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City of God (Image Classics), by St. Augustine
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No book except the Bible itself had a greater influence on the Middle Ages than City of God. Since medieval Europe was the cradle of today’s Western civilization, this work by consequence is vital for understanding our world and how it came into being.
Saint Augustine is often regardarded as the most influential Christian thinker after Saint Paul, and City of God is his materpiece, a cast synthesis of religious and secular knowledge. It began as a reply to the charge that Christian otherworldiness was causing the decline of the Roman Empire. Augustine produced a wealth of evidence to prove that paganism bore within itself the seeds of its own destruction. Then he proceeded to his larger theme, a cosmic interpretation of in terms of the struggle between good and evilL the City of God in conflict with the Earthly City or the City of the Devil. This, the first serious attempt at a philosophy of history, was to have incalculable influence in forming the Western mind on the relations of church and state, and on the Christian’s place in the temporal order.
The original City of God contained twenty-two books and filles three regular-sized volumes. This edition has been skillfully abridged for the intelligent general reader by Vernon J. Bourke, author of Augustine’s Quest for Wisdom, making the heart of this monumental work available to a wide audience.
- Sales Rank: #641062 in Books
- Published on: 1958-02-01
- Released on: 1958-01-19
- Format: Abridged
- Original language: Latin
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 7.98" h x 1.57" w x 5.20" l, .95 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 608 pages
Amazon.com Review
Augustine's City of God, a monumental work of religious lore, philosophy, and history, was written as a kind of literary tombstone for Roman culture. After the sack of Rome, Augustine wrote this book to anatomize the corruption of Romans' pursuit of earthly pleasures: "grasping for praise, open-handed with their money; honest in the pursuit of wealth, they wanted to hoard glory." Augustine contrasts his condemnation of Rome with an exaltation of Christian culture. The glory that Rome failed to attain will only be realized by citizens of the City of God, the Heavenly Jerusalem foreseen in Revelation. Because City of God was written for men of classical learning--custodians of the culture Augustine sought to condemn--it is thick with Ciceronian circumlocutions, and makes many stark contrasts between "Your Virgil" and "Our Scriptures." Even if Augustine's prose strikes modern ears as a bit bombastic, and if his polarized Christian/pagan world is more binary than the one we live in today, his arguments against utopianism and his defense of the richness of Christian culture remain useful and strong. City of God is, as its final words proclaim itself to be, "a giant of a book." --Michael Joseph Gross
Review
"The human mind can understand truth only by thinking, as is clear from Augustine."
– Saint Thomas Aquinas
Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Latin
Most helpful customer reviews
88 of 91 people found the following review helpful.
A Must Read Book
By Nathan A. Edwards
The City of God was completed 13 years after Augustine began to write it in 413 A.D. It was written slowly and became a much different work than that which Augustine set out to create. Three years after the fall of the Roman Empire, Augustine set out to prove that Christianity was not to blame for Rome's collapse as some had charged. Almost half of The City of God was dedicated to this original purpose. Luckily for readers today, as well as then, by book eleven he turns his attention to the two cities and almost entirely dropped his original theme which has been a dead issue for some time. The two cities Augustine applies his brilliant mind to for the remainder of the work is that of The World and of God. Beginning in book eleven, Augustine traces the history of each city from a Christian perspective in a highly contemplative and truly beautiful manner. However, he seems to never miss an opportunity to correct any contrary philosophies along the way. He eventually makes his way to his ideas, based primarily on the writings of the apostles Paul and John, about the final realities of each city, as well as the consequences for their respective citizens.
The City of God would probably not be considered light reading by most, but if one can complete it while trying to digest as much as they can, it is certainly worth it. This is one of those works which is probably understood a little differently each time it is read. One helpful disclaimer offered by Thomas Merton is that if one is unfamiliar with Augustine and his writing, they would be best served to first read Augustine's Confessions (Penguin Classics) prior to tackling The City of God. It really is good advice.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful.
Read this book!
By Anthony Spallone
What can I say? This is a classic. I am so glad I read this before my 30th birthday and before the 2016 US presidential election. It really puts things into perspective. No matter how great I think America is and how much of a superpower it is it does not compare to how long and how great the Roman Empire was. I cannot even begin to imagine how the citizens of Rome must have felt when they heard the news that the barbarian tribes from the north took over Rome in 410AD. This apologetic work from Augustine of Hippo does not only argue that the City of God will overcome the City of Man one day but also teaches one how to engage critics and persuasively convince the reader. Augustine was a Roman through and through but His love for the true Eternal City was always more important. This book gave me an appreciation for how God always has a 'pilgrim people' that He has predestined to fight the good fight. If you are looking for a biblical theology of the City of God throughout all of Scripture then this is a great read for you. It will also give you an appreciation for how the current trend of 'gospel-centered' is not anything new but really old and Augustine was a master at making Christ-centered connections from the OT.
For example, on page 971 Augustine skillfully writes, "This is why, as the Lord carried his cross, so Isaac himself carried to the place of sacrifice the wood on which he too was to be placed. Moreover, after the father had been prevented from striking his son, since it was not right that Isaac should be slain, who was the ram whose immolation completed the sacrifice by blood of symbolic significance? Bear in mind that when Abraham saw the ram it was caught by the horns in a thicket. Who, then, was symbolized by that ram but Jesus, crowned with Jewish thorns150 before he was offered in sacrifice?
The book is filled with little nuggets all throughout. Couldn't recommend it more!
50 of 54 people found the following review helpful.
Augustine's tale of two cities.
By Amazon Customer
"The City of God" is Augustine's most famous work. I agree with Thomas Merton's introduction to the latest Modern Library version, which says that an uninitiated reader of Augustine may wish to read his "Confessions" first to get a good background on the author. "The City of God" is long and deep, covering many philosophical and Biblical debates (many that are still alive today), so one who has been introduced to Augustine through his auto-biographical "Confessions" may find it easier to follow his logic as he discusses the numerous topics of "The City of God."
The first few hundred pages of "The City of God" may be very slow and difficult for the average modern, Western, reader. Augustine is speaking directly to the average Roman citizens of the time (413 AD), so the first several chapters of "The City of God" are spent debunking the Romans' beliefs in polytheism, a mindset long since abandoned by most in the civilized Western world (thanks mostly to... Augustine). But the difficulty of these first few chapters should only make one appreciate Augustine all the more for having helped dismiss such a convoluted belief system. Once Augustine has broken down the problems with Zeus and friends, he moves on to discussing Plato, Aristotle, and other Greek philosophers. Augustine discusses why these founders of Western culture came close to understanding the idea of the Judeo-Christian God, but he shows where they too eventually fell short of total comprehension of Him.
After Augustine has dealt with these religions and philosophies of the Romans, he begins to address the Bible and how it concerns the City of God and the earthly city (Rome, which had been sacked by Alaric in 410, was the best example of the latter). Augustine outlines the differences in the beliefs and actions of believers and non-believers, or in other words, the citizenries of the two cities in question. In doing this, Augustine discusses numerous debates and questions, including figurative vs. literal interpretations of Old Testament stories, how the Old Testament prophets pointed towards Jesus Christ and how Christ fulfilled their prophesies, as well as many other questions that are still discussed every day, nearly 16 centuries later. Ultimately, Augustine gives us the beautiful picture of life graced by Christ through the faith he gives to the citizens he elects to join his city. Augustine shows us how Christ's grace removes his predestinated citizens from the worries of the earthly city, while (paradoxically) energizing them to care that much more for the inhabitants of this city (as the Christians in Rome did for non-believers they sheltered from Alaric's invaders).
One note of recent relevance: The City of God is often referenced today for Augustine's discussion of "just war" theory. While Augustine definitely believed that war can at times be just, and therefore morally obligatory, he does not really go into great detail about "just war" theory in "The City of God." In nearly 900 pages (in the Modern Library edition), he writes about war for no more than 1-2 pages.
I highly recommend "The City of God" to everyone, Christian or not. Just for the history of it, this book is fascinating, but the theology makes it one of the greatest works ever written.
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