Augustine and The Mystery of the Church

Augustine and the Mystery of the Church James K. Lee on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:50:16 UTC t.jstor.org/terms

Augustine and the Mystery of the Church This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:50:16 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

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Augustine and the Mystery of the Church James K. Lee Fortress Press Minneapolis This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:50:16 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH Copyright © 2017 Fortress Press. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Email [email protected] or write to Permissions, Fortress Press, PO Box 1209, Minneapolis, MN 55440-1209. Cover design: Joe Reinke Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-5064-3263-2 Paperback ISBN: 978-1-5064-2051-6 eBook ISBN: 978-1-5064-2052-3 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z329.48-1984. Manufactured in the U.S.A. This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:50:16 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Contents Acknowledgments vii Abbreviations ix Introduction xv 1. The Mystery of the Church 1 2. The Church as the Body of Christ 27 3. The Church as the Bride of Christ 57 4. The City of God 75 5. The Church as Sacrifice 95 Conclusion 123 Bibliography 129 Index 149 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:52:18 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

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Acknowledgments I would like to thank my family, friends, teachers, and colleagues for their support of this project, especially: my wife, Anna Devin Burnstad Lee; my father, Dr. Sang Gun Lee, MD; my mother, Mrs. Young Ae Lee; my brother, Edward Tae Hoon Lee; John Cavadini, and the Cavadini family; Brian Daley, SJ; Joseph Wawrykow; Cyril O’Regan; Abbot Austin Murphy, OSB; John Sehorn; Jordan Wales; James DeFrancis; Kevin Haley; Katie Cavadini; Brian Dunkle, SJ; Bruce Marshall; William Abraham; Matthew Levering; and Andrew Mercer. I am grateful to the University Research Council at Southern Methodist University for a grant that allowed me to conductresearch on this project at the University of Notre Dame during the summer of 2015. I would also like to thank the Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame for its generous support. Many thanks to Michael Gibson and the wonderful team at Fortress Press. This book is dedicated to my wife, Anna, with love, gratitude, and admiration, as ever. vii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:53:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

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Abbreviations Series and Collections ACW Ancient Christian Writers, ed. J. Quasten and J. C. Plumpe (Westminster, MD: Newman, 1946–) BA Bibliothèque Augustinienne: Oeuvres de Saint Augustin (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1949–) CCSL Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina (Turnhout: Brepols, 1953–) CSEL Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum (Vienna: Tempsky, 1865–) Denis Sermones M. Denis: Miscellanea Agostiniana (2 vols.; Rome: Tipografia Poliglotta Vaticana, 1930–31) Divjak J. Divjak, Les Lettres de saint Augustin découvertes par Johannes Divjak (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1983) Dolbeau F. Dolbeau, Augustin d’Hippone. Vingt-six sermons au peuple d’Afrique (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1996) FC The Fathers of the Church, ed. R. J. Deferrari (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1947–) NPNF A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994–) PL Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, ed. J.-P. Migne (Paris: Imprimerie Catholique, 1844–1864) PLS Patrologiae Latinae Supplementum, ed. A.-G. Hamman (Turnhout: Brepols, 1958–1974) RSV Holy Bible, Revised Standard Version SC Sources chrétiennes (Paris: Cerf, 1942–) WSA The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century, ed. John E. Rotelle (Hyde Park, NY: New City, 1990–) ix This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:54:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Ambrose of Milan Abr. De Abraham (CSEL 32.1:501–638) Apol. De apologia David ad Theodosium Augustum (CSEL 32.2:229–355) Cain De Cain et Abel (CSEL 32.1:339–409) Ep. Epistulae (CSEL 82.1–4) Ex. Exameron (CSEL 32.1:3–261) Fide De fide libri U (CSEL 78:3–307) Jac. De Jacob et vita beata (CSEL 32.2:3–70) In Luc. Expositio euangelii secundum Lucam (CCSL 14:1–100) In Ps. XII Explanatio Psalmorum XII (CSEL 64) In Ps. CXVIII Expositio Psalmi CXVIII (CSEL 62) Inc. De incarnationis dominicae sacramento (CSEL 79:225–81) Jos. De Joseph (CSEL 32.1:73–122) Is. De Isaac vel anima (CSEL 32.1:641–700) Myst. De mysteriis (SC 25) Obit. De obitu Valentiniani (CSEL 73:329–67) Off. De officiis ministrorum (CCSL 15) Paen. De paenitentia (SC 179) Sacr. De sacramentis (SC 25) Spir. De spiritu sancto (CSEL 79:7–222) Augustine C. Acad. Contra Academicos (CCSL 29:3–61) C. Adim. Contra Adimantum Manichei discipulum (CSEL 25:115–90) Agon. De agone christiano liber unus (CSEL 41:99–138) Quant. De animae quantitate liber unus (CSEL 89:129–231) Bapt. De baptismo libri septem (CSEL 51:143–375) B. conjug. De bono conjugali (CSEL 41:187–230) B. vita De beata vita liber unus (CCSL 29:65–85) Cat. rud. De catechizandis rudibus (CCSL 46:115–78) AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH x This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:54:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Civ. Dei De civitate Dei (CCSL 47–48) Conf. Confessiones (CCSL 27) Cons. De consensu Evangelistarum (CSEL 43) Cresc. Ad Cresconium grammaticum partis Donati (CSEL 52) Div. qu. De diversis quaestionibus octoginta tribus (CCSL 44A:11–249) Doc. Chr. De doctrina Christiana (CCSL 32:1–167) C. ep. Pel. Contra duas epistulas Pelagianorum (CSEL 60) En. Ps. Enarrationes in Psalmos (CCSL 38–40) Ench. Enchiridion ad Laurentium de fide spe et caritate (CCSL 46:49–114) Ep. Epistulae (CSEL 34.1–2, 44, 57, 58, 88) Ep. Jo. In epistulam Johannis ad Parthos tractatus (SC 75) Rm. inch. Epistulae ad Romanos inchoate expositio (CSEL 84:145–81) Ex. Gal. Expositio Epistulae ad Galatas (CSEL 84:55–141) Ex. prop. Rm. Expositio quarundam propositionum ex epistula apostoli ad Romanos (CSEL 84:3–52) C. Faust. Contra Faustum Manicheum (CSEL 25:251–797) Gn. litt. De Genesi ad litteram (CSEL 28.1:459–503) Gn. adv. Man. De Genesi adversus Manicheos (CSEL 91) Gr. et pecc. or. De gratia Christi et de peccato originali libri duo (CSEL 42) Imm. an. De immortalitate animae (CSEL 89:101–28) Jo. ev. tr. In Johannis evangelium tractatus (CCSL 36) c. Jul. Contra Julianum (PL 44:641–874) C. Jul. imp. Contra Julianum opus imperfectum (CSEL 85.1–2) Lib. arb. De libero arbitrio libri tres (CCSL 29:211–321) C. litt. Pet. Contra litteras Petiliani (CSEL 52:3–227) Mag. De magistro (CCSL 29:157–203) Mor. De moribus ecclesiae catholicae et de moribus Manichaeorum (CSEL 90) Ord. De ordine (CCSL 29:89–137) Perf. just. De perfectione justitiae hominis (CSEL 42:3–48) Persev. De dono perseverantiae (PL 45:993–1034) ABBREVIATIONS xi This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:54:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Praed. sanct. De praedestinatione sanctorum (PL 44:959–92) Retr. Retractationes (CCSL 57:5–143) C. Sec. Contra Secundinum Manicheum (CSEL 25:905–47) S. Sermones (CCSL 41; PL 38, 39, 46; PLS 2) S. Dom. mon. De sermone Domini in monte (CCSL 35) Simpl. Ad Simplicianum (CCSL 44) Sol. Soliloquia (CSEL 89:3–98) Trin. De Trinitate (CCSL 50–50A) Vera rel. De vera religione (CCSL 32:187–206) Util. cred. De utilitate credendi (CSEL 25.1:3–48) Cyprian Ad Fort. Ad Fortunatum (CCSL 3:183–216) Ad Quir. Ad Quirinum (CCSL 3:3–179) De dom. orat. De dominica oratione (CCSL 3A:90–113) De eccl. De ecclesiae catholicae unitate (CCSL 3:249–68) Ep. Epistulae (CCSL 3B–3C) Hilary of Poitiers In Matth. Commentarius in Matthaeum (SC 254, 258) In Ps. Tractatus super Psalmos (CCSL 61–61A) De Trin. De Trinitate (CCSL 62–62A) Myst. Traité des Mystères (SC 19) Jerome In Is. Commentarii in Isaiam (CCSL 73–73A) In Ps. Commentarioli in psalmos (CCSL 72:177–245) Lactantius Div. Inst. Divinae Institutiones (CSEL 19) AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:54:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Marius Victorinus Adv. Ar. Adversus Arium (CSEL 83, 1) In Ep. ad Eph. Commentarii in Epistulas Pauli ad Ephesios (CSEL 83, 2) In Ep. ad Gal. Commentarii in Epistulas Pauli ad Galatas (CSEL 83, 2) Optatus Cont. parm. Don. Contra parmenianum Donatistam (SC 412–13) Plotinus Enn. The Enneads Tertullian Adv. Jud. Adversos Judaeos (CCSL 2:1339–96) Adv. Marc. Adversos Marcionem (CCSL 1:441–726) Anim. De anima (CCSL 2:781–869) Apol. Apologeticum (CCSL 1:85–171) Jejun. De jejunio adversus psychicos (CCSL 2:1257–77) Monog. De monogamia (CCSL 2:1229–53) Praesc. De praescriptione haereticorum (CCSL 1:187–224) ABBREVIATIONS xiii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:54:59 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

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Introduction The influence of Augustine in the history of Christianity is difficult to overestimate. Jaroslav Pelikan once described the history of Western theology since the Council of Orange (529 CE) as a “series of footnotes” to Augustine.1 Augustine’s thought on the “church” (ecclesia) has been so formative for the Western tradition that he is often called the “Doctor of ecclesiology.”2 Yet despite this widespread influence, scholarship on Augustine’s ecclesiology has suffered from impoverishment relative to the richness of his thought, especially over the course of the past two centuries. Many studies from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries betray the tendency to read certain texts from the Augustinian corpus in isolation from others.3 A selective reading of Augustine 1. Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, Vol. 1: The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 330. 2. Stanislaus J. Grabowski, The Church: An Introduction to the Theology of St. Augustine (St. Louis: Herder, 1957), xiv: “Although from time immemorial the Church hails [Augustine] as the ‘Doctor of grace,’ he merits equally as well to be honored as the ‘Doctor of ecclesiology’ since in this domain his teaching is so vast, penetrating, complete that it constituted a rich fund for all ages of Christian thought.” For a survey of scholarship, see Johannes van Oort, Jerusalem and Babylon: A Study into Augustine’s City of God and the Sources of His Doctrine of the Two Cities (New York: Brill, 1991), 93–154; Eugène Portalié, A Guide to the Thought of St Augustine (Chicago: Regnery, 1960), 230–42; Émilien Lamirande, Études sur l’ecclésiologie de saint Augustin, vol. 92 (Ottawa: Saint Paul University, 1969); Tarsicius von Bavel, “Church,” in Augustine Through the Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. Allan Fitzgerald, John C. Cavadini, Marianne Djuth, et al. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 169–76; Serge Lancel, Saint Augustine, trans. Antonia Nevill (London: SCM, 2002), 400–403; Hubertus R. Drobner, The Fathers of the Church: A ComprehensiveIntroduction, trans. Siegfried Schatzmann (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007), 403–4. The best introduction to Augustine’s ecclesiology in recent scholarship is Michael Root, “Augustine on the Church,” in T&T Clark Companion to Augustine and Modern Theology, eds. C. C. Pecknold and Tarmo Toom (New York: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013), 54–74. 3. Michael Fahey, “Augustine’s Ecclesiology Revisited,” in Augustine from Rhetor to Theologian, ed. J. McWilliam (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1992), 173–81, esp. 173–74: “The earliest studies . . . betray notable confessional prejudices and appear more as apologetical treatises that would have Augustine say what we would like him to have said in support of our confessional allegiances.” xv This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

neglects the complex development of his thought and leads to reductive accounts of his ecclesiology. In particular, the church has been reduced to a purely spiritual, invisible reality over against the visible community celebrating the sacraments. This view has taken hold due in large part to the work of scholars who interpret Augustine primarily in philosophical terms. Some claim, for example, that Augustine never got beyond the heavy influence of Platonism after his reading of philosophers such as Plotinus in the 380s.4 Consequently, Augustine’s thought is best viewed through the lens of Platonic categories. This approach has been applied to his ecclesiology by authors such as Hermann Reuter, Adolf von Harnack, Reinhold Seeberg, J. N. D. Kelly, Denis Faul, and, most recently, Phillip Cary.5 According to a Platonic interpretation, the true church consists of an inner, invisible reality over against the visible body in history. This is what Johannes van Oort refers to as a “two-fold ecclesiology,” for the church is first and foremost a spiritual reality in contradistinction to the empirical community.6 The Platonic Interpretation of Augustine The significance of Platonism for Augustine has been well documented, and indeed, Augustine remained indebted to Platonism until the end of his life.7 However, an exaggerated view of his Platonism fails to account forthe development of histhought, particularly after hisstudy of Scripture in the 390s. The result is a misinterpretation of Augustine’s 4. For example, Hermann Reuter, Augustinische Studien (Gotha: Perthes, 1887); Adolf von Harnack, Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, vol. 3 (Tübingen: Mohr, 1910); Augustin: Reflexionen und Maximen (Tübingen: Mohr, 1922); Pierre Battifol, Le Catholicisme de Saint Augustin (Paris: Gabalde, 1929); J. J. O’Meara, The Young Augustine (New York: Longmans, 1954); Robert J. O’Connell, Saint Augustine’s Platonism (Philadelphia: Villanova University Press, 1984). 5. Reuter, Studien, 47–100, 250–51; Harnack, Lehrbuch 3:158–66; Reinhold Seeberg, Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, vol. 2 (Leipzig: A. Deichert, 1923), 446; J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines (London: Black, 1958), 414–16; Denis Faul, “Sinners in the Holy Church: A Problem in the Ecclesiology of St. Augustine,” Studia Patristica 9 (1963): 404–15, esp. 410; Phillip Cary, Outward Signs: The Powerlessness of External Things in Augustine’s Thought (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), esp. 161–64, 193–220. 6. See the discussion by Oort, Jerusalem and Babylon, 124. 7. Goulven Madec, “Si Plato viveret . . . Augustin, De vera religione 3.3,” in Néoplatonism: Mélanges offerts à Jean Trouillard, ed. J. Lucien (Fontenay-aux-Roses: Fontenay, 1981), 231–47; “Bonheur, philosophie et religion selon Saint Augustin,” in Penser la religion: recherches en philosophie de la religion, ed. J. Greisch (Paris: Beauchesne, 1991), 53–69; John Rist, Augustine: Ancient Thought Baptized (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994); Roland Teske, To Know God and the Soul: Essays on the Thought of Saint Augustine (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2008); James Wetzel, Augustine and the Limits of Virtue(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008); John Peter Kenney, The Mysticism of Saint Augustine: Rereading the Confessions (New York: Routledge, 2005); Contemplation and Classical Christianity: A Study in Augustine (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xvi This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

ecclesiology based upon a Platonic framework that undermines the significance of visible things. A classic example of the Platonic approach is found in J. N. D. Kelly’s Early Christian Doctrines. According to Kelly, Augustine’s ecclesiology arises from and takes shape within a philosophical framework. The “essence” of the church is its “inward being,” which is “the communion of all those who are united together, along with Christ their Lord, in faith, hope, and love,” while the “outer manifestation” in the world is the empirical community.8 Kelly attributes the distinction between the invisible communion of charity and the visible church to Platonism.9 The invisible society of the saints is analogous to the Platonic ideal, which must be liberated from its condition in history. The empirical church celebrating the sacraments “ceasesto have validity.”10 Kelly so privileges the inward reality that the visible community can be discarded. Along the same lines, some have suggested Augustine’s notion of the church is “full of self-contradictions”11 and conflicts with his mature thought. Benjamin Warfield, for instance, claims Augustine’s mature theology of grace renders the visible church null and void.12 There is a fundamental incoherence to Augustine’s ecclesiology, and in the final analysis, the invisible reality prevails over the visible community. Phillip Cary takes the Platonic approach to new heights in his trilogy of studies on Augustine’s Platonism.13 According to Cary, Augustine constructs a kind of dualism in which an invisible reality has no relation to a visible thing. The outward is rendered “powerless” and inefficacious, for visible and invisible operate on entirely separate tracks.14 8. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, 414. Kelly continues, “Only those who are ablaze with charity and sincerely devoted to Christ’s cause belong to the essential Church,” for sinners “seem to be in the Church,” but have no part in the “invisible union of love,” for they are “inside the house, but remain alien to its intimate fabric . . . this line of thought transferred the whole problem of the Church’s nature to an altogether different plane” (415–16). 9. Ibid., 415; cf. Faul, “Sinners in the Holy Church,” 407–8. 10. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, 416. 11. Adolf von Harnack, History of Dogma, vol. 5, trans. Neil Buchanan (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1902), 163; Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 69. 12. According to Warfield, the disparity between Augustine’s ecclesiology and his theology of grace led to the Reformation. “For the Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine of grace over Augustine’s doctrine of the Church” (Studies in Tertullian and Augustine[Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991], 121). By contrast,see Jaroslav Pelikan’s account, “An Augustinian Dilemma: Augustine’s Doctrine of Grace versus Augustine’s Doctrine of the Church?” Augustinian Studies 18 (1987): 1–29. 13. Phillip Cary, Outward Signs; Augustine’s Invention of the Inner Self: The Legacy of a Christian Platonist (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000); Inner Grace: Augustine in the Traditions of Plato and Paul (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). 14. Cary, Outward Signs, 163. INTRODUCTION xvii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

This dichotomy completely eliminates the efficacy of sacraments such as baptism and the Eucharist,15 and consequently the church’s sacramental life has no real meaning or effect.16 Cary applies this scheme to Augustine’s ecclesiology such that the church is constituted by an inner, invisible communion of charity, over against the outer, visible church and entirely apart from the celebration of its sacraments:17 “The grace of God uses human social means, but these are inward, consisting in the power of charity to form the invisible unity of the church.”18 Cary embraces the fullest possible separation between visible and invisible, and his reading is the culmination of an overly Platonic interpretation of Augustine in modern scholarship that dispenses with the visible church. An Alternate Shape to Understanding Augustine On the contrary, in this study I argue the visible, sacramental community is intrinsic to the church in Augustine’s thought. For Augustine, the church is a mystery with visible and invisible aspects that are distinct but not separate. Far from discarding the visible body, Augustine places greater emphasis upon the empirical community as essential to the church in his mature works. In the end, Augustine offers a coherent albeit highly sophisticated theology of the church as one mystery. I demonstrate the coherence of Augustine’s thought by tracing its development from his early writings to later, more mature works. In his early writings, the influence of Platonism is evident in terms of the priority given to the ascent of the individual soul to the neglect of the communal body. Participation in a sacramental community is mitigated by the power of philosophy and the liberal arts to purify the mind. However, Augustine’s reading of Scripture in the 390s led to a seismic shift in his thought.19 Augustine no longer conceives of the way to God by means of an unmediated ascent. Rather, the way to God is by participation in a communal body celebrating the sacraments. In mature works from the late 390s on, Augustine insists upon the media15. Ibid., 200. 16. Ibid., esp. 161–64, 193–220. 17. Ibid., 200: “Grace comes to the individual soul not by external means but by a kind of inward channel, descending from God to the inner unity of the church, to which the soul is joined by charity.” 18. Ibid. 19. According Robert Markus, Augustine’s reading of Paul in the 390s produced a “landslide” and “earthquake,” proving to be a “catastrophic turning point in his Christian career”; see “Comment: Augustine’s Pauline Legacies,” in Paul and the Legacies of Paul, ed. William S. Babcock (Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1990), 223–24; Michael Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 294–95n14. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xviii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

tion of the sacraments as necessary for incorporation into the church, a kind of mediation that cannot be found elsewhere. As his thought continues to develop, Augustine maintains the necessity of sacramental mediation while arguing that the Holy Spirit may work beyond visible bounds. This does not obviate the sacraments, instead it reveals how God works through visible things and is not limited by them. In the end, the Holy Spirit will bring all of the elect into the unity of the church. Until that time, the visible church is a “mixed body” (corpus permixtum) of good and wicked, elect and reprobate. The church’s mixed condition is part of God’s plan for the purification of the elect and the transformation of the world. Some who share in the sacraments of the visible church may cut themselves off from the effects, yet the sacraments remain the means of incorporation into the one body of Christ.20 All who share in charity will be united to the one church, either in the present age or at the end time, that is, at the eschaton. Augustine presents a coherent vision of the church as a mystery that is visible and invisible, historical and eschatological. This study proceeds in two ways. First, it establishes Augustine’s understanding of the church as a mystery according to the Latin terms mysterium and sacramentum. Augustine inherits this distinction from the patristic tradition and develops it further in order to unite the visible and invisible aspects of the church. The church is visible and historical after the pattern of the incarnation, for just as Christ, the transcendent mystery of God (Col 2:2; 4:3), was manifested (1 Tim 3:16) visibly in his flesh,21 so too the church is a transcendent mystery made visible in history. Augustine’s mature ecclesiology is predicated upon a biblical, incarnational theology rather than Platonic philosophy. Second, this study explores key images of the church in Augustine’s works, including the body of Christ, the bride of Christ, the city of God, and sacrifice. Augustine’s meditation on these images follows the trajectory of his developing thought. In his early works, Augustine focuses on the ascent of the individual soul with the aim of vision, demonstrating his thorough engagement with Platonism. As his thought matures, he no longer fixates upon the individual to the neglect of the communal body.22 Instead, he depicts the church primarily in communal 20. The communion of charity is the body of Christ, properly speaking, but this invisible body is not a separate economy of salvation apart from the visible church; cf. C. Faust. 13.16. See the helpful discussion by Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 67–68. 21. Trin. 4.1.6; 5.20.27. 22. The fixation upon the descent and ascent of the individual soul to the neglect of the communal nature of the church is mirrored in Augustinian scholarship, particularly from the last century; cf. INTRODUCTION xix This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

terms, placing the individual in the context of the community. Vision is subordinated to charity, and the end of the Christian life is the enjoyment of God within a communal body. The shift from the individual to the communal reflects the corresponding shift from Augustine’s early Platonism to his mature biblical, incarnational theology,23 for the incarnation makes possible the union and formation of the “whole Christ” (totus Christus) as one body, head and members. As the body of Christ, the church is a community that is both visible and invisible, and the visible celebration of the sacraments forms the invisible communion of charity. Baptism gives birth to charity in the members,24 and the church’s eucharistic worship unites the city of God as one body and one sacrifice. Thus the invisible union of the ecclesia comes not at the expense of the historical community, but precisely as mediated by the sacramental life of the church. Augustine’s exegesis of biblical images reveals the intrinsic relationship between the empirical community and the invisible reality, for while they are not precisely identical, the visible church is the body and bride of Christ, in a process of purification and growth. The sacraments add citizens to the heavenly city of God, which is on pilgrimage to the heavenly homeland. Therefore the visible community celebrating the sacraments is intrinsic to the church. In his mature works, Augustine attaches greater significance to the visible aspects of the church. This growing attention to the visible community can be attributed not only to his biblical and incarnational theology, but also to his experiences as priest, pastor, and bishop in North Africa. By the late 390s, Augustine had been engaged in pastoral ministry for some years. With his elevation to the episcopacy, Augustine’s ongoing ecclesial ministry enabled him to come to a deeper understanding of the necessity of participation in a visible, sacramental comRobert J. O’Connell, St. Augustine’s Confessions: The Odyssey of Soul (New York: Fordham University Press, 1989), 84–89; The Origin of the Soul in St. Augustine’s Later Works (New York: Fordham University Press, 1987), 337–50. In response to O’Connell, see Ronnie J. Rombs, Saint Augustine and the Fall of the Soul: Beyond O’Connell and His Critics (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2006). 23. This does not suggest that Platonism in itself fails to account for the whole, for as Oliver O’Donovan observes, Augustine’s metaphysic possesses a “collectivist trait” which “can be traced without much hesitation to Stoic influence mediated through Plotinian Neoplatonism”; see The Problem of Self-Love in St. Augustine (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980), 134. However, Augustine’s early Platonism tends to focus on the ascent of the individual soul to the neglect of the communal body. By the time of his mature theology, Augustine conceives of the individual in the context of the church as a community with visible and invisible features. 24. Doc. Chr. 2.6.7. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xx This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

munity. In order for us to grasp the significance of this development, a brief historical overview is necessary. The Church in North Africa Augustine was born in the Roman colony of Thagaste, North Africa, to a pagan father and a Catholic mother.25 After studying in Madaura and Carthage, Augustine returned to Thagaste to begin his career in rhetoric. Along the way, he became enamored with Manichaeism, which espoused a radically dualistic view of good and evil, spirit and matter, soul and body. Augustine adhered to Manichaeism for the better part of a decade, but became disenchanted with it after an encounter with the Manichean bishop Faustus.26 Upon taking a teaching post in Milan, Augustine began to read the books of the Platonists, which freed his mind from the errors of Manichaeism.27 From the Platonists, Augustine learned that evil is not a substance—or existing thing—of any kind.28 Moreover, to posit evil as a co-eternal principle, in Manichean fashion, is to deny the omnipotence of the transcendent God. Platonism proved to have a deep and lasting impact upon Augustine’s thought, particularly in terms of the notion of divine transcendence.29 It was Ambrose, the bishop of Milan, who led Augustine to enter the Catholic Church. Under the instruction of Ambrose, Augustine discovered the richness and sophistication of Scripture for the first time.30 Previously Augustine had considered the Bible too primitive and simplistic.31 Ambrose taught Augustine how to uncover the mysteries 25. For detailed biographies, see Lancel, Saint Augustine, 3–458; Peter Brown, Augustine of Hippo: A Biography (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000); Matthew Levering, The Theology of Augustine: An Introductory Guide to His Most Important Works (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2013), xiv–xvii. 26. Conf. 5.6.10–7.13. 27. Ibid., 7.1.1–2.3. 28. Ibid., 7.9.13–21.27. 29. John Peter Kenney rightly points out that although the Platonists were right on transcendence, Augustine came to a distinctive account of transcendence which was not regarded as a “natural if latent capacity of the human soul,” but could only be recovered through a “divine act of beneficence. In such an account of transcendence, the concept of the One has thus been radically changed” (Contemplation and Classical Christianity, 165). Kenney continues, “Perhaps we may be better served, therefore, as readers of Augustine not to regard Platonism as simply a rival to his emerging Christian theology or, anachronistically, as its philosophical foundation. We might instead consider it as an alternative transcendentalist tradition, one that Augustine explicitly valued for that aspect of its thought, but which he also regarded as superseded by the more adequate transcendentalism of Catholicism” (166). 30. Conf. 5.14.24; 6.5.8. 31. Ibid., 3.5.9. Michael Cameron asserts that “Augustine’s original problem with the Bible was not intellectual but rhetorical: not that it was unphilosophical but that it was un-Ciceronian” (Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 27). INTRODUCTION xxi This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

hidden in Scripture. Soon after, Augustine decided to enter the Catholic Church, but prior to his baptism, he left his teaching post in Milan and retired to a rural villa at Cassiciacum with his mother and some friends. There he composed his first works, which reveal the strong influence of Platonism. In these early writings, the way to God is by an inward turn, a kind of solitary contemplation that enables the ascent to a vision of truth.32 After his baptism in 387, Augustine returned to Thagaste, where he established a monastic community and took up a life of prayer and study. During this time, he embarked upon a rigorous reading of Scripture. Much to his dismay, in 391 Augustine was ordained a priest,33 and in 395, he became coadjutor bishop of Hippo before becoming sole bishop in 396 after the death of Valerius. Augustine continued to study the Bible intensely during the 390s, particularly the writings of Paul, while assuming the responsibilities of the episcopacy, which included preaching, administering sacraments, catechesis, settling ecclesial and civil disputes, and attending African councils.34 Augustine’s life in the church as pastor and bishop played an important role in the development of his thought.35 As a pastor serving a large community, Augustine no longer fixated on an unmediated, inward turn in solitary contemplation as the way to God.36 More and more, Augustine recognized the necessity of outward participation in an ecclesial community. The Christian journey is not a flight of the “alone to the Alone” in Platonic fashion,37 with the aim of solitary vision. Instead, it requires participation in a visible body celebrating the sacraments and offering works of mercy, with the aim of the twofold love of God and neighbor.38 The church is not reducible to a series of individuals who have attained vision, but rather consists of a living “fellowship” (societas) united in charity.39 32. B. vita 2.28; Ord. 2.19.51; Sol. 1.6.13. 33. Brown, Augustine of Hippo, 131–38. 34. Ibid., 189–90; Levering, The Theology of Augustine, xvi. 35. F. van der Meer, Augustine the Bishop, trans. B. Battershaw and G. Lamb (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1961); Jane Merdinger, Rome and the African Church in the Time of Augustine (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997); Lancel, Saint Augustine, 235–70. 36. Augustine does not leave behind contemplation as a way to God, yet such contemplation is recontextualized within the church as a communal body, for even the great desert monk Anthony learned to read and to write as a member of a community; Doc. Chr. prol.4. On Augustine and contemplation, see John Peter Kenney, Contemplation and Classical Christianity, esp. 106–14. 37. A phrase made famous by Plotinus, Enn. 6.9.11; Andrew Louth, The Origins of the Christian Mystical Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981), 51. 38. Doc. Chr. 1.32.35; 1.10.10; Raymond Canning, The Unity of Love for God and Neighbour in St. Augustine (Heverlee-Leuven: Augustinian Historical Institute, 1993), 9–31. 39. David Meconi observes that “the church is never reduced to the sum of its enrolled members” in AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

This point is pressed home in Augustine’s recounting of the dialogue between Simplicianus and Marius Victorinus in Confessiones. Although Victorinus admitted he had become a Christian in secret, Simplicianus would not consider Victorinus a Christian unless he were found “in the church of Christ,” to which Victorinus famously replied, “Is it the walls that make Christians?”40 Augustine asserts that although the walls do not make Christians, what happens in those walls is essential, namely, the celebration of the sacraments and the profession of faith.41 To be in the church means incorporation into a visible community. As his theology developed, Augustine found a way to bring together the visible and invisible aspects of the church based upon his interpretation of Scripture and his mature incarnational Christology.42 Following his study of biblical texts such as the letter to the Galatians,43 in which Paul declares the Son of God was “born of a woman,”44 Augustine established an “incarnationalist” framework for his mature thought.45 This laid the foundation for his theology of the church as a mystery with visible and invisible dimensions. As Christ entered history in the sacramentum of his flesh,46 so too the church is a sacramentum, a transcendent mystery with a visible body. The church is the body of Christ on earth and continues the salvific work of the head by celebrating the “sacraments” (sacramenta), namely, baptism and the Eucharist. The church, in essence, is a communal body formed in charity by means of the sacraments.47 The One Christ: St. Augustine’s Theology of Deification (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2013), 193–94. 40. Conf. 8.2.4. 41. Ibid. 42. On Augustine’s exegesis of Scripture, see Isabelle Bochet, Le firmament de l’écriture: L’herméneutique augustinienne (Paris: Institut d’Études Augustiniennes, 2004). On the development of Augustine’s Christology, see Goulven Madec, Le Christ de saint Augustin: la patrie et la voie (Paris: Desclée, 2001); Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 158; idem, “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” in Augustine and the Bible, ed. Pamela Bright (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1999), 74–103, esp. 82–93. 43. Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 294–95; see also idem, “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” 82–93; Leo Ferrari, “Augustine’s ‘Discovery’ of Paul (Confessions 7.21.27),” Augustinian Studies 22 (1991): 37–61; A.-M. La Bonnardière, “Augustine’s Biblical Initiation,” in Augustine and the Bible, 5–25, esp. 19; Isabelle Bochet, “Augustin disciple de Paul,” Recherches de science religieuse 94/3 (2006): 357–80. 44. Gal 4:4; see Eric Plumer, Augustine’s Commentary on Galatians (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 177–79. 45. Michael Cameron observes that Augustine’s reading of Galatians in the 390s resulted in an “incarnationalist” paradigm that laid the foundation for his “prosopological exegesis” of the Psalms; see “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” 86–87; cf. idem, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 171–72, 179–80, 196; Michael Fiedrowicz, Psalmus vox totius Christi: Studien zu Augustins “Enarrationes in Psalmos” (Freiburg: Herder, 1997), 298–375. 46. Trin. 4.1.6; CCSL 50.167; cf. 5.20.27. 47. Doc. Chr. 1.29.30. INTRODUCTION xxiii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Augustine’s understanding of the mediation of the sacraments continued to grow in the context of the dispute with the Donatists. For most of Augustine’s life, North Africa was divided between Catholics and Donatists,48 a division that occurred following the double election of Majorinus and Caecilian to the see of Carthage sometime between 308 and 311.49 Caecilian was accused of being consecrated by a traditor, someone who “handed over” copies of the Bible to be desecrated or destroyed in the midst of persecution. Majorinus was elected and soon succeeded by Donatus. Those who supported Donatus in the resulting schism became known as Donatists. Donatism was characterized by the denial of the validity of baptism outside of what was considered the “true church,” that is, the church free from apostasy. The Donatists rejected episcopal consecration by traditores and insisted on re-baptism for those who entered their community from outside. By the 390s, there were hundreds of Donatist bishops, and in parts of North Africa, Donatists formed the majority of Christians. Against the Donatists, Augustine argued that the desire to possess a “pure church” free from sinners is rooted in pride. In conjunction with his insistence that the church on earth is a “mixed body” (corpus permixtum) 50 of good and wicked members,51 Augustine contended that earthly members of the church must undergo a process of purification while on pilgrimage. The church’s mixed constitution not only curbs pride and presumption, but also fosters hope, for any of the wicked could become a member of the heavenly city. At the eschaton, the elect will be separated from the reprobate, but this final separation is known to God alone. No one can presume to be a member of the elect; rather, each must place his or her hope in the salvific work of Christ mediated by the sacramental life of the church.52 Moreover, the power of 48. Michael Root observes, “On the topic of the church, Augustine found a conceptually and institutionally fluid situation. The North African Church was riven by a dispute over the nature of the church’s holiness and the conditions under which the sacraments could be rightly celebrated and received” (“Augustine on the Church,” 55). 49. Robert Markus, “Donatus, Donatism,” in Augustine Through the Ages, 284–87; Maureen A. Tilley, The Bible in Christian North Africa: The Donatist World (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997). 50. Augustine owed much to the dissident Donatist theologian Tyconius for this position; Robert Markus, “Christianity and Dissent in Roman Africa: Changing Perspectives in Recent Work,” Studies in Church History 9 (1972): 21–36; William Babcock, “Augustine and Tyconius: A Study in the Latin Appropriation of Paul,” Studia Patristica 17/3 (1982): 1209–15; Tyconius: The Book of Rules (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989); Paula Fredriksen, “Apocalypse and Redemption in Early Christianity: From John of Patmos to Augustine of Hippo,” Vigilae Christianae 45 (1991): 151–83. 51. Civ. Dei 18.49. For a discussion of the significance of sinners in the church, see Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 54–74; Yves Congar, “Introduction générale,” in Traités anti-Donatistes, vol. 1, Oeuvres de Saint Augustin 28 (Paris: Bibliothèque Augustinienne, 1963), 98–124. 52. It is possible for some who receive the sacraments to cut themselves off from the body of Christ. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxiv This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

the sacraments depends not upon the minister, but upon Christ.53 The sacraments of the church cannot be confined to a single community in North Africa,54 for the church “universal” (catholica) is spread throughout the world. The Donatists have cut themselves off from the one body due to their lack of charity, and the net effect of Donatism is a kind of sectarianism that limits the church to the sinless. In the midst of the dispute with the Donatists,55 Augustine presented a sophisticated view of ecclesial membership. The whole church includes the visible community throughout the world, along with all the invisible angels and saints in heaven, united in charity. Some who share in the sacraments of the visible church may cut themselves off from the effects,56 and thus do not share in the bond of charity. These are sinners,some of whom are reprobate. Nevertheless, the sacraments mediate charity by the power of God,57 and so Augustine posits the necessary mediation of the sacramentsforincorporation into the one body of Christ. At the same time, God is not bound by visible limitations, for there are some “outside of the church who will be inside,” and there are some “inside the church who will be outside.”58 For Augustine, this does not mean there is an invisible body of charity that subsists as an independent economy of salvation apart from the visible church. Instead, the Holy Spirit works to bring those outside the visible bounds into the very same communion of charity mediated by the visible community,59 for the elect who are outside the visible church will be joined to the one body at some future time.60 The visible and invisible are not opposed although they remain distinct, for the invisible These are sinners, and those who persist in sin are the reprobate; cf. Civ. Dei 16.10; 18.49. Properly speaking, the elect constitute the body of Christ; C. Faust. 13.16; En. Ps. 36[1].2; Civ. Dei 18.49. 53. Bapt. 3.11.16; Jo. ev. tr. 5.18; C. litt. Pet. 3.49.59. 54. Root points out the distinction between “validity” and “efficacy” is a modern one, and thus one must be careful when applying such terms to Augustine’s thought; Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 59. Indeed, Augustine may not employ such a distinction, nor does he give a clear definition of efficacy. Nevertheless, if the Trinitarian formula is used in baptism, an authentic baptism occurs; Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 58; cf. Bapt. 6.36.70; 3.15.20; 4.15.23; 4.17.25; 6.17.29; 7.16.21. 55. Geoffrey Willis, Saint Augustine and the Donatist Controversy (London: SPCK, 1950); Robert Markus, The End of Ancient Christianity (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 52–53. Adam Ployd provides an insightful examination of Augustine’s ecclesiology in relation to the Donatists while drawing attention to Augustine’s dependence upon a Nicene Trinitarian theology in Augustine, the Trinity, and the Church: A Reading of the Anti-Donatist Sermons (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015). 56. Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 65–67. 57. C. Faust. 19.14. 58. Bapt. 4.3.5. 59. See the discussion by Ployd, Augustine, the Trinity, and the Church, 146. 60. Bapt. 4.3.5. INTRODUCTION xxv This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

union of charity constitutes the fundamental unity of the empirical church.61 Participation in the visible sacraments is not a guarantee of participation in charity, yet the sacraments remain essential,62 for they retain their mediatory role in the building up of the body of Christ until the eschaton, when the sacraments will no longer be necessary.63 Until then, the Spirit works through the visible sacraments, and all who share in charity will be joined to the one church. According to Augustine, the one ecclesia is not a purely invisible reality, for the “true church” (veram ecclesiam) is the visible “church of Christ,” the one “which rises above and is seen by all.”64 Augustine’s reflections on the church continued in the midst of controversies with groups such as the Pelagians and the pagans until his death in 430, which coincided with the invasion of Hippo by the Vandals. In works after 400, Augustine refines his views on grace and predestination65 based upon deep faith in the mystery of God’s salvific plan. God’s plan is enacted precisely through the visible church as the pilgrim city of God on journey to the heavenly “homeland” (patria). Predestination is a source of hope for Christians on their journey, for God’s will cannot be thwarted, yet the identity of the predestined is known to God alone. The Pelagians, like the Donatists, err in the attempt to identify an elite communion that constitutes the true church. The church remains a mystery with visible and invisible dimensions, and the final constitution of the church will be revealed only at the eschaton. Against the pagan Romans, Augustine constructs a rich eucharistic ecclesiology in his defense of Christian worship. In contrast to pagan sacrifices, the church offers the true worship that leads humanity to its final end, namely, to cling to God. The Platonists are able to see this end, but they do not possess the way since they are guilty of pride and 61. See the discussion by Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 67. 62. Root observes that only by participation in charity are the sacraments effective unto salvation (“Augustine and the Church,” 64). 63. C. Faust. 12.20. 64. C. Faust. 13.13; CSEL 25.393; translation follows Roland Teske, Answer to Faustus, a Manichean (WSA I/20), 245; cf. S. 47.18; 71.37; 265.6; 398.14; 400.14; En Ps. 149.3; Ep. 44.3; 93.11, 17, 25, 50–51; 118.32; 140.43; 141.5; 173.10; 185.10–11, 46. Root notes ecclesia often refers to the outward communion of the visible life of the church, and Augustine’s argument with the Donatists only makes sense if the visible body is “church” in a strong sense; Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 67–68. 65. On the development of Augustine’s doctrine of grace, J. Patout Burns, The Development of Augustine’s Doctrine of Operative Grace (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1980); P.-M. Hombert, Gloria Gratiae: Se Glorifier en Dieu, Principe et Fin de la Théologie Augustinienne de la Grâce (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1996); Anthony DuPont, Preacher of Grace: A Critical Reappraisal of Augustine’s Doctrine of Grace in His Sermones ad Populum on Liturgical Feasts and During the Donatist Controversy (Boston: Brill, 2014). AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxvi This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

cling to their own wisdom.66 Augustine offers a sharp critique of the Platonists, which reveals his departure from earlier philosophical commitments. The way to God is not by an isolated, inward turn in Platonic fashion, but by participation in the visible community celebrating the sacraments. In this apologetic, the visible church is indispensable, for the eucharistic worship of the pilgrim city unites the whole city of God, on earth and in heaven, as the one true sacrifice pleasing and acceptable to God.67 The kingdoms of this world rise and fall, but the church continues the salvific work of Christ by celebrating the sacraments. In sum, Augustine’s ecclesiology develops from the early influence of Platonism to the Christological shift in his thought after his study of Scripture in the 390s, and refined within the context of his disputes with the Manicheans, Donatists, Pelagians, and pagans. Augustine’s mature thought yields a complex yet coherent account of God’s salvific work accomplished through the church as an irreducible mystery, with visible and invisible dimensions. Ecclesiology in Renewal Several important studies have contributed to a renewed understanding of Augustine’s ecclesiology, although none has traced its development. For example, in contrast to a dualistic conception of the church, Fritz Hofmann argues in favor of a single ecclesia, with three layers: 1) the visible Catholic Church, which shares the “communion of sacraments” (communio sacramentorum); 2) the invisible “communion of saints” (communio sanctorum), that is, the holy members within the church; and 3) the “fixed number of the predestined” (certus numerus praedestinatorum).68 These distinctions lie one within the other, like concentric circles, with the predestined at the center. Hofmann’s work proves useful, particularly his argument for a single ecclesia, yet one wonders if Hofmann’s multilayered interpretation gets beyond a separation between the visible and invisible. Joseph Ratzinger offers another approach in Volk und Haus Gottes in Augustins Lehre von der Kirche. 69 Ratzinger examines Augustine’s theology following his conversion to Christianity in 386 and argues that 66. Kenney, Contemplation and Classical Christianity, 165. 67. Civ. Dei 10.6. 68. Fritz Hofmann, Der Kirchenbegriff des hl. Augustinus in seinen Gundlagen und in seiner Entwicklung (Münster: Kaiser, 1933), 233–56; cf. Oort, Jerusalem and Babylon, 125; Faul, “Sinners in the Holy Church,” 410. 69. Joseph Ratzinger, Volk und Haus Gottes in Augustins Lehre von der Kirche, Münchener Theologische Studien 7 (München: Zink, 1954). INTRODUCTION xxvii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Augustine’s journey led him from a more metaphysical, speculative theology to an understanding of the church’s mediation in history. Augustine began to see the divine world no longer as the world of eternal Urgestalten, the primordial and timeless Forms, but as the holy community of God’s angels, the “intelligible world” (mundus intelligibilis), distinct though not entirely separate from the “sensible world” (mundus sensibilis).70 The church, as the house and people of God, is at the locus of the union of these two orders or levels of reality without being reduced to either, possessing a “revelation-character” as the “appearing of the invisible in this world.”71 Ratzinger shows how Augustine’s thought grows in contact with the great masters of North African ecclesiology, including Tertullian, Cyprian, and Optatus of Milevis,72 yet Ratzinger leaves room for further study of the development of Augustine’s ecclesiology. Along the same lines, Yves Congar identifies the visible and invisible aspects of the different kinds of communio in Augustine’s works.73 Congar establishes the biblical character of Augustine’s thought and points to certain passages that demonstrate the unity of ecclesia as one subject, with “interior” and “exterior” elements.74 According to Congar, the “internal” and “external” dimensions of the church relate as res and sacramentum, wherein the res is available through the sacramentum, but the sacramentum is not infallible, nor is its efficacy guaranteed.75 As Congar shows, Augustine may not possess a fully developed theory of church as sacrament according to the medieval distinctions of sacramentum et res, sacramentum tantum, and res tantum, 76 but Augustine lays the conceptual foundation for the unity of the church as one body, whose visible actions have invisible effects. 70. Ibid., 152. 71. Ibid., 153. 72. Walter Simonis claims that Ratzinger overemphasizes the centrality of Neoplatonism in Ecclesia visibilis et invisibilis: Untersuchungen zur Ekklesiologie und Sakramentenlehre in der Afrikanischen Tradition von Cyprian bis Augustinus (Frankfurt: Knecht, 1970). 73. Congar, Traités anti-Donatistes 1, 98–124. 74. Ibid., 115: “Saint Augustin en compare l’unité à celle qui existe, dans une même personne, entre l’homme extérieur et l’homme intérieur, entre l’homme mortel et l’homme immortel: c’est le même sujet existant, mais selon deux états ou deux niveaux d’existence.” 75. Yves Congar, Die Lehre von der Kirche: Von Augustinus bis zum abendländischen Schisma (Freiburg: Herder, 1971), 5; Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 69. 76. See the discussion in Henri de Lubac, Corpus Mysticum: The Eucharist and the Church in the Middle Ages, trans. Gemma Simmonds (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2007), 168. In Saeculum: History and Society in the Theology of Augustine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), Robert Markus rightly asserts that Augustine does not articulate a “fully-blown” sacramental theory of the church as sign, yet Markus opens the door for the possibility of an ecclesiology with a “sophisticated theory of signs and meanings,” which Augustine “did have at his disposal” (183–84). AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxviii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

In an insightful analysis, Michael Root describesthree levels of ecclesial unity in Augustine’s thought: 1) a unity constituted by common sacraments, 2) a unity constituted by visible communion in the Catholic Church, and 3) a unity constituted by true communion in charity, Christ, and the Spirit. Schismatics participate in the first, but not the second or third levels; “carnal” (carnalis) Catholics belong to the first two, but not the third; “spiritual” (spiritalis) Catholics belong to all three and form the body of Christ.77 Root argues for a coherent account of the church “as a social body in the world which, through God’s work in and through that body, fosters a spiritual reality that transcends this world and which will survive this world.”78 Root also draws attention to the ecumenical potential of Augustine’s thought while recognizing the tendency in certain circles to pull apart the visible and spiritual, such that the spiritual communion “is no longer the end achieved by the means of visible communion” and the visible and spiritual become discrete realities.79 This is a separation of what Augustine joined together.80 This study builds upon the works of Hofmann, Ratzinger, Congar, and Root by showing how Augustine unites the invisible and visible aspects of the church precisely as one “mystery” (mysterium, sacramentum) in his developing thought. In his early works, the significance of the visible church is mitigated due to an emphasis on the purification of the soul, which may be accomplished by philosophy and the liberal arts. In mature works, however, Augustine upholds the necessary mediation of the church’s sacraments for incorporation into the communal body of Christ. God may work beyond visible bounds, but the Spirit always brings those outside of the visible church into the one communion of charity mediated by the sacraments. Augustine uses ecclesiological images found in scripture in order to illustrate the unity of the one church on journey toward her eschatological end as the bride of Christ without spot or wrinkle (Eph 5:27). Other scholarly studies on ecclesiological themes acknowledge the visible community, but fall short of demonstrating how Augustine unites the visible and invisible aspects of the church. Émilien 77. Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 67; Cornelius Mayer, “Augustins Lehre vom ‘homo spiritalis,’” in Homo Spiritalis: Festgabe für Luc Verheijen, O.S.A., zu seinem 70. Geburtstag, ed. C. Mayer and K. Chelius (Würzburg: Augustinus, 1987), 3–60. 78. Harnack argues Augustine’s understanding of the visible church is full of contradictions; Harnack, Lehrbuch, 3:158–66. By contrast, see Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 69. 79. Root, “Augustine on the Church,” 73; 69–74. 80. Ibid. INTRODUCTION xxix This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Lamirande looks at the church’s journey toward the heavenly patria until the eschaton, when the earthly and heavenly zones will be unified,81 but Lamirande does not relate the visible to the invisible in the church’s present historical condition.82 Tarsicius van Bavel asserts that Augustine’s view of the church is “not a static one but a dynamic one.”83 The church is a “reality in process, a reality that has to pass through several phases in order to reach its specific goal.”84 Bavel rejects a dualistic interpretation of the church, but he leaves the distinction between the church on earth and its eschatological perfection as a tension, characterizing the church as “invitation.”85 Pasquale Borgomeo attempts to get beyond a separation between earthly and heavenly by speaking of the church of “thistime.”86 According to Borgomeo, the whole church is heavenly because of her origin and final end. Borgomeo shifts the emphasis away from the identification of a true church apart from the empirical community, but his study is limited to Augustine’s sermons. Johannes van Oort recognizes the inadequacy of a twofold interpretation in his focused study on the origin of Augustine’s doctrine of the two cities. Oort rightly establishes the role of the North African tradition in Augustine’s teaching on the two cities, but Oort privileges the eschatological aspect of the church at times to the neglect of the visible community.87 Robert Dodaro provides a helpful analysis of an Augustinian model of a just society for the city of God “in its earthly pilgrimage,” yet Dodaro does not consider what kind of society the visible church is, or how the members are related as a visible, communal body.88 These works reveal the need for further scholarship on the church in Augustine’s thought. 81. Émilien Lamirande, L’église céleste selon saint Augustin (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1963), 9–20. 82. Lamirande rightly observes that Augustine’s ecclesiology is far from an easily unified synthesis, yet its complexity is precisely its appeal; Lamirande, L’église céleste selon saint Augustin, 9. 83. Tarsicius van Bavel, “What Kind of Church Do You Want? The Breadth of Augustine’s Ecclesiology,” Louvain Studies 7 (1979), 148; “Church,” in Augustine Through the Ages, 169–76. 84. Bavel, “What Kind of Church,” 148. 85. Ibid., 168. 86. Pasquale Borgomeo, L'église decetemps dans la prédication desaint Augustin (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1972). 87. Oort, Jerusalem and Babylon, 124. 88. Robert Dodaro, Christ and the Just Society in the Thought of Augustine (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 1; cf. 94–107, 147–59. Dodaro tends to portray the church as a collection of individuals. By contrast, see the helpful assessments by John C. Cavadini, “Ideology and Solidarity in Augustine’s City of God,” in Augustine’s City of God: A Critical Guide, ed. James Wetzel (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 104n6; Robert Louis Wilken, “Augustinian Justice” (review of Dodaro, Christ and the Just Society), First Things (Nov. 2005): 50–53. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxx This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Order of Chapters The following chapters trace the development of Augustine’s ecclesiology from early writings, such as the Cassiciacum dialogues, to mature works from the late 390s on, including Contra Faustum, Confessiones, De doctrina Christiana, De baptismo, De Trinitate, and De civitate Dei. Augustine’s preaching also serves as a resource for his ecclesiology, especially Enarrationes in Psalmos, In epistulam Joannis ad Parthos tractatus, and In Johannis evangelium tractatus. These sermons offer in-depth exegesis of biblical passages and contain theological commentary upon ecclesiological themes.89 Chapter 1 traces the framework for Augustine’s mature ecclesiology according to his understanding of the church as mysterium (mystery) and sacramentum (sacrament). Augustine inherits this distinction in Latin terms and develops it in order to unite the visible and invisible aspects of the church. In mature works, mysterium can be used to indicate a transcendent mystery, which often carries eschatological resonances, while the sacramentum reveals the mystery in history. This distinction is not absolute, for mysterium and sacramentum form two poles of the same mystery. As sacramentum, the church’s visible condition is intrinsic to the mystery. Chapter 2 examines a central image of the church in Augustine’s works, the body of Christ. In early writings, this image is used sparingly, and there is an emphasis upon the individual ascent of the soul in Platonic fashion. The church is depicted primarily as a teacher of wisdom, and the goal of the Christian journey is a kind of solitary vision. The necessity of the sacraments is mitigated due to Augustine’s confidence in philosophy and the liberal arts to purify the mind. By the late 390s, however, Augustine’s thought undergoes a definitive shift away from a Platonic framework to a thoroughly biblical, incarnational theology. Augustine recasts the Platonic ascent according to the paschal mystery while taking into account the full significance of the church’s communal life. Vision is subordinated to charity, and Christ is the one mediator who offers purification from sin. The sacraments mediate the work of Christ by forgiving sins and incorporating members into the one body. The church is not merely a collection of individual 89. In Tractates on the Gospel of John 1–10, Fathers of the Church 78 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1988), John Rettig declares, “For Augustine, preaching, and the scriptural exegesis that was a necessary part of preaching, were the truly important theological activities, more important, perhaps, than the more formal treatises” (3); cf. van der Meer, Augustine the Bishop, 412, 452. INTRODUCTION xxxi This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

members undergoing ascent; rather, the church is a communal body united in charity by celebrating the sacraments. Together with the head, the members form the whole Christ, and Augustine constructs a rich ecclesiology of solidarity between head and members as one body. Chapter 3 explores the ecclesiological image of the church as the bride of Christ. Augustine weaves together the biblical images of body and bride in order to illustrate the union between Christ and the church. Against the Donatists, Augustine attributes the unity and holiness of the church to the spousal love of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit. The church is united to her bridegroom by the sacraments, yet the Holy Spirit may work beyond visible means to bring some into the unity of the church at a future time. Augustine refers to the church in an eschatological sense as “spotless” bride (Eph 5:27) in order to preserve the mediation of the sacraments rather than to dispense with the visible community, for at the eschaton, all will be joined to the same communion of charity. Chapter 4 analyzes the church as the pilgrim city of God. For Augustine, the visible church on earth is the heavenly city of God on pilgrimage, in a process of transformation. The church is built up by the conversion of the wicked city of Babylon into the heavenly Jerusalem by means of the sacraments. Augustine’s doctrine of the two cities is not limited to an eschatological grammar of separation, but is used to depict the church’s growth as a pilgrim people. The church’s journey in history is intrinsic to her identity, for it is during her earthly pilgrimage that citizens are added to the heavenly Jerusalem. Chapter 5 shows how Augustine brings together the visible and invisible aspects of the church in his understanding of the church as sacrifice. In early works such as De Magistro, sacrifice has an individualistic character as the offering of the mind and heart. By the time of Contra Faustum, Augustine expands the meaning of sacrifice according to his ecclesial exegesis of Scripture. The visible sacrifices of the Jews prefigured the one true sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Christ’s sacrifice is commemorated at the altar of Christians, that is, at the eucharistic altar. Augustine develops this theme further in De civitate Dei, in which the daily sacrifice of Christians includes the offering of the whole church, in heaven and on earth, as one body. The true worship of Christians is the supreme and total sacrifice of the whole Christ, head and members. The church offers herself at the eucharistic altar, and this includes the members of the visible church in union with the AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH xxxii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

entire heavenly city of God. The visible community is essential to the church as sacrifice. The influence of Augustine has not been lost, but the richness of his thought on the church has been obscured due to reductive interpretations. This study explores Augustine’s complex understanding of the church as a “mystery” (mysterium, sacramentum), revealed by Scripture, with visible and invisible dimensions. In doing so, it seeks to uncover the richness of his thought, and to show how the bishop of Hippo merits the title “Doctor of ecclesiology” today. INTRODUCTION xxxiii This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:56:13 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

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1 The Mystery of the Church In1 a sermon on Psalm 79 delivered in 412, Augustine declares that the entire Psalm offers a testimony about the mystery of Christ and the church:2 “Therefore, this is a testimony that confesses both Christ and his vine; that is, the head and the body, the king and his people, shepherd and flock, Christ and his church—the total mystery (totum mysterium) of all Scripture.”3 This passage reveals an interpretive key for Augustine’s exegesis of Scripture. The “total mystery” (totum mysterium) of Scripture is the “whole Christ” (totus Christus).4 Head and members remain distinct, yet Christ and the church form one mystery, and all of Scripture is concerned with this mystery.5 Scripture contains 1. Selections of this chapter have appeared in “The Church as Mystery in the Theology of St. Augustine,” Studia Patristica 70/18 (2013): 381–99. 2. On the date of En. Ps. 79, see Michael Fiedrowicz, Psalmus vox totius Christi: Studien zu Augustins “Enarrationes in Psalmos” (Freiburg: Herder, 1997), 434. For an overview of chronology, see A. Trapè, “Saint Augustine,” in Patrology, vol. 4, ed. A. Di Berardino (Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1994), 396–98; Vernon J. Bourke, “Augustine on the Psalms,” in Augustine: Biblical Exegete, ed. F. van Fleteren and J. C. Schnaubelt (New York: Lang, 2004): 55–70; Michael Fiedrowicz and H. Müller, “Enarrationes en psalmos,” in Augustinus-Lexikon, ed. C. Mayer (Basel: Schwabe, 1986–1994), 804–58; Éric Rebillard, Les Commentaires des Psaumes Ps 1–16, Oeuvres de Saint Augustin 57A (Paris: Bibliothèque Augustinienne), 41–51; Michael Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 166, 327nn9–12. Augustine’s Latin text follows the numeration of the Septuagint, which is one behind the Hebrew sequence for Psalms 9–147 found in most modern Bibles. 3. En. Ps. 79.1; CCSL 39.1111: “denique hoc testimonium et Christum et vineam confitetur; hoc est caput et corpus, regem et plebem, pastorem et gregem, et totum omnium scripturarum mysterium Christum et ecclesiam.” Translation is my own. 4. En. Ps. 138.2; CCSL 40.1990. 1 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

the mystery and reveals it through many images and figures.6 Scholars such as Michael Cameron and Michael Fiedrowicz have drawn attention to this hermeneutical feature, which Cameron describes as Augustine’s “Christo-ecclesial” interpretation of Scripture.7 The ultimate referent of Scripture is Christ the head, or the members of his body, the church. When speaking of the mystery of the church, Augustine at times uses the Latin cognate mysterium for the Greek μυστήριον, 8 while at other times he uses sacramentum. 9 Why use both mysterium and sacramentum to refer to the church? What is the significance of this distinction for Augustine’s ecclesiology? In this chapter, I analyze the meaning of the terms mysterium and sacramentum within the evolution of Augustine’s thought, and I examine how these terms are used in relation to the church. Augustine inherits this distinction from early Christian authors such as Cyprian, Hilary, and Ambrose, while developing it further in order to identify particular aspects of the church. In Augustine’s early works, mysterium and sacramentum are used synonymously. However, in mature works after the late 390s, sacramentum indicates the revelation of a transcendent mysterium. Sacramentum can be used for biblical figures and images, sacred rites such as baptism and the Eucharist, and the mysteries of Christianity, including Christ and the church. In his exegesis of Scripture, Augustine often employs sacramentum to refer to the visible, empirical church celebrating the sacraments, and thus the visible community is intrinsic to the mystery of the church. I begin by tracing the origin and development of the distinction 5. Bertrand de Margerie notes, “Relating entirely to Christ, Holy Writ nevertheless also relates to the church, in Augustine’s view” (An Introduction to the History of Exegesis, Vol. 3: Saint Augustine, trans. P. de Fontnouvelle [Petersham, MA: Saint Bede’s, 1991], 18); cf. Cameron, “Enarrationes in Psalmos,” in Augustine Through the Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. Allan Fitzgerald, John C. Cavadini, Marianne Djuth, et al. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 295. 6. En. Ps. 67.26; CCSL 39.889: “cujus rei mysterium continet etiam titulus illius Psalmi: ‘quando domus aedificabatur post captivitatem,’ id est, ecclesia.” For a survey of prominent ecclesial images in the Enarrationes in Psalmos, see Amy Oden, “Dominant Images for the Church in Augustine’s Enarrationes in Psalmos: A Study in Augustine’s Ecclesiology,” PhD diss., Southern Methodist University, 1990. 7. On the totus Christus as the hermeneutical center of Augustine’s biblical exegesis, see Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 288; idem, “Enarrationes in Psalmos,” in Augustine Through the Ages, 290–96, esp. 295; “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” in Augustine and the Bible, ed. Pamela Bright (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1999), 74–103; Fiedrowicz, Psalmus vox totius Christi, esp. 298–378. 8. For the use of mysterium for the church, En. Ps. 80.1; 67.26; 79.1; 138.2; Ep. 147.13; 196.3.12; S. 4.24; Bapt. 5.28.39; Doc. Chr. 2.16.25; Civ. Dei 15.26; 19.23; cf. Robert Dodaro, “Mysterium, -ii” in Augustinus-Lexikon, ed. Robert Dodaro, Cornelius Petrus Mayer, and Christof Müller (Basel: Schwabe, 1986–1994): 1–9. 9. En. Ps. 74.4; 138.2; Cat. rud. 27.53. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 2 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

between mysterium and sacramentum for the biblical term μυστήριον in the early Christian tradition. For Augustine, this is a distinction without separation, for the church remains one mystery, with visible and invisible dimensions. Augustine’s mature ecclesiology is predicated upon a theology of mysterium and sacramentum in which the church is the body of the one Christ, the total mystery of all Scripture. Μυστήριον In antiquity, the Greek word μυστήριον could mean “something secret” or “hidden,” or a “secret rite” of initiation.10 Mystery terminology was operative in philosophy, asin the works of Plato.11 Only those who have undergone specific philosophical training have access to certain kinds of knowledge. While it was once common to interpret early Christianity in terms of Greco-Roman mysteries and to understand many of its concepts as borrowed from them, a better recognition of the differences between pagan and Christian mysteries, along with a greater appreciation of the Jewish context of Christianity, has rightly placed a limit on such an approach.12 The technical language of mystery religionsis absent from the New Testament,13 and scholars have effectively demonstrated that μυστήριον in the New Testament developed from a Semitic rather than a Hellenistic background.14 In the Septuagint, μυστήριον appears twenty-one times, often as a translation of the Aramaic word raz, 15 as in the book of Daniel. In apocalyptic literature, raz is a technical term meaning the “secrets” of God with regard to God’s plan for salvation, as revealed to certain privileged seers. In Daniel 2, μυστήριον appears eight times, always 10. Everett Ferguson, Backgrounds of Early Chrsitianity, 3rd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993), 253. 11. A. E. Harvey, “The Use of Mystery Language in the Bible,” Journal of Theological Studies 31/2 (1980): 321–22; A. D. Nock, Conversion (Oxford: Clarendon, 1933), 182. 12. A. D. Nock, Early Gentile Christianity and Its Hellenistic Background (New York: Harper & Row, 1964), esp. “Hellenistic Mysteries and Christian Sacraments,” 109–45; B. Metzger, “Considerations of Methodology in the Study of Mystery Religions and Early Christianity,” in Historical and Literary Studies, ed. B. Metzger (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1968); J. Z. Smith, Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990). 13. Metzger, “Considerations of Methodology in the Study of Mystery Religions and Early Christianity,” 12. 14. Raymond Brown, “The Pre-Christian Semitic Concept of ‘Mystery,’” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 20/ 4 (1958): 417–43; cf. A. D. Nock, “Mysterion,” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 60 (1951): 201–4; G. Bornkamm, “mystêrion,” in G. Kittel, Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Neuen Testament (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1942): 820–23; Markus Bockmuehl, Revelation and Mystery in Ancient Judaism and Pauline Christianity (Tübingen: Mohr, 1990). 15. Raymond Brown observes that raz is almost certainly a Persian loan word in Aramaic and Hebrew; see “The Semitic Background of the N.T. Mysterion,” Biblica 39 (1958): 421n22. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 3 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

translating razin reference to God’s hidden designsrevealed in a dream or vision pointing to a further mystery, namely, the future of the kingdom. Thus μυστήριον has an eschatological sense insofar as it is used to indicate future events predetermined by God for the definitive establishment of the kingdom.16 A significant aspect of μυστήριον in the Semitic tradition is the proclamation of the mystery. The Jewish prophets to whom the mystery of God’s plan is revealed (Dan 2:17–19) proclaim and interpret the received mystery.17 In contrast, the mysteries of pagan religions are never to be spoken, for the initiates, who alone have access to them, remain bound to secrecy.18 The Semitic notion of μυστήριον forms the background for its use in the New Testament. In virtually every instance, it stands for the Semitic concept of a secret design of God revealed to certain privileged people, a notion derived from and encompassing the Aramaic raz and the Hebrew sôd. 19 Thus, in the New Testament, μυστήριον retains the eschatological resonances of raz while acquiring its revelatory character. In the New Testament epistles, μυστήριον follows the same pattern found in Semitic texts of a secret or hidden mystery and its revelation and proclamation, as distinct from a Greek mystery-metaphor. The mystery hidden from eternity in God (Eph 3:9; Rom 16:25) is Christ, the “mystery of God” (μυστήριου θεου; Col 2:2; 4:3; Eph 3:4) “manifested in the flesh” (1 Tim 3:16) according to God’s purpose for the redemption of creation.20 Christ is the eternal mystery, made visible in history as “the image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15) in whom “are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:3), through whom “all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible” (Col 1:15–16). In Christ, “all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (Col 1:19), and “by the blood of his cross” all things are reconciled to God (Col 1:20). This is the “mystery” of God’s will (Eph 1:9) “ordained before the world” (1 Cor 2:7), the salvific “plan of the mystery” (Eph 3:9) through Christ’s incarnation, passion, death, and resurrection, that is, the paschal mystery. In the person of Christ, the mystery of God’s plan of salvation is revealed and will find its eschatological fulfillment 16. Ibid., 423. 17. Dan 2:22, 28–30, 47. 18. Harvey, “The Use of Mystery Language in the Bible,” 330. 19. Brown, “The Semitic Background of the N.T. Mysterion,” 421; Harvey, “The Use of Mystery Language in the Bible,” 327. 20. Eph 1:10. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 4 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

“at the last trumpet,” when the “dead will be raised imperishable” (1 Cor 15:51–52). The “church” (ἐκκλησία) is intrinsic to the “mystery” (μυστήριον), for God’s will, “kept secret for long ages” but now “made known to all nations” according to the “revelation of the mystery” (Rom 16:25–26) is the formation of the church as the body and bride of Christ (Col 1:18, 24; Eph 1:22–23, 5:31–32). This is the “great mystery” (μυστήριον μέγα; Eph 5:32) prefigured by the first marriage in Genesis.21 Christ is mysteriously present in the members of his body, the church, according to God’s transcendent purpose, for as Paul declares in Colossians 1:27, the mystery is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”22 This is a mystery of union through incorporation accomplished by baptism,23 a mystery of transformation24 in which the members are conformed to Christ.25 The mystery of God’s salvific plan is the building up of the church “to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph 4:12–13). The New Testament use of μυστήριον, grounded in the Semitic concept of raz with its eschatological and revelatory resonances, culminates with the union of Christ and the church. The church is intrinsic to the mystery of salvation, and this biblical notion of mystery is carried forward in the works of early Christian authors. Μυστήριον in Early Christianity In the first three centuries of Christianity in the East, the Greek μυστήριον and its plural μυστήρια were used sparingly.26 Gradually μυστήριον would assume a significant role in Christian terminology due to its meaning in Scripture. By the fourth century, μυστήριον was used in the writings of the Eastern theologians to denote Christ and his salvific work, the rule of faith, the rites of baptism and the Eucharist, and the church, as evident in the works of Basil the Great (c. 330–379), Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 329–390), Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335–395), and John Chrysostom (c. 345–407).27 21. Bockmeuhl, Revelation and Mystery, 205. 22. Ibid., 185. 23. 1 Cor 12:12–13. 24. Phil 3:21; Rom 12:2. 25. Rom 8:29; Eph 4:15–16. 26. J. D. B. Hamilton, “The Church and the Language of Mystery,” Ephemerides Theological Lovanienses 53 (1977): 479–94; Nock, Early Gentile Christianity and Its Hellenistic Background, 124–45; D. H. Wiens, “Mystery Concepts in Primitive Christianity and in Its Environment,” Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt 2/23/2 (1980): 1248–84. 27. See Hamilton, “The Church and the Language of Mystery,” 489–90. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 5 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

In the Latin West, the vetus Latina translations of the New Testament found in North Africa and Italy used either sacramentum or mysterium to translate μυστήριον. 28 During the first three centuries of the church in the West, mysterium was seldom used, while sacramentum became widespread. Christine Mohrmann suggests this was due to the risk of confusion with pagan Hellenistic terminology since words such as mysteria, sacra, arcana, and initia carried pagan cultic connotations.29 These terms are scarce in the works of early Christian authors, while sacramentum is prevalent in the writings of Tertullian (c. 160–225), Cyprian (c. 200–258), and Novatian (c. 200–258).30 The etymology of sacramentum is complex and not entirely clear. Mohrmann observes that sacramentum belongs to a group of words that carry both religious and juridical connotations.31 In secular Roman usage, sacramentum meant an oath, as in the soldier’s oath of loyalty, which marked his entrance into military life and symbolized hisloyalty to its rules and ruler.32 In law, it meant the money deposited in a sacred place by the litigants, which also involved swearing an oath to witness to the truth.33 In religious terms, sacramentum was associated with words such as sacer and sancio, which could signify dedication to the sacred or holy through a “religious engagement” that involved “initiation.”34 Among early Christian authors, sacramentum possessed a kind of “plasticity” sufficient to retain the New Testament notion of the mystery of God’s hidden plan of salvation, as well as a sense of admission or initiation into a religious community.35 By the third century, sacramentum was adopted as the favored translation for μυστήριον in the West, as it effectively distinguished Christianity from the pagan mysteries.36 28. J. de Ghellinck et al., Pour l’histoire du mot “sacramentum” (Louvain: Peeters, 1924), esp. 30, 51, 55; Theodore Foster, “‘Mysterium’ and ‘Sacramentum’ in the Vulgate and Old Latin Versions,” The American Journal of Theology 19/3 (1915): 404–15; A. Kolping, Sacramentum Tertullianum (Regensburg: Münster, 1948). 29. Christine Mohrmann, “Sacramentum dans les plus anciens textes chrétiens,” Harvard Theological Review 47 (1954): 141–52, esp. 143–45. 30. M. Émile de Backer, “Tertullian,” in Pour l’histoire du mot “sacramentum,” 59–152; Foster, “‘Mysterium’ and ‘Sacramentum’ in the Vulgate and Old Latin Versions,” 407–9. 31. Mohrmann, “Sacramentum dans les plus anciens textes chrétiens,” 145. 32. Nock, Early Gentile Christianity, 141. 33. William A. van Roo, The Christian Sacrament, Analecta Gregoriana 262 (Rome: Pontifical Gregorian University, 1992), 37. 34. Mohrmann, “Sacramentum dans les plus anciens textes chrétiens,” 145. 35. Ibid. 36. Ibid., 143–45. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 6 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

For Tertullian, sacramentum means the “sacred mystery” of the economy of salvation, prefigured in the Old Testament and fulfilled in Christ.37 It may also refer to Christian teachings, as well as the sacred rites of baptism and the Eucharist.38 Tertullian contrasts the sacramenta of Christian initiation with pagan cults, such that the latter are demonic imitations of the former.39 In Tertullian’s figural exegesis of Scripture, sacramentum could be used synonymously with words such as figura, allegoria, and aenigma. 40 However, sacramentum remains distinct in its ability to designate the object or reality of the allegory or figure.41 For instance, Tertullian speaks of the “rock” (petra) in 1 Corinthians 10:4 as a figure of the reality of the “mystery” (sacramenti) of Christ.42 In this case, sacramentum designates Christ as the object of the figure. Likewise, the first marriage of Adam and Eve is a figure of the reality of “that great mystery” (magnum illud sacramentum, Eph 5:32) of Christ and the church.43 Sacramentum is not an absolute synonym for figura, but rather has the sense of a “sign” (signum, signaculum) that can refer to the object or reality of a figure.44 Like Tertullian, Cyprian employs sacramentum to designate the teachings of Christianity found in Scripture,45 as well as the rites of initiation.46 Moreover, sacramentum could take on a distinctively revelatory character. The sacramentum Christi is the revelation of Christ’s divinity in history through the incarnation.47 The figures found in Scripture are prophetic prefigurations of the mystery of Christ revealed “in sign and sacrament” (in signo et sacramento).48 In Cyprian’s works, mysterium refers to the mystery of Christ as the “reality” (res) to which all biblical types point.49 This appears to be the seed of a distinction that would continue to develop in the West, particularly during the fourth and fifth centuries, when the risk of confusion or contamination with the pagan mysteries had diminished. 37. Roo, The Christian Sacrament, 37; de Backer, “Tertullian,” 130–52. 38. De Backer, “Tertullian,” 130–52. 39. Praesc. 40; Apol. 7; 39. 40. Adv. Jud. 13; 14; Adv. Marc. 3.7; 1.13; 3.16; 3.19; de Backer, 115–52, esp. 119. 41. De Backer, “Tertullian,” 124. 42. Adv. Marc. 5.7. 43. Jejun. 3; Anim. 11; 21; Monog. 5. 44. De Backer, “Tertullian,” 129. 45. Ep. 63.2–4; cf. J. B. Poukens, “Cyprien et ses contemporains,” in Pour l’histoire du mot “sacramentum,” 196. 46. Ad Quir. 250; De eccl. 15; Ep. 59.4. 47. Ad Quir. 2.2; Ep. 74.10–11. 48. Ad Fort. 8; De dom. orat. 34; De eccl. 7–8; Ad Quir. 2.2.16; Ep. 53.2–4, 12; Ep. 59.4, 15. 49. Ad Quir. 2.19. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 7 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

While Tertullian employs sacramentum to signify the reality or object of a figure in order to avoid the use of mysterium altogether, his successors such as Cyprian could use the cognate to designate the reality or truth contained in and expressed by a sacramentum. In similar fashion, Lactantius speaks of the great mysterium, the hidden wisdom of God, found in the divine sacramenta of Scripture.50 For Hilary of Poitiers, sacramentum and mysterium form part of a rich vocabulary to express the inner and prophetic meaning of the biblical text, bringing together history and spirit.51 Future realities are foreshadowed by types and figures found in the Bible.52 These are the hidden “mysteries of God” (mysteria dei) revealed through sacramenta. 53 This distinction is not absolute, for Hilary can use mysterium and sacramentum interchangeably in order to speak of the divine mysteries. However, sacramentum possesses a unique revelatory character, as evident in his exegesis of the Psalms, which Hilary interprets through a Christological lens.54 The liturgical rites of baptism and the Eucharist are sacramenta that contain the divine mysteria. Baptism is a sacramentum of “new birth,” by which the members of the church are transformed, such that “it is no longer their own flesh which is in them, but that of Christ.”55 Likewise, the Eucharist is the sacramentum of the mysterium of Christ’s flesh.56 Victorinus, whom Augustine names in De doctrina Christiana as “one who spoiled the Egyptians of their gold,”57 uses mysterium in order to speak of God’s salvific plan through the incarnation, passion, death, and resurrection of Christ.58 Christ is the mystery of God, the eternal Logos made flesh, through whom the mystery of God’s will is accomplished, as revealed to the holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.59 50. Div. Inst. 7.22; 7.6; 4.20; 36.3; 38.2; 44.2. 51. Bertrand de Margerie, An Introduction to the History of Exegesis, Vol. 2, trans. P. de Fontnouvelle (Petersham, MA: Saint Bede’s, 1993), 49; J. Daniélou, “Hilaire de Poitiers, Évèque et Docteur,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique 90 (1968): 531–41. 52. In Matth. 12.1; 19.4. This is what de Margerie terms a kind of “futurizing interiority”; de Margerie, History of Exegesis, Vol. 2, 49. 53. In Ps. 118; De Trin. 5.17; 8.15; 9.41; 11.9. Hilary also uses mysterium to speak of the “great mystery” of Christ and the church in Eph 5:31–32; In Ps. 138.29–31; 52.16. 54. In Ps. 138.29–31. 55. Ibid., 91; de Margerie, History of Exegesis, Vol. 2, 49. 56. De Trin. 8.13; 1.9. 57. Doc. Chr. 2.40.60; Augustine also includes Cyprian, Lactantius, Optatus, and Hilary. 58. Adv. Ar. 1A.10; 1A.25; 4.31; In Ep. ad Eph. 1.praef.; 1.1.4; 1.2.14; 1.2.16; In Ep. ad Gal. 2.6.17; In Ep. ad Phil. 2.6; 2.9. 59. Adv. Ar. 3.10; 3.16; In Ep. ad Gal. 1.2.19; In Ep. ad. Eph. 1.1.9; 1.3.9; 1.3.11; 1.3.18. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 8 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

The church is part of the mystery,60 built up as the body of Christ in history.61 Optatus of Milevis refers to the rites of baptism and the Eucharist as sacramenta that contain hidden mysteria. 62 The church that shares the sacramenta of faith shares the same mysteria. 63 Ambrose also speaks of the mysterium hidden in and made visible through a sacramentum. Like Hilary, Ambrose sees Scripture as the vessel of the divine mysteria contained in and signified by the types and figures of the Bible as sacramenta. 64 The sacramenta of Scripture point to future mysteria, above all, the saving mysterium of Christ.65 For Ambrose, mysterium has the sense of the eternal66 according to the Pauline notion of the eternal mystery “hidden in God” (Rom 16:25) and God’s salvific will,67 revealed in history and accomplished by the incarnation.68 This mysterium extends to the church in union with Christ as his spouse (Eph 5:31–32).69 Ambrose employs both sacramentum and mysterium with regard to the rites of baptism and the Eucharist. In this liturgical context, mysterium most often means the grace contained in and made visible through a sacramentum. 70 Moreover, the sacramenta have effects, for it is precisely through the sacraments that the fellowship of the church is restored.71 Like Ambrose, Jerome speaks of the mysteria in Scripture.72 Each word of Scripture contains a hidden mysterium revealed through the sacramenta of the text.73 The works of Jerome and Ambrose attest to the widespread use of mysterium and sacramentum in the West by the fourth century. Augustine inherited this distinction in terms from the Latin 60. In Ep. ad. Eph. 1.3.10; 2.5.31–33. 61. Ibid., 2.4.11. 62. Cont. parm. Don. 2.12.1; 2.1.2; 4.2.4; 4.7.4; 5.3.6; 5.4.1; 5.4.6; 5.7.1; 6.1.1. 63. Ibid., 5.1.11; 2.1.2; 4.2.4; 5.4.5; 6.1.1. 64. Ex. 4.4.13; 5.7.17; 6.9.69; Cain 1.4.14; Abr. 2.11.86; Is. 3.7; 4.14; 6.56; Jac. 2.1.1; 2.3.12; Jos. 3.9; 3.14; 8.45; 12.69; In Ps. 12.37.57, 38.25, 43.49, 43.52, 43.66; 118.8.59, 13.4, 13.6, 17.8; In Luc. 1.564; 2.768; 3.664; 3.853; 5.400; 5.1075; 5.1127; 6.446; 7.134; 7.734; 7.1008; 8.254; 8.303; 8.431; 10.343; Sacr. 1.4.11; 4.3.10; Myst. 3.9.92; Ep. 2.8.6; 2.9.4; 6.28.16; 8.54.8. 65. Ex. 4.8.32; Cain 1.9.36; Apol. 17.79; In Ps. 12.43.49; In Luc. 2.639; 7.985; Fide 4.2; Sacr. 6.3.15. 66. Ambrose speaks of the mystery of the Trinity (In Luc. prol; 2.1290; 7.109), the mystery of God (In Luc. 7.1974), the mysteries of the Fathers (Off. 3.22; 7.38; Fide 4.1), and the eternal mysteries (Sacr. 3.2.11; Obit. 12.336). 67. Ep. 4.16.5. 68. Jos. 12.69; Fide 3.10; 3.14; 5.8; Spir. 2.6.54; 2.6.58; 3.5.33; 3.11.76; Myst. 4.20.96; Ep. 6.33.2. 69. Apol. 5.23. 70. Cain 2.3.10; In Ps. 12.43.1, 61.29; 118.5.15, 11.13, 13.6; In Luc. 7.434; 4.59; 4.861; 7.232; 7.474; 7.2542; 10.1579; Off. 1.33; 3.18; Inc. 1.4; Paen. 1.8; Ep. 9.67.5; Fide 4.10; Spir. 1.prol.15; 1.3.41; 1.3.43–45; 2.prol.12; 3.1.4; Myst. 1.2.89; 5.27.100; Sacr. 1.6.23; 3.1.5; 5.3.12; Obit. 23; 56; Ep. 4.12.2; 4.13.7; 8.54.8; 9.67.5. 71. In Luc. 7.232. 72. In Ps. 1.1.2; 7.22.10; 9.29.9. 73. Ibid., 6.13.2; 7.18.1; In Is. 13.48.12. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 9 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

tradition and developed it further correlative to his interpretation of Scripture. Augustine’s Use of Mysterium and Sacramentum The vetus Latina translation of the Bible Augustine received could use either mysterium or sacramentum to translate μυστήριον. 74 In his earliest writings at Cassiciacum (c. 386/387), mysterium appears only eight times, while sacramentum is absent.75 The divine mysteria are the teachings of the church, which have been “handed on to us” (nobis tradunt) 76 and proclaim Christ as the Son of God.77 Augustine speaks of the “guarded mysteries” (pro mysteriis custodita) of Platonic philosophy,78 but not by way of conflation with the Christian mysteries.79 Philosophy cultivates reason and “liberates a few,” yet it compels some of the learned to despise the mysteria of the church.80 In these early works, Augustine possesses confidence in philosophy and the liberal arts as sources of wisdom for the purification of the mind.81 The “venerated mysteries” (veneranda mysteria) of Christianity are distinct insofar asthey teach that God has assumed “a body like ours.”82 The incarnation is an act as merciful asit islowly, farremoved from the pride of the clever, that is, the philosophers.83 “Pride” (superbia) is the greatest obstacle to attaining the “happy life” (beata vita), which consists of knowing the truth by which one is united to the supreme measure.84 The Son of God is the supreme truth85 and the wisdom of God (1 Cor 2:4).86 The influence of Platonism upon Augustine’s thought is evident in terms of the emphasis upon the vision of truth.87 74. Foster, “‘Mysterium’ and ‘Sacramentum’ in the Vulgate and Old Latin Versions,” esp. 404. 75. Mysterium can be found in C. Acad. 2.1.1; 3.17.38; B. vita 1.4; Ord. 2.5.15; 2.5.16 twice, 2.9.27; 2.17.46. Augustine uses sacra to speak about sacred things, often referring to the sacred rites; C. Acad. 3.19.42; 3.20.43; see Goulven Madec, Le Christ de saint Augustin: la patrie et la voie (Paris: Desclée, 2001), 46–48. 76. C. Acad. 2.1.1; Ord. 2.5.15; 2.17.46; B. vita 1.4. 77. C. Acad. 2.1.1; CCSL 29.18. 78. C. Acad. 3.17.38; CCSL 29.57. 79. B. vita 1.4. 80. Ord. 2.5.16. 81. Ibid. This is the same end sought by the Christian mysteries, for the truths of philosophy will not contradict the mysteries of faith; C. Acad. 3.9.20. 82. Ord. 2.5.16; CCSL 29.116: “Quantum autem illud sit, quod hoc etiam nostri generis corpus tantus propter nos deus adsumere atque agere dignatus est. . . .” 83. Ord. 2.5.16. Augustine seems to be referring to the Platonists in particular; see John Peter Kenney, Contemplation and Classical Christianity: A Study in Augustine (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 68. 84. B. vita 4.35. 85. Ibid., 4.34; CCSL 29.84: “Quis est dei filius? Etiam hoc enim dictum est, ‘ego sum veritas.’” 86. C. Acad. 2.8.21; CCSL 29.29. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 10 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Augustine does not offer a developed incarnational Christology in these early works, but he upholdsthe divine authority, “which not only transcends human power in sensible signs (sensibilibus signis), but also, in the very act of leading man onward, shows him to what extent it has debased itself for his sake.”88 The debasement of divine wisdom, which seeks to lift up humanity to itself,89 is the self-emptying of the Son of God through the incarnation.90 In such deeds, the divine wisdom shows its power and reveals its mercy. The divine mysteria have purgative effects, mediated through the “sacred rites” (sacris) of initiation.91 Mysteria is used interchangeably to refer to the teachings found in Scripture, proclaimed by the church, or to the rites celebrated by the visible community. Sacramentum appears for the first time in De moribus ecclesiae catholicae et de moribus Manichaeorum, 92 composed soon after Augustine’s baptism in 387.93 By this time, Augustine had begun to study the New Testament, particularly the writings of Paul,94 after receiving instruction in the faith from Ambrose. In Mor. 1.19.36, Augustine interprets Paul’s injunction to “strip off the old man and put on the new” (Col 3:9–10)95 in light of the fall of Adam in Genesis. Against the Manicheans, Augustine demonstrates the continuity between the Old Testament 87. B. vita 2.28; Ord. 2.19.51; Sol. 1.6.13. This is an ascent that may occur with the aid of philosophy and the liberal arts; Ord. 2.11.31–2.16.44; Kenney, Contemplation and Classical Christianity, 68–83. 88. Ord. 2.9.27; CCSL 29.122. 89. Ibid. 90. Ibid. While the influence of Neoplatonism upon Augustine’s thought is evident in these early works, nevertheless, J. J. O’Meara acknowledges that at Cassiciacum, Augustine looked “to the church . . . as an authority which he could always obey, and he accepted the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Trinity” in The Young Augustine: An Introduction to the‘Confessions,’ 2nd ed. (London: Longmans, 1965), 22. Likewise, Goulven Madec asserts, “all truth comes from illumination by the Word,” and therefore, Augustine “did not need to borrow from Neoplatonism, particularly with regard to the invisible, transcendent mystery revealed through the incarnation of Christ”; see “Si Plato viveret . . . Augustin, De vera religione 3.3,” in Néoplatonism: Mélanges offerts à Jean Trouillard (Fontenay-aux-Roses: Fontenay, 1981): 231–47, esp. 232. 91. Ord. 2.9.27; CCSL 29.122–23. 92. Mor. 1.7.12; 1.19.36; 1.32.69. 93. In 387, Augustine was enrolled as competens, the final stage for the catechumenate before receiving baptism; see William Harmless, Augustine and the Catechumenate (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1995). 94. Conf. 7.21.27. By the time he left Italy in 388 to return to Africa, Augustine’s knowledge of and facility with Scripture had grown considerably. Although he considered his biblical formation quite limited (as he confesses in Ep. 55.38; 73.5; 104; Retr. 1.3.2; 1.5.2; 1.7.2; 1.18), his De moribus gives evidence of his thorough knowledge of Wisdom literature, the recommended reading for catechumens. Furthermore, during this period he likely studied the writings of Ambrose, Jerome, Hilary, and some Greek sources translated into Latin; A.-M. La Bonnardière, “Augustine’s Biblical Initiation,” in Augustine and the Bible, ed. Pamela Bright (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1999), 23–25; Leo Ferrari, “Augustine’s ‘Discovery’ of Paul (Confessions 7.21.27),” Augustinian Studies 22 (1991): 37–61. 95. Cf. 1 Cor 15:47–49. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 11 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

and the New.96 In this instance, sacramentum refers to the mystery of the incarnation of the “new man,” Christ. “But he wants us to understand that the Adam who sinned is the old man, while the man whom the Son of God assumed in a mystery (in sacramento) in order to set us free is the new man (novum).”97 Likewise, in Mor. 1.7.12, Augustine speaks of the “way” (via) of salvation prepared by the “precepts of true religion,” the “foresight of the prophets,” and “in the mystery of the assumption of man” (suscepti hominis sacramento).98 Augustine links sacramentum to the incarnation, but his mature incarnational Christology is not yet in place. Later in Mor. 1.32.69, sacramentum means the sacred rites of baptism and the Eucharist, the “divine sacraments” (divinorum sacramentorum) distributed by “bishops, priests, deacons, and ministers of every sort.”99 In this early work, sacramentum and mysterium are used synonymously, but sacramentum begins to acquire certain revelatory resonances. Mysterium is often used to designate the transcendent truths entrusted to the church that are contained in the Scriptures.100 Paul is a “man of the highest mysteries” (altissimorum mysteriorum virum) as an inspired author of Scripture.101 Citing 1 Corinthians 15:51, Augustine speaks of the “lofty mysteries” (alta mysteria) of the future resurrection.102 Augustine’s use of mysterium is in keeping with the Latin tradition before him, for mysterium signifies the transcendent truths contained in and revealed by Scripture. There is fluidity in the use of mystery terminology in other early works such as De Genesi adversus Manichaeos (c. 389). In this text, Augustine declares that many “mysteries and sacraments” (mysteria et sacramenta) are found in the book of Genesis.103 The images and “figures” (figurae) 104 of Scripture are filled with mysteria that are beyond the grasp of those who approach the text as a myth, namely, the Manicheans.105 The narratives of Scripture “contain great mysteries” 96. See Michael Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 79–85. 97. Mor. 1.19.36; translation follows Roland Teske, The Manichean Debate (WSA I/19), 48; PL 32.1326: “illum autem quem suscepit in sacramento dei filius ad nos liberandos, novum.” 98. Mor. 1.7.12; PL 32.1315. 99. Mor. 1.32.69; Teske, The Manichean Debate, 63; PL 32.1339. The first clear use of sacramentum for the rite of baptism comes in Lib. arb. 3.6.7 (c. 388/395). From this time forward, it is used regularly to speak of Christian rites such as baptism and the Eucharist. 100. Mor. 1.1.1. 101. Ibid., 1.12.20; cf. Conf. 13.26.40. 102. Mor. 1.19.35; cf. Quant. 4. 103. Gn. adv. Man. 2.12.17; PL 34.181. 104. On Augustine’s understanding of the “figures” (figurae) found in Scripture in early works, see Michael Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 77–96. 105. Gn. adv. Man. 1.13.19. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 12 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

(continent magna mysteria) inaccessible to the “proud” (superbi).106 There is a “hidden wisdom” (1 Cor 1:24) in the creation narrative of Eve, in which a “real, visible woman was made, historically speaking, from the body of the first man while he slept.”107 The hidden secret of this passage is Christ and the church, the “great mystery” (magnum sacramentum, Eph 5:32)108 contained in and revealed by the figures of the first parents. In this early work, there is no clear distinction in relation between mysterium and sacramentum. 109 They can be used equally to refer to the teachings of Christianity110 found in Scripture, and to the liturgical rites.111 In a work composed shortly thereafter entitled De utilitatecredendi (c. 391/392), Augustine employs sacramenta to speak of the books of Scripture.112 The rituals of the Old Testament are sacramenta that contain the mysteria of Christianity.113 These mysteria have effects through the sacred rites of the Catholic Church,114 which serve as means of grace.115 Once again, sacramentum and mysterium are used synonymously. By the late 390s, however, these terms acquire particular resonances, and sacramentum becomes more prevalent than mysterium in Augustine’s works.116 Sacramentum In his important study “Sacramentum” et “mysterium” dans l’oeuvre de saint Augustin, 117 Charles Couturier classifies Augustine’s use of sacramentum in three ways: 1) sacramentum-symbole, the symbols or figures 106. Ibid., 1.3.5. Augustine often speaks of the mysteria contained in Scripture in other works; cf. Util. cred. 4; 9; Simpl. 2; C. ep. Man. 23; Doc. Chr. 2.16.25; 4.21.46; Conf. 3.4.9; 13.24.35; 13.25.38; C. Faust. 22.92; Cons. 3.25.8; 3.25.84; 3.25.86; 4.10.11; 4.10.15; 4.10.20; Bapt. 5.28.39; Quaest. 1.152; C. Jul. impf. 3.106; Jo. ev. tr. 9.10; En. Ps. 33 [1].2; 41.2; 45.2; 46.2; 51.5; 58[1].1; 67.26; 80.1; 83.2; 87.1; 91.1; 106.14; 109.8; 113.4; 131.2; 143.1–2; Ep. 137.18; 196.16; S. 125.9; 130.1; 249.3; 266.6. 107. Gn. adv. Man. 2.12.17; Edmund Hill, On Genesis (WSA I/13), 83. 108. Gn. adv. Man. 2.13.19; 2.24.37; cf. C. Sec. 21. 109. Edmund Hill observes that in Gn. adv. Man. 2.12.17, Augustine uses sacramenta in the “wider meaning of the term,” which meant “any sacred or hidden truth orreality signified by some otherthing mentioned in scripture”; see On Genesis (WSA I/13), 83n29; Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 39, 67–75, 89. 110. Gn. adv. Man. 2.12.17; 2.19.29; 2.24.37; Vera rel. 33; 99; Util. cred. 35. 111. For the use of sacramenta with regard to the sacred rites, see Lib. arb. 3.67; Mus. 6.1; Vera rel. 8, 9, 33; S. Dom. mon. 2.25–27. For mysterium with regard to the sacred rites, see Util. cred. 16; 31; Simpl. 2.1.5. 112. Util. cred. 1.17.35. 113. Ibid., 1.3.9. 114. Ibid., 1.14.31, 2.4, 3.9, 7.14–16. 115. Ibid., 1.14.31; cf. Simpl. 2.1.5; C. ep. Man. 23. 116. In Augustine’s works, mysterium can be found 1372 times, sacramentum 1878 times, based on a search using the Cetedoc Library of Christian Latin Texts (Turnhout: Brepols, 2005). 117. C. Couturier, “Sacramentum” et “mysterium” dans l’oeuvre de saint Augustin, Études Augustiniennes 28 (Paris: Aubier, 1953), 161–332. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 13 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

found in Scripture, which include Adam and Eve, Jacob and Esau, Noah and the ark, the flood, David, the prophets, and other Old Testament figures, as well as John the Baptist, the figures in Paul’s letters, and all of the words and deeds of Christ in the Gospels;118 2) sacramentumrite, religious rituals, including Jewish rites such as circumcision, legal observances, and the Sabbath, and Christian rites, particularly baptism and the Eucharist, but also anointing, ordination, the sign of the cross, the creed, the Lord’s prayer, feasts such as Easter, and marriage;119 and 3) sacramentum-mystère, the divine mysteries of Christianity, such as Christ, the Trinity, the mystery of redemption, and the church.120 Couturier rightly regards sacramentum and mysterium as synonyms in general, yet he recognizes certain nuances between them, particularly in later works from the Augustinian corpus. Sacramentum possesses a prophetic character as a scriptural figure or type of a future thing.121 Moreover, the sacramentum contains and expresses the mysterium. As Couturier points out, the inverse relationship is never found.122 As such, sacramentum has a kind of “efficacy” (l’efficacité) as the sign of a mysterium. 123 This is not surprising, given the tradition Augustine received in the West. Like the preceding authors, Augustine frequently speaks of the mysteria “contained” (continent) in sacramenta. 124 Although 118. Ibid., 292–98, 189–255. 119. Ibid., 173–88, 277–92. 120. Ibid., 256–74, 298–301. Robert Dodaro notes, “each of his various uses of the term mysterium refers back in some way to the core mysteries of the trinity and the incarnation, and to the real but impartial way in which they are understood by believers. This is the point in his thinking at which the terms mysterium and sacramentum become most synonymous. Both terms as he uses them connote a tension, absent in examples, between God’s secret purposes and his self-revelation”; see Christ and the Just Society in the Thought of Augustine (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 151. 121. Couturier, “Sacramentum” et “mysterium,” 263–64. 122. Ibid., 272: “Le mysterium se presente ́ alors comme le figure,́ et le sacramentum, la figure: c’est ainsi que nous trouvons comme equivalent ́ de sacramentum, l’expression ‘mysteriorum signacula’, ‘signes des mystères.’” 123. Ibid., 265. For other discussions of “sacramental efficacy” in Augustine, see P. T. Camelot, “Réalisme et Symbolisme dans la doctrine eucharistique de S. Augustin,” Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques 31 (1947): 394–410; “Sacramentum fidei” in Augustinus Magister, vol. 2 (Paris: Congrès International Augustinien, 1954), 891–96; Basil Studer, “‘Sacramentum et exemplum’ chez Saint Augustin,” Studia patristica 16 (1985): 570–88; Cameron, “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” 74–103; Dodaro, Christ and the Just Society, 154, 163; John C. Cavadini, “The Sacramentality of Marriage in the Fathers,” Pro Ecclesia 17/4 (2008): 442–63, esp. 454–55. 124. C. Faust. 12.20; 19.17; Cat. rud. 1.32; Trin. 4.3.6; Bapt. 1.12; 4.18; 4.31; B. conjug. 15; Gn. litt. 8.4; Civ. Dei 6.11; 7.32; Gr. et pecc. or. 2.45; C. Jul. 3.8; C. Jul. imp. 1.57; Jo. ev. tr. 7.14; 8.3; 9.10; 15.5; 25.9; 44.2; 57.2; En. Ps. 6.2; 41.2; 46.2; 58[1].1; 67.26; 68 [2].6; 70[2].9; 80.1–2; 91.1; 93.1; 103[3].25; 106.14; 131.2; Ep. 54.8; 55.14; 87.9; 137.18; 147.32; 187.34; 196.16; Divjak 2.4; S. 2.4; 4.21; 6.8; 7.1; 83.5–7; 99.11; 122.3; 125.9; 130.1; 249.3; 252.1; 259.2; 266.6; 289.5. Augustine will also speak of the “mysteries” (mysteria) “wrapped up” (involucra) in Scripture; Simpl. 2; En. Ps. 30[3].9; 126.11; 127.2; 147.4; 147.23; S. 95.7; 160.3; 160.4; 350.2; 352.3; Cat. rud. 1.5. AUGUSTINE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 14 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Augustine does not possess a fully developed theory of sacrament in identical fashion to medieval scholastic definitions of sacrament,125 he provides the theological foundation for sacramentum as a transcendent mystery made present and efficacious in history, for the mysteria have effects through sacramenta. Beyond Couturier’s helpful study, an important qualification is necessary. The distinction between sacramentum and mysterium in Augustine’s thought serves not to separate but rather to unite the different aspects of the mystery. As an outward sign and visible presence of a transcendent mysterium, the sacramentum is not reducible to an external indicator that can be discarded.126 Rather, it further defines the mystery as a reality that is meant to be revealed in history.127 As such, the sacramentum is intrinsic to the mystery. The sacramenta found in Scripture reveal and disclose the mystery in different ways.128 One must seek the meaning of Scripture without discarding the particular sacramenta through which the mysteria are revealed.129 The development of this broad notion of sacramentum may be attributed not only to Augustine’s familiarity with the Latin tradition, but also to his study of Scripture.130 During the 390s, Augustine turned to the “writings of the Spirit,” especially Paul.131 Paul’s incarnational theology of Christ as the eternal Word “manifested in the flesh” (1 Tim 3:16) allowed Augustine to reconsider the relationship between visible and invisible, spiritual and material, transcendent and temporal.132 As the mediator between God and humanity, Christ did not despise the temporal, but rather chose to enter history in the flesh in order to become the “way” (via) to the “homeland” (patria).133 The incarnation is 125. However, the foundation for medieval sacramental theology may be found in Augustine’s thought, particularly his use of sacramentum; cf. Cavadini, “The Sacramentality of Marriage in the Fathers,” 454–55; Owen Phelan, The Formation of Christian Europe: The Carolingians, Baptism, & the Imperium Christianum (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), esp. 20–24. 126. Ep. 55.9, 12, 14; Doc. Chr. 3.9.13. 127. On sacramenta as “sacramental signs” that are “figurative” and “real,” see Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 158–60. 128. C. Faust. 19.11. 129. Conf. 4.5.9; 11.2.4. 130. Michael Cameron points out, “Through Ambrose and translations, he was exposed to Philo and Origen, and by the time of his elevation as bishop, Augustine had been reading Tertullian, Cyprian, and Hilary” (“The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” 98). In Doc. Chr. 2.40.60–61, Augustine also mentions the significance of Latin Fathers such as Lactantius, Optatus, and Victorinus. 131. Conf. 7.21.27. On Augustine’s interpretation of Paul, see Isabelle Bochet, “Augustin disciple de Paul,” Recherches de science religieuse 94/3 (2006): 357–80. 132. On the turning point in Augustine’s figurative exegesis from a “spiritualist” to an “incarnational” paradigm, see Cameron, Christ Meets Me Everywhere, 158; “The Christological Substructure of Augustine’s Figurative Exegesis,” 82–93. 133. Conf. 7.19.25–20.26; cf. Doc. Chr. 1.10.10. THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH 15 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 12 Apr 2023 22:57:27 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms