St. Augustine and the City of God

St. Augustine wrote the City of God at a time when the city of Rome had been captured, A.D 410. St. Augustine used this work as a way to prove the one true God, and to show how false and distant the Roman gods where. At the sacking and capture of Rome, many of the citizens blamed the gods and more so, the one true God. Claiming the Christians assimilation of their God and beliefs turned the Roman gods against the people. 

¹¹ St. Augustine pictured above  

Within the first 10 books, St. Augustine tackles many of the problems when the sacking and capture of Rome occurs. He starts off with 

correcting the notion that many Roman citizens create, blaming God

and the Christians for the sorrows and sufferings of the people. They

felt that they had been abandoned by their gods, and that due to the 

Christians bringing Christianity into the city, the old gods felt betrayed and turned against the people, leaving them to their sorrows.

Augustine uses the first few books to address their claims, and to give evidence to the people of Rome, sadly to show them that their gods had abandoned them long before the savior had come, and long before the arrival of Christianity to the city. Starting at book four, Augustine states that, if Rome suffered, then it was the will of the one true God, and not any fault of the old gods or the true Gods people. 

"True religion is the worship of the true God, not the cult of the false gods, who are just so many devils." ¹

St. Augustine uses the first ten books to set up the separation of the two cities he speaks of throughout the rest of his twenty-two books. 

The separation St. Augustine address is the separation between the city of God and the city of Man. the separation occurs when God allows his son to be resurrected, which stood as the separation, for Augustine, of the man and the spirit, of the two cities. It stood to be a categorical separation for mankind, the proud men stood to be eternally separated from God, while the sojourners were allowed and graced with eternal bliss. The men eternally damned to the City of Man, are rooted in a city founded on sin and vice, men who are selfish. Death, destruction, and conflict dwell and thrive in this City of Man. While this is the picture St. Augustine paints for the City of Man, he paints a very different picture for the City of God. The "Heavenly City" is painted by Augustine to be of grace and virtue, a place where the love of God stands as a governing factor for the city and the people. The City of God thrives with peace, salvation, and eternal life is strived for. The City of God for Augustine was an idea and heavenly paradise, "where the good were finally dominant." ² The City of God is built on the love of God to the contempt of self, while the City of Man on the other hand, is built on self love, to the contempt of God. 

As St. Augustine continues through his books, he moves onto the treatment of men, to men, focusing more on our fellow man and the role the gods and God play in our relationships to each other. 

"If we really love God, then we have to show it by how we treat our neighbor - he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. Love does no wrong to a neighbor, let us never decide to put a stumbling block or a hindrance in the way of a brother. We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. But each of us pleases our neighbor for his good to edify him, for Christ did not please himself." ³

The treatment of men plays into Augustine's retelling of the story of Genesis, and stand to over a view of mankind, mankind's destiny.  Most of Augustine's Books ten to thirteen focus on the creation of man, the nature of mankind, the creation and existence of evils especially in mankind's life, and then ultimately the downfall of mankind. For example, St. Augustine mentions the threat made Adam and Eve, in Chapter Twelve of Book 13. The threat stood to threaten not only their physical bodies, but their immaterial soul. Augustine does good to acknowledge the falling of man, of mans nature. The very image of the City of Man from the first ten books, demonstrates the falling of mans grace and nature, that Augustine goes on to detail from a historical point. 

⁷ City of Man in chaos

St. Augustine uses his historical retell of Genesis to talk through mans free will and two prime examples of mans will, Cain and Able. Books fourteen and fifteen deal mostly with these two subjects, and Augustine combines them in a way that Cain and Able not only display two different types of will, but they themselves display the very categorical differences Augustine makes between the City of Man and City of God. 

"I classify the human race into two branches: the one consists of those who live by human standards, the other of those who live according to God's will. I will also call these two classes the two cities, speaking allegorically." ⁴

Augustine places Cain in the City of Man, while Abel is placed in the City of God. Cain placed in the city with sin, vice, and self love, while his brother is placed in the city dedicated to God, filled with grace and virtue. He notes that while the heavenly city is usually a city where there is peace and a reached goodness, the earthly city and its people are usually divided amongst themselves, as they are a people of self love. Continuing on his retell on Genesis, St. Augustine moves into the stories of Noah and the Ark, David and Solomon, Abraham, Issac, and Joseph. He tells of the Kings and the gods being worshiped during the times of these men and their stories. From books fifteen to seventeen, Augustine uses these historical men and their stories to help guide his message of the City of God and the City of Man, to continue his criticism of not only the Pagans but of other religions as well. 

"When the Jews do not believe in our Scriptures, their own scriptures are fulfilled in them, while they read them with blind eyes." ⁵

Moving into Books eighteen to nineteen are focused more on the sources of good and evil, with Augustine looking at the Christian view of supreme good and evil. 

"Eternal life is the Supreme Good and eternal death is the Supreme Evil, and that to achieve the one and escape the other, we must live rightly." ⁶

He discusses misery, true happiness, justice, and the bitterness of life. Augustine says that he feels that true happiness cannot be attained in this life, and that those who are wise and wage wars for justice, tend to be miserable people. Examples of this wisdom can be seen in many lawyers in our modern generations, with lawyers being considered bloodthirsty and cold hearted. Book Twenty continues the theme of various topics, coming towards the end of St. Augustine's work. In Book twenty, one of the main topics of this book deals with Satan and the millenium, and how Augustine feels the vices and Satan play a role in the upcoming years, millennium's and into the future. He even speaks of how it is power [Satan] to be defeated. 

"In the end the Omnipotent will unloose him, so that the City of God may behold how powerful a foe it has overcome, to the immense glory of its Redeemer, its Helper, its Deliverer." ⁸

Coming to an end of Book twenty, St. Augustine talks of Revelations and the New Testament, the Old Testament and their final judgement's. Chapter twenty-one deals with pain, both physical and spiritual. St. Augustine tackles the question of eternal fire, eternal pain for the material body. 

"For pain is really an experience of the soul, not of the body, even when the cause of the pain is presented to the soul by the body - when pain is felt in the part where the body is hurt." ⁹

St. Augustine uses his address of the eternal fire and pain, to continue into a discussion of purgatory, punishment, and the ability for mankind to burn forever in the eternal fire, while not being consumed by it. This is how he ends Book twenty-one and beings twenty-two, his last book. 

¹² City of God 

Book twenty-two starts off with the statement of the citizens of the City of God being immortal. St. Augustine uses this book to also establish multiple stories of healing conducted by God, miracle stories. He discusses how life would be lived in the City of God as well, conducting his discussion from a Platonist view. The views of many famous writers and theologians such as Plato, Varro, and Labeo (whom he all cites throughout his work), are brought into question. He holds these men in high esteem, but he believes that not even these men had the whole picture, or the proper picture of God and what he is capable of. Most of twenty-two is an overall discussion on the eternal bliss that is met in the City of God. 

"[God] will be the goal of all our longings; and we shall see him for ever; we shall love him without satiety; we shall praise him without wearying. This will be the duty, the delight, the activity of all, shared by all those who share the life of eternity." ¹⁰

Throughout his twenty-two books, St. Augustine tackles many tough questions, deals with many theological and biblical problems, and provides a detailed picture of how he believes mankind is separated and functions both in the physical and spiritual realm. "City of God" represents both the physical and spiritual states of mankind, the history of Christianity, while also providing support to how the Christian God is there for his people, and allows forgiveness and grace to those who live life free from self-love, greed, vice, and sin. He shines a light on just how miraculous and eternal the one true God is, and how to be with him and in him, is true salvation, love, and happiness in both the physical and material worlds. 

¹ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg.163, Ch. 23, Book 4

² The school of Life, PHILOSOPHY – Augustine, February 27, 2015, 6:24, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBAxUBeVfsk 

³ Sesnus Fidelium, The city of God, The city of Man, September 15, 2015, 24:38, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKJmYh2lcik

⁴ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 594 

⁵  St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 828 

⁶ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 852 

⁷ (City of Man Image) St. Augustine and the End of the World, http://jaskology.com/?cat=4  

⁸ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 911

⁹ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 966

¹⁰ St. Augustine, “City of God”, Waxkeep publishing, March 2013, Pg. 1088

¹¹ Encyclopedia Britannica,Saint Augustine, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Augustine 

¹² OpenUtopia, City of God, http://theopenutopia.org/look/