Orthodox Christian Initiative for Africa: St. Augustine (June 15): "love the sinner, hate the sin"

Τετάρτη 14 Ιουνίου 2017

St. Augustine (June 15): "love the sinner, hate the sin"

A theological writer who made

too many mistakes, but still a saint

Orthodoxwiki. Icon: St Augustine and his mother, st Monica. Icon from the Orthodox Holy Monastery of Sts Augustine & Seraphim of Sarov in Trikorpho, Fokida, Greece (here).

Aurelius Augustinus was born in 354 in Tagaste (modern-day Souk Ahras, Algeria) to a Christian mother and a pagan father, raised in Roman north Africa, educated in Carthage, and employed as a professor of rhetoric in Milan by 383. He followed the Manichaean religion in his student days, and was converted to Christianity by the preaching and example of Ambrose of Milan. He was baptized at Pascha in 387, and returned to north Africa and created a monastic foundation at Tagaste for himself and a group of friends. In 391 he was ordained a priest in Hippo Regius (now Annaba, in Algeria). He became a famous preacher (more than 350 preserved sermons are believed to be authentic), and was noted for combatting the Manichaean heresy.
In 396 he was made coadjutor bishop of Hippo (assistant with the right of succession on the death of the current bishop), and remained as bishop in Hippo until his death in 430. He left his monastery, but continued to lead a monastic life in the episcopal residence. He left a Rule (Regula in Latin) for his monastery that has led him to be designated the "patron saint of Regular Clergy," that is, parish clergy who live by a monastic rule.
Augustine died on August 28, 430, during the siege of Hippo by the Vandals. He is said to have encouraged its citizens to resist the attacks, primarily on the grounds that the Vandals adhered to heretical Arian Christianity.

Augustine was born in the year 354 AD in the municipium of Thagaste (now Souk Ahras, Algeria) in Roman Africa. His mother, Monica or Monnica,was a devout Christian; his father Patricius was a Pagan who converted to Christianity on his deathbed. Scholars generally agree that Augustine and his family were Berbers, an ethnic group indigenous to North Africa, but that they were heavily Romanized, speaking only Latin at home as a matter of pride and dignity. In his writings, Augustine leaves some information as to the consciousness of his African heritage. For example, he refers to Apuleius as "the most notorious of us Africans," to Ponticianus as "a country man of ours, insofar as being African," and to Faustus of Mileve as "an African Gentleman." (Wikipedia)

Influence as a theologian and thinker

Reception of Augustine in the Orthodox Church

Book by Fr. Seraphim Rose

The Fifth Ecumenical Council, held in Constantinople in A.D. 553, listed Augustine among other Fathers of the Church, though there is no unqualified endorsement of his theology mentioned (just as there is none for most saints of the Church):

We further declare that we hold fast to the decrees of the four Councils, and in every way follow the holy Fathers, Athanasius, Hilary, Basil, Gregory the Theologian, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose, Theophilus, John (Chrysostom) of Constantinople, Cyril, Augustine, Proclus, Leo and their writings on the true faith.[1] (emphasis added)

In the acts of the Sixth Ecumenical Council (not yet translated into English), he is called the "most excellent and blessed Augustine" and is referred to as "the most wise teacher." In the Comnenian Council of Constantinople in 1166 he is referred to as "Ό Αγίος Αυγουστίνος - "Saint Augustine."
Despite these acclamations, most of his works were not translated into Greek until circa 1360 by Demetrios Cydones and some Orthodox Christians identify errors in his theology—especially those in his Triadology which gave rise to the Filioque addition to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed—and regard him as being one of the major factors in the Great Schism between the Church in the East and in the West. Thus, there are those among the Orthodox who regard Augustine as a heretic, although there has never been any conciliar condemnation of either him or his writings.

St Monica (from here)

More moderate views regard Augustine as (1) a theological writer who made too many mistakes to be included among the Church Fathers but still a saint, (2) a theological writer among many in the early Church (but not a saint), and (3) a theological writer with, perhaps, the title "Blessed" before his name. It should be noted, however, that the Orthodox Church has not traditionally ranked saints in terms of "blessed" or "saint" (i.e., suggesting that the latter has a greater degree of holiness than the former). Saint "rankings" are usually only differences in kind (e.g., monastics, married, bishops, martyrs, etc.), not in degree.
There are at least two books explicitly dealing with the issue of Augustine's place in Orthodoxy: The Place of Blessed Augustine in the Orthodox Church by Fr. Seraphim Rose (ISBN 0938635123), which is generally favorable toward Augustine, citing his importance as a saint in terms of his confessional and devotional writings rather than in his theology, and The Influence of Augustine of Hippo on the Orthodox Church by Dr. Fr. Michael Azkoul (ISBN 0889467331), which tends to see Augustine as the root of all Western Christendom's errors. (There is also a condensation of this book into a booklet titled Augustine of Hippo: An Orthodox Christian Perspective.) The former's cover (shown on right) includes a traditional Greek icon of Augustine, where he is labelled as "Ό Αγίος Αυγουστίνος"—"Saint Augustine."
Another view is expressed by Christos Yannaras, who descibed Augustine as "the fount of every distortion and alteration in the Church's truth in the West" (The Freedom of Morality, p. 151n.).

Quotes

From The City of God

St. Augustine evidently originated the phrase "love the sinner, hate the sin", which he tied in with a privative notion of evil:

For this reason, the man who lives by God's standards and not by man's, must needs be a lover of the good, and it follows that he must hate what is evil. Further, since no one is evil by nature, but anyone who is evil is evil because of a perversion of nature, the man who lives by God's standards has a duty of "perfect hatred" (Psalm 139:22) towards those who are evil; that is to say, he should not hate the person because of the fault, nor should he love the fault because of the person. He should hate the fault, but love the man. And when the fault has been cured there will remain only what he ought to love, nothing that he should hate. (14:6, Penguin ed., transl. Bettenson)

From Confessions

Our hearts shall ever restless be, until they find their rest in Thee. (1:1)

More quotes at Wikiquote...

Writings

At the end of his life (426-428?) Augustine revisited his previous works in chronological order and suggested what he would have said differently in a work titled the Retractations, which gives us a remarkable picture of the development of a writer and his final thoughts.

Books

On Christian Doctrine, 397-426
Confessions, 397-398
City of God, begun c. 413, finished 426.
On the Trinity, 400-416.
Enchiridion

Letters

On the Catechising of the Uninstructed
On Faith and the Creed
Concerning Faith of Things Not Seen
On the Profit of Believing
On the Creed: A Sermon to Catechumens
On Continence
On the Good of Marriage
On Holy Virginity
On the Good of Widowhood
On Lying
To Consentius: Against Lying
On the Work of Monks
On Patience
On Care to be Had For the Dead
On the Morals of the Catholic Church
On the Morals of the Manichaeans
On Two Souls, Against the Manichaeans
Acts or Disputation Against Fortunatus the Manichaean
Against the Epistle of Manichaeus Called Fundamental
Reply to Faustus the Manichaean
Concerning the Nature of Good, Against the Manichaeans
On Baptism, Against the Donatists
Answer to Letters of Petilian, Bishop of Cirta
The Correction of the Donatists
Merits and Remission of Sin, and Infant Baptism
On the Spirit and the Letter
On Nature and Grace
On Man's Perfection in Righteousness
On the Proceedings of Pelagius
On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin
On Marriage and Concupiscence
On the Soul and its Origin
Against Two Letters of the Pelagians
On Grace and Free Will
On Rebuke and Grace
The Predestination of the Saints/Gift of Perseverance
Our Lord's Sermon on the Mount
The Harmony of the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament
Tractates on the Gospel of John
Homilies on the First Epistle of John
Soliloquies
The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms

Bibliography

Fr. Michael Azkoul, The Influence of Augustine of Hippo on the Orthodox Church (ISBN 0889467331)
Fr. Seraphim Rose, The Place of Blessed Augustine in the Orthodox Church, 1997 (ISBN 0938635123)
Peter Brown, Augustine of Hippo (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967) (ISBN 0-520-00186-9)
George E. Demacopoulos and Aristotle Papanikolaou, eds., Orthodox Readings of Augustine (ISBN 978-0881413274)
James J. O'Donnell, Augustine: A New Biography, 2006 (ISBN 978-0060535384)
Adolphe Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life: A Treatise on Ascetical and Mystical Theology, 1930, reprint edition 2000 (ISBN 0895556596) p. 37.
Gary Wills, Augustine: A Life, 2005 (ISBN 978-0143035985)
Dr. Myroslaw I. Tataryn. Augustine and Russian Orthodoxy: Russian Orthodox Theologians and Augustine of Hippo: a Twentieth Century Dialogue. Lanham, MD: International Scholars Press, 2000. 183pp. ISBN 9781573093903