digital edition , edited and with an afterword by Thomas Marschler , 2011).
  • Norbert Fischer, Cornelius Mayer (ed.): The Confessions of Augustine of Hippo. Introduction and interpretations of the thirteen books (=  research on European intellectual history. Vol. 1). Special edition. Herder, Freiburg (Breisgau) a. a. 2004, ISBN 3-451-28356-5 .
  • Kurt Flasch : Augustin. Introduction to his thinking (=  Universal Library. No. 9962). 3rd, bibliographically supplemented edition. Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-009962-5 .
  • Kurt Flasch, Dominique de Courcelle (ed.): Augustine in modern times. Colloque de la Herzog August Library de Wolfenbüttel, October 14-17, 1996. Brepols, Turnhout 1998, ISBN 2-503-50794-8 .
  • Kurt Flasch: What is time? Augustine of Hippo, the XI. Book of Confessiones. Historical-philosophical study. Text, translation, commentary (=  Klostermann seminar. 13). 2nd Edition. Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 2004, ISBN 3-465-03374-4 .
  • Robin Lane Fox : Augustine. Confessions and conversions in the life of an ancient man. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-98115-5 .
  • Therese Fuhrer : Augustine. Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 2004, ISBN 3-534-15768-0 .
  • Wilhelm Geerlings : Augustine - life and work. A bibliographical introduction. Panorama, Paderborn et al. 2002, ISBN 3-506-71020-6 .
  • Christoph Horn : Augustinus (= Beck'sche series. 531, thinker ). Beck, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-38930-9 .
  • Gisbert Kranz : Augustine. His life and work (= Topos pocket books. 244). Matthias Grünewald Verlag, Mainz 1994, ISBN 3-7867-1795-8 .
  • Johann Kreuzer : Augustine for the introduction (= series for the introduction ). 2nd, supplemented edition. Junius Verlag, Hamburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-88506-609-5 .
  • Robin Lane Fox : Augustine. Confessions and conversions in the life of an ancient man . Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-98115-5 .
  • Henri Marrou : Augustine in personal testimonies and image documents (=  Rowohlt's monographs. 8, ISSN  0485-5256 ). Translated from the French by Christine Muthesius. Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 1958.
  • Cornelius Mayer et al. (Ed.): Augustinus-Lexikon. Vol. 1 ff., Schwabe, Basel 1994 ff.
  • Cornelius Mayer : Augustine treasure trove of quotations. Core themes of his thinking. Latin-German with short comments. Schwabe, Basel 2018, ISBN 978-3-7965-3902-2 .
  • Uwe Neumann: Augustinus (= Rowohlt's monographs. 50617). 2nd Edition. Rowohlt-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Reinbek near Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-499-50617-3 .
  • James J. O'Donnell: Augustine. A New Biography. Harper Perennial, New York NY et al. a. 2005, ISBN 0-06-053537-7 .
  • Karla Pollmann: Augustine. In: Peter von Möllendorff , Annette Simonis, Linda Simonis (ed.): Historical figures of antiquity. Reception in literature, art and music (= Der Neue Pauly . Supplements. Volume 8). Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2013, ISBN 978-3-476-02468-8 , Sp. 139–150.
  • Klaus Rosen : Augustine. Genius and saint. Zabern, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-4860-7 .
  • Eleonore Stump , Norman Kretzmann (Eds.): The Cambridge Companion to Augustine. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge u. a. 2001, ISBN 0-521-65018-6 .
  • Peter Seele: Philosophy of the epoch threshold. Augustine between antiquity and the Middle Ages (=  sources and studies on philosophy. Vol. 80). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin a. a. 2008, ISBN 978-3-11-019475-3 (also: Düsseldorf, Universität, Dissertation, 2007).
  • Roland Kany : Augustine's Trinity Thinking. Review, criticism and continuation of modern research on “De trinitate” (=  studies and texts on antiquity and Christianity. Vol. 22). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2007, ISBN 978-3-16-148326-4 .
  • Agostino Trapè: Aurelius Augustine. A picture of life. 1st edition of the revised and supplemented new edition. Verlag Neue Stadt, Munich u. a. 2006, ISBN 3-87996-677-X .
  • Timo J. Weissenberg: The peace teaching of Augustine. Theological foundations and ethical development (=  Theology and Peace. Vol. 28). Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-018744-9 (also: Freiburg (Breisgau), university, dissertation, 2005).
  • Ulrich Duchrow : Language comprehension and biblical listening with Augustine, hermeneutical studies on theology, vol. 5, dissertation Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg . Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1965.
  • Konrad Vössing , Augustine's ordination to the priesthood in Hippo Regius (391 AD) - self-statements, hagiography and modern interpretation . In: Roman quarterly for Christian antiquity and church history , Vol. 114 (2019), pp. 188–217.
  • Wendelin Schmidt-Dengler : Stylistic studies on the structure of the Augustinian denominations. Vienna 1965, OCLC 494359923 (Dissertation University of Vienna 1965, 248 pages).
  • Giovanni Domenico Giulio: Night Thoughts of St. Augustine. Trier 1843 digitized

Web links

Commons : Augustine  - album with pictures, videos and audio files
Wikiquote: Augustine of Hippo  - Quotes
Wikisource: Augustine of Hippo  - Sources and full texts
Works
Bibliographies
Secondary literature
Papal pronouncements on Augustine

Remarks

  1. ↑ also: Thagaste, today Souk Ahras in Algeria
  2. ↑ today Annaba in Algeria
  3. ↑ Augustine wrote over 100 works, 218 letters and 500 sermons over a period of approximately 45 years. List of works of the Center for Augustine Research at the Julius Maximilians University of Würzburg
  4. ↑ Cf. on this Pedro Barceló , Constantius II. And his time. The beginnings of the state church , Stuttgart 2004. For the theological debates from Constantine see also Luce Pietri u. a. (Ed.): The history of Christianity , vol. 2, special edition, Freiburg im Breisgau 2005, p. 193ff.
  5. ↑ See Pietri et al. a .: History of Christianity. Vol. 2, p. 447 ff.
  6. ↑ Henning Börm : Westrom , 2nd edition, Stuttgart 2018, and Walter Pohl : Die Völkerwanderung provide useful introductions to the historical background . 2nd ed., Stuttgart 2005, dar. Cf. also the various overview works in the Bibliography Spätantike .
  7. ^ Robin Lane Fox : Augustine. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-98115-5 , p. 31
  8. ↑ Klaus Rosen: Augustine. Genius and saint. Zabern, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-4860-7 , p. 15.
  9. ↑ Cornelius Petrus Mayer OSA : figure and work of Augustine. An introduction. Birth, Parents, Childhood and Schools. Center for Augustine Research at the Julius Maximillians University of Würzburg ( [1] on augustinus.de)
  10. ↑ Spelling: Monika, Monnica and similar.
  11. ↑ Assia Djebar : Scars in my memory. About Algeria's literary ancestors and the choice of language . Eurozine.com. Excerpt from her speech on June 22, 2006 on the occasion of her admission to the Académie Française. Le monde diplomatique, February 18, 2008
  12. ↑ Volker Henning Drecoll (Ed.): Augustin Handbook. Tübingen 2007, p. 50.
  13. ^ Augustine / Augustinism. In: Theological Real Encyclopedia . Volume 4. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin et al. 1993, p. 645ff., Here p. 646; Horn: Augustine , p. 13.
  14. ↑ Klaus Rosen : Augustine. Genius and saint. WBG, Darmstadt 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-5052-5 , p. 13
  15. ↑ married to Cypriana, a well-known son Licentius and died after 408 AD, see Josef Lössl: The author and his addressee. In Josef Lössl (ed.): De vera religione / The true religion. Augustinus Opera - Werke, Vol. 68, Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2007, ISBN 9783506756152 , pp. 11-14, here p. 12
  16. ↑ Peter Brown : Treasure in Heaven. The rise of Christianity and the fall of the Roman Empire. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-94849-3 , pp. 244f
  17. ↑ Jörg Trelenberg : Augustin's writing De ordine: Introduction, commentary, results. Vol. 144 Contributions to historical theology, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-16149-545-8 , p. 113, footnote 106 ( [2] on books.google.de)
  18. ↑ Klaus Rosen : Augustine. Genius and saint. Zabern, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-4860-7 , p. 22 f.
  19. ↑ Peter Brown : Treasure in Heaven. The rise of Christianity and the fall of the Roman Empire. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-94849-3 , p. 65 f.
  20. ↑ a b c d wdr of November 13, 2004: 1,650 years ago: Aurelius Augustinus born in Thagaste - church father from Africa
  21. ↑ so the writer Jostein Gaarder
  22. ↑ See Kurt Flasch : Augustin. Introduction to his thinking . Ditzingen 2003. p. 18.
  23. ↑ Martina Janßen: Mani. December 2010, keyword 51977 ( [3] on bibelwissenschaft.de), here p. 11
  24. ^ Sara Antonietta Luisa Arnoldi: Manichaeism and Bible exegesis with Augustine: De Genesi contra Manichaeos. Dissertation, Ludwig Maximilians University, Munich 2011 ( [4] on edoc.ub.uni-muenchen.de)
  25. ↑ Klaus Rosen: Augustine. Genius and saint. Zabern, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-4860-7 , p. 99.
  26. ↑ see also pessimum of the migration period
  27. ↑ An origin from the Scandinavian area does not correspond to the current state of research, rather it concerns East Germanic tribes (see also East Germanic languages , Lugier ).
  28. ↑ according to Greek doctrine the spirit emerges from the father through the son, according to the churches of the occidental tradition from the father and the son
  29. ↑ De civitate Dei 20.7
  30. ↑ De civitate Dei 20.9
  31. ↑ Enchiridion ad Laurentium 9, 29
  32. ↑ The data here based on the chronological catalog raisonné ( memento of March 13, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) of the Center for Augustine Research in Würzburg
  33. ↑ Adversus Iudaeos 7:10 and 8:11. These and the following passages are listed and documented in Bernhard Blumenkranz : The Augustins' Jewish Sermon , Basel 1946, in the chapter “Melting Jews with Augustin”, pp. 186–189. Blumenkranz offers a German translation of Adversus Iudaeos on pp. 89–110 . The Latin text ( Memento of May 24, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) and a French translation are available on the Internet .
  34. ↑ Sermo 80.5.
  35. ↑ In German translation here
  36. ^ In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 45,10.
  37. ^ In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 38,5.
  38. ^ In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 92,2.
  39. ^ In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 119.4. See Adv. Iud. 5.6.
  40. ↑ Both in Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 30.2. On the Jews as “filth” cf. De civitate Dei 17,4,6.
  41. ^ In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 31,9.
  42. ↑ Sermo 218B, here ( memento of July 5, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) in an annotated Latin-German rendering.
  43. ↑ Enarrationes in psalmos , 103, IV, 3. Cf. In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV , 56,9.
  44. ↑ De civitate Dei 18, 46; Augustine first developed the idea in Contra Faustum 13:11 .
  45. ↑ So in the commentary on Ps 40  LUT .
  46. ↑ Fr. 311 Laf., Trans. U. Kunzmann
  47. ↑ Joseph Ratzinger : People and House of God in Augustine's Doctrine of the Church , Univ. Diss. Munich 1951; Zink, Munich 1954 (= St. Ottilien: EOS, 1992), ISBN 3-88096-207-3 .
  48. ↑ Cf. Richard Klein: Symmachus . Darmstadt 1971. On the Christianization of the upper class cf. Michele R. Salzman: The Making of a Christian Aristocracy: social and religious change in the western Roman Empire . Cambridge / MA 2002.
  49. ↑ Aurelius Augustinus: From the state of God. XIX. Chap., 7th complete edition, Munich 2007, p. 541.
  50. ↑ Aurelius Augustinus, Vom Gottesstaat, 4th book, chap. 3, complete edition, Munich 2007, p. 171 f.
  51. ↑ Aurelius Augustinus: From the state of God. Complete edition, Munich 2007.
  52. ↑ Quid enim culpatur in bello? An quia moriuntur quandoque morituri, ut domentur in pace victuri? Hoc reprehendere timidorum est, non religiosorum […]. 75. Bellum autem quod gerendum Deo auctore suscipitur, recte suscipi, dubitare fas non est, vel ad terrendam, vel ad obterendam, vel ad subiugandam mortalium superbiam: quando ne illud quidem quod humana cupiditate geritur, non solum incorruptibili Deo, sed nec sanctis eius obesse aliquid potest; quibus potius ad exercendam patientiam, et ad humiliandam animam, ferendamque paternam disciplinam etiam prodesse invenitur. Neque enim had in eos quisquam ullam potestatem, nisi cui data fuerit desuper. Non est enim potestas nisi a Deo, sive iubente, sive sinente. Cum ergo vir iustus, si forte sub rege homine etiam sacrilego militet, recte poscit illo iubente bellare civicae pacis ordinem servans; cui quod iubetur, vel non esse contra Dei praeceptum certum est, vel utrum sit, certum non est, ita ut fortasse reum regem faciat iniquitas imperandi, innocentem autem militem ostendat ordo serviendi: quanto magis in administratione bellorum innocentissime diversatur, qui Deo iubente belligerato quem male aliquid i clean non posse, nemo qui ei servit ignorat. Augustine. Contra fist. 22.74f. Quoted from: J. Migne: Sancti Aurelii Augustini, Hipponensis episcopi, opera omnia (Patrologia Latina Volume 42). An English translation of this central passage can be found in J. Helgeland et al. a. (Ed.): Christians and the Military. Philadelphia 1985, pp. 81f.
  53. ↑ Josef Rief : The ordo concept of the young Augustine. Dissertation. Schöningh, Paderborn 1962, p. 21 ff.
  54. ↑ Hubert Mader: Sources on the Catholic Church's understanding of peace since Pius IX , p. 12
  55. ↑ Josef Rief: The ordo concept of the young Augustine . Dissertation. Schöningh, Paderborn 1962, p. 25.
  56. ↑ c. ep. Man.5
  57. ^ Henri-Irénée Marrou : Augustine and the end of ancient education . Schöningh, Paderborn u. a. 1981, ISBN 3-506-75340-1 , p. 489 f.
  58. ^ Carl Johann Perl: Aurelius Augustinus - Music. Heitz & Cie, Strasbourg a. a. 1937, notes, p. 302 f.
  59. ↑ Kath.net : Joseph Ratzinger is an Augustinian February 6, 2007
  60. ↑ Augustinus: Afrikanitaet Universalitaet, St. Gallen Abbey Library, April 20 - May 20 . Spolia, Journal of Mediaval Studies
  61. ^ Tilmann Moser : A difficult patient. To my enemy Augustine. In: ders .: From God poisoning to a tolerable God. Psychoanalytic Considerations on Religion. Kreuz, Stuttgart 2003, pp. 152-176.
  62. ↑ List of Augustine's works, date and place of origin and intention ( [5] on augustinus.de)
predecessor Office successor
Valerius of Hippo Bishop of Hippo Regius
396-430 		Heraclius
personal data
SURNAME Augustine of Hippo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Augustine of Tagaste; Saint Augustine; Augustin (German)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Doctor of the Church, Christian theologian and philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH November 13, 354
PLACE OF BIRTH Tagaste , Numidia
DATE OF DEATH August 28, 430
Place of death Hippo Regius in what is now Algeria