Imaginary Inpho

The City of God by Augustine - 15 - The Bible as History

Book Fifteen

Quote

📝 The good use the world that they may enjoy God; the wicked, on the contrary, that they may enjoy the world, would fain use God.

Notes

🔥 Augustine continues the sacred history from Adam and Eve's fall. Their sons were Cain and Abel. Cain belonged to the city of men; Abel to the city of God.

🔥 Jumping ahead in the Bible, Augustine makes a comparison with Abraham's two sons, saying they symbolize the two cities. Ishmael represents the city of men; Isaac the city of God. In that case, Sarah, Abraham's wife, was barren and her giving birth to Isaac was a miracle of grace, symbolizing how we are children of grace who follow God.

🔥 Back to Cain and Abel, Cain's murder of Abel is like when Romulus killing Remus (the two brothers who founded Rome). "Thus," says Augustine, "the founder of the earthly city was a fratricide." Wicked people war both against each other and against the good.

🔥 Because we live in a fallen world, we must "be patient toward all men" and cultivate peace.

🔥 Cain's sacrifice was rejected by God because it was not made with a good heart. Following that rejection, Cain went on to kill his brother, Abel, and then wandered off to found another city.

🔥 The Bible seems to say that Cain went on to build this city all by himself, which is kind of unbelievable. But Augustine argues that the Bible just doesn't name all the others who were alive at the time because it's focused on the city of God, only treating the city of men as a point of contrast.

🔥 People in the Bible are recorded as having lived for hundreds of years. This is lots of time for them to have many children and form a city, says Augustine. This forms part of his argument about how it is possible that Cain founded a city, since he lived hundreds of years and could have lots of kids(..?).

🔥 Humans were bigger back then, too. And also there were giants (which the Bible does mention). Augustine says he's seen a tooth 100 times bigger than ours.

🔥 He wades into the debate around how long people lived back then, but is satisfied that they lived long enough to form a community. The debate around this question would seem to implicate the authority of the Bible, so it seems that Augustine feels he must defend it against those who say it's impossible that people lived so long back then.

🔥 Some think maybe years were calculated differently back then, and there is some evidence to suggest this. Some examples of people who calculate their year as one tenth of ours, or whose year is the equivalent of our idea of a season. The Egyptian year was the equivalent of four months apparently. There are some other examples mentioned, too.

🔥 Augustine, however, argues that the years back then were in fact the same length of our years as we understand them today. He cites some evidence in the Bible to demonstrate this.

🔥 But, if their years were the same, that means they abstained from sex for over 100 years? Since the Bible only says they started having kids after that amount of time. Maybe their puberty started later, some people say?

🔥 Augustine argues against this, too. He refers to the genealogy in the Gospel of Matthew which doesn't mention first-born sons. It only mentions those who are connected with the line of Jesus. So it could just be they were having kids much earlier, but they only mention the kids they had after 100 years. He continues, "We need not worry ourselves with discussing the needless and obscure question as to their lateness of reaching puberty."

🔥 Another issue, people back then had to marry their sisters because there was no one else (if in the beginning there was only Adam and Eve, their kids would have to marry each other). Augustine accepts that that is what they had to do back then, and that it's no longer necessary now and considered unnatural.

🔥 The city of God and the city of man both spring from Adam — one in his son Cain, the other in his son Seth (Adam's son after Abel was killed). Seth's name means "he hoped to call on the name of the Lord," which Augustine sees as prophetic to his creating the family line that will be the city of God.

🔥 There is some discrepancy between Cain's and Seth's lines. There's ten generations from one to the flood, but only seven from the other. How do we account for this? Augustine spends some time trying to work out a solution.

🔥 There is another issue in that these two cities co-mingled and mixed with each other. And so both were susceptible to sin.

🔥 Augustine also tries to deal with the verses that say angels (sons of God, as they're called...?) slept with the daughters of men, and gave birth to giants. He believes giants were around, but that they eventually "perished through their own foolishness."

🔥 Humankind fell into wickedness and God decided to destroy them in a flood, regretting the fact that he made them. This raises some questions about God, too. How is it possible for him to be unchanging and eternal if we have an example here of him changing his mind? This problem has come up in earlier sections as well. Augustine offers some thoughts: "The anger of God is not a disturbing emotion of his mind, but a judgment by which punishment is inflicted upon sin. His thought and reconsideration also are the unchangeable reason which changes things." So there you go.

🔥 Noah and the ark are symbols of Christ rescuing us from the "flood" of sin and destruction. Even the dimensions of the ark resemble the dimensions of a human, the body of Christ hung on the cross. The ark also symbolizes the city of God, a sojourner, or stranger, in this world. Not native to it.

🔥 The story can have symbolic meaning and be real history at the same time, says Augustine. "No one ought to suppose ... that we should study only the historical truth, apart from any allegorical meanings."

🔥 He goes on to explain the details of how the animals, and which animals, needed to get into the ark. What about the carnivores that need to eat other animals? He works to address some of these questions.

Reflection

💬 I think we're finally starting to see how this work might be categorized as history, though it's still a very particular kind of history. Augustine is clearly concerned with establishing the Bible as a legitimate and authoritative text describing the real history of humanity, and using that as the foundation to tell humanity's story. For Augustine, our history is not merely about kings and battles, it's not even primarily about events here on earth. That is only the city of men. The city of God is the center of the story, and it is about our relationship with God, which goes beyond our lives here on earth.

This seems to be Augustine's view of history, one that is very much tied up with the tenets of Christianity. A modern reader may or may not agree with the way he binds together those two things. But I believe there is a notable innovation here in terms of shaping history as a cosmic narrative in which we can understand ourselves. This was a new way of looking at, and of writing, our history.

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