The Scriptural Roots of St. Augustine's Spirituality

The Scriptural Roots of St. Augustine's Spirituality | Stephen N. Filippo | Ignatius Insight

Perhaps of all the Church Fathers, none shone so brightly as St. Augustine (351-430). Augustine's spirituality has deeply pervaded the Church right up to this very day. Two great Orders in the Church (just to cite a few), the Benedictines and the Franciscans took their spirituality directly from St. Augustine. St. Augustine's spirituality came into the Benedictine Order primarily through St. Anselm (1033-1109) and into the Franciscans primarily through St. Bonaventure (1221-1274). Both these men were in themselves, also great lights in the Church.

Of course, no discussion of Church giants can be complete without mentioning St. Thomas Aquinas, who is best described as 'following St. Augustine in Theology and Aristotle in Philosophy.' In sum, the Church gets her Dogmatic Theology primarily through St. Augustine. Since Spiritual Theology is based upon the correct Dogmatic Theology, it only makes sense that one of the Church's greatest Theologians, St. Augustine, is also responsible for a great deal of her Spiritual Theology.

And for St. Augustine, as it should be for all Catholics, this means a deep concentration and constant reflection on Sacred Scripture. The scriptural roots of St. Augustine's spirituality can be clearly seen by examining one of his greatest, yet lesser known works, De doctrina Christiana, literally "On Christian Doctrine," but actually "On how to read and interpret Sacred Scripture."

In De doctrina Christiana (henceforth "DDC"), St. Augustine lays the groundwork for a good, spiritual exegesis by elucidating on the virtue of charity, and all that means. Then, in order to begin the climb to spiritual perfection, he explains a scripturally based seven-step ladder. Lastly, he gives seven rules that are helpful in reading and understanding Sacred Scripture correctly.

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Comments

[Blake Helgoth]

How is it that you missed the fact that the Dominicans follow the rule of St. Augustine and read it in community at least once a week?

[Marge]

I read somewhere quite a few years about about a passage as follows "love God and do as you like" because if you really love the Lord you will think twice about doing something displeasing to Him. Was his quote from St. Augustine or St. Paul.

[LJ]

Anyone approaching Scripture from truly "charitable" motives and intentions, needs to have a "pure heart," so that one does not love other "things" but only the Holy Trinity. They also need a "good conscience" lest a bad conscience lead to anxiety, guilt and despair, and so alter one's mental state that they seriously misconstrue the Sacred Texts.

One wonders how many heresies and "scripturally based" tangents have arisen for this very reason. It is human nature to justify ourselves rather than confess our guilt, and if we can do it from Scripture and convince ourselves thoroughly enough, we can then become at very least a dissident, and at worst a schismatic or heretic.

Like many others, I have often thought, considering his early struggles with guilt and perhaps scrupulosity, and his actions much later, that this was at the core of Luther's rebellion. By force of his own momentum it became Sola Fide and Sola Scriptura but I think by his own writings and admissions it all started much as St. Augustine points out.