• Autobiography
Confessions: a emulatio of the Aeneid by Virgil.
• 13 books (one more to suggest addition of
Christianity). Plagiarized in his writings
• Friendships important

• Sex is an interior state of mind
• Transmission of original sin
• Eve, biological mother of humanity, is a type for Mary, spiritual mother (typology-
Greek tupos = type, example)
• Evil is a deficiency of good
• World view is dualistic;

• A new reality, two planes (dualism)
– God’s world--eternal truth existing before and after creation
– Physical world of sense-apparent objects
• Believed the world follows a linear progression from darkness to light
• From body to soul
• From evil to goodness
• From doubt to faith
• From blindness to understanding

• God’s time – timeless instant
• Temporal world – all things flow upward
• God allows free will

• Read Book 2. Why do you think Augustine wrote his Confessions?
• What do you learn about his beliefs from reading from Book 2?
• Think of an example of something similar that you or your friends have done. What was the motivation? Any connection with
Augustine?

• Roman emperors were theocratic monarchs
(Augustine wrote the City of God to condemn Roman “divine” emperors”)
• Growing social, political, economic unrest
• Distrust of reason
• Growing impulse toward mysticism

• Greece, Egypt, Southwest Asia
• Less intellectual than neoplatonism
• More personal than religious philosophy
• Promise of personal immortality
– Cult of Isis – Egypt
– Cybele in Phrygia
– Dionysus in Greece
– Mithra in Persia

• Heritage back to Neolithic times
• Agricultural
• Birth, death, rebirth of gods and goddesses associated with regeneration of crops
• Initiates acted out symbolic rituals
– Spiritual death and rebirth
– Ritual baptism
– Communal meal of flesh or blood of the bull in spring
– Cult of Isis: Queen of Heaven and Earth
Mother

• Associated with sun and forces of Light and
Goodness
• Man-god Mithra released forces of cosmic life and energy by slaughtering Bull of
Fertility
• Mithra’s followers
– Sought regeneration and personal attachment to this hero-god

• Celebrated Mithra’s virgin birth on December 25
(after sun’s rebirth at winter solstice)
• Seven stages of initiation, one of which was ritual baptism, fasting, death and resurrection, communal meal of bread and wine representing the flesh ande blood of the bull (his origin), and deliverance from evil
• Favorite religion of Roman soldiers

th

• Jonah and the whale
• Jonah is a type or example for Christ
• Prefigures death
• Third Century CE

• Entry to Dom St. Peter
• Worms, Germany
• 12 th Century
• Type prefigures
Resurrection

Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus 359 CE Vatican
Abraham St. Peter Christ Arrest Trial
Job Adam & Eve Entry Daniel/Lion St. Paul

Chi rho
Matthew/angel
Greek word ichthys
Acronym: Jesus
Christ, Son of God,
Savior
Luke/ox; John/eagle
Mark/lion

• Jesus is “the good shepherd”
• Symbol of promise to the departed to join flock in heaven
• Also lamb as sacrificial offering

• Plotinus = 3 rd C (neoplatonist)
– Union with One: ascent through series of levels of spiritual purification (Dante)
– Soul is eternal and divine
– Universe is layered in ascending degrees of perfection

• Octavian tried to restore old Roman values of duty and civic pride
• Germanic tribes invaded
• Oppression and poverty
• Constantine 313 CE
• Edict of Milan (by end of 4 th C. Christianity is official religion)
• Council of Nicea 325

• 36 books in Hebrew Bible
• Sadducees – Jewish aristocrats; cultural and religious solidarity; denied that soul survived
• Pharisees – more influential Jewish teachers; interpreters of Hebrew law; believed in advent of messianic redeemer (a shepherd); human soul is imperishable; wicked will suffer eternal punishment

Essenes
• Monastic communities near Dead Sea
• Renounced worldly goods
• Practiced asceticism
• Believed in immortality of the soul
• Anticipated coming of teacher of truth
• Dead Sea Scrolls (Essenes lived near Dead Sea)
• forecast final apocalyptic age

• Gospels – 40 years after his death
• No biography, no writings
• Jewish rabbi
• Ethical concerns; moral lessons
• Pacifistic message
• Antimaterialistic message
• Temptations of temporal world distract

• Evils of material wealth (classical world was materialistic)
• Faith over ritual
• Spirit of Hebrew law, not the letter
• Love of God and neighbor
• God was stern, but loving
• Taught cultivation of compassion, righteousness, trust in God

• Blessed are the poor, the gentle, the mourners, the seekers of goodness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, the persecuted because of their belief in Jesus.
• His followers are the light of the world
• Jesus came to fulfill the laws
• Believers should follow his commandments
• Followers should not judge others
• The golden rule

• Rewards in heaven
• Moral intention is more important than outward behavior

• Best known of apostles (d. 65)
• Jewish tentmaker from Tarsus in Asia Minor
• Greek and Hebrew language
• Never met Jesus
• Wrote 10-14 of 27 books of New Testament
• Universalized Jesus’s message

• Jesus taught Jews; Paul wrote to people of
Greece, Asia Minor, Rome
• Apostle to the Gentiles
• Laid basis for Jesus as New Adam

• Salvation by faith
• Jesus: son of God
• Jesus, sacrifice for human sin
• Sin had entered world through Adam and
Eve’s defiance of God
• Jesus’s death was act of atonement
• Jesus was New Adam

• Old Testament
– 39 books in the King James Version)
– written in Hebrew (with a little Aramaic) from
11 th to 2 nd century BCE.
• The New Testament
– 27 books in the King James Version)
– written in Greek from 40 AD to as late as 150
AD)