Feast Day of Augustine of Hippo

Feast Day of Augustine of Hippo

St. Augustine of Hippo, named Aurelius Augustinus at birth, is remembered by Christians around the world on August 28, the day of his death in 430 in Hippo Regius (known today as Annaba, Algeria). He was an influential theologian and is considered by many one of the Church Fathers during a time when its doctrines were in their earliest formation.

Augustine was born on November 13, 354, in Tagaste, Numidia (now Souk Ahras, Algeria). His mother, Monica, was a Christian; his father, Patricius, was a pagan when Augustine was born but would later convert to Christianity. During the year before Augustine began studying in Carthage, he lived in idleness, becoming involved with a Carthaginian woman (her name is unknown) who bore him a son, Adeodatus, in 372. While studying in Carthage, Augustine was exposed to a treatise by Cicero that instilled in him a lifelong love of philosophy.

Once Augustine completed his education, he remained at Carthage where he taught rhetoric. In 373 he converted to Manichaeism, a faith he would follow for nine years. It was founded by Mani, a Persian who taught of the duality of the universe: the realm of light, or spirit (ruled by God) and the realm of darkness, or matter (ruled by Satan). To overcome fleshly desires and gain redemption, one must contemplate the light of spiritual knowledge and reject the body. In the end, all light would be redeemed and the world would be destroyed. Manichaeism would pose one of the major challenges to Christianity in the third century, and Augustine himself would confront its followers.

Despite the rather austere tenets of the Manichaean faith, Augustine continued to live a decadent life. When he was 28, he traveled with his mistress and son to Rome, where he received an appointment as imperial professor of rhetoric at Milan. Once in Milan, he dismissed his mistress, became betrothed to a young woman who was deemed more suitable for him, and took another mistress during the two years he waited to marry. In Milan he also met the bishop Ambrose, who presented Christianity in a way that made it attractive to Augustine. He soon became disillusioned with Manichaeism, which did not seem to provide answers to the questions of life that he was asking.

After two years at his post in Milan, Augustine resigned and eventually made his way back home to Tagaste, where he looked after his family property and raised his son, Adeodatus, who died while still an adolescent. Before Adeodatus died, father and son were baptized into the Christian faith on Easter Vigil in 387. Following his conversion, Augustine pledged himself to a life of celibacy.

In 391 while visiting the town of Hippo, Augustine entered the priesthood and began a vigorous debate with the followers of his former faith, Manichaeism. This was the beginning of a long struggle against heresy in the Christian church. In 395 or 396 he became bishop of Hippo, a position that he would hold for the rest of his life. During this time he battled two other groups whose teachings were considered a threat to Christianity, namely the Donatists and the Pelagians. While dealing with these denominations, Augustine refined his beliefs and teachings concerning original sin and predestination. He was a prolific writer, producing such works as Confessions (c. 400), the West's first autobiography, which revealed the events of his dissolute youth and his life until shortly after he converted to Christianity.

Sometime after the year 410 he wrote his most famous work, The City of God (22 volumes, 413–26). By this time, Rome had been sacked, and Augustine wrote the book to answer the charge that God had not been able to save the city. In the process, he produced one of the seminal works of Western Christianity. The City of God examines the conflict between the civitas Dei (City of God), consisting of Christians devoted to the church, and the civitas terrera (Earthly City), home to pagans and heretics. In Augustine's view, only those belonging to the City of God will know eternal life, while those in the Earthly City will perish at Judgment Day. That is because those in the Earthly City cling to institutions, which are manmade and will therefore fade away like a dream, while those who live in Christ (the City of God) know that his kingdom is not of this Earth and is therefore eternal. His argument, which sought to debunk belief in the Roman gods, was powerful in its time, for it spoke directly to those Christian converts in Rome who were yet reluctant to completely surrender themselves to their new faith. Augustine also wrote many other works that dealt with Christian doctrine, including De trinitate (The trinity, c. 399–c. 421), De spiritu et littera (On the spirit and the letter, 412), and De gratia Christi et de peccato originali (On the grace of Christ and on original sin, 418). In 428 he wrote his Retractions in which he corrected those things in his earlier works he felt were misleading or wrong.

In the early fifth century, the Vandals, a Germanic tribe who had already invaded Spain, invaded Africa at the invitation of Count Boniface, a Roman governor in Africa who was at odds with the emperor of Rome. In the course of this conflict, they besieged Hippo for 18 months. Augustine tried to mediate the dispute prior to the siege, but while he reconciled Boniface with Rome he could not persuade the Vandals to stop their attack. Before Hippo fell, the aged bishop became ill. The Vandals took the city shortly after Augustine's death on August 28, 430. They would go on to take Carthage as well and establish a kingdom in Africa. Augustine himself was declared a Doctor of the Church and canonized.