Current Seminar:
• Augustine's De Trinitate
7/7/2007
Book XIII, Chapters 5-6
Br. Dunstan Robidoux OSB
In chapter 5 Augustine gives a number of reasons, he speculates on a number of reasons which would indicate how fitting it was the our redemption
is accomplished by Christ in the way that it was done, by way of a saving death and a ransom or price that is paid to the devil: a ransom which refers
to Christ’s innocent blood and to a trick that is played on the devil. The devil thinks that he has Jesus in his power but, by putting to death
someone who did not deserve death (someone who, in this regard, is quite unlike ourselves), the devil is conned in terms of what the devil regards as
right action. In a way, the devil overreaches himself and, by this overreaching, a greater good is accomplished. Instead of just penalties
and a law of retribution that is being carried out, a second law makes its appearance, a law of satisfaction and reparation as Christ does something
which supplants and, for believers in Christ, replaces a law of retribution where persons are simply punished at the end of time for the sins that they
have committed. Christ’s saving death opens up another way whereby, by a free and loving acceptance of suffering that we are all to imitate from
Christ’s example, sins are forgiven. They are expiated in a way which leads to a just reconciliation that comes into effect in the relations
which exist between God and his human creatures. From great evil, an even greater good is brought about, a point which illustrates one of St.
Augustine’s most basic insights. God has set up a world whereby it is possible for good to emerge from evil. In fact, the greater an evil,
the greater the good which can possibly result.
Please note that if one attends to the different reasons that Augustine gives in chapter 5 which speak about the fittingness of Christ’s incarnation
leading to a saving death, one finds a brief statement of reasons that was later taken by Aquinas who takes each of Augustine’s reasons and writes a
whole article about it. The many reasons that Augustine gives are greatly expanded on by the systematic thinking of St. Thomas Aquinas. See
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 3a, q. 1, a. 2. Drawing on and summarizing a number of insights taken from St. Augustine, Aquinas lists five
reasons which all refer to Christ’s incarnation as the best of any possible pedagogy that can be used to bring human beings toward a knowledge and life
of virtue which leads to the human good in its concrete realization. Then, as a means which best deals with how human beings can be delivered from
sin, Aquinas gives a second set of five reasons which specifically refer to the relation which exists between Christ’s incarnation and the problem of
sin: how the Incarnation creates conditions which lead to deliverance from sin and the power of sin. But, as Aquinas admits, none of these reasons
should be understood as exhaustive. An infinitely valuable action can only be understood by an unrestricted act of understanding.
In chapter 6, Augustine takes up an earlier distinction which had distinguished between knowledge and wisdom. Christ’s work or soteriology
which culminates in his voluntary saving death reflects a knowledge, a knowledge which Christ imparts through grace and which instructs believers on
how they are to cope with the trials and struggles which come to them in the course of earthly life. However, as the Son of God, as divine, in
Christ there exists wisdom, a wisdom that we can all share in to the extent that we devote our minds to the contemplation of eternal truths. Wisdom
refers to truths and knowledge, right actions or deeds which ought to be done if, as human beings, we are to reach a divinely intended supernatural
goal. In another way of saying it, one can correlate wisdom with theoretical knowledge and “active knowledge” with practical human knowing. A
good analogy for understanding God as triune cannot be obtained by employing any analogy that relies on the human senses. A good analogy cannot
also be obtained if one talks about faith and belief and love even if one is referring to interior things, things that are more interior than anything
having to do with the senses. In the end, nothing cannot be loved unless it is first known and so, if one wants a more apt analogy for the
Trinity, one must move more into the life of the human soul toward something that is more fundamental.
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