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Augustine of Hippo
354–430· Philosopher· Reality, mind & God
Well documentedSolid records, texts or physical evidence.
North African bishop and philosopher who fused Christianity with Platonism and shaped Western theology more than anyone after Paul.
See it on the Philosophy map →The idea
Idea: humans are restless until they rest in God, and only grace can heal a will damaged by sin. Born in Thagaste (now Algeria), Augustine taught rhetoric, followed the dualist Manichaeans, read the Neoplatonists, and converted in Milan in 386. As bishop of Hippo he wrote the Confessions (c. 397–400), the first great autobiography, and The City of God (413–426), prompted by the Goths' sack of Rome in 410. Main objection: his doctrines of original sin and predestination.
Why it matters
His views on sin, grace, free will, time and just war shaped Catholic and Protestant theology alike; Aquinas, Luther and Calvin all built on him.
Legacy and sources
More than five million words survive, including hundreds of letters and sermons, more than from any other ancient Latin author; his friend Possidius wrote his life soon after his death.
Still debated
Whether his later doctrine of predestination broke with his earlier defense of free will is still debated.
Inside this (2)
Connections (6)
▸Plotinus and Neoplatonism influenced Augustine of HippoWell documented
The connection
Reading 'books of the Platonists', probably Plotinus and Porphyry in Latin, freed Augustine from the Manichaean view of evil as a substance. He took from them God as immaterial, evil as an absence of good, and the inward climb toward God, themes that run through the Confessions.
When and how
Milan, 386, in Latin translations by Marius Victorinus, a few months before his conversion.
How we know
Confessions Book 7 describes these books and their effect; parallels with the Enneads are close and widely recognized.
Debates and open questions
Exactly which treatises he read, and how much came from Porphyry rather than Plotinus, is debated.
▸Augustine of Hippo answered The problem of evilWell documented
The connection
Augustine gave the answer that dominated Christian thought: evil is not a created thing but a privation, a lack of good, as blindness is a lack of sight. Moral evil comes from the free choices of angels and humans, and God permits it because a world with free will is better.
When and how
Rome and Hippo, 388–395, in On Free Choice of the Will; developed later in the Confessions and The City of God.
How we know
The answer is set out explicitly in his surviving works, which later theologians, including Aquinas, quote at length.
Debates and open questions
Critics ask whether calling evil a privation does justice to real suffering, and whether his free-will defense fits his later belief in predestination.
▸Do we have free will? was central to the theology of Augustine of HippoWell documented
The connection
Augustine first defended free will to place the blame for evil on creatures, not God. Then, fighting the monk Pelagius, who held that people can choose good unaided, he argued that sin has bound the will so only grace frees it. That tension framed Western debates on freedom and predestination.
When and how
Rome and North Africa, 388–430: On Free Choice of the Will (388–395) and the anti-Pelagian writings (411–430).
How we know
His treatises, his Retractations (c. 427) reviewing his own earlier views, and church council rulings on Pelagianism document the debate.
Debates and open questions
Whether his late views on grace leave any real room for free will is still argued by historians and by Catholic and Protestant theologians.
▸Augustine of Hippo influenced Boethius, The Consolation of PhilosophyWell documented
The connection
Boethius drew on Augustine's theology: God as the highest good, evil as a lack of good, and God's eternity as standing outside time. His answer to how divine foreknowledge fits human freedom refines a solution Augustine had sketched.
When and how
Rome and Pavia, Italy, c. 510–524, roughly a century after Augustine's death in 430.
How we know
Boethius' theological treatise On the Trinity names Augustine's writings as its model, and the Consolation's views on evil and eternity parallel his.
Debates and open questions
How much Boethius took from Augustine versus directly from the Neoplatonists they both read is debated.
▸Augustine of Hippo was synthesized with Aristotle by Thomas AquinasWell documented
The connection
Augustine was the Western church's greatest authority, steeped in Plato; Aristotle was the newly translated master of logic and nature. Aquinas wove them together, keeping Augustine's teaching on grace, sin and God but explaining knowledge through Aristotle's senses-first account rather than Augustine's divine illumination.
When and how
Paris and Italy, 1250s–1274; Augustine is the Church Father Aquinas cites most often in the Summa Theologiae.
How we know
The Summa constantly pairs 'the Philosopher' with Augustine, often using Augustine for the 'on the contrary' authority that frames Aquinas's answer.
Debates and open questions
Franciscans such as Bonaventure felt Aquinas gave too much to Aristotle at Augustine's expense; how faithful he was to Augustine is still debated.
▸Augustine of Hippo anticipated "I think, therefore I am" (the cogito)Well documented
The connection
About 1,200 years before Descartes, Augustine answered skeptics with 'If I am mistaken, I exist' (si fallor, sum): even being deceived proves the one deceived is real. Descartes' cogito makes the same move, but uses it as the foundation of all knowledge rather than one argument among several.
When and how
Augustine's City of God, Book 11 (written c. 413–426) and On the Trinity; Descartes' Discourse (1637) and Meditations (1641).
How we know
Arnauld and Mersenne pointed out the parallel to Descartes, and his 1640 letter replying to the comparison survives.
Debates and open questions
Descartes said he had not read the passage and that Augustine used it differently; whether he absorbed it indirectly through his schooling is unknown.