Augustine’s teachings on human nature
The Manichees:
Focused on the use of reason – they were dualists
They argued that evil and suffering are caused by a lower evil power – NOT
GOD
o To them, the world is a battlefield between the forces of light and
darkness
Argued that the soul is trapped in the body
o Humans should liberate the higher soul into the greater light
o Good works lead to the soul’s release
The lower soul seeks material
Platonist influences – Argued evil and suffering come from the soul’s inability to
control the body
o Happiness comes from the separation of materialism with the One
For the Manichees, Christ was an enlightened being
Out of engaging with Platonists, Augustine concluded evil was the
privation of good
Ambrose:
Taught Augustine that knowledge comes from God’s grace in Jesus Christ
Taught him to read the Old Testament symbolically instead of literally
Within 3 years, Augustine became a bishop
The Pelagians:
Argued humans can overcome personal sin using free will
Disagreed with the idea that Original Sin leads to universal guilt, which is only
removable by God
Augustine disagreed with this
o Argued that human nature after The Fall was entirely corrupt
o Adam’s original sin and guilt has been passed through the generations
o All humans are born in sin – incapable of choosing to do good or follow
God
o Humans need God’s grace – only extended to a few called ‘The Elect’
Human will before and after the fall:
GENESIS 1-3
In Genesis, Augustine sees harmony
o Harmony is characterised by obedience to God and to one another
o People are at harmony with themselves
The Will is God give
o Privilege and the hallmark of our elevated existence
o Determines who we are by choosing to do good or evil
The Will is driven by two forces
o Self love (Cupitidas)
o Generous love (Caritas)
Love of others requires love of self
o If one cannot recognise their own dignity then one cannot love another
person
o Can’t love others means you can’t love God
Sex and friendship:
Adam and Eve were married as friends
o There was freedom between them (a communion)
Friendship included reproduction (Genesis 1:28)
o The sexual act was secondary to the friendship
o There was sex without lust
, o The Will is in harmony with the body
Friendship is the highest expression of human existence
After the Fall, friendship continues to express love of God
True friendship is only possible for those who love Christ first
o Friendship involves a generosity of oneself to another
Human will after the Fall:
Question was – What caused humans to reject their perfect relationship
with God?
o Pride – seeking to be like God
The two wills (Cupiditas and Caritas) became separated after the Fall
How did the idea to sin enter their mind?
o Came from the serpent
Adam and Eve weakened our Will
o Bodily desires have come to dominated
The divided soul/will is at war with itself
o Wants to do good but it does the opposite
o This results in a weakened will – Akrasia (the tendency to act against
one’s better judgement) comes from Adam’s disobedience
Concupiscence - humanity’s tendency to sin
o Dominates the desiring aspect of the soul
While the body is good (it is created by God), we misuse it
o While friendships are good, they can go wrong
Shows us Original Sin has visible effects in the world
o Adam and Eve made sin an ontological condition of human existence
Augustine says we have undergone a double death
o First is Adam’s rebellion
o Second death is our mortal state
Sin is transmitted to us through the sexual act
o After the fall, sex with lust comes into exist
The lustful aspect of sex distorts our natures and orients them towards evil
o Calvin in his Institutes goes further – ‘the whole man is in himself nothing
but concupiscence’
o Calvin develops his concept of sensus divinatis – we have a sense of the
divine, to be like God, however it is marred and distorted by the fall
o God needs to renew the memory of his presence to prevent our corrupted
human nature from pursuing and worshipping false idols
Free will and predestination:
Augustine’s view on this changes over time
o Appears to both support and reject predestination
Issue of predestination is that what is the point of being good
Humans are prone to sin
o Predestination encourages us to persevere
In order to become good, we must accept God’s grace
o God’s grace is the reality of him loving us
o We must rely on the sacraments to reach Heaven
God’s love is healing us – allows more of God to come out of us
o To live well is to place one’s trust in God
o To accept that everything God wants for you is the best thing
Criticisms of Predestination:
Predestination undermines the omnibenevolence of God
o If no good acts can qualify us for heaven it would be a complete refutation
of God’s omnibenevolence
, Pelagius – it’s unethical for humanity to be blamed for the actions of Adam and
Eve
o Concludes that only having our free will makes sense
o Parable of the sheep and goats seems a more reasonable suggestion that
we are consigned to Heaven and Hell by our deeds
Hick goes on to say that the concept of Hell undermines the omnibenevolence
of God
o Draws on Hume who states that finite crime is not deserving of infinite
punishment
Bonhoeffer’s concept of cheap grace
o Predestination renders Catholics to moral nihilism alongside refuting
omnibenevolence
o Bonhoeffer believes that the Catholic Church offers grace too cheaply – by
attending mass and taking the Eucharist
o Fails to appreciate the true Christian life prescribed by Jesus
Augustine and free will:
Saving grace of Augustine’s theory is his concept of free will (or voluntas)
o Without free will human action is rendered pointless
Illustrated by Smart’s Utopian Hypothesis – if only good exists then there is
no good
o If God purely forces us to do good there would be no such thing as a good
action
o C.S. Lewis – right action is only afforded as a possibility when there is a
choice to be had against an immoral one
Interpretation of Augustine:
The Fall as a symbol of someone’s spiritual journey
o Emphasises that the Fall is about renewal of redemption
From the moment Adam and Eve commit sin, God starts the process of bringing
humanity back to himself
o God seeks to bring union after division
Some see the Fall as an imaginative story about the law of innocence
o It is also seen as a moment when each person rebels against God
Jewish interpretation doesn’t focus on doctrine
o See the Fall as an example of human judgement that leads to perfection
o Perfection comes about through the subsequent giving of the Torah
For Christians, this is Jesus Christ
Does Augustine’s Fall leave us with enough room for moral and
spiritual development?
Augustine on redemption:
Augustine highlights the spiritual dimension of being human
o Requires revision
o St Paul – one cannot interpret Augustine through a platonic perspective
o About the personality of the individual
Augustine said redemption begins when the human realises what state they’re
in and they begin their journey to perfection
o Life is a journey of body and spirit
o This journey continues after death when we meet God face-to-face
Belief in original as irrational and dangerous:
Richard Dawkins
Blames human suffering on the tradition of original sin
All corruption cannot rest on the actions of two people
We come from less sophisticated beings (evolution)
The Manichees:
Focused on the use of reason – they were dualists
They argued that evil and suffering are caused by a lower evil power – NOT
GOD
o To them, the world is a battlefield between the forces of light and
darkness
Argued that the soul is trapped in the body
o Humans should liberate the higher soul into the greater light
o Good works lead to the soul’s release
The lower soul seeks material
Platonist influences – Argued evil and suffering come from the soul’s inability to
control the body
o Happiness comes from the separation of materialism with the One
For the Manichees, Christ was an enlightened being
Out of engaging with Platonists, Augustine concluded evil was the
privation of good
Ambrose:
Taught Augustine that knowledge comes from God’s grace in Jesus Christ
Taught him to read the Old Testament symbolically instead of literally
Within 3 years, Augustine became a bishop
The Pelagians:
Argued humans can overcome personal sin using free will
Disagreed with the idea that Original Sin leads to universal guilt, which is only
removable by God
Augustine disagreed with this
o Argued that human nature after The Fall was entirely corrupt
o Adam’s original sin and guilt has been passed through the generations
o All humans are born in sin – incapable of choosing to do good or follow
God
o Humans need God’s grace – only extended to a few called ‘The Elect’
Human will before and after the fall:
GENESIS 1-3
In Genesis, Augustine sees harmony
o Harmony is characterised by obedience to God and to one another
o People are at harmony with themselves
The Will is God give
o Privilege and the hallmark of our elevated existence
o Determines who we are by choosing to do good or evil
The Will is driven by two forces
o Self love (Cupitidas)
o Generous love (Caritas)
Love of others requires love of self
o If one cannot recognise their own dignity then one cannot love another
person
o Can’t love others means you can’t love God
Sex and friendship:
Adam and Eve were married as friends
o There was freedom between them (a communion)
Friendship included reproduction (Genesis 1:28)
o The sexual act was secondary to the friendship
o There was sex without lust
, o The Will is in harmony with the body
Friendship is the highest expression of human existence
After the Fall, friendship continues to express love of God
True friendship is only possible for those who love Christ first
o Friendship involves a generosity of oneself to another
Human will after the Fall:
Question was – What caused humans to reject their perfect relationship
with God?
o Pride – seeking to be like God
The two wills (Cupiditas and Caritas) became separated after the Fall
How did the idea to sin enter their mind?
o Came from the serpent
Adam and Eve weakened our Will
o Bodily desires have come to dominated
The divided soul/will is at war with itself
o Wants to do good but it does the opposite
o This results in a weakened will – Akrasia (the tendency to act against
one’s better judgement) comes from Adam’s disobedience
Concupiscence - humanity’s tendency to sin
o Dominates the desiring aspect of the soul
While the body is good (it is created by God), we misuse it
o While friendships are good, they can go wrong
Shows us Original Sin has visible effects in the world
o Adam and Eve made sin an ontological condition of human existence
Augustine says we have undergone a double death
o First is Adam’s rebellion
o Second death is our mortal state
Sin is transmitted to us through the sexual act
o After the fall, sex with lust comes into exist
The lustful aspect of sex distorts our natures and orients them towards evil
o Calvin in his Institutes goes further – ‘the whole man is in himself nothing
but concupiscence’
o Calvin develops his concept of sensus divinatis – we have a sense of the
divine, to be like God, however it is marred and distorted by the fall
o God needs to renew the memory of his presence to prevent our corrupted
human nature from pursuing and worshipping false idols
Free will and predestination:
Augustine’s view on this changes over time
o Appears to both support and reject predestination
Issue of predestination is that what is the point of being good
Humans are prone to sin
o Predestination encourages us to persevere
In order to become good, we must accept God’s grace
o God’s grace is the reality of him loving us
o We must rely on the sacraments to reach Heaven
God’s love is healing us – allows more of God to come out of us
o To live well is to place one’s trust in God
o To accept that everything God wants for you is the best thing
Criticisms of Predestination:
Predestination undermines the omnibenevolence of God
o If no good acts can qualify us for heaven it would be a complete refutation
of God’s omnibenevolence
, Pelagius – it’s unethical for humanity to be blamed for the actions of Adam and
Eve
o Concludes that only having our free will makes sense
o Parable of the sheep and goats seems a more reasonable suggestion that
we are consigned to Heaven and Hell by our deeds
Hick goes on to say that the concept of Hell undermines the omnibenevolence
of God
o Draws on Hume who states that finite crime is not deserving of infinite
punishment
Bonhoeffer’s concept of cheap grace
o Predestination renders Catholics to moral nihilism alongside refuting
omnibenevolence
o Bonhoeffer believes that the Catholic Church offers grace too cheaply – by
attending mass and taking the Eucharist
o Fails to appreciate the true Christian life prescribed by Jesus
Augustine and free will:
Saving grace of Augustine’s theory is his concept of free will (or voluntas)
o Without free will human action is rendered pointless
Illustrated by Smart’s Utopian Hypothesis – if only good exists then there is
no good
o If God purely forces us to do good there would be no such thing as a good
action
o C.S. Lewis – right action is only afforded as a possibility when there is a
choice to be had against an immoral one
Interpretation of Augustine:
The Fall as a symbol of someone’s spiritual journey
o Emphasises that the Fall is about renewal of redemption
From the moment Adam and Eve commit sin, God starts the process of bringing
humanity back to himself
o God seeks to bring union after division
Some see the Fall as an imaginative story about the law of innocence
o It is also seen as a moment when each person rebels against God
Jewish interpretation doesn’t focus on doctrine
o See the Fall as an example of human judgement that leads to perfection
o Perfection comes about through the subsequent giving of the Torah
For Christians, this is Jesus Christ
Does Augustine’s Fall leave us with enough room for moral and
spiritual development?
Augustine on redemption:
Augustine highlights the spiritual dimension of being human
o Requires revision
o St Paul – one cannot interpret Augustine through a platonic perspective
o About the personality of the individual
Augustine said redemption begins when the human realises what state they’re
in and they begin their journey to perfection
o Life is a journey of body and spirit
o This journey continues after death when we meet God face-to-face
Belief in original as irrational and dangerous:
Richard Dawkins
Blames human suffering on the tradition of original sin
All corruption cannot rest on the actions of two people
We come from less sophisticated beings (evolution)
