Augustine | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

Augustine (354–430), born in Thagaste, North Africa, November 13, synthesized Platonism with Christian theology, and is considered a doctor of the European church. He taught rhetoric in Carthage, Rome, and Milan, until his conversion (386) and entry into monastic life; he became a presbyter (391) and bishop of Hippo (396), now Annaba, Algeria. Representative of the implications of his thought for science, technology, and ethics is the fact that in his early years he took an interest in one of the sciences of his day, astrology, and may even have practiced it himself; later he argued decisively against it. Augustine died in Hippo on August 28.

For Augustine, the chief concern of human beings ought to be God and the soul. This did not imply indifference to the material world and its events. When human beings perceive order in nature, he said, it points toward the realm of true happiness, the intelligible realm of divine ideas, which not only gives the world its form but enables the mind to discover both regularities in the world and rules for ethical behavior (De ver. rel. 29,52–36,67; 39,72–45,83). His general principle was that the mind judges things that are inferior to it, according to norms that are above it (De ver. rel. 31,58; 52,101). In the world presented by modern natural science, in which the order of the physical world appears to be the result of impersonal forces if not chance, the decisive question becomes to what extent the human mind can connect with realities superior to it.

In this journey from the outward to the inward and then upward, his most impressive venture was an analysis of music. In the sixth book of De musica (389), he traces the crucial role of proportions or numbers, starting with the physical sounds and moving inward to hearing, memory, speech, the spontaneous judgments that arouse delight at these proportions, and finally to the intelligible principles by which such judgments are made. His approach foreshadows modern interests in acoustics, the psychological effects of music, and the importance of music to the human spirit (for example, Arthur Schopenhauer).

Similarly he was aware of optics. When viewing a structure or a painting, humans spontaneously make judgments of harmony, he stated (De lib. arb. 30,54; 32,59). But there are complexities. An oar in water appears bent, but the light waves are not being deceptive; they act according to their nature as they are propagated through media of different densities, and what is fallacious is the premature judgment that the oar is really bent (De ver. rel. 33,62; 36,67).

Truth, he said, is God's wherever it is found; just as the Israelites were justified in appropriating the Egyptian's gold and silver because it belonged to God (Ex. 3:22, 11:2, 12:35), so Christians can appropriate all truth. The glory of the Gentiles, he said, is their science and philosophy (Conf. VII,9,15), though it must be transformed by the insights gained from revelation, which is the tradition of Israel. This early Christian attitude is continued by many modern Christians in dealing with secular science.

One of the major scientific disputes in which Augustine took part concerned the antipodes: Are there people living on the other side of a round earth, standing upside down? He regarded it as a matter of scientific conjecture rather than direct experience, but on the basis of Scripture he decided against it; he even thought that, if there should be people there, they could not be descendants of Adam and Eve (De civ.

Dei XVI, 9). The eighth-century Irish monk Fergal or Vergilius in Salzburg was notorious for taking the opposite position. Gradually the question was seen as one for scientific inquiry rather than revelation, and Augustine's position was cited by Johannes Kepler, René Descartes, and the Encyclopedists as evidence of theological obscurantism.

Augustine's contributions relevant to science, technology, and ethics may be summarized in three ways. First his last word, at the end of The City of God (413–426), is an appreciation of human culture—the liberal arts (geometry, grammar, logic, and music); the fine arts, which use material things to convey thoughts and feelings (poetry, theater, painting, and architecture); and, perhaps most basic, the practical arts (domestication of plants and animals, the crafts, architecture and civil engineering, and navigation). These are indispensable, he said, to the life of the earthly city, even though the latter is not the highest end to be sought.

Second, in dealing with the issue of natural evil, Augustine acknowledged that humans live in a dangerous world, but saw this as an invitation to scientific inquiry and technological mastery. He argued that people are like visitors to a forge, surrounded by unknown implements; they resent falling against a furnace or a sharp tool, but the smith knows how to use each of these objects to accomplish his work (De Gen. c. Man. I,16,25–26). The venom of scorpions is poisonous, but it can also be put to medicinal use (De mor. II,8,11–12). The most personal kind of intervention is medicine, in which he finds many metaphors for the healing activity of God through Christ. In the early-twenty-first century, industry and government support both scientific inquiry and technological intervention.

Third, beyond these kinds of intervention in the world, Augustine suggests that human beings should not think solely in terms of their own discomfort or inconvenience; rather they should appreciate the intricate structure of all living forms, knowing that God created them though humans may not know why (De civ. Dei XII,4; XXII,24). In this respect he encouraged the later Christian Platonism of the Chartres school and of Kepler, which sought order in nature precisely because of the conviction that God rules intelligently and intelligibly.

Christian Perspectives:; Historical Traditions;; Just War.

Delhaye, Phillipe. (1951). "La theacytelorie des antipodes et ses incidences théologiques." In Le Microcosmus de Godefroy de St-Victor: Étude théologique, ed. Phillipe Delhaye. Lille, France: Facultés Catholiques. History of the "round earth" question.

Ferrari, Leo C. (1996). "Augustine's Cosmography." Augustinian Studies 27: 129–177. The most complete account of Augustine's picture of the world.

Fortin, Ernest. (1984). "Augustine, the Arts, and Human Progress." In Theology and Technology: Essays in Christian Analysis and Exegesis, eds. Carl Mitcham and Jim Grote. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. Reprinted in Ernest Fortin: Collected Essays, Vol. III: Human Rights, Virtue, and the Common Good: Untimely Meditations on Religion and Politics, ed. J. Brian Benestad. (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield [1996]). Survey of Augustine's appreciation of culture and technology.

Martin, Thomas F., O.S.A. (2001). "Paul the Patient: Christus Medicus and the Stimulus Carnis (2 Cor. 12:7): A Consideration of Augustine's Medicinal Christology." Augustinian Studies: 219–256. Thorough discussion of the medical metaphor.

Nowak, Adolf. (1975). "Die 'numeri judicales' des Augustinus." Archiv für Musikwissenschaft 32: 196–207. A close analysis of Augustine's view of aesthetic judgment.

O'Daly, Gerard. (1987). Augustine's Philosophy of Mind. London: Duckworth. Comprehensive survey of Augustine's theory of knowledge.

Pickstock, Catherine. (1998). "Ascending Numbers: Augustine's De Musica and the Western Tradition." In Christian Origins: Theology, Rhetoric and Community, eds. Lewis Ayres and Gareth Jones. London and New York: Routledge. Defense of Augustinian aesthetics and cosmology by comparison with Indian, modern, and postmodern approaches.

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