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St. Augustine'S Philosophy of MAN

St. Augustine's philosophy of man reconciles Greek philosophy and Christian scripture. It views happiness as the ultimate goal, but says true happiness is found only in God. Augustine also saw Plato's form of the good as the living personal God revealed in scripture. As a bishop, he developed concepts like the spiritual city of God and original sin. His works influenced both Catholicism and Protestantism.

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Chard Apdujan
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178 views17 pages

St. Augustine'S Philosophy of MAN

St. Augustine's philosophy of man reconciles Greek philosophy and Christian scripture. It views happiness as the ultimate goal, but says true happiness is found only in God. Augustine also saw Plato's form of the good as the living personal God revealed in scripture. As a bishop, he developed concepts like the spiritual city of God and original sin. His works influenced both Catholicism and Protestantism.

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Chard Apdujan
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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ST.

AUGUSTINE’S PHILOSOPHY OF
MAN
• St. Augustine’s philosophy of man reconciles and
brings together to an admirable synthesis and
harmony the wisdom of Greek philosophy and the
divine truths contained in the scriptures.In common
with Greek ethics, its being eudaimonistic in
character, as it makes happiness the end-all and the
be-all of human living; but Augustine tells us with the
Bible that this happiness can be found in GOD alone.
The summum bonum.
• which is Plato’s and Aristotle’s concept of the
absolute and immutable and is now seen by
Augustine with the aid of the light of divine
revelation as the living personal God, the creator
of all things and the supreme ruler of the
universe. So, the idea of the Good of Plato is
revealed, to Augustine as the living reality, God.
Who Is Augustine?
Augustine of Hipponesis was
an early Christian theologian
and philosopher who lived
from approximately 354 AD
to 430 AD.
He was the bishop of Hippo
Regius, which is modern-day
Algeria.
He is known for his writings
that influenced the
development of western
Christianity.
Augustine the Monk
In his early years as a Manichean monk, St.
Augustine had trouble interpreting the Bible.
Manichaeism was a major religion founded by
an Iranian prophet in Persia.
Manichaeism taught an elaborate dualistic
cosmology describing the struggle between a
good, spiritual world of light, and an evil,
material world of darkness.
Augustine’s Conversion to Christianity
In the summer of 386, at the
age of 31, Augustine
converted to Christianity.
He said his conversion was
prompted by a childlike
voice he heard telling him to
"take up and read" which he
took as a divine command
to open the Bible and read
the first thing he saw.
Augustine read from Paul's
Epistle to the Romans
wherein Paul outlined how
the Gospel transformed
believers, and the believers'
resulting behavior.
Augustine’s Religious Concepts
Augustine developed the concept of a spiritual city of
God.
His concepts included the Trinity as defined by the council
of Nicaea and later the Council of Constantinople that
also identified with Augustine’s City of God.
In the Catholic and Anglican Churches he is considered a
saint while the Calvanists and many of the Protestant
churches consider his teachings on salvation and divine
grace make him one of the fathers of the Protestant
Reformation.
Some of Augustine’s doctrines include views on original
sin, the doctrine of grace, and predestination.
Augustine’s belief in original sin.

Augustine taught that Original sin of Adam and


Eve was either an act of foolishness followed by
pride and disobedience to God.
Self-centeredness made Adam and Eve eat of it,
thus failing to acknowledge and respect the
world as it was created by God, with its
hierarchy of beings and values.
Discuss the difference in Augustine’s belief and
the principle of gaining knowledge and the
atonement.
PHILOSOPHY OF THE STATE

• TWO SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: STATE AND


CHURCH
Augustine upholds the supremacy of the
church which takes care of the spiritual
well-being of the citizens over the state
which administers to the temporal well-
being of the body church and the state
• cannot be separated from eachother anymore
than the body can be separated from the soul
inman s present existence on earth.Hence,
the obligation of all citizens to obey laws
andproperly constituted civil authority for the
maintenance of peace and order for their own
good
WHAT THEN IS GOD?
Augustine answers this question with the words
of the scriptures that God is Love; teaches that
mortality consists in love, since it is love that
makes us like unto Love (God).
Thus, the first and the greatest of all the
commandments, becomes the basis and the
central point of Augustine’s Christian ethics.
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy
whole heart, with thy whole soul and with thy
whole strength: and for love of God thou shalt
love thy neighbor as thyself.”
Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount.
In 393 Augustine wrote a Commentary on the Sermon on
the Mount.
He was very adept at searching out the will of God
revealed through the scriptures.
Augustine approached his work with the temperament of
a child, rather than that of a scholar.
His commentary shows that he feared God while
possessing a clarity and depth that recommends it across
the ages.
His understanding of the Beatitudes speaks of a perfect
moral law that was hidden in the Old Testament and
unveiled by Christ in the New Testament.
Augustine said,
“anyone who piously and earnestly ponders the
Sermon on the Mount—as we read in the
Gospel according to Mathew—I believe he will
find therein … the perfect standard of the
Christian Life.”
Imparted by the One True Teacher, the Sermon
on the Mount provides the divine principles of
justice guiding us to the narrow path that leads
to communion with the Saints.
Discuss the following
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for
righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of
heaven.”
Augustine thought the eighth Beatitude allowed
us to perfect ourselves through redemptive
suffering.
St. Augustine explained that “the profitable
thing is not suffering those evils, but bearing
them with equanimity and cheerfulness for the
sake of Christ.”
Discuss Augustine’s interpretation of the following beatitudes.

Meekness corresponds with piety or honor for


the sacred Scriptures and the restrained power
to live them out.
Mourning corresponds with the gift of
knowledge and facilitates the discernment of
good from evil.
Hunger and thirst for justice corresponds with
the gift of fortitude to be truly just.
Mercy coincides with the gift of counsel which
exhorts us to forgive as we wish to be forgiven.
Continued…
Purity of heart corresponds with the gift of
understanding what the eye has not seen and
the ear has not heard.
Peacemaking corresponds with the gift of
wisdom.
Augustine explained that “for with peacemakers
all things are in proper order, and no passion is
in rebellion against reason, but everything is in
submission to man’s spirit because that spirit is
obedient to God.”
LIBERTY AND LOVE
Augustine proposes love, the central point of
philosophy.
“That the will is free, and that it is at the same time
irresistibly drawn towards the good, are
indubitable facts.” - Augustine
Augustine showed that , while man is free
physically, he is morally bound to obey the law. He
can disobey the law, but he ought not to do so.
This law, which is the Law of Conscience, ever
admonishing us to do good and to avoid evil, is the
proximate norm of morality.
To Augustine, evil is non-being.
• Despite his concept of evil as something
negative, Augustine sees the life of every man,
the history of nations, and the whole human
race as the story of constant struggle and
conflict between two forces, two tendencies:
that of good (inspired and motivated by love)
and that of evil (impelled to and driven by
hate).

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