Augustine of Hippo and His View of Election As Regards Salvation
Biography
Augustine of Hippo, or more popularly known as St. Augustine, was the child of St. Monica. However, despite a religious upbringing, Augustine spent most of his young life in blasphemous beliefs and immoral lifestyle. Although he was a remarkably intelligent person and had been indoctrinated to the Christian faith early in life, his sins of wickedness and his self-glorification corrupted his thoughts too much, that he became completely blind to the Divine Truth. Augustine's mother, Monica, was a devout Christian, while his father supported paganism for most of his life, merely converting to Christianity prior to his death. Monica persevered to instill in Augustine the Christian faith, and to a certain extent he felt attracted to the concept of God and Jesus Christ, yet he was overwhelmed by the lures of pride, prestige, and indecency.
After a somewhat ordinary young life, Augustine wandered through a number of philosophical perspectives before officially accepting the Christian faith. At a young age, Augustine was already reading Hortensius by Cicero, a pursuit that made him immensely interested in philosophical methods and inquiry that would greatly influence his adult life. In 373, as a student and with a renewed interest in different types of faith, Augustine formally converted to Manicheanism-- a philosophy that divides life into two opposing sides (e.g light or dark, good or evil, right or wrong)-- even though without his mother's blessings. He was attracted to the principle of free philosophy which drew him toward the natural sciences. Nevertheless, it did not satiate his spiritual hunger. After being a Manichean, Augustine became a follower of the more cynical principles of the Academic thinkers. Even though attracted by Christianity in 383 at Milan, he did not convert to the faith but instead resorted to Neo-Platonism.
Augustine went to Carthage to take up rhetoric, an academic field that he used to acquire a teaching job in Milan, Rome, and Carthage. Once his intellectual development reached total maturity, he went back to Tagaste and to Carthage afterward to become a teacher of rhetoric. And then, in Milan, Augustine became acquainted with Ambrose who is acknowledged for the conversion and baptism of Augustine into Christianity in 387. Going back to his native soil immediately after his conversion into Christianity, he was anointed a presbyter and soon after as bishop of Hippo. At the age of seventy-six, still the bishop of Hippo at the time, Augustine gave in to a lethal disease.
St. Augustine is widely celebrated for his written work Confessions, his personal narrative or description of his conversion. The Church was deeply influenced by the principle of 'augustinianism' that developed from such written works. The Christian Revelation letters, essays, and books of St. Augustine are perhaps more significant and prominent in the history of philosophical systems than any other Christian writings-- The City of God, a written work that addresses the contradiction between the 'world' and the Christian faith and is considered the earliest Christian philosophy of history; On The Trinity, a writing that talks about the Trinity within the perspective of the logos or divine reason; and, the Confessions, homilies on the Epistle and Gospel of John.
St. Augustine also penned the discussions with Donatists, Pelagians, and Manicheans which guided his thoughts toward the concepts of the Church, the sacraments, grace, salvation, and creation. Hence, St. Augustine is regarded as one of the most exceptional and grandiose personalities of the Western antiquity. He is always included in the list of those who want to gain a better knowledge of how the demise of the Roman Empire consolidated and strengthened Christianity. He educated himself to become a specialized mentor of rhetoric-- he rapidly became the most outstanding of his time. Yet, his passion was directed toward the scholastic reflection of wisdom and philosophy. Eventually, soon after his conversion to Christianity, he was appointed bishop of Hippo Regius, which obliged and inspired him to use his writing skills to the vindication and defense of Christianity during the immature and unstable period of the Church.
Theological Perspective of St. Augustine on Salvation
Pelagianism, a complex belief system based on the theories of Pelagius and his colleagues, became popular as a religious movement of human free will, which claimed that individuals are capable of pursuing their own salvation. Augustine responded vigorously against the beliefs of Pelagianism, arguing for the need to seek God's grace at all phases of the Christian life. Augustine believes that people did not have the fundamental liberty to carry out the first actions toward salvation. He believes that human beings possess a free will that was tarnished and distorted by sin, and which pushed them toward wickedness and distanced them from God. It is only through God's grace that this tendency toward sin can be totally negated.
A core argument of Augustine's ideas is the natural sinfulness of people. The story of The Fall in Genesis explains that human nature has degenerated from its unstained, virginal state. Human nature as it is at present is therefore not what God designed it to be. The virtue of the original human nature created by God has been tarnished or damaged, but not irrevocably, as the principle of salvation declares. Augustine argues that individuals are now corrupted by sin. He depicts sin as a natural part of human nature. It is an indispensable, not discretionary or elective, element of human nature. This idea, which is elaborated in Augustine's original sin proposition, is of great value to his concepts of sin and salvation. He argued that all human beings are sinners; all need salvation, and that all failed God's glory, all need to be saved.
Augustine believed that 'grace' is the immeasurable or unearned God's gift through which God willingly severs the bondage of human beings to sin. Salvation is a gift from God. Salvation cannot be attained by a person all by him/herself, but must be done for him/her. Hence, Augustine stresses that the path toward salvation is held by God alone. It is God who decides who to save, not human beings. Augustine viewed 'election' in divine ways-- election refers to whether an individual would be saved or not, whether one would be damned to hell or raised to heaven. The Augustinian doctrine is that almost all human beings are accursed; God summons some by means of His mercy and grace, an elect, to be redeemed. Augustine believes that nobody is deserving of an election, and human beings are totally defenseless or helpless in the face of overpowering forces that pulls them toward evil or righteousness.
Augustine further explained that God perpetually appoints the elect through mercy and grace; yet this doctrine does not eliminate Christ's determination to save everyone, a salvation achieved through human freedom “that leaves to the elect full power to fall and to the non-elect full power to rise”. Thus, Augustine's creed of predestination provides absolute popularity to a biblical interpretation of sin, while underlining God's grace. As explained by Augustine:
When someone believes in him who justifies the impious, that faith is reckoned as justice to the believer, as David too declares that person blessed whom God has accepted and endowed with righteousness, independently of any righteous actions (Rom 4: 5-6). What righteousness is this? The righteousness of faith, preceded by no good works, but with good works as its consequence.
In his first written works, Augustine viewed predestination in accordance to God's forethought. The belief was that God simply elect those people whom He anticipated would willingly and unconditionally give their faith in Him.
Nevertheless, the older Augustine supported a doctrine of predestination rooted in God's independent and unknowable decision. This belief claims that God decides to award His redeeming grace to the elect, but not to everyone, even ignoring the wicked. Hence, God foreordains some to heaven through overpowering but not forceful grace, and abandons others in their sinful life to be rightfully punished through their own actions and choices. This grand and frightening creed of 'double predestination' was criticized and repudiated by numerous in Augustine's time. Nonetheless, he argued that although God's election could be biased, it is never unjust. Augustine explained that sinful people do not have any claim to God's grace. The decision whether to save or condemn is completely within God's sovereign privilege and discernment. Most significantly, he was confident that his thoughts on the issue were actually in line with the decisive teachings of the Scripture.
The solid doctrine of predestination laid out by Augustine inspired Roman Catholic scholars in the past, but has been, to a great extent, taken for granted by contemporary religious academics. The fundamental explanations of Augustine on this issue were adopted mostly by Calvinists, Lutherans, and Protestant Reformers, and remain until now in the celebrated confessional doctrines of the Reformed religious creed. In contrast, the Catholic Church has firmly refused to adopt certain features of this developed Augustinian salvation and predestination doctrines, primarily because they do not complement the Church's belief in God's merciful, compassionate love.
The ecclesiastical doctrine encouraged individuals to pursue their salvation. Such belief created several challenging questions about the Augustinian argument that human attempts or pursuit cannot help them attain salvation, which originates exclusively from God's mercy and grace. John Cassian, one of the pioneers of monasticism in the West in late antiquity, insisted that both human efforts and the grace of God contribute to one's salvation. Cassian and other detractors of Augustine placed emphasis on two claims. First, the doctrine of predestination appeared to suggest that Jesus Christ died merely for those elected or predetermined for salvation, but, in truth, Jesus Christ gave his life to the entire humanity. Second, Augustine claimed that nobody can perform goodness separate from or without grace, but people apparently do carry out goodness. As asserted by Cassian, “How can we imagine without grievous blasphemy that He does not generally will all men, but only some instead of all to be saved?” Obviously, God's grace is needed to be saved, as recognized by Augustine's detractors, but people can start to act toward their salvation without such grace, and God awards it to everybody, but some reject it.
On the other hand, the supporters of Augustine argued that Cassian's views make God appear incompetent. In other words, Cassian seems to promote the view that God desires the salvation of all but, unfortunately, He cannot do it. Augustinians argued that nobody can turn down grace if it is given; hence God should not award it to everybody. As proclaimed in 529 by the Synod of Orange, “The grace of God is not granted in response to prayer, but itself causes prayer to be offered for it”. The basic consensus here is that Augustine is keenly appreciative of the fact that humanity is doomed without God. Human beings were made by God for Him, and even though humanity has created a chasm of sin that detaches it from God, God has made a way to traverse it.
Numerous people have denounced the Augustinian doctrine of salvation as being somewhat prejudiced because it preaches that salvation can only be attained through God's grace, and that human effort toward salvation does not count. Jesus Christ, who is God's human form, did not grant Christians any alternative or choice but to spread the Word that it is merely through a faithful acceptance and belief in His sacrifice for humanity that human beings can gain salvation from their sins. As stated in the Gospel of John, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me”. In all other religions aside from Christianity, it is believed that one's salvation depends on how sinful s/he is and the good deeds that s/he has done. The individual can never be certain whether s/he has been righteous enough to gain salvation from his/her sins. Yet, the Christian Bible says otherwise, in fact supporting Augustine's doctrine of salvation-- human beings are sinners and could by no means gain salvation through their deeds in life.
The Scriptures attest to the Augustinian doctrine of salvation: “We are all infected and impure with sin. When we display our righteous deeds, they are nothing but filthy rags.” Apostle Paul emphasized that salvation can only be attained through Jesus Christ's sacrificial death: “For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.” Jesus Christ was pure and did not commit any sin. Thus He was elected to bear the cost of humanity's sinfulness and save them from damnation. Such salvation can only be attained through God's grace and mercy toward humanity, as Augustine claims, and people can only gain it through faith, not by their efforts to receive it: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” Simply put, it is not enough to be righteous; it is not enough to be pious or religious; it is not enough to serve God. Salvation can only be earned through God's grace, nowhere else.
All human pursuits of salvation are destined to fail. Yet, according to the Bible, salvation has already been awarded to humanity through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Human beings only need to have faith and wholeheartedly accept the sacrifice of Jesus Christ to receive this salvation. Those who receive salvation do so because God has elected them to be saved. The Holy Spirit has breathed wisdom to a mind overpowered by sin and life to a lifeless soul. Those who receive salvation could be presumed to have willingly chosen God, but just after God has elected them first to receive salvation: “You did not choose Me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask of the Father in My name, He may give to you.” Likewise, God has not elected some for salvation.
The Augustinian doctrine of salvation is largely misunderstood. In order to receive salvation, people should have faith in Jesus Christ as the ultimate gift from God to redeem the non-elect or lost sinners. God has granted the non-elect the heart to choose to believe in Him, and this could win them salvation. People act on faith in harmony with the heart God has granted them. Moreover, lost sinners are damned for eternity because they have chosen to disbelieve or renounce salvation through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Lost sinners are eternally damned to hell because they refused to have faith in God. They are also condemned because God has decided not to redeem them from their disobedience, doubt, and sin.
Conclusions
Augustine's early life has been largely spent in debauchery and immorality, yet he was able to redeem himself and become canonized as a saint after his death. His doctrine of salvation and predestination asserts that God has already chosen who will receive salvation and who will be eternally damned to hell. Therefore, good deeds or righteous living does not count as a path toward salvation. Human beings do not have the power to determine their eternal fate, only God does. These somewhat radical ideas were criticized far and wide. However, these criticisms are largely based on a misinterpretation of the Augustinian doctrine of salvation. In the most basic explanation, St. Augustine believed that people are damned to hell not merely because God has chosen them to perish, but because they are deserving of such punishment.
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