Browsing by Subject "Augustine."
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Item Augustine against the academic doctrine, way of life, and use of philosophical writing.(2013-09-16) Spano, John; Hibbs, Thomas S.; Foley, Michael P., 1970-; Philosophy.; Baylor University. Dept. of Philosophy.The recent literature on Augustine’s Contra Academicos stresses the philosophical, ethical, and literary elements of the text. However, these works neglect the polemical role of the dialogue as a response to Cicero’s Academic Skepticism. I offer a reading of the first of Augustine’s Cassiciacum dialogues, the Contra Academicos, that shows how his work can be read as a comprehensive rejection of the Academic philosophical life and doctrine as presented in Cicero’s dialogue, the Academica. To accomplish the goal, the work begins with an analysis of the doctrine in, way of life recommended by, and pedagogical function of Cicero’s Academica. The remaining chapters examine Augustine’s response to each of these elements of Cicero’s work. In Chapter Three I accentuate the philosophical importance of Augustine’s accusation that the Academics practiced a form of esotericism. This accusation, largely neglected, helps underscore Augustine’s rhetorical strategies to cultivate in his students an awareness of philosophical ironic discourse. Chapter Four focuses upon Augustine’s critique of the Academic way of life and the problems that arise from their insistence that all must seek wisdom yet be content with the inevitable impossibility of finding wisdom. Chapters Five and Six examine Augustine’s positive contributions to philosophical writing. Augustine rejects the Academic emphasis that wisdom must be sought by reason alone, suggesting that reason and authority are the twin means for that pursuit. The dual emphasis disallows Augustine from pedagogical uses of deception in the dialogue form, a subtle but important shift from other philosophical uses of this form of writing. By allowing reason and authority to guide one in the pursuit of wisdom, Augustine’s work also steers the reader away from the despair that Academic skepticism can so easily cultivate.Item Augustine's solution to the problem of theological fatalism.(2011-01-05T19:39:33Z) Hemati, Russell Danesh.; Beaty, Michael D.; Philosophy.; Baylor University. Dept. of Philosophy.In Augustine's dialogue De Libero Arbitrio, his interlocutor Evodius presents an argument for the incompatibility of divine foreknowledge and human freedom, a position we now call "theological fatalism." Since this position is irreconcilable with Augustine's theological commitments, he endeavors to reveal some flaw in Evodius' reasoning. The tradition of modern analytic philosophy has misinterpreted Augustine's arguments against theological fatalism, and as a result, his arguments are underappreciated and often ignored. Augustine is often characterized as accepting a deterministic understanding of free will (called compatibilism), even though the text of De Libero Arbitrio, De Civitate Dei, and several late anti-Pelagian do not support such a view. A more promising interpretation of Augustine's argument is that he endorses a version of free will whereby free actions have alternative possibilities only in reference to causation, but not in reference to foreknowledge. He argues that to exercise free will is to be the cause of what is willed. Thus, no loss of freedom is implied by advance knowledge of a volition, even if that volition has no alternatives relative to foreknowledge. This interpretation embodies a unique way to solve the problem of theological fatalism which has various benefits: it is more harmonious with Augustine's other works, it avoids various paradoxes of God's involvement in human affairs, and it can be combined fruitfully with other methods of solving the fatalism problem to make a comprehensive theory of foreknowledge, providence and free will. A particularly strong objection to Augustine's solution is that an agent cannot be truly free without the ability to do otherwise, regardless of the contents of God's foreknowledge. I argue that the important, intuition-bearing quality of alternative possibilities is the leeway within causality. Since Augustine's solution accepts alternative possibilities relative to causality (in fact giving more reasons to affirm this type of alternative possibilities), he does not compromise robust freedom of the will by rejecting leeway within foreknowledge.Item The conversion and therapy of desire in Augustine's Cassiciacum dialogues.(2010-06-23T12:17:30Z) Boone, Mark J.; Hibbs, Thomas S.; Foley, Michael P., 1970-; Philosophy.; Baylor University. Dept. of Philosophy.The philosophical schools of late antiquity commonly diagnosed human unhappiness as rooted in some fundamental disorder in our desires, and offered various therapies or prescriptions for the healing of desire. Among these only the neo-Platonic treatment for desire requires redirecting desire towards an immaterial world. Although Augustine agrees with the neo-Platonists on the need to redirect our desires to an immaterial world, he does not adopt their therapy for desire. Instead he adopts a thoroughly Christian approach to the healing of desire. The conversion of desire results from the Trinitarian God's gracious actions taken to heal our desires. Augustine does not recommend fleeing from the influence of the body, as neo-Platonism encourages, but fleeing to Christ, immersing ourselves in the life of the Church, and practicing the theological virtues. In this dissertation I examine Augustine's Cassiciacum dialogues. In Contra Academicos (Against the Academics), Augustine argues that we must vigorously desire wisdom in order to attain it; that we must have hope in the possibility of attaining wisdom; and that our desire for wisdom must be bound in faith to Christ. In De beata vita (On the Happy Life), Augustine argues that the Trinitarian God is the only perennially satisfying object of desire and shows that the pursuit of God is the activity of a prayerful community of believers who are practicing faith, hope, and charity. In De ordine (On Order), Augustine recommends that the reordering of our desires be pursued through a liberal arts education and through Christian morals. In Soliloquia (Soliloquies), Augustine says that we ought to love God and the soul. He also reminds us to submit to Christ's authority and practice faith, hope, and love. After discussing these things, I discuss in a concluding chapter the harmony of love for God and love for human beings, pointing to passages in the dialogues that suggest this harmony.Item The Donatist church in an Apocalyptic age.(2014-09-05) Hoover, Jesse A.; Williams, Daniel H.; Religion.; Baylor University. Dept. of Religion.As a dissident Christian tradition that still endured sporadic Imperial persecution, the Donatist church occupied a unique niche within the wider apocalyptic milieu of late antiquity. This was an era characterized by intense eschatological speculation, spurred on by the recent political ascendency of Christianity within the Empire, the rise of rival theological communions in its wake, and mounting anxiety over the increasing tenuousness of Roman rule in the western provinces. Despite its often-overstated estrangement from the transmarine Christian communities of late antiquity, Donatism was no stranger to this phenomenon. In this dissertation, I wish to contextualize extant Donatist interaction with apocalyptic exegesis in order to see where it remained in continuity with the wider western apocalyptic tradition and where it diverged. This is a topic which will require some nuance. The dominant tendency within early and mid-twentieth century academic discussions of Donatist apocalypticism – when it is mentioned at all – have been to portray it as evidence of an anachronistic inclination within Donatist theology or as a symptom of simmering national or economic dissatisfaction, a religious warrant for social unrest. Reacting to such interpretations, more recent discussions of Donatism which emphasize its theological viability have tended to avoid the topic altogether. In this project, in contrast, I portray Donatist apocalyptic exegesis as an essentially dynamic, adaptive theological phenomenon. As befits an ecclesiastical communion which once formed the majority church in North Africa, Donatist interaction with apocalypticism was neither monolithic nor static. Rather, it evolved significantly throughout the roughly sesquicentennial years of the movement's literary existence, capable of producing such diverse expressions of eschatological thought as the strident denunciations of the emperor Constans as "Antichrist" encountered in Macarian-era Donatist martyrological acta, the gematric calculations of the Liber genealogus – or the spectacular apocalyptic vision of Tyconius, as sophisticated as it is unique. In the various apocalyptic narratives still traceable within extant Donatist writings, I submit, we are given an invaluable window into the inner life of the North African communion.Item Reclaiming happiness of the city and the soul : Augustine's engagement with Cicero and Porphyry in the City of God.(2014-09-05) Jangho, Jo.; Williams, Daniel H.; Religion.; Baylor University. Dept. of Religion.The present dissertation argues that Augustine's City of God demonstrates the superiority of the Christian faith to pagan philosophy in the attainment of happiness and, ultimately, seeks to turn the Roman intellectuals to the Christian faith. The study investigates Augustine's correspondence with educated Romans and shows that the target audience of the City of God is primarily those who are interested in the Christian faith, yet under the sway of pagan philosophies and their criticisms of the Christian teachings. Since Cicero and Porphyry were the major philosophers who taught a way to happiness on socio-political and contemplative levels respectively, Augustine presents the Christian faith as the single way to the true commonwealth and the beatific vision which these two philosophers desired to achieve. In other words, he presents the Christian faith as completing the goal of pagan philosophy, especially the goal of Plato's philosophy: happiness on both the political and contemplative dimensions. The dissertation concludes that Augustine integrates these two main eudaemonistic components in Platonism through the City of God.The dissertation also claims that Augustine identifies Rome with Nineveh in the Book of Jonah, and that such re-conceptualization reflects the evangelistic attitude toward his contemporary intellectuals.