archos404's review against another edition
4.0
Great little introduction to the thought of Augustine. The focus is more on the thought of Augustine with minimal attention paid to the life and times of the Saint, as Chadwick himself explains on p1. Throughout heavy focus is made on Augustine the Neoplatonic philosopher, with reference to his influences of Plotinus and Porphyry.
Chadwick structures the book chronologically, developing along with Augustine's life and the successive works he wrote. Thus a good overview of the works of Augustine is given. Constant reference is also made to the major works of Augustine throughout - Confessions, City of God, the Trinity and his Sermons and Commentary on the Psalms - showing the continuity of his thought.
However, the fact that Chadwick is an Anglican does come to the surface at some points in my opinion, otherwise it seems quite ecumenical.
Overall a great little overview of Augustine's thought and works which should be a great key to knowing where to start reading Augustine's huge corpus.
Chadwick structures the book chronologically, developing along with Augustine's life and the successive works he wrote. Thus a good overview of the works of Augustine is given. Constant reference is also made to the major works of Augustine throughout - Confessions, City of God, the Trinity and his Sermons and Commentary on the Psalms - showing the continuity of his thought.
However, the fact that Chadwick is an Anglican does come to the surface at some points in my opinion, otherwise it seems quite ecumenical.
Overall a great little overview of Augustine's thought and works which should be a great key to knowing where to start reading Augustine's huge corpus.
sprague's review against another edition
4.0
Exactly what the title says: short (150 pages) but comprehensive. Recommended as an easy-to-understand summary of his life and beliefs.
peterseanesq's review against another edition
5.0
Please give my Amazon review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/RVNGZON4I6XCX?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp
Augustine: A Very Short Introduction by Henry Chadwick
Henry Chadwick's book lives up to its subtitle. It is a short and effective survey of the life and thinking of one of the seminal thinkers of Western civilization. Chadwick structures his survey by looking at topics such as free will, grace, Creation, and the Trinity. Chadwick intersperses these chapters with biographical chapters on Augustine's approach to vocations and a chapter on The City of God.
Chadwick begins by explores Augustine's intellectual influences, including Manichianism, Cicero and Neoplatonism. This chapter was particularly useful because Chadwick offers a lucid and comprehensible explanation of the ideas of Neoplatonism. For example, Chadwick explains:
"This way of thinking of causative emanation in the great chain of being enabled Plotinus to achieve several things at once. On the one hand it solved the problem of how to keep the transcendent One and the world from losing all relation to each other, without the Absolute ceasing to be Absolute, and without the world logically dropping out of existence altogether. It expressed a kind of redemption by ‘conversion’ to the source of being. On the other hand, it alleviated a problem which caused acute mental gymnastics for all Platonists, namely answering the question how evil could ever have entered into the continuum of things, when that was an overflow of supreme goodness and power.
Plotinus taught that at the apex of the hierarchy are three divine existences: the One, Mind, and Soul. The One is supremely Good, and therefore all lower levels of the hierarchy below the One must be also distinct from the Good; in short, less than perfectly good. Even Mind has some inferiority about it, some delusions about its own grandeur. Soul, still further down the scale, has the power to produce matter. Matter, being at the opposite extremity of the hierarchy from the good One, is in cosmic terms utter evil, formless non-being."
These are ideas that interface with classical Christian theology. How does a perfect God create an imperfect world? How does a perfect, infinite and transcendent God enter into a finite and changing creation? Augustine viewed Platonism as the philosophy closest to Christianity, so he had to deal with these issues.
Because I am currently reading The City of God, I found Chadwick's chapter on Augustine's great work to be particularly useful. For example, Chadwick advises:
"The title came from the Psalter, and was chosen to offer a conscious contrast to the Republics of Plato and Cicero, with whom parts of the work were a running combat."
Bazinga! I immediately started to read references to Plato and Cicero as oppositional points to the arguments that Augustine was making, rather than Augustine supporting those writers.
Significantly, Chadwick splices autobiographical details into his discussion of The City of God. For example, he writes:
"In regard to justice, the city of God had an obvious bias to the poor. Augustine noticed that the most vocal defenders of paganism were in general defenders of the old social order in which the poor fawned on the rich, and the rich exploited their dependent clients (CD 2.20). He realized how inadequate was private almsgiving and the Church chest with its register of paupers daily fed from the soup kitchen. The dimensions of destitution were too great to be met except by redistributive taxation (CD 5.17)."
And:
"The domination of one man over another may be abused, but it is the lesser of two evils where the alternative is anarchy and every man for himself. Augustine hated the slave trade. Whenever feasible, he used the church chest to emancipate slaves oppressed in bad households. On one occasion his people took direct action to liberate slaves from a ship in Hippo harbour, and the chest was used to reimburse the aggrieved owners. It was hard to stop destitute parents selling their children. Augustine was once nonplussed by a reasonably well-to-do tenant farmer who sold his wife and, when Augustine expostulated, declared that he preferred the money. Yet slavery was not an unmitigated evil when slaves in good homes were better clothed, fed, and housed than the free wage labourers who were the great majority of the labour force.'
These are fascinating insights that bring Augustine, the man and author to life, and make his theological writings more relevant to the modern reader.
I recommend this as an excellent source of information for anyone interested in learning more about Augustine's life and thoughts.
Augustine: A Very Short Introduction by Henry Chadwick
Henry Chadwick's book lives up to its subtitle. It is a short and effective survey of the life and thinking of one of the seminal thinkers of Western civilization. Chadwick structures his survey by looking at topics such as free will, grace, Creation, and the Trinity. Chadwick intersperses these chapters with biographical chapters on Augustine's approach to vocations and a chapter on The City of God.
Chadwick begins by explores Augustine's intellectual influences, including Manichianism, Cicero and Neoplatonism. This chapter was particularly useful because Chadwick offers a lucid and comprehensible explanation of the ideas of Neoplatonism. For example, Chadwick explains:
"This way of thinking of causative emanation in the great chain of being enabled Plotinus to achieve several things at once. On the one hand it solved the problem of how to keep the transcendent One and the world from losing all relation to each other, without the Absolute ceasing to be Absolute, and without the world logically dropping out of existence altogether. It expressed a kind of redemption by ‘conversion’ to the source of being. On the other hand, it alleviated a problem which caused acute mental gymnastics for all Platonists, namely answering the question how evil could ever have entered into the continuum of things, when that was an overflow of supreme goodness and power.
Plotinus taught that at the apex of the hierarchy are three divine existences: the One, Mind, and Soul. The One is supremely Good, and therefore all lower levels of the hierarchy below the One must be also distinct from the Good; in short, less than perfectly good. Even Mind has some inferiority about it, some delusions about its own grandeur. Soul, still further down the scale, has the power to produce matter. Matter, being at the opposite extremity of the hierarchy from the good One, is in cosmic terms utter evil, formless non-being."
These are ideas that interface with classical Christian theology. How does a perfect God create an imperfect world? How does a perfect, infinite and transcendent God enter into a finite and changing creation? Augustine viewed Platonism as the philosophy closest to Christianity, so he had to deal with these issues.
Because I am currently reading The City of God, I found Chadwick's chapter on Augustine's great work to be particularly useful. For example, Chadwick advises:
"The title came from the Psalter, and was chosen to offer a conscious contrast to the Republics of Plato and Cicero, with whom parts of the work were a running combat."
Bazinga! I immediately started to read references to Plato and Cicero as oppositional points to the arguments that Augustine was making, rather than Augustine supporting those writers.
Significantly, Chadwick splices autobiographical details into his discussion of The City of God. For example, he writes:
"In regard to justice, the city of God had an obvious bias to the poor. Augustine noticed that the most vocal defenders of paganism were in general defenders of the old social order in which the poor fawned on the rich, and the rich exploited their dependent clients (CD 2.20). He realized how inadequate was private almsgiving and the Church chest with its register of paupers daily fed from the soup kitchen. The dimensions of destitution were too great to be met except by redistributive taxation (CD 5.17)."
And:
"The domination of one man over another may be abused, but it is the lesser of two evils where the alternative is anarchy and every man for himself. Augustine hated the slave trade. Whenever feasible, he used the church chest to emancipate slaves oppressed in bad households. On one occasion his people took direct action to liberate slaves from a ship in Hippo harbour, and the chest was used to reimburse the aggrieved owners. It was hard to stop destitute parents selling their children. Augustine was once nonplussed by a reasonably well-to-do tenant farmer who sold his wife and, when Augustine expostulated, declared that he preferred the money. Yet slavery was not an unmitigated evil when slaves in good homes were better clothed, fed, and housed than the free wage labourers who were the great majority of the labour force.'
These are fascinating insights that bring Augustine, the man and author to life, and make his theological writings more relevant to the modern reader.
I recommend this as an excellent source of information for anyone interested in learning more about Augustine's life and thoughts.
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